It's Been Awhile!

I didn't go away - just took a hiatus! In the intervening month we haven't done a lot that was newsworthy. Tom is still in school (he got his midterm grades and is doing very well). Andy is still doing well with homeschooling (in spite of the MEAN TEACHER he has!). Jerry has been busy working and restoring a 1950 tractor for his uncle. His uncle bought the tractor a couple of months ago and wanted to convert it from a 6-volt system to a 12-volt, so now it is finished and running beautifully. Jerry wanted me to drive it when it was finished (and I wanted to drive it), but I was too afraid! If something happened to it, I didn't want to think about Jerry's uncle's reaction! If it belonged to us I would probably try it. Maybe I'll get my courage up before it leaves here next week - we'll see. I did finally get brave enough to drive Jerry's John Deere backhoe. He needed me to drive it and push a wrecked truck into the garage while he steered the truck. I actually enjoyed it so much that I took it for a spin down the driveway a few times! He had bartered with the guy who owns the wrecked truck - if Jerry would remove the engine from the wreck (which was still good and which the owner of the truck wanted), then Jerry could have the transmission for his truck. He got the engine out and the man took the wreck away, but the engine is still hanging on the engine stand in the garage because he hasn't picked that up yet. So, between Jerry's uncle's tractor and the engine, I didn't think there was room for our vehicles which made me a little nervous the other night when the weather forecast was for storms with possible hail. Jerry proved me wrong, though! He crammed the tractor and engine and grill off to one side, and managed to fit the Tahoe and his old brown truck in the other. The brown truck is the one that he used to drive and that the transmission is for - this is the one he had painted and it isn't tagged or insured yet, so we definitely didn't want hail damaging that! That truck means as much to him as one the boys, I think!

Well, I will try to post more consistently, but right now I need to go and do a few things and clean this awful house! Yuck!