“On the Eighth Day of Christmas, my true love gave to me Eight Maids a-Milking.” I don’t think any wise maid milk would stick around during a Wisconsin winter to milk a herd of cows when the highs will be below zero. Of course technology has changed the way cows are milked with even robots do the milking, and while the machine might breakdown occasionally, they don’t call in sick from a New Year Eve hangover!
Eight Machines a-Milking
You often hear about a curious cat, but calves are curious too and it is much easier to handle one curious cat than a herd of curious calves!
Curious Calves
This donkey looks as disgusted as I feel about the weather since the promised sunshine hasn’t appeared for eleven days now and with snowflakes flying in the air, I don’t know if there is much hope for any hint of sunshine today either.
Disgusted Donkey
You often hear the saying that ‘timing is everything’. Well my timing was off this fall, since whenever I had an appointment and would be traveling somewhere, either the autumn leaves hadn’t turned yet or in this case, I was too late and the leaves had already fallen off the trees. With a ring of trees encompassing the church, I imagine it would have been a beautiful view, but one I didn’t get to witness this year.
Although this view of the church might look very similar today, if there was sunshine instead of thick fog, since after two months of early winter, it was warm enough over night to melt most of the snow away (at least temporarily that is). Built in 1922, this country church still is standing proudly.
Saint Johns Church
With another very foggy day, it is hard to see the trees across the lawn so no chance of being able to able to see across a field. But then there are no pretty autumn leaves to see anymore if it wasn’t foggy, although you might see some corn yet in the fields waiting to be harvested.
The wet, damp conditions haven’t allowed the corn to dry down enough to store the kernels without drying the corn which is an added expense. And since 95% of corn farms are family farms, extra added expense is never desired so it is a gamble on letting the corn dry naturally to save dying cost but it needs to be harvested before the snow get too deep so they can get into the fields with a combine or it can’t be harvested until spring which causes a lost of bushels when the snow snaps ears to the ground.
Corn efficiency has increased over the years, from an average 38 bushels per acre in 1950 to 153 bushels per acre in 2010.
Corn to Harvest
The sun might have shone bright yesterday, but the cows don’t have a nice grassy pasture to lay on as the fields are ice and snow covered with more snow coming today.
Dreaming of Greener Pastures
I don’t think any school kids will be using this outhouse behind an old school during recess as I think it has seen too many kids and has weathered one too many years.
Outhouse Out of Commission
This Sunday’s picture is another non-white rural church but does have a slight connection with last week’s picture. Last week’s church was rebuilt after a tornado and was where my mom attended as a child and this week’s church was rebuilt after a fire on a winter morning in 1945. (Since I wasn’t born yet, I don’t know if the original church was white or not.) The present structure was finished in 1952 and is where I have attended most of my life. It is also the church from which we held the funeral services for my father last month and today some of dad’s relatives are coming to visit since the snow storm won’t arrive until tomorrow.
St. Bridget’s Church
It is another November gloomy day with rain and snow flakes flying in the air and so soon this barn will have fields of white instead of fields of green grass.
Changing Weather
This rake might have to come out of retirement since there is a lot of leaves on the ground to clean up after a windy week. The rake will be ‘re-tired’, as well as person using it, after this fall’s leaf cleanup.
Re-tired Rake
