Visitors with a side of tiling

 The cursor blinks lazily as I sip my lukewarm coffee that I spiced up with a half pump of cinnamon dolce syrup. And the truth is, I’m not quite sure where to begin. Perhaps I’ll just ramble on. It’s a gorgeous, cloudy morning as the wind rumbles around the house and scatters the gold, burnt orange and flaming red leaves. I am reveling in the serene silence around me interspersed with the dog snoring and the humming washer. My visitors are trekking back home and hubs is out tiling.

If the weekend had gone according to plan, I would have been driving south to start harvest in SoDak. With farming, and life, it’s a rare time indeed to have a plan go through without a few adjustments, detours and maybe even a complete overhaul. Ah well.

Hubs had talked about installing tile in a section of field near the house. I wasn’t too wild about the idea because it’s just one more thing to do in harvest or right after. Well, he really wanted to try and get rid of a salty, low spot in the field and generally improve drainage. (There are a number of depressions in this field that love to retain water.) I couldn’t really argue against tiling on the sole reason that it’s more work. Ha. That excuse would work for everything!

Tiling trainee

The tile was delivered Thursday and I’d had plans to ride with hubs and learn more about installing tile. They were set to begin on Friday. Well, Friday afternoon my doorbell rings just as I was half done with bookwork. (Bookwork then tile lessons with hubs.) Who do I find on my doorstep? None other than my grandparents; I was surprised. My grandparents are in their mid-eighties and rarely travel more than an hour or two from home. Turns out they’d done a tour of North Dakota to see the oil wells and whatnot on their way up. Quite the road trip.

I had serious, quality time one-on-one with my grandparents this weekend. Since hubs was out tiling and cruising the field going a speedy one mile (and change) an hour. He did prove to be the topic of many a conversation as we watched from the house.

Hubs adores my grandma and the Michigan bars she makes. In deference to the spontaneous nature of their road trip she brought the ingredients for these bars. We spent a pleasant Saturday afternoon baking together. Somehow we managed to not trip over each other in my small kitchen. Well, she baked and I made chicken soup from scratch.

My awesome Grams :)

Later, Gramps wanted to know if I had made the noodles too. (I have to be gluten-free and GF baking requires an extra cup of patience more than normal baking.) I responded with, ‘I make noodles like this: I rip open a box and dump the contents into the boiling water.’ I don’t think I’d ever have the time, or patience, to make homemade noodles, even if it was winter and no field work.

Hubs escaped to his man cave on wheels. It’s too bad really, he missed out on the voice projecting so the stone deaf can hear me speak, the repeated questions I had just slowly answered and the constant bustling around for something to do. But there was Sunday and all the stories of how to farm in the good ol’ days for him to catch up on.

The best part? As they were leaving, I said ‘bye and see you soon!’ I head south this week and I’ll get to see all the family on church on Sunday.

May you enjoy the colors of fall, the wind be at your back and your coffee perfect.

P.S. Hubs took a few photos of tiling and a video of the tiling. Head over to my Facebook page or Instagram to see more.