So we had a busy weekend and there are a lot of photos and videos of it.  It started Saturday when the grandkids were brought over for babysitting while their parents attended a wedding.  Tom had repaired William’s quad so it was running for the first time for us.  Here is William getting instructions from grampa on his first day ever of rising his quad.

Here are videos of William riding his quad his first day:

Tom gave William more instructions and then they headed out back together.

I hung out with Piper in the house.  Here she is checking out our cat Izzy,

watching Shaun the Sheep with me,

crawling,

and eating food off of my dinner plate.

Despite all of her toys, she liked playing with the coasters the best.

Of course, she liked hanging with grampa too.

William and I played rousing games of Monopoly

and Connect 4 (not necessarily following the rules).

Sunday morning the kids enjoyed watching motorcycles videos with grampa.

Tom watched the kids and started smoking a brisket while I did the chores.  Here is a GBH in the sheep’s field.

Here is our recent rainfall.  Everything is wet.

William continued to ride his quad

while Tom looked after the brisket.  The amazing recipe he used is here.

Steve really enjoys having the kids here.

More riding photos.

Tom and William take the quads out to check on the sheep.

I made Dutch Oven Baked Beans in the fire pit.  Here is the amazing recipe I used.

Chloe relaxed on the porch.

More quad riding, of course.

Here are photos of how our home was transformed in just one day of babysitting.

Here is Piper sleeping soundly.

We had a Father’s Day get together in the afternoon.  Here are William and Piper enjoying watermelon with their father Russ.

Steve enjoyed the company of their dog Belle.

The pigs enjoyed the leftover pineapple and watermelon.

Cheryl enjoyed petting Billy.

William showing off how muddy his quad is.

My father came over and admired Thomas’ motorbike.  Sammy (Jay and Russ’ other dog) just wanted on the porch.

Piper and Jay sat on Tom’s quad.

Here is the feasting on the back porch.

William is pretty muddy.

Russ got muddy too.  Here is his chair after he got up.

This morning I got up early because I wanted to document the location of the sunrise here close to the solstice.  I couldn’t do it over the weekend because it was too cloudy but it was clear this morning.  This is how light it was at 5:20.

Here are the birds’ songs.

Here is the view looking east down the prairie.

Here are the growing chicks.

Here is Marji the cow checking me out.

To give perspective here is the 180 degree view looking east from our hay barn, going from the north to the south.

The sunlight is starting to hit the nearby hill.

And finally I can see the sun coming up.

Here is its location to the northeast.

And here was its location on Christmas morning, to the southeast.

It really is impressive how much it does change over the year here.

So that was our Solstice/Father’s Day weekend.  It was quite the memorable times.  I am really appreciating how incredibly lucky I am.