Hot August sun shone down on mown hayfields.  Grasshoppers fly through the air wings clackingA little creek wound through the meadows where horses and cows stood under big oaks switching flies in the shade.  A doe and her fawn stepped from sun dappled foliage to drink water from the creek and then dantily stepped into the meadow to graze among the livestock.   

In the adjacent hayfields men worked baling hay under the hot blue August sky they then loaded the heavy bales on flat bed trucks and drove to a big barn to lift them into the barn hay loft for winter store and feed.  Sweat and dust and hay weeds prickled their skin.  Shirts hung open and unbuttoned as they worked, brown faces grimed with dirt and sweat soaked through their checkered shirts.   As they worked they could here the creek laughing and tumbling over rocks on it merry way and they glanced longingly in that direction in anticipation of a cooling swim in it’s inviting waters.  They soon threw off thier sweat soaked shirts and the hot sun shone on dark tanned torso’s as they workedBy

A knotted rope tied to a big oak hung limply near the creek bank where a large deep and wide green pool of water.  It beckoned one and all for a cooling swim on a hot summer day. One more turn and we will have it done boys said the Pa. Mama said she had a picnic dinner ready to take to the old swimming hole so when we finish up here how about we get the ladies and all go for a good long swim in that beckoning water. The fellows cheered and set to work with renewed vigor.  

Back at the farm house; sitting in the icebox a tall pitcher of cold lemonade and another of cool buttermilk sat waiting to parch thirsty palates.  Bread cooled under checkered cloth on the counter and the kitchen was a beehive of activity as the women folk pared, peeled, and busily put up preserves, and good things for winter store from the garden and fruit trees.  The kitchen was hot from jellies and jams cooking on the stove and three canner kettles full of jars being processed; Beads of presperation ran down hot faces as they snapped beans, shelled peas and cut carrots and peeled and pared, apples and pears and pitted peaches, plums and apricots.