Monday, February 3, 2014

Brandon and Haley are in the last bin of 2013 corn (#10) doing the sweeping.  This is a milestone every winter, and it’s occurring this year weeks ahead of typical.  Usually, our goal is to be MT by the end of March or early April, but this time we are cleaning out the last bin here in early February.  Technically, we are not completely MT (empty) yet, for the overhead load-outs are full along with a healthy amount temporarily in our ‘wet’ storage hopper-bottom bin.  But the back-straining bin sweeping is now all done.

Just a few more truck trips and we will be MT.

It has been a sunny day, and the temps got up to about 30F.  Not bad…

I filled out some papers this afternoon for the ESA (Ecole Superior d’Agriculture d’Angers) college in Angers, France.  It looks like we will be hosting another French ag college student for the month of June.  We thought long and hard about doing this again, for it takes some commitment on our part… energy, convenience, and some financial resources.  But we have been blessed over and over again with this experience, so we figured… why not try one more time.   After all, this will be the 32nd  French student to visit this farm, and there has only been one that didn’t seem to be a happy fit with us… seems like the odds are in our favor, huh?

In fact, we also got in an email today a request from one of the former students to return to our farm this fall for a couple weeks.  This young fellow, Damien Vaucelle, came as a student (in French: etudient) in 2000.  He is now married to Gaelle, and they have a daughter–Juliette.  She is about a month older than our granddaughter Ella.   He has visited us once in his post-student days (2010), and it was a happy time.  We look forward to our reunion with Damien again this fall.  And he is a fellow John Deere enthusiast!

Now I’ve gotta practice on my francaise again!

a bientot… tout le monde….