Monthly Archives: August 2010

Back in the routine

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    If this blog has been conspicuous by its absence,  it’s because a combination of being busy writing for our print pubications and a switch in blog formats, has been getting in the way of posting. We switched to a new format earlier this month and it’s taken me awhile to figure out the new one. Now that I’ve got the basics down I’m good to go and plan to get back in the blogging routine.

    Speaking of routines, school stated Wednesday and my family has been working the past few days to get back in that groove. While summer schedules can be complicated, things really get interesting with football practices, football games and daycare to juggle. One thing that helps my husband and I, who both work in Grand Forks, 30 miles from where our children go to school in Larimore, N.D.,  is that we have good friends we can rely on to help us out if there’s an unexpected glitch in the schedules, such as a sick child or change in game or practice times.

         Although school has started, I’m pleased to see that the weather so far this week, hasn’t turned fall-like. It seems like 90-degree days are much easier to tolerate this time of year, probably because we know that the number of hot days will be limited and before we know it, we’ll be piling on layers of clothes.

Harvest time

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     This was a great week for harvesting grain and farmers were out in force across the countryside. Yesterday I saw a dozen combines in fields between Oslo, Minn., and East Grand Forks when I was reporting on a story, and on my way home after work to our farm near Larimore, I saw several more.

    Three combines in a field was a common sight. They can really eat up a field quickly and we passed several with only straw and stubble  left on them. Some of the fields already were being chisel-plowed. The efficiency of agriculture and the speed at which farmers can complete their work these days amazes me. They can do in a day what it took four or five to do when I was growing up on the farm.

    One of the fun parts of being a reporter is the opportunity to get out of the office and talk to people. I had a great morning on Thursday when I got to ride in two combines while working on a harvest story for the Herald. One farmer was combining wheat and the other was combining barley. I rode a round with each of them and talked to them about this year’s crops.

     Riding in the combine brings back a lot of memories of harvest at our house when I was growing up. I not ony rode in combines, but also on swathers and in grain trucks with my dad and brothers.

     Harvest is the culmination of a season of hard work and I’m glad I got to be part of it growing up and that I still get a chance now and then to get a close-up look at it.