Neighbor Problems Kiowa Kansas

DAY 1:

Yesterday, September 13, 2011, we had gone to get the boat trailer inspected at Medicine Lodge.  I had Christina call her sister to see if it would be possible to get her neighbor’s number so that we could call to see if we could park the boat in their driveway until this weekend.  We have a lot of things in the garage where we have been keeping the boat.  Until we move into our house that is the only place for us to have access to our things.  This week I was hoping to wash the boat and clean it out before this weekend.  I didn’t want to move everything in and out of the garage every time I moved the boat.

Christina called to ask her sister.  Her sister said no, that now was not a good time to ask.  We left it at that.

When I got home Cherish was distraught.  I heard that she had just found out that her neighbor that is not living in the vacant house beside them is going to cut down the tree that is growing on the border of both of their yards.  It is a large tree that produces a lot of shade for the yard.

Then I found out that they were trying to buy some land from this neighbor.  The fence that goes around the house is not on their land.  They had an agreement with the father to use the land.  The father has passed and his children have inherited the house and the land.

The reason for the tree being removed is for a new 10-foot tall fence being put up along the actual land line all the way into the front yard.  The land line is only a couple feet from the house and would require the air conditioner to have to be moved.  On top of that there is only about 15 foot from the back of the house that is their land.  There could be very little back yard for Todd and Cherish’s 9 children to play in.

None of this was discussed with Todd or Cherish before this day, and the people coming to cut down all the larger trees were already starting to cut on the other end of the yard.

Cherish made an offer to buy the small portion of land so that they could keep their air conditioning, shade and a reasonable back yard.  The neighbor said that she would think about it.

DAY 2:

Today, September 14, 2011, the neighbor stopped by the house while I was home for lunch.  She asked if Todd was home.  I told her that they had left town to take Peyton to the hospital for his fractured leg.  She asked that I have them call her when they get back because she had made a decision.  She went on to say that she had thought about it all night and decided she can’t just start selling off parts and pieces of her families land to random people.  Then went on to say that they had a difficult enough time getting possession of the house and had to agree to make all kinds of improvements in order to get the house.

It was everything I could do not to spit chew all over her.  There is a lot of land around the vacant house in the first place and no use for the land that they plan to take back from Todd and Cherish. 

I asked Christina today if Todd and Cherish knew the size of the land when they bought the house.  She said they did.  Part of me is outraged at the insensitivity of this nasty woman.  The other part of me tries to reason that it is her land. 

The tree however is not hers.  It is on the property line and is half on her land and half in Todd and Cherish’s.  I feel that there may be a big battle over that tree.  It is the only shade for Todd and Cherish and will increase energy consumption if it is cut down.  It is in the way of the new fence for the ruthless neighbor. 

DAY 3:

September 15, 2011, I am home with the younger children while Todd and Cherish are in Wichita with Peyton.  Peyton ended up having surgery for his fractured leg.  I hear the chain saw start up around 8:00 in the morning. 

By 9:00, the insensitive, heartless neighbor called.  She asked if Todd or Cherish were home.  I let her know that Peyton had to have surgery and they would be home that afternoon.  She then said that she was going to go ahead and cut down the tree that she had told the Reeve’s that she would not cut down.  I asked her politely to wait until the Reeve’s got home from surgery, as I didn’t want to bother them during this trying time.

Her response was, “It really doesn’t matter, the tree is on my property, and they don’t have a say in it anyway.”  She went on to try to make herself sound better, but the more she spoke the more distaste I had for her.  She said that the tree trimmers said that the tree didn’t provide any shade for the Reeve’s anyway.  I quickly corrected her as the tree hung more than half way over the yard.  She then said that the tree’s roots were growing into the shed foundation.  She sounded so pitiful when she said it, like she just came up with it.  There is a closer, larger tree on the other side of the shed.  That one’s roots aren’t growing into the foundation of the shed or the patio?  She is leaving that tree.

She ended the conversation with, “I just hope they don’t hate me.”  I wanted to tell her that even her own family dislikes her, and now I hate her, and will make sure many, many others will hate her.  That would have been useless to say.  She thinks she is royalty and everybody needs to bow down to her.  She is shallow.  I am sure it would have hurt her, but she would consider me unworthy to be giving her insults.  This seems to me to be another case of horrible parenting.  Any good name her father had built in this town is dying with her.

As soon as I got off the phone with her I was trying to think of what to do to save the tree.  I tried calling my wife who did not answer.  Right away, the tree cutter moved from the tree he was working on, to the tree in Todd and Cherish’s yard.  I broke down and called Todd and Cherish in the middle of surgery.  They called one of the law enforcement officers to come over to see if he could stop the cutting until they got back to town.  He didn’t think he could do anything so he suggested calling the City.  The city was no help in the matter either.  Nobody could stop the cutting of the tree.

I had just read a book, As The Crow Flies.  In the book there is lady that was 2^nd generation in the money.  Her father had built up his legacy, then, she came along.  In the book she was ruthless, manipulative, and downright evil.  As I was reading I was happy it was a fictional book and people like that don’t really exist.

This neighbor is the exact same woman that was in that book.   

Now there is the air conditioner that the neighbor said she would allow to stay.  She has already lied on everything else.  She has known what she was going to do all along and has not given any consideration to Todd and Cherish.  She proved that point by waiting until they were out of town for their son’s surgery to cut down the tree.

Last night, my wife and I were running at the track.  She quit running and said she can’t stop thinking about what a horrible person the neighbor is.  My wife wants retaliation.  I jokingly told her to try to wish bad things on her.  I then said I hope a tree falls over and crushes her legs, and then when she is in surgery we can point and laugh at her.  How just would that be?  We laughed about it for a while, but couldn’t get the thought of how horrible this woman is, out of our heads. 

Nothing will cure my hatred for what she has already done and how she treats people.  She needs a lot of prayers, for her to become a better person.  I really do hope that she can change.

Evil Brewing in Kiowa Kansas

Why are people so inconsiderate?  What happened to the good ole days when people did things because it was the right thing to do?

If I do one thing right with raising my boys, I hope it is to teach them to do the right thing. 

A couple years after I had gotten out of college, Christina and I were living in a rental house.  The landlord had not paid his fees to the city for renting the house.  The city in turn put a 30 day evacuation notice on our door.  Of course we called them to find out why.  They explained to us that the landlord had not paid his dues and said that we would be evicted if they were not paid.  They also advised us to not pay the rent until the dues were paid in case we were going to be evicted.

The landlord showed up later and demanded his rent so he could pay his dues.  I let him know what the city had told us.  The next day we woke up to a 3 day eviction notice on the door from him.

That was enough for me.  He had already been into the house several times while we had not been there.  Once the bathroom candles had been lit and the tub dirtied,  he had brought a woman into our house while we were out of town for the weekend.  I could not put it past him to come into the house to take our things for not paying the rent.  I called into work that day and rented a storage unit and a rental trailer.  We moved everything out of our house that day.

That night we were homeless with no family close to stay with.  Instead of getting a motel room and spending a ton of money while we were waiting to find another place we decided to camp at the lake.

A couple weeks went by and we had not found a place.  One of the guys at work heard that we were living at the lake and offered to sell us his 28 foot motorhome for $1300.00.  When I got to his house to look, I found the motorhome was trashed.  It had been used for partying and had beer spilled all over the walls and floors.  There was meat in the unrunning refrigerator that had been there for years.  He had told me the AC unit had not worked and he could not get the motorhome to start.  I told him I would buy it if I could get it to start.  I spent a day working on it and got it to start.  The next week was spent cleaning it.

Finally, we got it to the lake to live out of.  The first day I crawled on the roof and had the air conditioner fixed right away.  It was a perfect little home for that summer.  We lived in it for a couple more months while we were waiting on a pet friendly apartment to open up.  We had a great dane and it was hard to find a place to live with him.

We finally got our place to live and we really didn't want to move from the lake.  The motorhome went to storage.  Not long after that I heard that my job at Hewlett Packard was going to end due to HP moving out of the area. 

I was able to transfer positions to Ohio.  My Grandmother expressed interest in buying the motorhome.  At the time it was not too old and only had 40,000 miles on it.  I knew I could sell it for 4 to 5 times the amount I bought it for after cleaning and fixing it up.  My mother reminded me that it was for family and insisted that I sell it to her reasonably.  I sold it for 1800.00, which was the cost of it plus what I had put into it fixing it up.

That's the type of life lesson I want to teach my boys.  Luckily for me, I had sold it for that amount because it still needed more work than I thought it needed.  Grandma wouldn't have let me hear the end of it if she paid more and it still needed that much work.

I won't go into detail yet about why I feel people are so inconsiderate.  I feel the situation that occurred yesterday and today has not been fully resolved.  What is transpiring to happen is not good and could be the evilest act I have ever heard of towards one's neighbor.  However it turns out, I will be adding it to the blog.  What I heard today made me sick to my stomach.

Crazy Kansas Boat Tagging Part II

Kansas received the letter from Ohio stating that they do not title trailers under 4000 pounds.  They still required the trailer to be inspected, which still requires a title for the trailer from Ohio.

We called around to several different law enforcement agencies to see if they would inspect it.  Each time the response was the same.  They had to have the title.  Christina called Topeka again to see what needed to be done.  They said they would send a request to the sheriff's office in Medicine Lodge stating that we cannot get a title from Ohio and that they should do a VIN check for us.

Today at 9:30 was the only time they could do it for the next 2 weeks so I took off work this morning and dug the boat out of the garage at the house we haven't gotten yet.  The garage keeps getting more and more stuff piled in it while we are waiting for the tenants to get their house finished so we can move in.

We got the VIN checked without any problems and took the inspection paperwork to the courthouse to be sent off to the state so that my tags will not be suspended next week.

Hopefully that will be the end to the drama of getting tags and licenses in Kansas.  Now I have the boat and motor to register.  I have to drive to Pratt to have that done.  The titles for those are in my possession.


Last night we went to see my nephew Peyton play Junior Varsity football.  In the third quarter he was tackled while returning a punt.  In the midst of the tackle his ankle or leg was fractured.  He is laying on the couch in discomfort now as the pain relievers don't seem to be helping much.  I hope that it heals quickly and doesn't cause any problems for him in the future.

This weekend Mizike, G-Diddy, myself and our families will be going to Canton for a camping/fishing trip.  We are hoping to catch some walleye while we are there.  Mizike and G-Diddy were close friends of mine in college.  We have met a few times since, but this will be the first time we have all met for a camping trip.  It will be a blast!

Another Busy Weekend - with some fishing

Anton with the Big Bass of the Day

The weekend started out early as I had to take off a half hour early to head to the high school football game at Kinsley, KS, 2 hours away.  I picked up Christina on the way and we made it to the game as Kiowa was down 0-12.  Our presence was felt and soon after we arrived everything went right.  Kiowa ended up winning 34 - 12.

After the game we drove 3.5 hours to Gaylord, KS to my wife's parents to spend the weekend.  Saturday morning came quick and early and we made our way to the Smith Center airstrip for a pancake feed and air show.  The pancakes were delicious and came with giant sausage patties.  The kids age 8-16 were taken on plane rides for free.  There were around 30 different planes that flew in for the occasion.

Santana got to ride in the airplane with the open cockpit.  The other nieces and nephews rode in the green and white plane behind it.

The kids got to clime in the Medical Helicopter to check it out.

Gavin in front of one of the many planes we got to walk around and check out.

Gavin's Wings

Leo Outside the Medical Airplane

All the kids in line for Snow Cones.  There were 7 small and 7 medium snow cones for the lot of us.

The airshow was really fun.  The pilot was fun to watch and very informative on what he was doing.  It's pretty amazing how much you can do in a plane.

That afternoon Cindy decided to take the older kids to a pond to fish.  I couldn't pass up on that opportunity when she asked if I wanted to go.  There were lots of fish to be caught.  My nephew Anton caught the first and biggest.  He said he had 9 total.  I probably had the most with around 15.  Santana and Peyton each had a bluegill.  It was a blast to get out to a pond and catch bass that will bite on anything.


Peyton looked for turtles and walked the whole way around the pond.  Santana fished for quite a while before she ended up chasing frogs.  She was touching the fish and putting her own worms on the hook.  Not bad for an 8th grade girl.

We ended up keeping 5 of the bass for supper.  This was the 2nd time I've eaten bass and it tasted really good.

Average size bass for the pond

Santana's Spunky Gill.

Labor Day Weekend in Kiowa

 Friday evening started out with me getting off work a little late.  Instead of taking a short lunch break I had hit a couple garage sales in town to see what kind of deals I could find.  There was several deals to be had including the purchase of a full size trampoline for 15.00. 

After work we went to unload the Explorer at the garage of the new house.  We got back to eat supper before Peyton's football game and found out the game started at 7 and not at 7:30 as we had been told.  We ate quick and got to the game a little after 7.  The Chieftains were scoring their 2nd touchdown as we showed up.  It was a great game and my freshman nephew Peyton got in on defense with 5 minutes remaining.  In that time I saw him make 3 tackles, 2 for a loss as well as a sack. 

 Saturday morning we got up early to go garage sale shopping again as there were about 7 garage sales in town for the busy weekend.  We filled up the Explorer again and finished shopping in time to get to our sand volleyball tournament.  Our team was Todd, Cherish, Christina, myself, and our neighbors across the street.  We ended up winning all 4 of our games and winning the tournament.  I had a couple awesome blocks at the net against 2 of the best spikers.

 Sunday I woke up sore from volleyball.  My shoulder and quads were aching.  We went to church then lazed around for a while.  Later in the day we drove to Alva, OK to do some grocery shopping.

Monday we woke up to run the 5K.  There were nearly 300 entrants.  Christina and I finished 152nd and 153rd.  Christina finished 30 seconds behind 2nd place in her division.  I think she could have easily shaved 5 minutes off her time. 

 The Reeves clan swept up on trophies.  Most of them were finishing as we were passing our 2nd mile.  Even the 6 year old, number 135 in the picture below.

 After the 5K we walked to the park for a ham and bean feed.  We ate, had some homemade ice cream, and walked around the park enjoying the activities for several hours.  The kids rode rides at the small carnival they had set up between the park and the ball field.  They also got to dig through a hay pile to find money.  After the park we went back home and relaxed the remainder of the evening after eating way too much taco chili. 

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Getting Ready for Kiowa's Big Weekend

Last Friday I decided to try to go a week without smoking, chewing, drinking soda, or alcohol and at the same time drink water and run.  It's a week later and I have failed to have total control of myself for even that short of period.  I did make it without smoking a cigarette, or drinking soda or alcohol.  I drank lots of water.  There was only 1 night that we ran in the last week.

There were quite a few times I craved a soda, only a couple times I really thought I needed a cigarette and probably wouldn't have drank any alcohol anyway last week.  I told myself it was for only 1 week so I was able to hold off my cravings.

With running, I should have been out every evening.  I enjoy running but it is hard to get out of the house sometimes when there are 11 kids and we are leaving our 2 for Todd and Cherish to watch.  Even if they are already in bed.  They like to crawl out of bed a lot before they go to sleep.  I was also consumed in the book As The Crow Fly's.  It was too good to put down and once the kids were in bed I was reading until it was too late to go run.  The good news is that I have been able to drop 12 pounds since moving back to Kiowa.  I strongly believe that some of that came from preparing to run the 5K.

This weekend is a big weekend in Kiowa.  Saturday we will be in a sand volleyball tournament.  Sunday, I'm not sure what is planned and on Monday we will be in the 5K.  There is something happening all weekend so we will stay busy.

It shouldn't be too much longer before we get our house.  We keep hearing that they will be moving out this weekend.  Hopefully we will be in by Sunday or Monday but it will probably take longer.

Off to Kindergarten

Leo's First Day of Kindergarten

"Are you going to school today?"  I said, as I shook Leo's leg to wake him.  He climbed out of bed right away without fully waking.  He grabbed his backpack and threw it on his back and grabbed the 2 plastic sacks that held his swimming things and Kleenex tissues.  "You have to change and brush your teeth and hair first" Christina said. 

He changed into his outfit for the day then started to put his backpack on again.  "Not yet" I said.  We could tell he was anxious to start his first day of Kindergarten. 

After a bowl of Cheerio's for breakfast he went back down to brush his teeth and hair.  Peyton and Santana were getting ready to drive off to school.  With this being Peyton's first day to drive on his own, we went to see them off.  Peyton was in his football jersey and Santana in her cheerleader uniform.  They used to be so small.

Breanna, Teagon and Leo eating Cereal before school.

The kids were all getting ancy to get to school.  We took some pictures and walked them to school a little early.  Leo and I made our way to the Kindergarten classroom.  Christina and Gavin had fallen behind.  I thought Leo would remember where Teagon had class last year but he walked right by the room until we reached 4th, 5th and 6th grade hall.  We turned back and got directions and soon found the Kindergarten classroom with Mrs. Rooks standing there.

Dayton watches on as Anton, McKenna, Keaton, Leo, Breanna, and Teagon posed for a picture before the first day of school Sept 1, 2011

Walking by the Hospital on the way to School.

Leo at his first day of Kindergarten with Mrs. Rooks

Leo found his locker area and hung his backpack and swimming gear up.  Then he found his desk.  He recognized his friend Bryson sitting next to him.  He sat down at the spot at the table that had his name, took out his box of school items and started playing with the scissors.

"Remember what you learn so you can tell me all about your first day when I get home", I said.  Then Christina and I wished him luck and left him sitting there ready to start his first day of school.