Quotations that you might enjoy!

Well, I do indeed realize that it has been quite a little while since I last wrote on here. Oops. Sorry about that. Guess I just don't got no advice for y'all! But that's okay. You don't really need OR want my advice anyhow! =P So, instead, I am going to write down some quotes that I have found over the past few days. They are by different "famous" people. Hope ya like them, and maybe some of them will even encourage and challenge you! =)
 And by the way, HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!! Remember to thank God for all the many blessings He has given to you, and continues to give each and every day! He is indeed worthy to be praised! He is mighty and awesome and powerful and wonderful and gracious and loving and kind and caring and so many more attributes! Just remember to give Him the glory and the thanks! =) 
 All right, now for a few of my favorite quotes, first of all.
 "If you can't convince them, confuse them!" --Harry S. Trumman
 "I feel more like I do now than when I first got here!" --Rick Husband, Astronaut
 "Don't bump your head. It hurts!"
 "A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble in the road." --Henry Ward Beecher
 "A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five." --Groucho Marx
 "California is a fine place to live--if you happen to be an orange." --Fred Allen
 "A smile confuses an approaching frown." --Unknown
 "God loves you just the way you are." --Max Lucado
 "In the great orchestra of life, you have an instrument and a song." --Max Lucado
 "What makes us special is the signature of God on our lives." --Max Lucado
 "How wide is God's love? Wide enough for the whole world." --Max Lucado
 "He has shown that He never fails. That's what makes God, GOD!" --Max Lucado
 "It's what we do for Christ in the here and now that will make a difference in the then and there." --Max Lucado
 "Waiting times are growing times and learning times. As you quiet your heart, you enter His peace...as you sense your weakness, you receive His strength...as you lay down your will, you will hear His calling." --Roy Lessin
 "God's fingers can touch nothing but to mold it into loveliness." --George McDonald
 "Leave the broken, irreversible past in God's hands, and step out into the invincible future with Him." --Oswald Chambers
 "Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done." --C.S. Lewis
 "Faith expects from God what is beyond all expectation." --Andrew Murray
 "God's hand is extended to you--not to push you away, but to draw you close, not to keep you at a distance, but to hold you near to His heart." --Roy Lessin
 "Circumstances may appear to wreck our lives and God's plans, but God is not helpless among the ruins. God's love is still working. He comes in and takes calamity and uses it victoriously, working out His wonderful plan of love." --Eric Liddell
 "To abide in Christ's love is to make His love your home." --Max Lucado
 "A friend knows the song in your heart, and can sing it back when you have forgotten the words." 
 "Life is like a piano. What you get out of it depends on how you play it."
The following is a series of actual quotes taken from insurance and accident forms. They are actual words of people who tried to summarize their encounters with trouble. (Some are actually quite funny! Others are funny only because it's so horrible! Haha!)
 -"Coming home, I drove into the wrong house and collided with a tree I don't have."
 -"The other car collided with mine without giving warning of its intentions."
 -"I thought my window was down, but I found it was up when I put my hand through it." (you know, I've done that before...oops!)
 -"I collided with a stationary truck coming the other way." (haha)
 -"A truck backed through my windshield into my wife's face." (that's horrible!)
 -"A pedestrian hit me and went under my car."
 -"The guy was all over the road; I had to swerve a number of times before I hit him."
 -"I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law, and headed over the embankment."
 -"In my attempt to kill a fly, I drove into a telephone pole." (whoops...)
 -"I had been shopping for plants all day and was on my way home. As I reached an intersection, a hedge sprang up obscuring my vision. I did not see the other car."
 -"I had been driving for forty years when I fell asleep at the wheel and had an accident." (Wow! That sure is a LONG time to be in a vehicle!!!)
 -"To avoid hitting the bumper of the car in front, I struck the pedestrian." (Uh...)
 -"As I approached the intersection, a stop sign suddenly appeared in a place no stop sign had ever appeared before. I was unable to stop in time to avoid the accident." (A stop sign suddenly appeared, eh? Indeed! I'm sure that it really did JUST appear!)
 -"My car was legally parked as it backed into the other vehicle." (Well, ya know, if I'm thinkin' correctly, it can't back up when it is parked! The gear has to be switched to "reverse")
 -"An invisible car came out of nowhere, struck my vehicle, and vanished." (wow!)
 -"I told the police that I was not injured, but removing my hat, I found I had a skull fracture." (oops)
 -"The pedestrian had no idea which direction to go, so I ran over him." (Oh dear!)
 -"I was sure the old fellow would never make it to the other side of the road when I struck him."
 -"I saw the slow-moving, sad-faced old gentleman as he bounced off the hood of my car." (ooooh...that's really horrible!)
 -"The indirect cause of this accident was a little guy in a small car with a big mouth." (heh heh)
 -"I was thrown from my car as it left the road. I was later found in a ditch by some stray cows." (haha)
 -"The telephone pole was approaching fast. I attempted to swerve out of its path when it struck my front end." (I'm sure it was the TELEPHONE POLE that struck you...it couldn't have been the CAR that struck the telephone pole, now could it?)
 -"I was unable to stop in time and my car crashed into the other vehicle. The driver and passenger then left immediately for a vacation with injuries." 
 And that's all for now, folks. Hope ya liked all of these! 
 I do have a bit of advice, when driving, don't swerve to miss something! It usually doesn't do much good! You should just keep driving straight ahead, and look where you WANT to go, NOT where you don't want to go! Because you will go towards where you are looking. Especially when you see a deer, don't swerve to avoid hitting it! That can cause even more of an accident. Just brake REALLY hard (as hard as you can!), and hold the steering wheel straight. However, when you are going off the road or something, DO NOT jerk the wheel or slam on the brakes. Just hold onto the steering wheel and take your foot off of the gas! And let the car gradually slow down. That way it is a lot less likely for you to over-correct, and roll or something worse. It will be noisy and scary, but just hold on! It's better than rolling! These are things that I have learned from my Pa! Who is a very good driver. Never had an accident in a car before. Just thought I'd share those things with y'all. And drive defensively! Watch out for the other drivers out there! And drive with confidence, and don't be overly cautious and careful, just enough. I used to be way too cautious and even scared when I drove, but not anymore! I kinda like driving now. It's a good thing.

Some pictures of a few of my favorite things!

Just for the fun of it, I am going to post some pictures of a few of my favorite things. And also, for the amusement of y'all folks. Because I do realize that a blog that is just words can get quite boring sometimes, so I am going to add a few pictures every once and awhile. However, one thing, I will not be posting pictures of people, unless they are off in the distance or something, because this blog is open to more readers than our other one, and so I do not want to post pictures of us on it, for security reasons. But you'll get to see our animals, and the food that we eat, and the crops that we grow, and on occasion our vehicles, house, trees, etc. Oh! And of course, you will likely be seeing some fabulous Kansas Sunsets and Sunrises! Yay! =)
 Enjoy these pictures for now though. Hah!
 That first one is just a movie of Pa working on our drive. This was taken a couple of years ago.
 And now, here are a few of my favorite things:

Sledding! Definitely a favorite thing to do around here when it actually snows!

Sliding down the snowy trail in a "train" with my sisters!

Tractors! However, this is a John Deere tractor, which is NOT my favorite kind of tractor! Don't think that it is! It's the tractor that I like, not the brand!

Harvesting alfalfa. (I ain't never helped with it, but have watched!)

Seeing beautiful Kansas sunsets! This one is a really nice one! =)

Rainbows, Crop Quest pickups, green grass! Aw, very nice!

Dark thunder clouds! I really like thunder storms!

Doing stuff on the roof! Here we are putting up Christmas lights.

Snow! I am posting lots of pictures of snows...maybe because it snowed some here today! And it sure did make us happy!

Havin' fun in the snow with my 4 sisters! =)

Feeding cattle in the snow...with a tractor!

Following cattle that are following the tractor. (We were in the excursion leaving from Grandpa and Grandma's one New Years Day)

Spot the dog (what is wrong with his eyes?!?)

Building things with my sisters! This is our Bartel Bungalow =)

Burning grass! One of my favorite things about Spring!

More burning of grass! We were called "firefighters" that day...by REAL firefighters!

Plantin' soybeans and corn

FIRE!!! I am fascinated by fire! This here is when we were burning yuccas.

CATTLE!!!! My very favorite animal!

FORDS!!! There ain't nothin' like a Ford!

Fall leaves in our pond! There was actually some water in it! Wow!

Our pond in the fall.

Pinecones and frost on the pine trees. I like pinecones!

Building snowmen! Fun!

Look at all that snow!!! That was one big blizzard! Great fun to play in, let me tell you!

Baking chocolate chip cookies!

Irene, Patty, and Josie's soybeans that they grew.

And the corn that they grew. It looks rather nice, iffen I do say so myself.

Helping Pa work on the vehicles! I like learning about things like that.

Grain cart and tractor! Case IH tractor and Ford grain cart. Nice! Harvesting corn.

Spray plane! Spray planes are something that both Josie and I really like.

Grilled cheese sandwiches. Yum!

Tomato soup to dip them sandwiches in. It sure does taste good.

Horse at the fairgrounds

A cow, with some spit comin' out of her mouth! Haha!

Gruffy with his corny grin! I never knew a dog could grin so...but Gruffy sure can!

Yummy food that we ate for supper on Christmas Day in 2010.

Another pinecone! These are one OUR trees!!!

And last of all..."Mother Goose Cake"! One of our one inventions. It's really good, though! Surprisingly.

 And that would be all!
 Have yourselves a good and godly day! =)

How to Avoid Kitchen Catastrophes

Well, since we ain't had much debatin' goin' on here, I decided that I am going to make this a joint debate/advice blog! Meaning, that I am also going to be giving y'all advice on occasion! Not saying that this advice will be worth while, or mean anything to you, but it might learn some of ya on a few things. Or maybe it will just make you laugh. That's fine too! Also, if you have anything that you want advice on, just let Patty know! She'll be happy to oblige you with as good of advice as she can muster! It may not always be practical...but oh well. Iffen ya want serious advice, just specify that, and she will give you as serious of advice as she can possibly think of! But if you just want fun or funny advice, she likes doing that as well! =) Probably better, more 'n likely. Okay, so enough of that. I really do have some advice for y'all today! And as the title suggests, it has to do with cooking in the kitchen and other things that happen in the kitchen! And all of these tid bits of advice have come from experience. I'd advise you to play close attention! Hah. These things have actually happened to one of the members in our family! I will tell you in parenthesis which member it was each time. Hope ya find this amusing! And maybe it will help you avoid future kitchen catastrophes! =D
 Advisory #1. Don't let Patty and Josie in the kitchen! This could be trouble. It could be disastrous. It could be detrimental. It could be incredibly messy. And it could be somewhat humorous at times, but I don't think you want to find out!
 Advisory #2. Pay very close attention to advisory #1! Make sure you know exactly what it means, and please follow it to the T! Once you have understood it, and agreed to abide by it, you may proceed on to Advisory #3.
 Advisory #3. Turn the light on when you first go into the kitchen. It just might help some. (Josie gets on to me a lot for not turning the light on when I go into some rooms. However, I usually do flip the switch when going into the kitchen. Just not in the washroom sometimes.)
 Advisory #4. When heating up a can of something, it might be wise to open the can first, and put the contents in the pan, instead of just putting the closed can with the contents inside of it still into the pan. And thinking that it will cook that way! Oh, and don't forget to turn the burner on either! Nothin' ain't gonna cook without the heat! Unless you are outside in 120 degree weather or something, then it might start to cook, but probably wouldn't finish. (This happened to Patty when she was just learning to cook at age 9. Anise had asked her to put a can of tomato soup, I think it was, in a pan and warm it up. So, I did just that! I put the can in the pan that was on the burner, and left it that way. The burner was not on. The contents of the can were still in the can. The can was unopened. Anise comes in a little later to find it like this. She then tells me that I have to OPEN the can and dump the contents out of it! And I also have to turn the burner on! Oops. I now know that! Hah.)
 Advisory #5. When making pizza, don't forget to put a pan underneath the dough when you are rolling it out and putting the toppings on! Because then it makes it very difficult to transfer this fully made pizza over to a pan so that you can put it into the oven to cook it. It needs a pan under it! (Irene was once making pizza, and she had gotten it all ready to go into the oven, and then when she tried to pick it up, she realized that there was no pan underneath it! Oh dear! So, she had quite the ordeal trying to get it onto a pan without completely destroying it. She did manage to get it onto a pan in fairly decent shape! It still tasted good! =) I think she will remember to put a pan underneath it from now on though.)
 Advisory #6. Don't use a steak knife to cut up chicken! It is much to sharp to be using it like that. And you are most likely going to get hurt one way or the other. (Dandi can testify to this one. She was cutting up chicken with a steak knife in January 2010, and ended up cutting her first finger very severely. She had to be taken to the emergency room and have stitches put in it. It was not very nice at all! And I'm sure it hurt somethin' fierce. It sure did bleed a lot. That knife cut deep. It was rather scary!)
 Advisory #7. Maybe it would be best to check and see if the "shield" thing is on when you get ready to shake spices into something. If it is not on, then the result will be a big pile of that certain spice in whatever it is you are cooking or baking! And you most likely DO NOT need that much! (A few months ago, Patty was making tomato sauce for enchiladas, and got out the cummin and started shaking it into the sauce...without checking to see if the shield was on first...then she looked down and saw a rather large pile of cummin in the sauce! Oops. That wasn't supposed to happen. So she carefully scooped as much as she could out with a spoon. But there was still more than necessary in the sauce when she was done! However, thankfully, it did not taste bad! But it still would probably be a good idea to check before you dump!)
 Advisory #8. Don't turn the electric mixer on full speed when you are mixing up pudding or something, and the bowl is already close to overflowing! It WILL indeed overflow then! And fly all over the kitchen and you as well! It will result in quite the mess. And of course, you have to clean it all up when you're done. (Patty was making Kansas Dirt awhile ago, and was making the pudding stuff, and the bowl was already very full, but she put the mixer in there and it was on a pretty high speed, and boy did white stuff go everywhere! Well, what can I say? I'm a messy cook! No matter what I cook, I will make a mess! Guaranteed.)
 Advisory #9. When washing dishes, and there are several of them, it might be best to stack them in the drainer carefully and not too high, otherwise they might topple over! Well, the good thing about it is that it makes a nice loud bang when it falls over! Just as long as there ain't nothin' breakable on top, there shouldn't be no harm done. (I have a tendency to stack things up in the drainer as high as I possibly can. And yes, they have fallen over sometimes. But I haven't had the catastrophe of somethin' breakin' yet, so that's good. I just like to see how much I can fit in there at one time!)
 Advisory #10. When washing water bottles or something, don't forget to put the lid on them before you start shaking them. Soap and water will go quite far, let me tell you! (Josie was washing dishes one day, and when she got to the bottles, she filled them up with water and started to shake them to get them clean. They did not have the lids on them, so yes, the contents did indeed fly out! Same goes with when you are washing plastic baggies, maybe don't squeeze them so hard when washing them! The water can squirt out very easily! But it's kinda amusing.)
 Advisory #11. If you want your toast to actually get toasted, you should probably plug the toaster in first of all, or make sure that it is still plugged in, sometimes someone comes by and unplugs it without you seein'. You'll be waitin' in awful long time for them to pop up iffen ya don't! I don't know how many times we have done this (several of us have), and how long we've waited for them to pop up! Oops. But usually it happens because someone else has come and unplugged it, and we forget to check and see if it is still plugged in when we push the lever down.
 And there are probably more things that I could give you advise on, but that will be all for now.
 And y'all feel free to leave cattle trails about whatever you like! =)
                          Go chew the cud! It's good for you.

K-State vs. Oklahoma and Nebraska

Well, welcome to the second debate! The first one is still not quite wrapped up, so I hope it is all right to have two going at once! Correct me if I am incorrect, please, Patty. Thank ya kindly.
First off, I will state some factual facts. (Factual facts sounds better than plain ol' facts.)
As for wins and losses, the three teams in discussion are dead even. All three have the impressive record of 7-1.
Kansas State is 2nd in the Big 12, Oklahoma is 3rd in the Big 12, and Nebraska is 2nd in the Big Ten. (Please do not ask why they do not spell out 12 and they do spell out ten. I haven't the slightest idea, but it is a very intriguing question.)
Now, you see right there that K-State is better than Oklahoma in terms of status in conference. And, technically, we should be better than them, because we beat Texas Tech and Texas Tech beat Oklahoma. Of course, theories and technicalities do not always work out, as we have seen. But nonetheless, in theory, K-State should be a better team than Oklahoma.
Now I will turn to discussing the moral side of these teams. Nebraska has long been known for their nastiness towards the opposing team, so I think I will let that lie for the time being. Oklahoma, however, has recently gained a very bad habit of rude behavior. (Evidently they thought since Nebraska left the conference, somebody had to replace them in that aspect.)
For instance, when they played us, on one of the plays one of the OU players stomped deliberately on our QB AFTER the play was over. And showed no regret for it whatsoever. And then later on, they pushed our QB so far out of bounds that they smashed him into a bench. They also injured one of our other players legs, but that was during the play and not on purpose (At least, I don't think so), so that is not entirely their fault, as injuries occur often in football. Now, on the K-State side, there was good sportsmanship to counteract Oklahoma's nastiness! Quoting one of Oklahoma's defensive players, "He is a physical guy and sometimes when I came up and hit him, he was really polite in trying to help me up." Speaking of our QB there.
Well, I of course have plenty more to say, but I will now open up this debate for... debate! =P Go ahead, folks!