18 Sep Kimberly: Busy time of the year

I left Mychal and the crew in Montana at the beginning of August to head home for football and school. The transition from camper living to house living is always a struggle for the first few weeks, but I do enjoy being able to wash a bigger load of laundry at a time and not running out of hot water. I don’t enjoy that it’s a lot more area to keep clean than the campers!  

Mychal got back to North Dakota the last weekend of August, so, over the long Labor Day weekend, the kids and I headed to South Heart, North Dakota, to visit. That was a long three weeks of being away from Mychal and the crew. I enjoy being home, but I always have mixed emotions when we pack up the car to head home. I do travel on the weekends to where Mychal is, but this year there are not a lot of weekends that will work for us to see him. Bentley has a game one weekend. My brother is getting married, and there is another football game the same weekend. I got to help my cousin find her perfect wedding dress this past weekend, and one weekend I will be attending an emergency medical service conference to maintain my education hours for my emergency medical technician license. I think that, between the kids’ events and other activities, I am on the run more than I am during harvest.

This year, I took on a new role as a preschool teacher. I have helped the previous teacher the past few years, but this year she took a different job in the school, so I decided to step up and do it instead of seeing the program disappear. I have only had one day of class so far, but it was a lot more fun than I was expecting, even with my nephew as one of the students.

We currently have crews spread out all over North Dakota cutting wheat, durum and canola.

Roger has a crew in Langdon, North Dakota, cutting wheat that has been averaging 60 to 80 bushels an acre, while Logan and his crew have finished wheat in Westhope, North Dakota, and have started on canola. Cole has been near Hannah, North Dakota, combining canola that is averaging between 2,700 and 3,300 pounds per acre. The wheat has been running anywhere from 70 to 105 bushels per acre. Mychal has been in South Heat, North Dakota, cutting anything from wheat to durum to canola. When they think they are about done, the phone rings again.

The soybeans have been turning pretty fast around home, and this week the temperature is going to be in the mid-80s with no rain in sight. I am not ready for the cold weather, but it is a nice break from the very hot days we had this summer.

We have 18 to 20 employees again this year with two being from the J1 program. We have one guy from Portugal and one from England. We have all learned a lot about each one of them and their countries, and my kids love asking them questions every time we see them.