Corn, Corn, Corn, Corn...

What a day!  My friend Mary (waving here, 'cause I KNOW you are reading this! ) and I were discussing our mutual digital scrapbooking hobby at lunch, and somehow (totally unrelated to scrapbooking!) it came up that our family had totally missed the whole sweet corn season this year.    She said,  "I'm going to pick sweet corn at my brother's tonight after school.  Do you want to come?"  Of course, I said yes. (not knowing what I was getting myself in to!) 

Mary picked Ethan and me up after school, and we headed over to her brother's weed ...oops...I mean corn field.  We picked 253 ears of corn!!!   Yes.  253!  Do you folks have any idea how much corn that is?  Well...let me tell you...it's a LOT!  It's a lot of corn, and it was EXTREMELY hot out in that corn field!  Man...we worked up a BIG sweat!  Ethan was grunting and groaning as he was trying to lug those huge garbage bags full of corn  around out there!   He was a really big help!

Since Mary and her husband Tim have cows, she graciously invited Ethan and I to husk the corn at her house, so we wouldn't have to pay the city to dispose of it all.  Well, I wasn't going to make Ethan help with ALL the corn by himself, so I began recruiting my kids.   I picked Rachel up at 5 after volleyball practice, and  I called Caleb and Cameron on their cell phones and said "If you are getting a ride home from Cross Country practice with a friend, have them drop you at Tim and Mary's house."  Not knowing what they were in for, they actually showed up!  We all shucked corn.  The older two boys ran into town to pick up pizza, and the rest of us kept shucking corn.  (Oh, and we had to take a few minutes to admire Mary's dog Rosie's  CUTE 3 week old little puppies!)

After a yummy Casey's pizza and (what else?) CORN supper, the kids helped carry the corn into the house, and fed the husks to the cows.  Then all four kids came home (tonight was a BUSY homework night for all but Caleb!) and Mary and I cut the corn off the ears, boiled it and bagged it up.  We did 64 cups of corn!  Whew...what a LONG day but really productive day.  That corn looks wonderful in my freezer!

I have GREAT friends!  It is SO much more enjoyable to do a big job like that with a friend!  We laughed and even got a bit...(dare I say it?) SILLY by 9 pm, but what a FUN way to get a job done!

I also have GREAT kids!  They (fairly) willingly worked and helped us get the job done.  When the kids came home, Caleb helped Rachel with her math homework, looked over Ethan's homework, AND quizzed Ethan on his spelling words!  When I got home, Cameron was finished with his homework and was practicing his trumpet.  Rachel was plugging away at her homework.  She was working on a book report for her demanding Literature teacher (who happens to also be my above mentioned friend Mary, LOL)

I also have a really great husband, and I'm missing him terribly.  This week he's in South Africa!  Sigh.  I'll be glad when he is home for a while!  Can't wait to see him and hear all about this trip!