Oh brother

Meatball subs

Brian had a cow butchered a couple of weeks ago, and I promised to make him meatball subs. He wasn't the only one who showed up for the ground beef, tomato sauce, cheese and french bread combination last week.  

Hard workin'

Guy-size

I rewarded our lawn specialist with a brown cow. We have girl-sized parfait glasses at the Cookie house--they don't hold ice cream and root beer proportional to such a guy job as getting a lawn mower ready for the season and teaching Julie how to drive it. So, I offered Logan his treat in the biggest, prettiest vessel I could find. He insisted on holding it so you can't see the pretty flower painted on the side of the vase. 

Boys in blue

Several weeks ago, the electricity to the well pump at the Cookie house blitzed. The boys in blue came to the rescue. Dad and three of my brothers, who all happened to be wearing blue, dug a trench from the garage to the well for the new electrical line. They did in an hour or so what would have taken me a hundred days to do. 

36 hours

After work on Friday, Joel drove from Pennsylvania to Michigan. Saturday, he worked with his Dad and brothers hauling scrap metal from the barn ruins. On Sunday he joined us at church and for dinner, and then set out on the long drive back to Pennsylvania.

Brother

(with a snow plow) 

Siblings

Aaron

Dinnertime

As I was sorting pictures, I noticed that these photos from two consecutive nights complemented each other.  

Lawn boy

Logan tried to convince his brothers to chip in and buy a zero-turn-lawnmower for Father's Day. Logan's persuasiveness isn't that powerful, though.

Cinnamon roll

Libby bakes bread on Tuesdays mornings. Sometimes, to the delight of her brothers, she shapes part of the dough into cinnamon rolls, which she serves warm for lunch.

P.S. My apologies to those of you who haven't eaten breakfast yet.

Growing boy

Those legs are where all the pizza went.

Brian

...known as "my Brother Brian" by my cousin's three-year-old daughter.

Wrenching

(Wrenching, in mechanic-speak, means repairing machinery)

Volleyball

Logan gave Betsy a glow-in-the-dark-volleyball for her birthday.

Tree chipping

After a quick stop at the grocery store we delivered ice cream sandwiches to the Kindy Tree Service crew Wednesday afternoon. Jerry, Kevin and Aaron removed ten Ash trees, victims of the Emerald Ash Borer, from a backyard. They piled the branches in the street. We arrived with our frozen treat in time to watch Jerry use the tractor to dump loads of branches in the chipper while Aaron controlled it by remote.

Tractors, barns and quilts

My brothers don't have to close their eyes to dream about tractors. Betsy constructed a quilt for each of the boys using tractor fabric that she purchased at the Outback Toy Store. The barn quilt was the most difficult and Betsy declared that she will never attempt that pattern again.

Joyful noise

...a loud noise

Innovation

After finishing a partially completed 3D puzzle of Notre Dame, Logan recognized the potential of the huge, old Cathedral. He renovated the building to serve as a parking structure for his farm equipment, machinery and trucks.