Montana Monsoon

In India, a monsoon is defined as the seasonal wind patterns that bring in 3-4 months of rainy weather. I would think for Montana, four and a half days of solid rain would qualify. My brother had recorded over 5 inches by Saturday afternoon and it didn't really quit raining until sometime Sunday afternoon. Amazing. Plus this was a nice steady rain that allowed the ground to mostly soak up all the moisture...my little garden is looking pretty darn happy. The peas, spinach, lettuce and beets are all up, along with some rogue beans and sunflowers that Carter helped plant, and naturally all the weeds. The garden is chock full of wild oats since a good amount of the soil was scooped out from the corrals to fertilize it. They are going to be a pain to control this year, particularly with my rather relaxed hit or miss weeding style, but hopefully all the nitrogen and compost is worth it. It's still cloudy this morning and they have forecast thunderstorms for the rest of the week. So with any luck, we may get a little more rain before this system moves out.

Saturday was a pretty nice quiet day around here. I mostly worked catching up on some of my computer work that I had been putting off while Robert and Carter helped my cousin Wynne's family with their fridge and plumbing issues. Their fridge dies so Robert helped them load up an extra one of my Aunties, and well, the plumbing...from what I've heard needs to be seen to be believed. Apparently it was all installed without any vents so that when the lift pump (using Robert's explanation here) kicks on, it shoots air up through the toilets--a lot of air with a lot of pressure. They are probably our only neighbors in 100 miles that have their very own bidet, which would be a pretty sweet deal, if they actually wanted one. And I thought this old house had issues. In the afternoon as it was still raining pretty hard, everyone took a nap! Things have been so busy this spring, that it was really nice to have a quiet slow day. Plus Carter's been working pretty hard running around in the rain, bringing in as much mud into the house as possible. There are so few of good rainy days to take advantage off around these parts. Again, another reason why I like rainy days! Carter curled up an took most of her nap on Dad and looked pretty cozy. I didn't waste much time after I saw her sleeping to get in a quick nap of my own. My opportunities for naps don't come often, so I try to take advantage of it when I can. Being pregnant with a very active toddler definitely is much more tiring than being pregnant the first time when you can slow your pace down as needed.

Sunday we loaded up and went to town while it was still raining. Robert needed some stuff to keep working on organizing his shop and I figured I'd come along. Carter was mostly hoping for the french fries I think. I had bought new windshield wipers earlier in the week and spent a half hour in the rain trying to get the dang things on before I gave up in disgust. Robert popped the new ones on in about 2 minutes. I was fairly convinced they needed some special tool after finally reading the directions. Robert decided that special tool must be a penis. Grrr! However, I did get to teach him a thing or two about flat tires. I've been trying to get him to fix the slow leak on my car tire for about a month with out any luck. (then tried to get Walmart to fix it on the first day I've seen them backed up ever...they estimated the wait at 3-4 hours. I decided not to wait) Anyway Robert was just planning to drive into town on this bad tire without airing it up. However my daddy taught me better! I made him stop and check the tire with the pressure gauge and sure enough, no pressure in that tire! Ha! I was feeling a bit better for that after the dang windshield wipers. After finishing up our bit of shopping in town, we stopped at a Burger King with a playground (we had to actually go to two different ones since the first one had the playground closed for repairs. Carter was pretty disappointed, so off we went in search of another one.) I was so impressed with how nice my little girl was trying to play with the other kids. She would say excuse me to get around a kid, help another one get the door open, helped a really little girl up into the playground. It was so sweet. I know I don't get to take full credit for her nice manners--it's truly a community effort around this place with all my family but it really made me feel good about the kind of little girl I'm trying to raise. Naturally though it didn't take long before some bigger kids knocked her over and got her banged up. Robert had to wiggle up through the maze and rescue her. I think her feeling were more hurt than anything.

Sunday afternoon we spent digging up all our baby trees we had planted 2 years ago when we were living up on the hill next to my sister. When we moved over here last July, it would have been easier to chip the trees out of concrete than get them out of that ground up there. So sadly we abandoned them, and just to show us, most of them lived...worse still, some them actually did better once we left them alone. (I might have gotten a bit carried away with over watering them...) We figured that if we were ever going to get them, now was the time after all this rain. Rance was nice enough to come over and help and my sister helped watch Carter to I could also help--mostly just clean up anything that had gotten left when we moved. It was so nice to get that all taken care of. Now of course, we have to hurry and get all the trees planted..."we" mostly meaning Robert of course. Trying to find enough places down here to plant everything is a little trickier since we are down in a coulee and not on an open flat lot like we were before. We spent an hour trying to decide where we wanted to put all the trees. Carter spent that time jumping in mud puddles like a good kid. I still haven't gotten all the mud out of the bathtub or washing machine, but boy did she have fun. We could hear her yelling "Splash" just before she would jump in. The picture I took was too dark, but believe me when I tell you there isn't much on her that isn't covered in mud. All she's missing is the mud beard!