Creatively challenged :)

Homeschooling has challenged me on sooooo many levels! To name just one....family yearbook page :) So the deadline was tomorrow and I hadn't even started :( We didn't do one last year because I was new to all this and didn't know what to expect (that would be the kinestetic learner in me ;) so after viewing the yearbook last year I knew I wanted to do one this year. PROBLEM: I'm not a scrapbooker and I didn't want to busy or to plain of a page, and how do you "sum up" a year on one page?
SOLUTION: a scrapbook program, and keeping it simple. Plus remembering in "normal" yearbooks they just have a plain headshot pic anyways! LOL So without further ado, here's our page :)

Garden progress

These pictures are from March 23, showing the progress of our seeds. As you can see We've moved some of them into larger containers. Most of the ones that have been moved are the green beans but there are also some watermelon and squash too :)

Zoo anyone?

So how complete would spring break be without a trip to the zoo? Once again, we got to attend with friends and family :)

The kids on the earthquake simulator.
They had some extra things going on this week due to spring break and one of them was a demonstration of a pig doing a painting :) We all got free raffle tickets for a chance to win it, then we watched him paint.




And of course everyone ALWAYS wants to climb on the tiger statues at the end for pictures :)

Fun with friends

I didn't take near enough pictures, but we had a VERY busy spring break. We got together with friends at some point EVERY day of spring break! This sunk in for Brianna on Wed and she pointed it out to me just how busy we'd been :) Thur evening we were finally able to have some friends over from church for a bonfire..........we'd been under burn ban for quite some time. After we got done eating and roasting marshmellows the kids had a blast ;)



Caleb being pushed by a friends..........
Caleb's turn to give her a push :) Don't know why my camera lens was so dirty?!? It wasn't raining or anything.

Fun on the farm

Sad but reality

Ok, you know how we planted our seeds indoors last Tue....we've been watering and sunning them daily. Well when it's been warmer I've put them outside on the hood of the van so they'd get better sun..............today dh thought they'd slip off so he told me he'd moved them to the top of the van. What do you think happened? Yep, we left and all the hard work my kids had put into those 2 containers...............Brianna had done one and Ethan one............well Brianna's (my sentimental one of course) went kersplat on the road but Ethan's was caught just in time. Thankfully we had plenty of seeds left so I just had dh buy a new container, thing is now that puts us a week later on our growth, not bad except for the tomatoes and peppers which were already behind for starting from seed :( But hey, we can always buy those as plants! Needless to say I explained to dh that this was why I put them on the hood.........so I don't miss them :( The worst part was that the container we lost had 12-18 seedlings that were sprouting, Oh well at least they should sprout quickly again!

How neat :)

I had the honor of being interviewed by a fellow blogger for some audio blogs she's doing with the idea that every mom has a story :) Check it out at crazy days of mommyhood. It was pretty fun, but funny how you can get nervous just being recorded! LOL

Great therapy!

So we found out some "ordinary" stuff around here that's apparently GREAT therapy for Micah! His home therapist came out this week and we did our hour of therapy outside as it was sooooo nice. It was so good to hear that some of the things he loves most doing outside are actually therapeutic for him :) Then just this morning I realized that one of those toys I don't particularly like in the play dough container is probably soooo good for him. You know they toy where you push the play dough through the "man tube" to make it have hair, well that pushing down I think is really good for his arm strength. So here he is pushing to make the hair grow :)

And the seeds are started!

Last year was our first try at a garden, mine EVER, and dh's on his own (away from home). Since I was managing most of it once the seeds were in the ground (he handled all that for me.... super guy) it didn't do to well :( Only our okra really grew though we planted all kinds of stuff. So this year I searched out a friend who had some more experience since I'm a better hands on learner ;) Well she came over yesterday and helped us start our seeds in a seed starter. We started 2 types of tomatoes, broccoli, squash, pumpkins, green beans, lima beans, 2 types of onions, chives, basil, cucumbers, watermelon, cantaloupe, okra.........I think that's all but I don't have a list in front of me :) So here they are, and I'm told at varying times over the next 3 weeks they'll be ready to go into the ground. Also we'll add corn, another type of onion, and carrots that don't transplant well or crow further down than seed trays would allow ;)

Um, a what??

Life is so...........unpredictable :) So as an adolescent I thought off and on about the idea of homeschooling but nothing to deep. Then once I had children the thought crossed my mind some, but nothing to serious, just passing thoughts. And living in the country...... although I had thought parts of it would be neat (as a child and teen) overall I wasn't an outdoor girl, so no. I mean I was the child in upper elementary that would go help in the kindergarden class so I wouldn't have to go to recess! LOL So here I am living a life NO ONE would have guess (just ask almost anyone I knew growing up) so why I am I still surprised by these unexpected things when they pop up??? LOL

So one Sat morning I got a call from a friend asking if I wanted 2 deer fetuses.........uh what? So she did some explained as to how and why she had them and said she just thought my kids might be interested in seeing them and learning about the growth process :) So a couple days later we met up so I could pick them up. Of course my son is VERY interested and would really like to dissect one and my daughter thinks the only thing neat are the cute little hooves. LOL (She's her mom all over!) So we kept them on ice for a few days till my dear husband got some fermaldihide so we could store them for our "school lab" ;)

So here is one of them......... (stored by the way in a quart size canning jar)

See the hooves?
And this is a closer view of it's head. And on the left I think the skin broke in transit because the bone is sticking out a bit :(

So now I think we're going to do some research and see if we can determine about how old they were or what stage of developement they were at. If any of you more experianced homeschoolers have any recommended sources (other than google. LOL) we'd love to hear about them!

Our new "kid"

We came home on Sunday from morning service at church and David noticed Eddie (the male goat) was "peaking" in the shelter....... not usual behavior for him :) So without saying much he asked me to get the kids in and that he was going to check on the goats. Since he'd just built a gate for them the day before I assumed he was checking to make sure it was holding up well. A few minutes later Brianna came in sounding a tad frantic and said dad needed me.......... since I'd seen Chloe (momma goat) laying down the night before breathing like she might be in the start of labor I thought it was probably related to that! Sure enough she'd given birth JUST before we got there! She hadn't even fully delivered the placenta yet so we knew it had all been recent :) The baby was of course quite messy but momma was doing a great job getting her all cleaned up. So here are pictures of her, probably less than an hour old!! Mom and baby appear to be doing great and it looks like we'll be getting a wether (castrated male) so Eddie won't be lonely ;) Goats milk anyone ??






It was so cute, though the kids were fascinated by it all they were a bit grossed out by the placenta ..........Micah thought it was poo :)

Baking Bread

At Keepers this month we learned how to make bread from scratch! Something I personally had no clue how to do but soooo wanted to learn. We got a great lesson about the nutrition of a wheat grain too. Did you know that most of the nutrients in a grain of wheat are in the found in the smallest portion of it?


See, the germ is only 5% of the whole kernal but it contains the most nutrients. There are 30 nutrients found in the germ, but when we buy wheat flour in the store it's been processed and only 4 of those nutrients remain (still good but not as good as fresh). Needless to say I'd love to get a wheat mill so I can grind (don't worry it's electric so it only takes minutes) my own fresh flour. The only catch is once you grind it you have to use it within 3 days so it doesn't spoil ;)
Oh, and that 85% Endosperm........that's where we get white flour :) and it has the least amount of those nutrients, especially when we bleach it.






So now that we had some education we went to the store and bought both whole wheat flour and bread flour (cause if you use ONLY the whole wheat it's a much more dense bread, but I want at least some of that so it's more healthy ;) and we got started on our bread :)








We made 2 batches so we could make a variety of things and Brianna wanted to give some as part of a gift to her cousin :) Oh yeah, and in the process of all this our washer flooded Micah's room, so as if the whole timing part of making bread wasn't enough we added a nice little monkey wrench into the whole thing! LOL

And without further ado.........here's a portion of our finished product!
The tin container is a heart shaped loaf tube :)
Now we can have sandwiches on our own freshly made bread!!

Playdough fun

Micah has finally gotten to the point of not just eating the play dough so the kids are getting more time in with it! He wakes up bright and early (between 6:30 and 7am) and starts asking to go outside or play play dough right away :) LOL. So here are the kiddos playing away.

Our Anniversary :)

Well Feb 27 was our 10yr anniversary! We got tickets to the Opera with my parents to see Hansel and Gretel :) My parents treated us to dinner at a very nice restaurant right next door to the theater where we had a great meal. Afterwards we walked over to the theater.....I think the flash made the lighter color in my makeup look more pale....... I mean I know I'm pale but not THAT pale! LOL


And this was the view from the balcony at the hotel we stayed at :) VERY nice.
It was a WONDERFUL anniversary and I'm looking forward to many more years with such an awesome husband.........who by the way had gotten me an awesome gift.......a GPS! No more getting lost or having to call for directions ;)