There was Bach... and it was better

The second day of school went MUCH better than the first. The kids knew what to expect, the waffles were not black, the three-year old kept it together -for the most part, and all went smoothly.

We still finished quickly -- about an hour or so. We're starting with Bible and memory verses during breakfast, then on to handwriting for Annalivia and letter-learning for Daniel. Then math and reading practice for Annalivia followed by read-alouds for everyone. Right now math is simplified -- just practicing writing numbers; tomorrow I'll add the full program, which I hope will be a little interesting to Daniel, too, so I expect it will get a little longer. Once I become more familiar with our spelling program, I'll add it to the mix, too. And our read-alouds may get longer, too, though right now we are reading ahead due to popular demand, so it may not add much time. Art is in the afternoon. I'm hoping to add piano after Christmas.

I was kind of concerned by how quickly everything goes, but if Annalivia was going to kindergarten, she'd be there for about 3 hours and couldn't possibly be doing academics all of that time. Things will get a little more intense, I guess, but for now the schedule is nice and easy. If we start by 8ish, we are finishing up by 9:30 or so which means my niece, who comes to visit in the mornings, gets in on some read-alouds and then we are done.

I like it.

The first day of school

My facebook post of 11 a.m.

The first day of school involved a 2 am wakeup by the 1 yr old, a 25 minute cry by the 3 yr old upon waking, burned waffles and an early recess called by Mommy @ 9:15. Other than that, it was great! :)

Yeah. I had a sneaking suspicion that today was going to be a little tough. I'm blog-friends with enough homeschoolers to know that, behind the cute pictures of children studiously parsing Latin verbs or reciting the third chapter of Leviticus while holding hands, things can be a little rocky on the first day of the new routine.

Still. I will admit -- I might have let myself dream of clean children with smiling faces, gathered around the table, eagerly looking to the mater familias to spark their little imaginations and fuel their fledgling educational desires. And in this vision, there may have been some Bach cello partitas floating in the background. Maybe.

But, ummm, yeah... not so much. I tried to be in bed by 9:30. Got there about 10 and Dennis and I finally stopped talking about 10:45. Then my head started to hurt. Sinuses? I don't know. As I wrote on fb... Emmeliese was up in the middle of the night which is very rare (thank you, Jesus, for that). She was awake and fussy for about an hour and Dennis and I were groggy enough to not choose the simple thing and just change her diaper, feed her and put her back down and hence stretched the treatment out far too long. I set an alarm to get up before the kids, who usually sleep until about 7:30. But Annalivia was awake before 7 wanting her school dress to be buttoned up by her sleeping mother. Emmeliese woke up 10 minutes after that. As we all headed downstairs, Daniel started crying and maintained his wail for about 25 minutes. And he continued to lament off and on for the half-hour after that as he laid on the bathroom floor.

In what I regarded as a sign from God, Eggo waffles are on sale this week at our grocery store, so I got some chocolate chip waffles, which we never have, as a special treat. I burned the first few. And, turns out, the kids don't like treats like that. After finally getting edible chocolate chip waffles on the plates of three hungry kids, I heard, "Mommy, can I please have just regular waffles?"

Annalivia and I did Bible study and began learning our memory verse for the week while Daniel was on the bathroom floor. This greatly upset him when he came to the table. Annalivia had, meanwhile, moved on to handwriting. Then Daniel got upset that he didn't have handwriting practice to do. Finally, I got him dressed and sat on the couch and kissed him until he stopped fussing andn then we did our read-alouds for the day with all three kids leaning up against me. That actually worked well.

After that as we only had one more thing to do and I was loaded with realizations of what worked and what OBVIOUSLY did not and what I can do differently, so I called a recess, turned on Kipper and laid down on the couch. And moaned a little.

Oddly, I would say it really WAS a successful morning. We got everything done we needed to do and Annalivia was excited by everything and the execution of everything worked pretty much like I thought it would... with burned breakfast and crying preschoolers thrown in.

But, tomorrow WILL be better...

Another end-of-one-month-beginning-of-the-next update

:: We found out that the balance in the family is being righted. Our new little one is Peter John and he's doing very well, growing just fine, and not raising his momma's blood pressure at all.

:: Upon hearing the news, I immediately broke out my crochet hook. I started making him a green and brown striped blankie. And I had to buy some blue yarn the next day. HAD TO.

:: Good friends of my sister moved next door to us. The dad of the family is doing some work on the new house for us, which has been very helpful. The house is progressing in leaps and bounds. Dennis and my dad have been working their tails off. Right now, we have drywallers installing drywall on all the ceilings. A friend from church has just formed his own custom cabinetry shop, so we are hiring him to do the kitchen, for not much more than a kitchen from Menards. Then floors need to be sanded and painted or stained and walls need to be painted. Then the whole thing needs to be cleaned. Then we can move in! It's so exciting to see it finally coming together.

:: Far more exciting for Annalivia and Daniel than hired-help living right next door has been that the family has two children near their ages. They spend hours -- literally -- outside playing with them and by themselves hoping the neighbors will come out and join them. We had to do some basic neighbor education, including "no going into another person's house uninvited" ;) but they are getting the hang of it now. I think.

:: Annalivia has had a summer of dental appointments involving a silver crown and culminating in the same tooth being pulled. Poor bug. She got her first visit from the tooth fairy who paid extra for a silver tooth that had been pulled, unexpectedly. The $2.50 sort of made up for the trauma of the visit.

:: Daniel is very 3-years-old this summer. He is so much fun in so many ways, and also testing lots of limits/ learning not to be a baby anymore. It's a neat time. Most of the time.

:: Emmeliese went through a very fussy phase at the beginning of the summer and is now settling down into lots of sweetness. She likes to make us laugh and likes to play with her siblings, especially with whatever they are currently using to play. Her hair is full of curls in the back and constantly in her eyes in the front, since she always pulls out her rubberbands and I'm a lackadaisical mother who no longer cares about disciplining for those things.

:: I'm ready for fall. It's been bloody hot here this year. So far we've made it, but only thanks to air conditioning, ice cream and McDonald's smoothies. Bring on the 70 degree temps and sweaters. That's what I'm ready to experience.

Hope all is well with everyone out there!

Seven years later

Today, Dennis and I celebrated our 7th anniversary. We had a great day. Today is also my mom's birthday, so we started with breakfast there, then went to church. Church was great and my sister and Dennis' mom were with us, which was extra-nice. Afterwards, Dennis' mom brought the kids home and Dennis and I went out to Biaggi's for lunch. Then we took a little drive, ended up meandering around an antique mall, had some ice cream and headed home.

After church and during dinner, we had a great time talking about the next 7 years in light of the past 7 years. Our lives have been so, so, soooooo GOOD since we got married! And sooooo much better than what came before. It was lovely to spend some time thinking about what we can do to make the next 7 even more wonderful (knowing full well that the best laid plans of mice and men...).

During our discussion, we discovered that both of us heard the same thing from God in the space of about 12 hours at completely different locations, circumstances, etc. It was very cool, though a little uncomfortable, since what we heard was that it is time to get rid of some luxuries we've enjoyed. But knowing God gave us both the same thing, an answer we weren't seeking at all, to different questions, is just really awesome.

I'm so proud of my husband. Not only does he sacrifice every day all the time for us, not only does he love me, his wife, and his children wholeheartedly... he also is willing to humble himself to ask for guidance from God AND, best of all, actually follow the direction he receives, even when it's a little tough.

What a guy!

What a GIFT!

I do love him so...

FPU, VBS, RCBC, and AC (a summer update)

Time for an update, I suppose. My poor Wolfie can't sleep. :)

:: We have made it through most of June, thanks be to God. Last week was VBS at our church for 6 days and, oh my goodness, was it ever exhausting! Good, but exhausting.

:: Two Sundays ago, Dennis and I joined Rock Creek Bible Church, which we have been attending for the last year. Our pastor asked us to give our testimony before we reaffirmed our confession of faith and so we did. It was a very meaningful, moving experience for us. I've only ever joined a church when I was 12 years old. It was neat.

:: I'm teaching the junior high Sunday School class for the summer. I have loved, loved, loved being part of our adult Sunday School class, but felt like God was nudging me towards this. It has been wonderful so far! I have 15 kids who are intelligent, well-behaved, inquisitive and totally open to experiencing the Lord in their lives. It's very, very cool.

:: Dennis and I are taking Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class this summer at a church in Bloomington. It is a bit of a hike for us, but they offer free childcare, so we're in. :) It's been very good so far. We had read Dave's books, listened to his show, etc. before, but the videos and class discussion have been great. We're liking it.

:: The house is progressing. Slowly. Dennis was unable to work on it for about a month from mid-May to mid-June. Now we're at the point where we need to get it reappraised and get ready to move in. We have our geothermal/ heat/ ac guy coming to finish vents and run gas lines for us the week after next. Then we're having the kitchen, dining room, and all the ceilings in the house drywalled by actual professionals. I think my wondrous sister is going to come and prime the walls for us next week. And then we have to sand all the floors, put in the bathroom fixtures, mock-up a kitchen, and we can get it reappraised! That's not TOOOOOO much. In the grand scheme of things, I mean.

:: It has been raining, raining, raining all summer here. The kids have been inside far too much, watching far too many movies and being far too antsy. I've done absolutely no gardening. My grapevines and raspberries are being devoured by japanese beetles and there is a weed that is literally trying to pull down one of my apple trees. I need to get over to the new house and put in the rest of the trees/ bushes that are festering over there.

:: Our rental house does not have central AC so we use an aging window unit in the downstairs that occasionally just gives-up-the-ghost. But sometimes it works. So we stay cool with fans, clothes-optional days (for the kids!), and my constant refrain of "Make sure the back door is shut!". And sometimes we just get in the car which has cold air conditioning.

:: And finally -- baby is fine, I'm doing well -- tired, tired, tired. Kids are growing and changing and Dennis is making everything possible. All is well.

I'm going to try to write more often here. We'll see how that goes. Hope everyone is having a good summer!

Heroes

Yesterday I was listening to one of my favorite David Bowie recordings EVER. (Apologies to those of you who expect more out of me. I just love Mr. Bowie.) The kids decided to do some performing and grabbed their "guitars" -- a foam pirate sword and a giraffe thing from one of our sets of building blocks.

An extra effort

Blogging seems to be falling by the wayside once again these days. I think this is the case for two reasons -- 1.) I'm back on facebook (yes, I know, Amalee -- soon I'll be diseased) and 2.) I have this new little phone that has internet and I can do most everything I ever did on the computer in about half the time with it. The only thing I can't do is type very well on it with its teeny little keyboard. Hence, the lack of blog posts.

Apologies.

Anyway, by way of an update -- we are all doing well.

We started homeschool for Annalivia. Since the middle of the school year will be pretty interrupted with the baby in December, I decided to start now. After deliberations ad nauseum, I decided to go with Sonlight, and so far, am loving it because Daniel can be very involved in it and it just seems to fit our family fairly well. We're also using Math-U-See for beginning math and Hooked on Phonics for phonics, which I never thought I would use, but, for some reason, it has really clicked with Annalivia. And we're going to use A Reason for Handwriting, but I've decided to wait until fall to start it. We'll see how all of this goes and how I feel about everything when we take our big Christmas break.

Annalivia and Daniel have been stuck in the house quite a bit so far this spring/ early summer because we've been getting a lot of rain. I send them out to play whenever the ratio of bickering: play heads in the favor of the former. But usually, they're content to draw a lot and build things out of chairs and tables and such, and do lots of pretending together.

Emmeliese is awfully darn cute. She's also frustrated a lot of the time, in that pre-verbal-yet-definitely-has-an-opinion stage of childhood. She loves trucks, trains, and things-that-go. She loves to climb on things, and especially loves to stand on kiddie chairs which freaks her mother out. She has found that, by pushing little chairs up to the kitchen counter and sink or near a drawer, she can reach or get into all manner of fun, formerly-forbidden things. Then she howls with indignation when others dare move her. We have to keep a close eye on this one. :)

Dennis is working hard on the house and coming up with all sorts of innovative ways to do things. Dad has finished putting a skim coat of joint compound onto the plaster walls, save for one room, and is now working on sanding them. I, of course, just want to slap some paint on them, but I'm deferring to the wisdom of others who think the walls should be more finished than I.

And I am doing fine -- feeling fairly well, though totally exhausted in the mid-afternoon and a little green around the gills occasionally. And I'm really hungry for peanut butter, which is odd. But other than that, I'm having a fairly normal early pregnancy for me.

Anyway, that is pretty much our lives in a nutshell. I wanted to upload a video of the kids being rockstars, but I can't get YouTube to cooperate right now. I'll, perhaps, post it later.

Hope all is well with you and yours!

Art in the morning

My new phone makes video-uploading to YouTube a one-step operation. Today, I decided to film Little Miss Helpful trying to do artwork with her siblings. I wish I had kept recording. At the end Daniel said, "Emmeliese! For goodness' sake! NO! I mean 'For baddy's sake'!"

That Peter was sure smart...

Lately I've been finding so much wisdom in Peter's letters. I love how I can read or hear a Scripture over and over again and then, suddenly, it appears, as though brand new, before me! Bread of Life, indeed...

“Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care; serving as overseers—not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not greedy for money, but eager to serve; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away.” ~ 1 Peter 5:2-4

A different definition of "fruitful"

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post about the fruitful year I was planning to have beginning with the 35th celebration of my birth. I was thinking we'd plant a bunch of fruit trees, some fruit bushes... y'know... perhaps even go so far as to plant some tomatoes. That's what I was thinking...

This week, we found out that God has given us a special birthday gift that won't be delivered for 9 months (right in time to be a stellar Christmas present, too.)

Just a slightly different definition of "fruitful"...

Yeah, it has blown our minds, too. :)

Strawberry Jam without extra sugar

This weekend the kids and I made no-sugar-added Strawberry Freezer Jam. Oh. my. goodness, it is good! We made a special loaf of Honey Oatmeal Wheat bread and the combo is our go-to food for breakfast, lunch and snacks. Fresh strawberries smeared on toasted perfection... what's not to love?

Strawberry Freezer Jam

2 lbs strawberries

1 tube frozen white grape juice concentrate or apple juice concentrate

1 package no-sugar added pectin

2 envelopes plain gelatin

2 T-1/4 c. lemon juice

stevia

Heat juice concentrate to boiling and allow to simmer until reduced to approximately 1/2 cup. Set aside.

Hull and cut the strawberries (we cut ours in 1/2 inch pieces). Crush the strawberries to desired smoothness (we left big chunks). Allow the strawberries to sit for a while, or until a lot of juice has come out of them.

Put strawberries in large pan, then mix in juice concentrate and 2 T of lemon juice. Next add pectin and gelatin and mix until both are dissolved. Heat the pan over medium high heat, stirring frequently. The jam should boil hard and thicken (if it seems too thick, add a teeny bit of water or more lemon juice -- it is better to have it too thick than too runny). It will eventually begin to foam. When this happens, turn off the heat, skim the foam and continue to stir occasionally for a minute or two. Taste the jam (carefully!) and add stevia to taste (Start with 5-10 drops and mix well before re-tasting. Don't add so much that it is bitter. Stevia is not good when it is the first thing one tastes.).

Ladle warm jam into freezer containers and allow to cool before covering and putting in fridge or freezer. It should keep in the fridge for several weeks and the freezer for several months, though, trust me, you'll use it long before that.

Before eating, stir it a little to make it less jello-like. Ours is exactly like regular sugar-filled jam when stirred.

Enjoy (in copious amounts)!

And let me know if you try it!

Edited to add: I forgot the lemon juice! It's fixed now.

Breathtaking

Mommas... I entreat you. Read Ann's words here today.

The fruitful year

This year, at the beginning of May, I turn 35. I have decided to make it my "fruitful year" by embracing the gardening gene long latent within me and plant the bejeebers out of the yard of our new house.

Dennis gave me the go-ahead and so, for a pre-birthday gift, I ordered a significant load of fruits, including:

5 apple trees -- Honeycrisp, Goldrush, Pixie Crunch, Sundance, and Pristine.

2 cherry trees -- Montmorency and Sweet Stella

1 peach tree -- Contender

1 pear tree -- Honeysweet

10 raspberries -- Heritage (above)

3 Currants -- Red Lake

3 Cherry Bushes -- Nanking

2 Native Plums

2 Gooseberries -- Pixwell

2 Grape vines - Cayuga

...and a partridge for the pear tree. :)

Our yard is very large, and the trees are all semi-dwarfs, so they won't get too unmanageable. We cut down some inherited trees -- two pears and an apple -- that were unruly, old, and non-productive, so now we can have the fruit we want.

This weekend was spent digging holes. The raspberries, grape, pear and peach are in. Pristine is waiting in a trench against the garage for her sisters to be delivered. I expect to get an email notifying me of impending delivery soon. I'm eager to meet these ladies.

I'm excited. I think it's going to be a fruitful year. :)

What we've been doing lately

Collecting pebbles/ fish from side of the cellar door/ river


Doing Very Important Tasks with Daddy's hand truck

Building castles in the sky...and the sand

Watching the goings-on patiently...

...Or not so patiently

High-fashion digging

Helping Daddy...

... pants optional.

My new BFF

Keeping eyes open for the risen Christ

Post-Easter has always been a bit of a challenge for me. In pastoral ministry, the focused intention of Lent, Holy Week, and Easter was a gift, especially for a congregation that was, generally, rather purpose-less. After Easter, we had a "now what?" feeling, I think.

This is now my second Easter as a layperson and both Easters, I've been surprised to find that, come Monday morning, the same feeling settled upon our family. Dennis and I talked about how it almost seemed as though we had spent Lent, and especially Holy Week and Easter morning, really carefully shaping our family's devotional experiences only to have Easter pass away with the dawn of Monday morning and a 5 a.m. alarm clock call. The question remains -- now what?

This year, in the face of a bit of malaise, I was smart enough to go back to the Scriptures and read about what the disciples did post-Resurrection. It looks like they had returned to a "normal" pattern of life, to a certain extent. They went to work, ate and slept. But they also shared stories of Jesus. They met together, presumably to remember and perhaps, re-enact what they did with Jesus. And, most instructive to me, they were receptive to meeting the risen Christ wherever they were, even in the most seemingly mundane of settings.

So, this post-Easter, Dennis and I have decided we should do the same. We're back to the day-to-day activities, as per usual. But as we work, eat, sleep, etc., we're going to be intentional about remembering what Jesus did and we'll be trying hard to re-enact what he did, especially how he sacrificed himself. But most of all, we'll be trying to keep our eyes open, ready to meet with the risen Christ wherever we are.

Photo: Dan-o and Annalivia with our Easter cross

Easter photo attempt

We've yet to get a good photo on Easter. I don't think I ever made it into a photo this year. Oh well. Everyone knows what I look like.

This photo was taken outside church. It was incredibly windy, as you may be able to tell. Annalivia and Emmeliese are wearing dresses that Dennis' mom made. They were lovely and are large enough that they should be able to wear them for a good year.

Daniel was supposed to wear a little black Eton suit that I had him try on about a week before Easter. On Easter morning, he put it on and, I kid you not, it was a good 1/4-1/2 inch too short on the sleeves. He looked like he was wearing last year's suit (which it was). Luckily, I stockpile dress clothes for boys several sizes ahead when I find them in thrift stores or on clearance and we were able to put together an entirely different outfit in about 10 minutes. His shorts were a little long for his knee socks, but he looked very handsome and he was SO proud of his tie! ("Just like Daddy's!" he said.)

Since this is our first year at our new church, we left our traditional hats at home. Next year, perhaps.

My Lenten "sacrifice"

I gave up facebook for Lent. It was a fairly easy sacrifice, though I expected it to be more difficult than it actually was. I found that I really enjoyed the silence in my life and that, when I wasn't being filled with online interactions, I actually sought out real humans friendship. Amazing how that happens... :)

One of the best side effects of giving up facebook was that I tended to not think very negatively about a lot of people. I've realized that there really is virtue in our grandmothers' teaching, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." I realized as I thought about this during Lent that there are some key people in my life whom I really, greatly admire and one of the things I have always loved about these individuals is that they didn't share all of their opinions with all people. I don't know why the internet gives humans the permission to share things that normal, well-adjusted people wouldn't share in polite society, but it does. I don't need to share what I think about every subject all the time. I realized that it's a good practice to guard speech, in real life, and online, and that there are many subjects that really require relationship with others before most people are able to breech said subjects. Peggy Noonan, Eugene Peterson, and some others get a pass. Most of the rest of us should probably still our fingers when something pithy comes to mind.

During my facebook-fast, I also found that, honestly, I just didn't think about a lot of people I "saw" all the time on facebook. And what I discovered was that I didn't miss them. I don't mean that in a spiteful way. It's just that those people are not in my everyday thoughts. And I realized during Lent -- I don't think they're supposed to be. I think relationships are supposed to be at different levels of knowledge and intimacy.

So, I logged in to facebook again in the evening on Easter. I was on it for about 7 minutes. I read about some friends I hadn't thought about for 6 weeks or so. I looked at some pictures. Then I deactivated my account again. I just don't think it's a wise thing for me. And leaving it behind is not much of a sacrifice.

Love

Dennis by the garage at the house we rent

Christ is risen!

Where, O death, is now thy sting?

Alleluia!

He is risen, indeed!!

Photo: First light of Easter dawn on our resurrection cross