I don’t remember now what my big idea was.. Just that I was earnestly expounding.. And then Emily looked at me and said “Of course we’ll do that, Ken.. It’s a tradition!!” And I smiled.. I love that. In a lot of ways that’s what makes families unique and special. It’s those things that make perfect sense to you, when this equals that. If this happens it unleashes a whole string of events. This may be puzzling to an outsider.. But we all do it.. Traditions..

Now I’ll be the first to applaud spontaneous behavior. Obviously if every little detail was controlled by what always has been, how horrible would that be? But there’s still those little things.. Like whenever it would dump snow in the evening to where my dad was convinced that we wouldn’t have school the next day, he’d load us up and head for Wal-Mart.. Dashing thru the snow.. And the experience was never complete without a cappuccino from Sheetz..

Or every time we’d drive thru a tunnel with the truck, both windows would roll down, he’d jake like mad, and then blow the airhorn. That was so cool. And I’d breath in that familiar smell of diesel smoke and be so glad to be a trucker.. 🙂 I continue that idea.. But it’s a pitiful attempt.. No straight pipe jake.. And a GMC horn makes me feel like crying when you compare it with a Kenworth..

When Mother was growing up, there was always a Christmas plate with her name on it, Christmas morning.. Laden with an orange, peppermint drops, and assorted candy.. You guessed what’s at the Horst household every Christmas for forever.. I love it. It’s part of who we are.

Some things are personal traditions.. Or quirks maybe.. 🙂 Like I have a habit of blowing the horn whenever I see that Beautiful Virginia Welcome sign.. “I’m sorry to the car that’s beside me-no road rage here.. Just ecstatic to be arriving!!”

I’m sure if you think, you can list a whole lot of things that you do traditionally.. It’s fun.. Always eat at the Tastee Freeze when we move heifers to Churchville.. Shady Maple Grocery’s filled doughnuts are a must.. Chocolate milk from Whitesel Bro’s during December.. Matching outfits for the first day of school.. Singing in barn.. Soft pretzel parties..

Another tradition around here has been to spend the night in the farms latest building project.. Julia has been very faithful with this.. To the point that she spent the night on the barn’s new waterbeds.. She carefully roped off several stalls, and spent a fairly restless night under the heavy surveillance of most of the herd.. Our cows could not understand the sleepover.. 🙂

We were over at the neighbors, reminiscing.. And I mentioned that we put up a new grainbin this summer. “Remember our sleepover in one about 17 years ago?” “Hey, we should do that again!” “Tanner’s old enough to stay with his dad, I’m sure I would be in..” “Maybe this time Emily won’t head for the house halfway thru the night..” “Hey! Give me a break-I was cold and 4 years old!!” So we laughed and wondered if it’d actually happen..

We started combining soybeans this week, and as Father loaded the first load on the dump trailer, I saw we had waited til the eleventh hour once again.. Long story short, we sat around the campfire enjoying the night sky and the blessing of childhood friends.. Then crawled into the metal castle to spend the night. Everything echoed and sounded hilarious, but my air mattress was great.. Way too soon the alarms were going off for the morning milkers, and they attempted to sneak out of the building-but the slatted floor creaked with every step. I waited about 5 seconds before I rolled out of my sleeping bag cocoon and headed for the house.. After all, I WAS cold, and somebody needed to head in- it’s a tradition.. 🙂

Bonus Pics:

During transport to the field, I drove past this flowerbed multiple times.. I thought it was very noteworthy..

Cut some sorghum this week, a little variety from corn

Beautiful Paradise Lane..

Photography by Emily 🙂