31

Well, you may have noticed that I’ve been gone? No? Either way I had a great vacation! Actually it was AMAZING! I went to visit my friend 31. She lives WAY down in the bottom of Kentucky in a barn. There were a lot of things I did not take pictures of, however I did get some amazing pictures. 31 lives in a giant barn that her family is turning into a house. I will admit I am quite spoiled by A/C and indoor plumbing, but those were really the only creature comforts I totally missed, especially since it was 100 degrees. OK, clarify, we did have A/C where we slept, but not where we were working all day. The outhouse was not disgusting and did not have a pit. It was neat and there was a bucket under the seat and after you took care of business you sprinkled sawdust over what you left. Being VERY allergic to oak trees I asked for something so I did not have to touch the saw dust. We arrived Tuesday around 3:00pm. I had planned to arrive around 4:00pm but I forgot about the time change.

Why do I call her 31? Click here and read about her. On with the story...

31 has 14 children, she is a midwife and has lots of clients, but her

primary business is selling home made feminine protection. Some of what she sells can be seen here. Her sewing room is WOW! It’s like having her own fabric store right there. She had a whole wall of bolts of great fabric. She had those plastic drawer sets with TONS of trims and
other fun stuff. Than on the other wall was big bins full of sewing stuff. She invited me to root through all her sewing stuff (feeling happy tingles here). This bug showed up on the sewing table.

31 has a big board where every day she writes down each kids name and what they should be doing that day. While we were there I got to watch goats being milked, help make soap, cheese, bloomers for a peanut and hum, besides a mess that’s all I can think of right now.

I had brought my sewing machine and when I sat down to sew I said “what do I do with these scraps? She said “oh, just drop it on the floor and we’ll sweep up later” I was so happy. I felt so at home!

It was about a half mile to the mail box and back. One evening we took a walk and the peanuts sat right down in a patch of soft dirt. They started grabbing handfuls of it and throwing it through the fence. It was so cute. They called it fireworks.

31’s eldest dd and her husband also live in the barn. They have 3 kids. Their littlest is peanut #1. So had the very best time carrying around peanut #1.

The last thing we did was go visit 31’s friend G. I am so excited G will be coming to visit me next month. Anyway we had to go back to 31’s house to I could pack some stuff in my trunk before heading back. As I was waiting for 31, who had disappeared, and waiting, and waiting, suddenly she comes back holding the baby puppy. She had gone into the laundry room and was hearing a squeaking sound. It was the puppy. In the picture below it was about 2 hours old.

I got up early one morning and went out to the porch. Peanut #3 was holding a kitty. It was really cute. I was really glad I was not that kitty, because even when the kitty said clearly “I WANT DOWN” peanut #3 acted like she did not understand.





Peanut #1 liked to help keep the place tidy.


The Teen even admitted to having a good time. Here she is escaping with the other teens for a few hours.


The kids had a great time at G's house. She had one of those cool dune buggy cars and her son took my kids for a ride.













The kids had a fun time swimming at G's house. The tiny kids who did not swim played with water balloons.



This is 31, G and I. There was more, but blogger's being dificult and I've given this 2 hours already. Thanks 31!