Harvest

Well, this week has thrown us into harvest.  Those who are my friends on facebook got a small taste of my venting on how difficult that is.  Harvest is a very exciting time, but also a very hectic time.  In our house, we don’t dread it, but look forward to it.  That doesn’t mean it doesn’t come with a set of challenges, but then again, so does the slow season.

Solveig is teething.  That’s been making it a little difficult at home.  Elias is still 3 therefore he still speaks in this whiny tone.  That’s difficult too.  The excitement of school starting has worn off, and Silje and David are looking for any excuse to delay work all day, and that has been difficult.  My best friend (Knut) is working all day, and is no longer home for meals.

He’s never too far, which is nice.  I remember once having to call him off the fields because David was trying to get off his bunk bed by slipping between the bed and the wall.  He was mostly successful, and only failed in regard to his head.  So there he was dangling by that portion of his head where it is thickened by his ears, and for the life of me I couldn’t push him back up or move the heavy beds away from the wall.  I might have been very, very pregnant with either Elias or Solveig at the time.  Anyway, Knut was working, but not far away, and was able to stop in and rescue his son.

I think this might be our 6th harvest on the farm.  In those years, we’ve seen the farms record-breaking best year, and record-breaking worst year in the 4 generations this farm has been in our family.  It’s not a long enough time to brag about, but it has been some extreme experiences.  What I have learned is that the 2 hardest parts of harvest are: when it starts, and when it ends.  The middle isn’t so bad.

When it starts, everything in the family is thrown off routine.  Toddlers especially react strongly to daddy being gone more often.  We’ve learned from experience that it’s important in order to make sure the little ones sleep better at night and behave well during the day if I bring them out to see Daddy at least once a day.  It’s like they mentally relax a bit knowing what’s going on.

It’s hard on the older kids because now Knut is asking them to take over some of his chores, and it’s not quite all on me as before.  I think it’s good for them to pitch in with things like emptying trash cans and taking out the slop and bringing food out to the chickens, and other jobs around the house that Knut normally does.  Still, it goes quickly to the “woe is me” attitude, which I tolerate very poorly this time of year.  So poor kids get no sympathy from anyone, which somehow only increases the “woe is me” attitude.

As for me, meals get hard.  I hate not having another adult there at mealtimes.  I feel like if I put even a morsel of food in my mouth, it will break out in a food fight.  I’m constantly correcting the kids’ manners when Knut is there taking turns in teaching, but I might as well eat after the kids are done during harvest.  At least, that’s what I usually try to do, but then Silje cries that no one is eating with them, then, and when I finally AM eating, Solveig tries to steal the food, and the boys, who moments earlier declared they were full and couldn’t eat another bite, stare at my food and explain to me that they’re starving and need a snack, and how come I get to eat and they don’t get to eat.

However, adjustments are made.  Pretty soon we’ll reach a groove as a family.  We take opportunities to go out in the fields with the kids as often as we can.  Knut starts calling saying “I’m in the tractor right next to the house.  Do you want to send out anyone to come ride with me?”  Then I get a few minutes of breaktime.

The next big adjustment is when harvest ends.  It usually starts with Knut relaxing a lot.  He’s usually pretty exhausted after the corn harvest especially when they often pull 20 hour shifts and come home for 4 hour rest every day. I start saying things like, “Um, you know, I could use some relaxing time too.  It’s not like I’ve been at home twiddling my thumbs.”

Then there’s the matter of getting him back into the flow of our family, and readjusting the kids to him.  You see, for some reason, when the kids are getting used to having another authority figure in the house again, they feel the need to test if he actually means what he says on everything.  This translates to a lot of pushing Daddy’s buttons and screaming when he asks them to do anything.

Then there’s the fact that some rules have changed or evolved over harvest, as we have adjusted to life, and the kids growing and needing new boundaries over time.  Knut is not always in the loop with how the kids are used to expecting when he’s been “gone” for a few months, and that leads to some clashing.

Then he stands in the middle of my kitchen, just looking around when I’m trying to cook, and I usually ask him to just get out of the way in some rude manner that sparks an argument.  You see, every year since we’ve come to the farm, Knut and I have a really good argument very soon after harvest ends.  It’s usually the big fight of the year.  He feels like I don’t like having him around, and I am annoyed that he doesn’t see what needs to be done, or how he handled one of the kids, or that he’s not giving me enough of a break.  It’s happened every year just after harvest like clockwork, and I’m told by other farm wives that is common.  It’s the culmination of lack of sleep, lack of a break, lack of communication all coming together.

Then Knut’s solution is to go out on some date, just the two of us to get me out of the house and away from children, and we seem to get back in sync somehow every year.  Maybe this year we should try to go on that date before the big fight, not after.  Something to think about…

Anyway, harvest has begun, and we are all excited about that.  First, we’re excited we have a crop to harvest this year.  This year we have seen so many others, mostly heard of many, who have plowed up their fields months ago during the drought.  Our fields don’t look fantastic, but they don’t look half bad.  Because of the huge loss of crops this year elsewhere, the prices are very good this year, and the not-the-best grain this year will do just fine in this marketplace.

I need to get on top of things, though.  I’m not in harvest mode, and that needs to change fast.  Yesterday, my day looked like this:

Got up after Solveig woke up about 4 times in the middle of the night.  She’s teething.

Started school a bit late because I wasn’t ready.

Gave the younger kids a bath during the older kids’ independent seat work, which didn’t work so well because I ended up just yelling down the stairway until my voice hurt.  More on that tomorrow.

Retreated to doing computer stuff and knitting stuff because the kids were driving me nuts. 

Drove noon meal out to Knut with kids.

Fed kids, put 2 younger ones down for naps.

Elias took 2 hours to fall asleep, and I had to stay in his room to make sure he stayed in his bed.  Turns out he just needed to poop.  He pooped, (in the potty chair!) and then fell quickly asleep.  5 minutes later, Solveig woke up from her nap.  So no break for me.  You moms out there know what a trapped feeling you get when you don’t get that naptime.

Yelled at David that he couldn’t spend anymore time at the computer.  We needed to finish our memory work.

Spent a significant amount of time explaining to Silje that she couldn’t spend as much time on the computer as David did because she needs to go to piano practice.  Silje cries about how unfair life is, and I lecture her about how piano lessons are a privilege, and reminding her how much she loves to play.  She’s annoyed her schoolwork is harder than David’s (since she’s in 3rd grade and he’s in 1st) and even though she begs to be in activities, she’s annoyed that her activities take away the free time that she sees David has. 

Brought Silje to piano practice…at the wrong time…and had to bring her home again.

Brought Silje to piano practice at the right time and dropped her off.

Picked up Silje from piano practice.

Let kids run around the house like crazy while I figure out supper.

Have no idea what’s for supper, so I pack the kids up for McDonald’s.  I’m done, and after yelling at them so much that day, I figured they could use a treat.

Kids scream and fight the whole way to McDonald’s.

Kids fight while I’m ordering at drive through.  There’s no way I’m bringing these kids in a public place when they’re like this.

Kids fight and complain the whole way home from McDonald’s.  I pull the van over 4 separate times to discipline kids, take away helicopters that are being used as guns to torment little brothers, and other general parenting things.  I wish I had a duct tape with me.  Knut hates McDonald’s, so I was planning on just making him some ham and cheese sandwiches for supper.

Knut calls while I’m driving home with a car of kids where at least 2 are crying at any given point, and tells me that he’s dropping off grain at the elevator about an hour away, and he won’t be back in our area until about 8pm…the kids bedtime.  He was wondering if I could keep the kids up so I could bring out to the field his supper, since he likely won’t be home until very late and he was hungry.  I am not happy, but neither do I want to abandon Knut when he needed me.

I get the kids’ pajamas on, brush their teeth, and get them in the van.  More yelling and tears.

We drive out to the field.  Knut is proud of me on the phone and gives me great compliments because when he said I needed to bring the food to the south side of the Brit farm, I replied, “Is that the one where I take the dirt road just after that old horse pasture way past Ruth and Jerry’s old place?” which is how I get most of my directions from these farmers.  This city girl is somehow figuring out how to get around a world where farms are not labeled, and all next to places that are named for families that used to live there, or horses that used to be in some field.  Having this kind word from him made my whole day.

I find the approach to the field and start driving in.  I see Knut get down from the tractor and head towards us with his lunch bag full of dirty dishes.  I realize I have no bag to give him.  I forgot his supper…after all that.

I tell him when he gets to the car, and he sees the state the kids are in, and said no matter.  He just got to the field the same time I did, and it turns out the combine had stopped due to some unforseen trouble, and he had enough time to drive home and pick it up after all.  I’m glad he gets to eat, but I’m annoyed that it turns out I didn’t have to keep the kids up late.

I get home, put the kids in bed.  Solveig is shouting “HI!!!” from her crib.  Elias is shusshing her loudly from the other room.  David is shusshing him.  I’m done, so I just go downstairs and let them figure it out.  I open up a container of frosting, grab a spoon, sit in front of the computer and knit a bit.

End of day.

Today I’ll do better.  I hope.  If not, then tomorrow I’ll do better.  My plan is a bit more prayer, focus on more giggles and hugs with the kids, and make sure everyone in the family, including myself, gets enough food today.  The clean house and schedule stuff will just have to slide until I can get that shorter list accomplished.