Don: Gone 30 days, home 7, leaving today for another 23-24 days. Put in about 50 hours at work this week since I could get to the office. Went in early everyday so that I could be sure to leave by 5:00. I often work late but not this week! Needed to do this for myself because everyone there been so wonderful in supporting my extra time away from the office so I can be with Karen while she is out of town. That is what I did through Friday. Missed Dylan’s big day and Karen’s first public outing but it was great that Dennis was able to help with that. Thanks Dennis!

Saturday needed to be a work day and boy, was it ever. I started early at the barn and Dennis brought the boys out to us there. He even picked up Karen on the way so I didn’t have to stop. Karen wore her mask all day, like a good girl, and she left the horses alone. I don’t think she realized how much she missed the place but the kids and ‘normal’ home life are more important to her these days. She always had her priorities straight but they have changed to be even more so now.

We now have all the hay we think we will need at our barn and carried more over to Johnny’s while he is keeping Elvis for us. The pastures have been drug to hide the fact that horses do poop. The boys picked up a BUNCH of pine cones with Karen’s help. Jacob fixed the trampoline. Ken, Jacob, Dylan and Darren tossed hay up in the loft while I stacked it. Now that was a real big help! Laura brought Darren so he could help and she could watch. Thanks Laura! Dad did a great job of riding around on his electric cart doing what he loves the most, supervising. He is a very consistant person. I can tell you what he is going to say in almost every instance, depending on when he pulls up. For example, just as we finished stacking the hay in the loft, he drove up and said, “You’re doing it wrong.” Sometimes he will give us the benefit of the doubt and ask, “Did you do it right?” Oh, but we weren’t done yet. Darren, Laura and Ken had loaded Ken’s big tractor up and brought it over so we could stack the big rolls of hay into my brother Gene’s hay barn. Darren handled the stacking. Thanks Darren! He even drove one over to the pasture for us. Saved a lot of manual labor but we still worked hard all day. We didn’t break until after 4:00. Then it was off to Ken and Madeline’s to work on their computers. They had more than a couple virus programs on every hard drive. The rest of the family played cards and a great time was had by all.

God has really blessed us all. What a great day.