Your author and his adoring chickens take a turn around the estate on Thanksgiving morning.

I had a great Thanksgiving, not just because of the huge meal and fun desserts. No my favorite part (sorry to house guests and wife who prepared the big meal) was in the early morning when I went out to check on my chickens.

It was such a beautiful morning, I did not have to run right back inside to escape the cold. Instead I ran back inside and got my Bible. I went outside to my little farmyard and let my chickens out of the coop to forage around the yard before I fed them breakfast proper.

Don’t I paint a romantic picture — young farmer clad in a sweater walking to and fro in his yard reading aloud from Psalms? And all the while his chickens peck at the ground contentedly around his feet. Inside the house, the farmer’s wife bakes bread for the holiday meal later that day.

I only wish the chickens pecked contentedly at my feet because they loved me and wanted to spend time with me. The truth is they only care about me as the provider of chicken food. They stay close hoping I might magically produce the white food bucket and rain chicken food down on their heads. Mindless beasts! (But still sort of fun.)

Oh yeah, the meal was pretty amazing too. Thanks, Nikole.

Artist's rendering of the alleged crime scene.

Yesterday, Helen, Lydia and I planted sunflower seeds in little starter containers because none of the sunflower seeds we planted in the ground ever came up. I left the little containers on our picnic table to germinate and turn into big, healthy sunflower sprouts.

This morning, I found the little containers on their sides, dirt spread around, and sunflower seed shells strewn about. I did not witness the crime, but I knew right away who was responsible. Squirrels are such jerks!

As if that were not bad enough…

Once, last year I had another negative squirrel experience. We often had several monarch chrysalises hanging from a stick in our house. One morning, a butterfly emerged and was hanging from the stick drying his wings. I put the jar holding the stick out on our picnic table so the butterfly could fly away whenever he was ready. But, before, the innocent butterfly could take his first flight, a squirrel came along and ate the butterfly and two chrysalises! There is no question who committed the crime, as my children caught the culprit in the act.

Carniverous rodent of death.

Now this is a family blog, so I cannot discuss the thoughts that went through my mind when, on my returning home from work, I learned of the crime. I will just say I know now why old men work so hard to keep squirrels out of their bird feeders (and some trap squirrels in live traps and deport them to parts unknown). I am becoming such an old man.

Proposed consequence for eating butterflies.

Note: The killing of squirrels is not condoned by this blog or its authors. However fantasizing about killing squirrels is encouraged as a great reliever of stress.

I was talking with my mother-in-law the other day and she chastised me for not updating my blog. I said, “Hey! Lady,” (she likes it when I call her ‘hey, lady’). “Hey, Lady, I’m a boring man. I don’t have anything worth blogging about.” (Yes, I was so upset I left a dangling preposition.) But she would not get off my case, so I said, “Fine! I will put up some sketches or something.” Mercifully, she said, “Good, now put my daughter on!” She’s tough.

Drawing of Ruthie with wet hair

Ruthie asked me to draw her. Of all my children, she asks me to draw her the most. She was funny. She would not stop moving. I told her to keep looking at the same spot. She thought the mile-wide lake qualified as one spot. She was looking over my right and my left shoulder. But she looked back at the same spot often enough that I could catch a likeness.

Maddie on the dock with a smoldering stick

At one point I was in the water with many screaming children when I noticed Maddie on the dock near a stick as she often is, waiting for someone to throw something she might fetch. But this stick appeared to be smoking. I said, “I think Maddie might have a stick from the fire pit.” A closer inspection by Marilyn revealed that her stick was indeed smoking and had burned a brown patch in Roger’s new, very expensive, marine plywood decking. Maddie has since been in protective custody.

Drawing of Edward's frog

Edward caught a frog and put him in a tall pail. I drew him and kept saying to passing children, “Don’t bump the bucket! The frog will move.” (I put my art way above my relationship with my kids.) After I finished the drawing, we roasted the frog over the campfire on a marshmallow stick and ate him. (Really, we let him go near where we caught him.)

How Important Is Sketching?

Little fishes near the dock

I felt like most of the time I was holding a baby or trying to keep her from walking into the lake. I looked forward to the times I could have both hands free to sketch. One morning I abandoned my parental responsibilities and left Lydia clinging to Nikole’s leg as Nikole made pancakes. I stood on the dock and did gesture sketches of the little fishes that spend time near the dock. I don’t think the sketch will win any awards but I am very pleased with it. It represents those rare times when we get to sneak away and be self-absorbed. (And my beautiful wife really gives me lots of opportunities to sneak away to either play with kids or sketch random plants and critters.)

By the way, I really like my mother-in-law, and she is not really abrupt as represented here.

A drawing of Bethany by NIkole

My daughters have been drawing fairies lately. They begged my wife to draw fairies with them. She pretended to draw a fairy, but the whole time she was sneaking peeks at Bethany and drawing her. It is used here without permission.

Portrait of a bean plant in my garden

Sunday was super busy. After church, my cousins, the Ilgens, from Milwaukee came to visit along with my Aunt Ursula, my Aunt Ruth and my parents. (By the way, Aunt Ursula, I tried to name Lydia after you and your mother Ursula, but I was shut down by my wife. Let’s be bitter together. But first, let’s get back to my busy day.) Later in the day, when our house was empty (except for the roaring hoard which lives there) and several family members were napping, I went to the garden to find something to draw. I sat on an upturned bucket and drew a bean plant climbing up the garden fence and onto my home-made trellis. It was very relaxing and theraputic, but I was tempted to worry… what do my industrious neighbors think about their goofy neighbor sitting for an hour on an upturned bucket in his garden?