We Work Hard, We Play Hard

The boys had a couple days off from school last week. My wife was out of town, so we headed down to Iowa to my parent's farm. They had hoped to also drive to Des Moines to have time with their cousins (and their trampoline), but our time ended up being shorter that we initially thought we'd have. And both my grandmothers (the boys great-grandmothers) were now in the same nursing home. We hadn't gotten to see my maternal grandmother since she moved there, and time with them is short and precious, so we wanted to make that a priority (and of course I forgot to take pictures while we were with them).

One of the days were were there we spent helping my dad on the farm. The crops had all be harvested (I was hoping we'd be able to get in some combining). So we helped work ground (breaking up the ground the corn was planted in to overturn the stalks and make planting in the spring possible).

The boys traded off spending time in the tractor I was driving and the one Far-Far (grandpa) was driving (both were John Deere of course). Each of them got a chance to drive. Nils loved working the lever to raise the disk ripper when we got to the end of a row and had to turn around. Anders wasn't thrilled with being in the tractor all day. Nils loved it and would have spent more time there.

We talked about farming and hard work and how much easier it is now than in the Little House on the Prairie books we've been reading.

After we were relieved from our work by my uncle, I took the boys to a good old country park where we played on the playground equipment that would be contraband in any city because it's an unsafe liability (I'm fairly certain some of it is older than my parents), we hiked around the lake and climbed up to go across an old train trestle. After visiting my grandmothers in the nursing home again, my parents took us out to eat at The Pizza Ranch.

The boys also found out that hard work pays off as Far-Far gave them a few dollars for "helping" out in the field. I hope time on the farm teaches them a little bit of work ethic--as well as having good time with family and being outdoors.