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Chelsea Matthews

Life on a Ranch

I’m currently sitting at one end of our kitchen table. The other end (it’s a big table!) is currently housing the leftovers of a kitchen clean-out project I recently embarked on. There, you’ll find some canning jars, vitamins, small white pitchers, and a couple of baking dishes. They’ve all lost their place in the kitchen, but I don’t want them to leave completely. So, they sit on my table… waiting for me to decide what to do with them. But over here on my writing side of the table, I have a notebook and some new pens (my favorite ones) I used to jot down a list of some of the things we’ve been up to over the last couple of weeks, all things I could potentially write about in this column. I’ve never made a list like this before- I usually just shoot from the hip and see where the keyboard takes me. Today, I’m running through my list and I have music playing in the background. If you want to listen in while you read, I have the soundtrack on from “The Man From Snowy River”. Buck, Cooper and I recently drove over to Hot Lake Hotel, where they show $5 movies, and we watched Jim and Jessie in the first “Man From Snowy River”. I have a soft spot in my heart for that movie and especially the soundtrack. A little over 20 years ago, I walked down the aisle to “Jessie’s Theme”. It was played by a group of local musicians, all of whom I was lucky enough to grow up around and have as family friends. In fact, one of the guitar players played not only for our wedding, but my parents’ wedding as well. Having recently been to a couple of weddings, it was fun to note the special touches each couple added to their day. For me, one of my favorite, and most special parts of our wedding day was that string band playing the processional and recessional. And to top it off, during the ceremony, my dad joined them on the same guitar I grew up listening to- I often fell asleep to the sweet sound of my dad's guitar while he sat strumming on the side of my bed. He and the string band backed up a duet of a really great song called “ The Battle Hymn of Love” (by Kathy Mattea and Tim O’Brian) sung by two friends with two of my most favorite voices. Due to some technical difficulties, we don’t have a video of any of that, but we do have sweet memories. I don’t have a lot of opportunities to share that part of our wedding, but since we recently saw “The Man From Snowy River” and we've been to some weddings, it seemed like a good time to sneak it in... and now you know! Speaking of background noise, let's consider another type- the type our kids have gotten to grow up listening to as they fall asleep, particularly in the fall. We have weaned calves in the corral. It might not be quite as endearing as my dad’s guitar, but it’s not the worst thing to hear either. At least we don’t think so... our house guests might disagree and we have had a few of them. Our mason friend, Josh, came to stay a couple nights while he worked on a tile project in Cove. My sister-in-law stopped on her way to Challis, Idaho to visit her dad, my father-in-law, Bill. And while she headed that direction, my mother-in-law Jackie headed this direction and stayed for a night on her way to Wallowa County. Upon her departure, she left a pan of sourdough biscuits. We pulled them hot out of the oven after a late-night volleyball match. I wish she had been here to hear us all take great delight in their warm goodness, the perfect addition to a beef and veggie concoction I threw in the oven earlier in the day. And that’s not all. We also had Emma for a night. Emma is the younger sister (14 years younger) of my ol’ friend, Ashley who I grew up riding with. Emma was on her way to the Pendleton Round Up and we got to have an overnight on her birthday, a birthday I remember well because Ashley missed our very first High School rodeo due to her arrival! I've loved her like she’s my own little sister ever since. We had company, but that wasn’t all we had on the schedule. Buck and Cooper left Friday for a Junior High football game down in Crane then headed West for a couple days of Salmon fishing on the Columbia with Darren and Trenton Hansen and Brett and Brock Beverage. By the sounds of it, and the looks of the pictures they’ve sent, they’ve been having a great time and had some success, too. And I’m really looking forward to having Salmon in the freezer. While the guys were gone, the girls and I took care of chores here and kept the weaned calves comfortable. I asked Katelyn which extra chores she wanted for the weekend, and she volunteered to keep all the troughs full. I told her she needed to absolutely, 100%, make sure they didn’t overflow and make a muddy mess for the calves. (We have all made the mistake of forgetting about a running hose, with some of those times being worse than others; one time Cooper forgot when we left for a weekend, and we came home to a flooded barn and driveway!) She made me laugh when that made her reconsider and asked to switch jobs. Well, I didn’t forget about the hose, but it did flip out of the trough when I walked away to take care of some other things while it filled! Thankfully, I wasn’t gone long enough for it to make too big of a mess, but it was irritating, nonetheless. Later, I relayed my error to Katelyn, “See, it’s just way too much pressure!” she quickly responded. Thankfully, the calves have stayed really healthy- the cooler (but not too cold) weather has helped. Lucy has been staying busy working for Frisch’s. She's taking a senior work study for a chunk of her school day and farming into the evenings. After she got off work Saturday evening, the girls and I got everything settled at home then ran over to Richland, Washington for a quick overnight shopping trip. We looked at, and sat on, a variety of couches (I’m on the hunt) and did some Homecoming dress shopping, amongst other things. We ate yummy food and not only soaked in the hotel hot tub, but I soaked up the time with the girls. They’re both busy and even when I’m home, they often aren’t. We got back from Richland a few hours ago and within a few minutes of unloading, they both had plans to head out. With Buck and Cooper still driving home from their fishing trip, our house is pretty quiet tonight. That's something I don’t really like getting used to, but it seems to be happening more and more often. I think I’ll turn up the music (I’ve moved on to Kathy Mattea) while I fold laundry, put a load of dishes away and get ready for another busy week out here in Union County. -Chelsea




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