Someone stop the world… June 25, 2008

…I wanna take a break!!

     Isn’t summer supposed to be the time of the year that things slow down and you can take it easy? 

     What happened to the lazy days of summer?  Yeesh!

     In addition to spending three days (or more) a week at the gym for Ms. Firecracker to prepare for Gymnastics Nationals, we also have VBS this week.  We love VBS.  The kids meet new people and make new friends.  They make crafts, learn new songs and just really enjoy learning about God and praising Him. 

     It is so awesome to watch the kids as they sing songs about God’s strength, mercy and goodness.  Despite all the busy-ness VBS is a very good week!

     On the homestead it has been a hard few months. 

     We have now lost all of our adult chickens.  It is driving me crazy!  They are not being picked off one at a time, here and there .  There are no carcasses to be found.  There are rarely feathers found.  It is not happening at night.  They are disappearing during the middle of the day.  There are 3-5 missing at a time.  I cannot find any tracks and whenever I have the game trail camera set up no chickens disappear those days!   So far I have ruled out possums, snakes and raccoons.  I have not smelled a fox in the area -ever.  We do not have any packs of dogs around here that I know of.  I have never known coyotes to hunt during the day and when they have shown up usually there is only one or maybe two chickens missing.    PS- this is also how we lost all of our ducks and most of our guineas. 

     Anyway, that leaves us with two adolescent chickens, 1 adult guinea, 1 adolescent guinea and 13 chicks.  Mr. Muscles and I have to sit down and come up with a plan.  A live trap is in the very near future.  Not that it would do any good with dogs or coyotes.  I will have to set the game trail camera up again. 

     It just makes me so mad.  All of our egg layers are gone and the adolescent chickens are 3-4 months away from laying eggs.  Geez, the chicks are just now 3 weeks old.  Enough whining, for now. 

     The kids and I have also been working our tushes off outside.   We have hauled 5 loads of dirt to backfill the retaining wall.  That is half of the loads that we need.  We have also built about half of the rock walls needed around the strawberries, grapes and blackberries.  I got a whole bunch of new flowers in the ground and even half of the first section of stone walkway laid out.   Oh, and I dug and built the new firepit.  We use it for roasting marshmellows and chilling around on the weekends.  

     See?  Busy but getting so much done!  I will get pictures up soon.  I would love to show ya’ll the progress we have made. 

I am off for now.  I have blogs to catch up my reading on. 

Have a blessed day!

~Rhen

My problem with coupons June 19, 2008

I don’t have a problem with coupons, per se but the title got your attention, right?   LOL

     Rather, I have a hard time implementing using them. 

     Cutting your grocery budget is a huge way of saving money.  To save money on groceries I menu plan, shop for two weeks of groceries at a time, use my store money-saving card, a few coupons and look for clearances. 

     I wish I could get more use out of coupons but it just doesn’t happen.  Very few of the products our family uses ever have coupons.  Usually the coupons are for disposable products, processed foods, foods filled with refined sugar, convenience foods and more generally unhealthy food. 

     Even with coupons, the individual serving snacks are more expensive that the big box or tub.   On the other side of coupons- so many of the name brands the coupons cover are still more expensive with the coupon than what I already buy and it is no better!

    As a part of our family’s commitment to be healthy, and raise healthy children, we not only are careful of what we put in our bodies but also what we put on ourselves.  Your body (and your child’s) is a sponge and it soaks up whatever chemicals bath products, lotions, make up, deoderant and such have in them.  This means we are very careful about what products we use.  Those products are bought at the local health food store with the exception of the Burt’s Bees products, which are sold at our local grocery store.  It is a very rare thing to find a coupon for organic products.  I am a member of a money saving club at our local health food store.  I save 5% off of each purchase and then 3 times a year there is a 15% off weekend but no coupons. 

     Recently I paid $2.50 for the Sunday newspaper to get the coupons out of it.  I was not even able to find enough usable coupons to cover the cost the newspaper. 

     So this leads me to a question I have for all of you.  Do you have a source of coupons that are for products that are healthy and eco-friendly?   Do you have any luck with coupons?  I would love to hear how the whole coupon thing works out for you. 

Have a blessed day,

~Rhen

    

Wordless Wednesday- Our camping trip June 18, 2008

Here are a few pics of our camping trip including the creek we played in and caught things out of. 

We had a blast!

Visit 5 Min for Mom for more Wordless Wednesdays!

 

This week’s agenda June 16, 2008

I am so proud that I have to share to something with you. 

I mowed the grass! 

An ordinary thing you say?  Ha!

     Over a year ago Mr. Muscles was mowing a path down by the creek and clearing some of the hollow.  When he had finished he started back up to the house.  He had only made it about 75 feet when the lawntractor ran out of gas.  Not a problem.  The ATV will easily pull it back up.  All was going well and he was almost to the top (we live in the mountains so this particular hillside is quite steep) when the rope contecting the lawntractor to the ATV broke.  For most of the trip back down the mountain the lawntractor just rolled backwards but about 20 feet in front of me, I was coming up the hillside, the thing diverted right and started fliping.  

     It was crazy looking!  The hood opened up and was bent, two of the tires were pulled off their rims and the poor thing looked bad.  Mr. Muscles did manage to get it all the way up to the house where we accessed the damage. 

     has been working on it ever since.   While it was working well enough to be used last summer I did not feel safe.  This year Mr. Muscles did an overhaul on it and now it is working like a champ again.

Our grass so high the kids could play Marco Polo and Hide and Seek in it! 

It is extremely satisfying to mow down grass that tall.  I laughed, out loud, the entire time I was mowing!

Everthing looks so much better.   It actually looks like someone lives here! 

     Mr. Muscles, the kids and I worked hard around here this past weekend and I hope to carry that momentum through the week despite our schedule.  LOL

     So, my to-do list is:

scrub and clean out the fridge

grocery shopping for the next two weeks

laundry (a little to make up after working outside so much)

finish the new fire pit

gather rocks for the rock walkway to the grilling deck

a load or three of dirt to fill in behind the retaining wall

weed and mulch the front gate gardens

weedeat

finish attaching the pasture fencing to the t-posts

finish ordering the rest of next year’s curriculum

oil all the wood furniture in the house

mulch the vegetable gardens

finish our study of the human body

help the kids to write down the last of their books for the summer reading program. 

 

I really hope I can get this list completed.  With the kids’ summer gymnastics schedule it is harder to get everything done before it gets too hot outside.   That afternoon heat is a little too much when you are trying to haul rocks around.

For this week’s menu:

Tuna Salad

Hamburgers w/ baked homemade cheesy fries and baked beans

BBQ chicken stew

Homemade pizza

Veggie night

Chicken fajitas w/ refried beans

Saturday night is our family night out.  No cooking, no cleaning and my tea glass is never empty. 

Looking for more menu ideas?  Visit Organizing Junkie! 

All of our meals are homemade and not out of a box.  If you are interested in any of the recipes I use just leave me a comment and I will post it with next week’s menu as well as email it to you.

Have a blessed week,

~Rhen

Roughin’ it! June 9, 2008

     I know I have been a little scarce ’round these parts for the past few days but, I have an excellent excuse.  I was camping!

     Mr. Muscles and I packed up our tribe and joined our good friends, Sherriff W and Teacher M (and their 2 kids), and went camping Friday, Saturday and Sunday. 

     We had such a blast.  We played in the creek and set out minnow traps.  We caught polywogs, spring lizards, minnows, crawdads and tadpoles.  We built a little dam with a spillway and then swam where the water pooled up. 

     We cooked over a fire and roasted marshmellows.  When the marshmellows were soft we put a Hershey’s Kiss in the middle.  The Kisses were dark chocolate and oh-so-good!! 

     The kids were tickled pink by the glo-sticks we brought for at night in the tents.  Sherriff W and I have decided to rename them a MUCH cooler name.  They will forever more be referred to as chem lights.  Isn’t that just the coolest name?!

     There are two parts to camping that are my favorites.  I really enjoy after the kids have laid down and are giggling away, we, the adults, get to sit around the fire talking, laughing and just enjoying adult conversations.  Teacher M and I tend to get a little goofy. 

     The other part I really enjoy is after I have woken up.  I never sleep-in while camping.  Mr. Muscles and I stoke the coals and get the fire going again.  While the coffee is percolating we snuggle and enjoy the quiet of the early morning.  There is a light mist hanging around the mountains.  The birds are busy flittering all around us.  And notice I used the word quiet.  Yes, guiet.  There is not too much of that around our house so I soak it up when I can.  LOL

     While those are my favorites I also like sleeping in a tent, cooking over a fire, playing games with the kids, exploring the woods and the whole camping experience in general.

     We arrived home Sunday evening and headed straight for the shower.  We both took one on Friday but we were truely roughing it.  No electricity, bathrooms or running water.   What we took is what we had.  After a shower and a short nap we unloaded everything from the van and trailer.  We had it all put away and cleaned up in no time. 

     We all went to bed a little early Sunday night but I can tell you that I would have enjoyed sleeping in the tent just one more night.

God Bless!

~Rhen

PS- I will post a few pictures as soon as I can. 

WFMW- killing boredom June 4, 2008

Shannon has given us the task of combating boredom.

My children have learned not to tell me, “I’m bored”.   There is always something to do.  Dusting, folding laundry, wiping the counters, sweeping, pulling weeds, making smaller rocks out of bigger rocks with a sewing needle…- I am just kidding on that last one.  :)  LOL 

But, there are other things we do that the kids (and Mr. Muscles and I) really enjoy:

1.  Play doh.  You can make your own and create whole worlds

2.  Painting.  By taking the painting outside it really helps keep down the mess.  The kids get inspired by what they see and get creative.

3.  State parks.  Most of the State Parks are free to go to.  Once there you can hike, identify different flora and fauna and meriweather.  Opps- ixnay the meriweather.  :)  You can print nature scavenger hunt lists off of the computer and then go on a scavenger hunt while there. 

4.  Making beads and figures from modeling clay.  You can let it air dry then paint them.  The beads can be made into jewelry while the figurines can be played with.

5.  Take a trip to a local farm and learn more about what they do there.

6.  Spend some time at the library.   Our library has a summer reading program our kids look forward to participating in.

7.  Put up a tent in the backyard.  The kids play in there for hours!

Those are just a few of the things that we do. 

What do you do with your kids to chase off boredom?

Visit Rocks in My Dryer for more ideas!

On the agenda this week! June 2, 2008

Don’t you just love the weekends when you tackle your to-do list and actually accomplish most of it?! 

This past weekend Mr. Muscles and I:

   hung 330 feet of fencing

   burned a large pile of debris

   organized the lower shed

   stacked the rest of the wood from the deck demo.

Mr. Muscles also:

   mowed the yard

   weedeated

   tightened the trim on the chicken house

   built a compost pile

   started the tune up of the lawntractor (new blades, greasing, oil, etc…)

And I was able to:

   put a bale of wheat straw in the chicken house

   restack and organize all the lumber, metal, fencing, etc. around the lower shed

   move the chicks to the chicken house

   do 4 loads of laundry

   get all the stuff in the compost pile

   get started digging out the new fire pit

   clean up the yard.

The whole homestead feels much better! 

This week we will be working on backfilling, finishing the fire pit, make a stone path to the deck, weeding the gardens, putting up strings for the beans to grow on and a few other things.

The kids will be helping, taking care their chores and working on finishing their books for the school year.  We homeschool almost year round.  The kids are now on summer schedule for dance and gymnastics.  That puts most of our gym time in the morning.  When we get home they will work on their books and such. 

I need to get out there with my camera and take a few pictures.  I am documenting all of our projects as we continue to improve and grow our homestead.  I like to go back and look at the pictures.  It is great to see just how far we have come. 

I am also going to fit my menu for the week in here.  Don’t you just love my sneakiness?  LOL

Turkey meatloaf (this tastes really good), black eyed peas, broccoli, sliced cucs and Greek salad.

Homemade pizza.  I will trying a new crust recipe I got from Joy.

Grilled BBQ Chicken, roasted corn and potato salad.

Hamburgers, coleslaw and baked beans.

Breakfast with turkey sausage, cheesy eggs and pancakes.

Beef tips with rice, green beans and sliced veggies.

One night will be our family night out.  It is one of my favorite nights.  No cooking and no cleaning!  LOL

For more great menus and dinner ideas visit Organizing Junkie.

Have a blessed day!

~Rhen

May’s giant tackle! June 2, 2008

 

May was designated for kid’s rooms in Organizing Junkie’s Monthly Round Up organizing challenge. 

I was totally thrilled.  I took on Ms. Lovebug (5) and Ms. Independent’s (3) room. 

They had two large buckets for their toys but it was just not working out.  Anytime they wanted to get a toy everything was dumped out in search of that toy.  What a mess!

Here is the room before:

As you can see, everything is out.  It was a huge daily chore to get everything picked back up again. 

Because they just chunked everything in the giant buckets that would often include clothing and shoes. 

This always became hardest on Sunday mornings as we hunted for the other shoe.  UGH!

Here is one of two shelves we bought the girls for organizing their toys.

As you can see, we have started the long process of sorting the toys.  They were sorted into three piles:  keep, give away and throw away. 

This shelf is Ms. Independent’s (3).  Ms. Lovebug (5) has one with tubs that are pastel colors.

Here is the room with the clothes put away, the toys done and the beds made.  Yes!

The new shelves make it much easier for the littles to keep their toys picked up.  They actually like knowing where all their toys are!

For more organized kids rooms visit Organizing Junkie.

Have a blessed day,

~Rhen

You know you are a homeschooler when… May 30, 2008

… dead critters equal a chance for an autopsy.  (We are not the only ones!)

Recently I offed a rooster.  Yep, struck him down in the prime of his life. 

Roosters are not allowed to puff up and run at me or my children.  To do so means death! 

My weapon of choice was a level.  I was working on fencing that day and had a 2 foot level in my hand at the time of his ill-fated bravado. 

I don’t think the girls (hens) were all that impressed anyway.

Mr. Muscled skinned him and then he and the kids performed an autopsy.  They identified all the organs, asked lots of questions and thought the whole thing was really cool. 

We have been studying the human body so seeing many of the same organs in the chicken, and on a much smaller scale, really helped them understand how things really look. 

Ever since then the kids have been begging me to off another chicken.  I can’t.  We have lost 8 in 2 weeks.  I am not sure what it is but the last 3 were taken during the day.  I have a game trail camera and a live trap that we will set up tomorrow.  Then we shall see what is killing our flock!

Have a blessed day,

~Rhen

Thursday Thirteen #22 May 29, 2008

My Thursday Thirteen is going to be all in pictures.  During our visit to family in Alabama we took a trip to the Montgomery Zoo.  Here are 13 critters we saw. 

1.

Is this one pregnant monkey or what?!

2. 

This boa was just cool looking. 

3. 

Here is the most adorable baby elephant ever!  I just love the black hairs that stand out all over his body.  LOL

4. 

Here is one of the baby Giraffes.  They seemed just as interested in the kids as the kids were in them.

5. 

I just love the look the Zebra is giving me.  Hahaha!

6. 

The white tiger was very intent on his cleaning.  He was not distracted by anything.  LOL

7. 

Here is the baby Rhino Rocky.  He is standing by his momma like he is in charge of something. 

8. 

This is a Maned Wolf.  They stink to high heaven.

9. 

This particular flamingo had such striking coloring with the darker pink looking like it was painted on.

10. 

This little guy is just barely bigger than a Chihuahua.

11. 

This big boy roared almost the whole time we were at the zoo.  His roar could be felt everywhere!

12. 

This Leopard was just feet away.  His teeth were huge and his eyes were so intense.

13. 

This picture looks fuzzy because I snapped it through the wire cage.  The wires are the lighter lines you see.  The Bald Eagle is still beautiful and very regal.

For more TT’s pop over to Thursdaythirteen.com

Have a blessed week,

~Rhen