Friday Five: March Rambles

It's March already, and I realized last week that in spite of my good intentions, I haven't written anything here in quite some time.  I even updated the blog look for winter, then didn't finish any posts to go with the new theme (though I started two).  I do miss writing and rambling here, but I'll admit that other forms of social media have become my go-to for quick snippets and pics of everyday life.

BUT...this year I decided to take the season of Lent mostly off from social media.  I chose to make it not a *complete* fast (although I feel that sometime I should do that), because I am committed to participating in a faith study with my local moms' group on Facebook.  So my plan is to allow myself a little time to check in there on the weekends, and maybe a quick peek at Instagram.  In the meantime, I'm not including blogs or blogging in "social media," as that's not a place where I've struggled lately to maintain a balance.  While my main goal for the Lenten weeks is to spend time focusing on my family, doing some neglected housekeeping projects, and spending more time with my local friends (and doing some much-needed spiritual introspection), I also decided to make a goal of posting something here at least a few times, to scratch the writing itch and perhaps fire up my love of blogging again. 

So, since I never completed any New Year's posts, I decided to jump back in with a rambly, fun post instead.  We'll call it the Friday Five: March Rambles edition.

Ramble 1: So far, March hasn't felt at all like spring.  Although today...it's finally in the mid-30s with bright gorgeous sunshine!!!  The past weeks have been cold (think January cold!) and snowy.  We have ridiculous amounts of snow, and since we haven't had much warm weather to melt it, it just keeps piling up.  I have most of my winter decorations still up, because, well, it still seems appropriate.  But I'm feeling the urge to start putting out some springy stuff soon.  The coming week is supposed to be warmer, and I'm definitely looking forward to that!

Ramble 2: In addition to being a cold and snowy winter, it's also been a good winter for wildlife.  We've enjoyed watching a pileated woodpecker, numerous other birds at the feeder, a little white weasel with a black tip on its tail, a porcupine (which unfortunately died), and lots of deer.  Also a fox, and a barred owl, which even found its way into the chicken coop at one point, and surprised Josiah by flying out over his head when he went to do the morning chores.  (Amazingly it hadn't harmed any chickens...maybe it was just in there to catch mice?)  The deer have been very active this week and we counted 13+ in the backyard both yesterday and today.

And we saw the fox yesterday too, at the same time as some of the deer.

Ramble 3: I've been mulling over the beauty of community lately.  Ten years ago I was a stay-at-home mom of three little kids ages 5 and under, and I could count my local friends on one hand.  And I didn't have the chance to get together with those few friends very often, either.  We were commuting an hour away to church, and I hadn't had the chance to really build close friendships with many ladies there.  So much has changed in the past ten years and I'm incredibly grateful.  Seasons and friendships come and go, and some of the things that have changed have been hard, but in the process God has given me the gift of many more local friends.  Not only do I have people pouring into me, but I get  to (hopefully!) pour into others' lives, I have a local church now with a number of dear friends, I've been able to get to know other local moms through homeschooling, the library, moms' group, and even swim lessons.  Truly I'm amazed at the ways God brings new friends into our lives!  At the same time I'm also grateful for old friends, many of whom are not local to me, but still are a blessing to me as we're able to be connected in various ways across the miles.

Ramble 4: I am loving the preschool age with this little girl: 

This video is from back in the fall, but I still love it!!  Also, if you haven't checked out Mackenzie Koppa's podcast, The Same Page, I highly recommend it!  Ari memorized this scene from Romeo and Juliet just from listening the podcast every day for a few weeks.

I also love how she still says some words wrong.  A current favorite is "smallow," which is her word for swallow! 😂

Ramble 5: I've recently embarked on yet another weight-loss journey (it's about time, seeing as my baby is 4 years old...incidentally, the last time I lost significant weight, Josiah was my "baby" at the time, and also 4, so maybe that is the magic age for me??), and I've lost a little over 4 lbs in the past month.  I've been working out 5-6 days a week since the beginning of February, and another helpful tool for me has been the Lose It! app (free version).  I'm not getting super consumed with making sure my calories for each day are accurate, but it's been helpful to see where I might be overdoing things here and there, and trying to come in somewhere in the ballpark of their recommendation.  I also did a 40 day sugar fast back in Jan/Feb, and that helped a lot, as now I don't crave sugar quite so much and have been able to save it mostly for special occasions.

Okay, that wraps up today's post...we have a busy weekend ahead, but I hope to write more next week.  Till then... have a good weekend!😊

Long time no post!

Wow, it has been quite a while since I've posted anything...way back in March.  Crazy! 

Just this week I received a surprise package in the mail from a friend, and she mentioned that she misses my blog, and reading my goals...well, I miss blogging!  Honestly it's so hard to find even 15 minutes of quiet to sit down and write here, but I so hope I can pick it up again.  Maybe I need to start pulling some early morning "shifts" to write. :) 

I just updated my blog background because it seems that the Shabby Blogs site is down (or doesn't exist anymore?).  Bummer!  I really loved that "new" background that I found last summer.  This one is nice too, but not quite the same. 

Life carries on at a frantic pace (at times), but we are really having a lovely summer so far.  We've fit in a lot of fun things, even though Jim is busier than ever with work (we are thankful!).  Just this past week we hosted relatives from my side of the family and his, on two separate days, which was really fun.  Here are a few pictures from our time together:

{with my youngest cousin Andrew}

 {with Great-Grammy T.}

 {with Jim's cousin Troy and his family}

I've been thinking about trying to set myself some kind of blogging schedule, and maybe that will help me be consistent with posting again.  Maybe something like one day devoted to cooking/recipes, another day to natural living/health/wellness, another day to family updates...we'll see.  I know that not a lot of people still check in here very often since I'm such a sporadic blogger, but I do hope I can change that.  (I know I say that every time I start posting again...good intentions and all!)  Anyway.  We will see what I can do!  I hope that all of you who do still check in from time to time are having a good summer!

"The Pause that Refreshes"

I started a post back on February first...seriously, I did.  It was called "February Goals and Habits" and it was about 2 sentences long before I got distracted and never got back to it.  Arrrgggghhh!  WHY do I have such a hard time prioritizing blogging, which is something I enjoy?  Anyway, here's me, being determined to write at least one post this month, and since it's the last day of the month, this will be it. ;)

Years ago I read through the Mitford series and one line stayed with me... the mayor, in talking about the town of Mitford, commented that "Mitford would like to be the pause that refreshes."  I love that.  And I've been thinking I don't have enough of my own "pauses" in life!  This week, though, has been a bit of a pause, and I'm enjoying it.  Our schedule since last summer has been pretty jam-packed.  As the kids get older we have more activities than we used to...although we still have very few activities compared to most of our public school friends!  But one thing we have prioritized over the past year and a half is swim lessons for the three older kids.  Because they are in two different levels, we have lessons on both Mondays and Tuesdays.  This means a trip into town (15 minutes each way) twice a week, plus usually another trip at some point to do a full grocery shopping for the week.  Then every couple weeks or so I've been trying to take Ari to preschool storytime at the library, and/or moms' group which meets at a local church.  I feel like it's good to give her some social time with kids her own age, since she's the "caboose" in our family.  :)  These events fall in the middle or end of the week, plus we have prayer meeting/kids' club at church on Thursdays.  So, all that to say that most weeks, we are out of the house for something almost every day.  Again, not a busy schedule compared to many families...but busy, for us!  But it's a season, especially with the swim lessons, and we have wanted to keep them going with that as long as possible, since once you take a break it's really hard to get back in...they have a long waiting list.   Anyway, this week is school vacation here in NH, and this week (and last) have also been a break between swim sessions, so I've been thoroughly enjoying the extra staying-home time and it feels good to catch my breath a bit in this "pause."  I even menu-planned on paper for the first time in months!!  While we are still doing most of our schoolwork, we are taking a spontaneous break from our together read-aloud time in the mornings, which has actually felt really good.  It's everyone's favorite part of school (mine, too!), but sometimes it's nice to change things up and this has been the right week for that.  Jim's been home, we've been sugaring, and the weather has been so beautiful that we've wanted the kids to be outside playing and helping as much as possible.  Taking time off from a little bit of school has allowed for that, and it's been nice.

And now...off to bed for another pause that refreshes.  I hope to put up another post before the end of the week, about my goals/plans for March...let's see if this one actually happens!

Popping in...

The problem with setting goals (at least blogging goals) is that I feel super guilty when I don't meet them.  Yeah, like that little goal of posting here once a week...you know, the one that lasted for about 6 weeks, and then I didn't post anything from the beginning of March until now?  And then I feel like I'm so far "behind," and there are so many things I missed...Sam's birthday and our Ohio trip and VBS at church and, and, and... Then it's hard for me to jump in and just post SOMETHING!  But anyway, here I am...popping in to say hi to anyone who might still have my poor neglected blog in their newsfeed somewhere. :)  I'm not even going to recap the past few months right now, I'm just going to ramble a bit for a few minutes and see what happens.

It's chilly here today, in the low 60s.  This is pretty rare for July!  We've had a pretty rainy/cool summer so far, with just the occasional day or two of hot, muggy weather.  I can't say I mind the cooler weather, though it would be nice to see the sun a little bit more often. ;)

And I also want to know WHY summer goes by so crazy fast?!  June didn't seem too bad, but July is flying by like it's out of control.  I have/had so many things on my to-do list for this summer, and there are still lots of them I haven't had time to tackle yet.

I'm sure everyone is eager for some kid pics, so we'll start with Miss Ari:

 This girl cracks me up so much sometimes!  One day she was tired and decided to lie down on the couch with her...blender?!  I posted this on Facebook with the caption, "What? Doesn't every girl snuggle with her blender when she gets sleepy?"

Another day this happened while I was vacuuming...she actually took a pretty long nap like this! 

Ari is now 2 years and 8 months old.  (Just another example of how time goes by crazy fast.) Everybody tells you the days are long but the years are short, and it's all too true!  She is becoming such a big girl these days.  I had two goals for her for the summer: get her potty trained and get her weaned (yes, she was still nursing once a day...longest I've ever gone with any of the kids!).  Well, I'm happy to say we have tackled both and accomplished both, before the end of the summer!!!  Yay, Ari!!  Oh, she still has the occasional little oopsie in her undies, and I still put a diaper on her at nights, but she usually wakes up dry.  I'm so proud of her.  It feels so good to have her at a more independent stage, and it also feels SO GOOD to finally be getting a full night's sleep almost every night!!!

The big kids are all having a good summer too.  I had planned to keep them going with some schoolwork, but that lasted until almost the end of June and then we took a break.  It's all good...we'll just jump back in where we left off in a few subjects and start fresh in others.  They did their CAT (academic testing) the last week in June and that went pretty well.  It's nice to be taking a break from school for a bit, although I am already in planning mode and have that on my mind a lot.  I will have an 8th grader this coming year, which means high school is looming, and THAT makes me a bit nervous!!  Here are a few random pics from this summer:

I got my hair cut in June, and later that week I bought a flat iron to play around with.  It's been fun to straighten my hair on occasion, and I can also make curls with it!  I like playing with curls on Julia...so pretty! :)

 When we got back from Ohio in mid-May, the bugs had just come out and they were BAD.  Julia was not impressed!  One weekend we worked on the flower garden and got it looking beautiful for summer.  My bleeding hearts were gorgeous this year!

 A little collage from one Sunday in May.  I received the beautiful bouquet from my secret sister at church!  Also, this was my first time doing a bun in Ari's hair...she and Julia loved having matching hairstyles. :)

 We got new chicks after we got back from Ohio.  Ordered 18, they sent 20, and 1 died, so we ended up with 19.  We had them in the house for a couple weeks till they got too big and stinky, and the kids had fun with that!

 Julia and Josiah each ordered 4 chicks of their own (different breeds)...Julia brought some of hers in her room to snuggle a few times.  I think she wished they would stay little longer!  

 We had a lot of rain/flooding in our area the weekend of July 4th.  We dressed up for the holiday for church that Sunday and got a few pics in front of the flooded river.  Down there where the flagpole is, there is a little amphitheater where the college does outdoor plays sometimes, and it was pretty full of water.  The church kids had actually been playing games down by the flagpole at VBS the week before!

 Less shadowed pic, but the sun was in their eyes!

 Family selfie

With that I will stop for now, because I have a kitchen in great need of some attention!  I'll try to post again soon.  Oh, it's felt so good to sit down and chatter a bit!  I hope all of you are having a wonderful summer so far!!

Just a little chatter :)

Hello there, blogland!  I'm so bummed that I've missed two weeks of posting.  I have so many posts swirling in my head, but I just didn't make the time for writing anything the past couple of weeks.  Hopefully I'll have time to update a bit more this week.  I figured I would put up a quick post tonight since I'm waiting for Ari to settle down (she keeps getting up and needing to be put back to bed).

Yesterday we took a little trip south to visit the closest Bass Pro Shop to us.  Fun!  I was picturing it bigger, like a Cabela's, but it was smallish.  But still with lots of neat stuff to see.  Ari especially liked the big fish tank, and we had to keep going back there again and again to visit the fish. :) The other kids liked it too, and of course Sam and Jim had fun looking at guns!

 I took this picture of Ari napping sometime last week.  I STILL love watching her sleep...she is so cute anytime, but just so beautiful and peaceful when she's sleeping!!  I still adore her pointy elf ears, too. :)

 Last week I bought fabric!  Time to motivate myself to sew, after a long time away from it.  This print will become an Easter dress for Ari and matching skirts for Julia and me.  Can't wait to see how they turn out!  I'm happy Easter is later this year, so hopefully it'll actually feel a bit springy for a change!

 Ari's hair gets really crazy when she plays on the couch... Jim was able to capture a bit of the static in this pic.

 I've just completed day 3 of a Whole 30.  (More about that in a future post--coming soon!)  I've been buying a lot more veggies because of that.  This was some of my grocery haul last Friday...

 Josiah had fun decorating his punching balloon as a Bad Piggie. :) I love how Ari ended up in the picture, too!

 Not sure how well this next one will show up, but I thought it was cool.  We had friends over for supper last week, and Sam took this panoramic pic with Jim's phone.  It was interesting to see a wide shot of our living/kitchen area!

Well, I think Ari is finally down for good, so I will sign off for now and go get myself to bed.  Hopefully tomorrow I can post about Sam's birthday!  I hope you're all having a great week. :) 

Randomness

 I've been mulling over post ideas all day, but here we are at the end of the day and I decided to go with random. :)  Mainly because all the other things I want to post about require more brain power as well as more time!  So here are some pictures from the past few weeks, and a few links at the end.

Jim and I sneaked off for a half hour for a quick snowshoe in the woods one Saturday.  We need to do this more often!  He snapped a few pics on his phone.

 (I wish I'd put on a little makeup that day, I look sooo tired!)

 Ari needed something to do one day while the big kids were doing something together and didn't want company. ;)  So I put her to work "helping" with dishes.  I think we'll do this more often...she had fun and so did I (even though I ended up washing several things over and over, since she kept pulling stuff out of the drainer to play with!).  I can't get over how long her hair is getting and what a big girl she looks like in this pic!

 It's great when the kids pull out toys they haven't played with in a while and get creative.  Sam had fun with the Geo-mags!  First he made a hat...

 Julia wanted to try it too, and discovered it wasn't too comfortable. :D

After that, he continued building and ended up with a soccer ball!

Then there's Josiah...also creative, although he usually prefers paper crafts.  Like this. ;) 

 Jim came home with flowers for me one day, out of the blue.  I was so surprised!  Aren't they pretty?  A bright spot in these gray winter days, for sure!

 The local rink has been offering a homeschool skate time on Mondays.  We've gone twice, and the kids love it!  Since most of the local ponds aren't too great for skating this winter, I'm glad we still have an opportunity to skate, even though it costs a little bit.  I love love love this pic of the kids and a couple of their friends from last week!

And now for some linky fun:  

• Food love: I am working on getting back to menu planning, after the hustle and bustle of the holidays.  (I'm not doing well at it consistently, but I'm getting there.  I was in a good groove through the fall, but having trouble finding that groove again right now!)  Anyway, I am mostly all about simple meals right now and this Baked Gnocchi and Sausage hits the spot every time.  Yum!  Tonight I served it with homemade foccacia bread.
• Book love: The kids and I have been reading Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (we're studying China as part of our Sonlight curric. right now).  This is a perfect read-aloud in my opinion, because most of the chapters are super short.  Of course, the kids always beg for "one more chapter" because they're so riveted, but we're taking our time working through it.  It's a lovely story and incorporates many Chinese folk tales along the way, which is so much fun.  Love it!
• Pinterest love: this Valentine banner...I want to make one!  And I've also been looking at ideas for shared girls' rooms, dreaming about decorating our future addition.  There are so many cute and creative ideas out there!  I love this bookshelf and window seat.  I also think this room is lovely (apparently I have expensive tastes :D).  
• Movie love: We enjoy watching movies on Amazon Prime, and this week we did a 1-week free trial to the Starz channel on Amazon (so we could watch the new Star Wars movie).  We also found a few other movies to try... I really enjoyed Pixar's Inside Out (made me laugh and cry, which is pretty much how ALL Pixar movies are for me!), and then last night we watched Risen.  Totally different genre, but it's based on Jesus' death and resurrection, as seen through the eyes of a Roman soldier.  Some violence, so I wouldn't recommend it for younger kids, but it was (in my opinion) excellent and really brought the Bible to life.  

And that's all for today...hope everyone is having a great week so far!

January Ramblings

Well hello, blogging world!  Long time no post!  I've started out to write here several times over the past few months, and each time I got sidetracked before I had time to finish and actually post what I had written.  By the time I remembered and got back to it, the things I had written were no longer relevant in the context of the season.  It was (is!) a little frustrating to me that I am apparently so disorganized that I can't even get a thoughtful blog post written, and I've let 4 whole months go by with nary a word here in my little space.  I miss it.

So, one of my goals for 2017 is to post here once a week.  I'm going to try to actually carve out time for either a family-related post, random thoughts, something that's been a blessing to me, goals...or whatever comes to mind on that particular day.  I really love the fact that for over 10 years, I've kept a pretty decent record (at least up till more recent years) of our life here on our back road.  I just can't bear the thought of shutting down the blog or posting so infrequently, because I know one day I'll be kicking myself that there are such big gaps in our "history."  This is the only journal I keep at present, and looking back on memories here is such fun.  Maybe some weeks I'll manage to post more than once, but I figure if I can put up 52 posts a year, I'll be happy...and it'll be so much better than what I've done lately!

So here we go...some January ramblings.  (I do hope to put up another post in a few days with some pictures and thoughts from December, so I can record our Christmas memories and activities in one place, too.)

January Goals and my Word for the Year

It's been a very long time since I set specific goals for a year or even a month.  This year I honestly haven't had time yet to set many goals, but I did choose a few, as well as my "one word" for 2017.  I will start with that...my word is "Thrive."  I thought over several words such as "purpose" and "discipline" (both with the same idea, I guess) but then the word "thrive" came to me and I knew it was just right for this year.  You see, the past two years since Ari was born, I've pretty much felt like I was in survival mode.  I'm not blaming this completely on Miss Ari, and I hope it's abundantly clear on my blog and in real life, just how much of a blessing that little girl is to our family!!!  She's a sweet and precious gift from God, and we all can't imagine life without her now, even though she was not in *our* plans!  BUT...just being honest here...she's a lot of work.  She's our high-maintenance child, and it was definitely a change to go back to little sleep, working around naptimes, juggling school for older kids who still need a lot of Mom's time, paying bills, taking care of the home, etc.  We did a lot of "coasting" over the past two years and I let a lot of things go because a) I was so tired and b) I wasn't managing my time well (partly because of being so tired, partly because I'm a time-waster by nature...oh my, did I just admit that?!).  Anyway.  I know that some things need to change this year, and the word "thrive" hits the nail on the head for what I want my year to be like.  I want to thrive in the area of managing my home and taking care of my family, in my personal walk with God and prayer life, in my friendships with others, and in my health and fitness.  I want my kids to thrive too, in the rest of their school year.  This doesn't necessarily mean that I'll be going overboard trying to do "all the things" as I know that will just lead to burnout and more exhaustion...but it means that I'll be making a conscious effort to improve the way I manage my time (and theirs), determining what things to say yes or no to, and using tools that will strengthen me spiritually.  (More on those hopefully at a later date!)  I know that some of you can relate (and some MUCH more than I can, because you have larger families!) that it is so different to have both older kids and toddlers or babies.  In some ways it is easier...because the big kids can all take care of themselves for the most part, and they're a big help with the little one(s).  But in other ways, it makes Mom so much more stretched, I think.  I'm running the big kids around to activities (not a lot, but a few) while trying to make sure Ari still gets my time and attention (and naps), and homeschooling takes up a lot of our time.  It's so much different from when I was 34 and had a 6, 4, and 2 year old...at that point we only had one kid in school and it took maybe 2 hours start to finish.  I was doing things like baking all our bread, always keeping goodies on hand, etc. and now I find it hard to fit those extra things in.  (I know I need to train the big kids to help with the baking and stuff like that, but sometimes it seems impossible to even fit that in!  We will get there, I think...it just takes time.)

Boy, I really went on and on about that, didn't I?! :D  Thanks for listening to my rambles, whoever is still out there reading.  As for my other January goals, they are fairly simple:

• Read 2 books
• Lose 5 lbs (gotta get back to losing that baby weight, since my baby is actually a toddler now!!)
• Have a daily quiet time
• Blog 4 times
• Use my new planner daily (I got a Happy Planner--yay!  So far I LOVE it.)
• Drink 3 quarts of water daily
• Exercise 20 times

And I think that I'll wrap this post up so I can actually, you know, get it posted before I get distracted!! :)  Happy New Year everyone, and may you THRIVE this year too!

A winter Saturday daybook

Way past time for another update!!  I decided I'd like to try posting a daybook every now and then (I'd love to do it weekly, but no promises!  Maybe monthly?), after being inspired by Sarah's recent post at Amongst Lovely Things.  I used to do these via email with a dear friend a few years back, but got away from the habit.  But they're a fun way to post snippets of real life in a random-style update, so let's give it a try!

Outside my window: Snow.  And more snow.  (But it's not actually snowing at the moment...so far, anyway.  We're supposed to get some today and tonight, but it hasn't started yet.)  We are not buried in the white stuff like the folks in Massachusetts and southern/seacoast NH, but we do have plenty!  It's also been VERY cold.  This is the longest spell of consistently cold weather than I can remember in quite a few years.  I actually don't mind the winter weather that much . . . but give me another month, and I'll definitely be feeling some spring fever! :)

Around the house: I took some time off school this week to do a bit of cleaning up.  I didn't get near as far as I'd planned, but at least we made a start.  There were some problem areas that were driving me crazy, and I got the worst of the mess tackled.  Hoping to hit some bathrooms today!  At least my kitchen and entry areas are more under control now, the living room doesn't look bad (although still dusty), and our bedroom has been vacuumed and straightened.  We did the kids' rooms a few weeks back, and they're still looking fairly good at the moment.

In our homeschool: As mentioned, we took time off from school this week.  We skipped most of the kids' workbooks, but we caught up on our read-alouds, which felt really good!  We also received our first Magic School Bus science kit this week, so we did a few of the experiments in that.

 The kids seemed to really enjoy it!  (We subscribed to a year's worth of kits from an Educents sale.)  We also ordered two new Life of Fred math books from Educents (another sale!) and those came this week as well.  We started reading "Cats" yesterday . . . the kids were cracking up.  Fred is ALWAYS a hit around here!!

I am reading:  Lots of things.  But too many blog posts and articles, and not enough real books!  When I stopped to think about it, though, I realized I'm reading more books than I thought.  I just have a lot going at one time.  We have ongoing school read-alouds; we just finished Toliver's Secret, which we all loved!  I'm also reading On the Banks of Plum Creek to the kids.  They love it and always beg for just ONE more chapter!  For personal reading, I'm loving the Hearthland serial novel by Chautona Havig on my Kindle, and am a few chapters into The Antelope in the Living Room by Melanie Shankle (also on Kindle).  Hilarious!  In "real" books (vs. Kindle books), I'm slowly reading through Beyond All Dreams, my current review novel by Elizabeth Camden, and Caught Up in a Story, by Sarah Clarkson.  Yep, lots of books going at once, and it's nice to see that I'm actually reading a lot more than I realized!

Thankful for:  My hardworking husband.  He is working super long hours right now (58 last week, close to the same this week) and it is hard on him (and all of us) in some ways, but we know it is for a season, and we are thankful for a steady paycheck at this time of year!!  I'm thankful too for friends who take time to encourage me and pray for me.  Godly friends are a wonderful gift!

In the kitchen:  Still trying to work on eating "Trim Healthy Mama" style . . . making little steps of progress, but not completely sticking to it yet.  Trying to get more organized with menu planning again, and realizing the need to use my crockpot more!  Also thinking about doing a big freezer cooking day at some point, so evening meals will be easier.  Lately we haven't been eating till 6:30 or 7 pm, mostly due to my lack of having a good plan.

I am loving:  The "big kid stage" of my older kids.  There are parts of it that aren't so lovable of course, but overall they are such good helpers (yesterday they carried in ALL the groceries and helped me put away everything without being asked), and play really well together.  They can all dress and feed themselves, do their chores, help out with Ari . . . they are such a blessing.  There is still training to do, attitudes to deal with every day, problems that need to be sorted out now and then, but the good parts outweigh the harder times!

I am thinking about:  Changes I need and want to make in our homeschool.  I recently read Teaching from Rest, by Sarah Mackenzie, and it really gave me a lot to think about.  In fact, it was the breath of fresh air I needed right at the moment, and a wake-up call that I've been stressed out way too much about "getting all the things done" and doing too much "pushing through" instead of focusing on a love of learning.  It would take way too long to condense my thoughts on this (and I'm still sorting them out), so maybe I will do a separate post on that sometime.  Suffice it to say that this little ebook was really good, and I highly recommend it!

I am buying: LOTS of groceries these days.  Apparently kids eat more and more, the bigger they grow. Who knew?! ;)  Thankful for frequent sales on chicken breast!  Also, I just ordered this lovely scarf yesterday--thinking ahead to summer.  I love a good deal, and this is currently just $5.95 (with free shipping) from Cents of Style (using the coupon code SPRING).  I was going to get another print as well (coral chevron), but it was sold out by the time I got around to ordering.  Maybe I'll get one next time the sale comes around.

Some of my favorite things: Baby smiles.  Spontaneous lunch dates with my kiddos.  Movie dates with my man.  Watching The Great British Bake Off (baking competition) free on PBS and/or Youtube.  Warm fires on cold days.  Sleep.  Baby snuggles.  Reading out loud to the kids.  Visits with friends.

Good links around the web:  

• This post from Money Saving Mom.  Love her reminder to take time for ourselves as moms!
• This recipe for peanut butter chocolate chip mug cakes (THM friendly!) from All Day I Dream About Food.  I've made this multiple times and it is super yummy!
• This new Lent study at She Reads Truth.  While I don't actually observe Lent (I've always thought of it as a Catholic thing), I love the focus of this study--Returning, Repenting, Remembering--with the theme of "Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross" (which also happens to be one of my favorite hymns).  I'm trying to follow along with the daily Bible study and it's been a blessing so far!

And I think that's a long enough daybook for this time! Hope you've enjoyed this random peek into our lives! 

Aprons, Yogurt, and Other Randomness

Before I forget, I need to answer a couple of questions that have been asked!  First, Nikki asked what pattern I had used for the aprons I made last month, and I forgot to reply.  I figured it would be good to mention it in an actual post rather than a comment, since others might be interested too.  I just checked, and unfortunately that pattern appears to be out of print now. :(  However, I bet you could find it online somewhere, maybe Etsy or Ebay?  Here is a picture of it--the number is McCall's 5643.  And FYI, I adapt it a bit every time I make it--I basically make View A, but without the flap thingy on the top, and with the pocket for View B instead (except this time I changed up the pocket a little).  I also make it reversible.  So I buy two coordinating fabrics (2 yards of each) and use the second fabric for the main part of the lining.  It's kinda hard to explain, but basically everything is double sided--if the two fabrics are polka dots and checks, you'll have a polka dot and check fabric on each side.  If you end up sewing one of these, you can look back to my original pics if you need it to make more sense. :)

Also, Joey had mentioned that I should post a yogurt tutorial since I've been making it a lot lately!  Instead of that, I'll do the quicker and easier thing--point you to the original blog post with its own great tutorial!  It's found here on Trina Holden's blog.  I have made yogurt three times now (most recently with whole milk instead of 2%) and it has turned out great every time!  The kids love it and Jim eats it with granola nearly every day.  I think it is yummy as well, and I love to put it in smoothies.  

I updated Eating for Two last week and forgot to post about it here--I know some of you discovered it anyway, but just thought I would mention it for those who hadn't!  

Another link I wanted to mention . . . some of you may be familiar with the Fresh Modesty blog.  I stumbled upon it a while back and while the girl who writes it is a whole lot younger than me, I love her style and I especially love her denim skirts!  I think they are really flattering, and I have been eyeing her ebook with 2 skirt tutorials for quite a while now.  I still hope to get it eventually and make myself a skirt or two, plus it would be a handy resource for sewing for Julia as well!  Anyway, she has recently embarked on a new business venture called Fresh Apparel, where she will be offering her "Errand #17" skirt for sale (a limited number will be available at first).  She currently has a Kickstarter campaign going to raise the money for the first batch of skirts.  Now, these will not be cheap--but they WILL be made in USA, and well-made by the sounds of it!  So I wanted to throw out the info in case anyone would like to donate to her business.  (You can donate any amount of a dollar or more--but there are incentives for donating higher amounts.)  You can go here to read all about it!  The campaign is fully funded for the first round of skirts, but she would love to read her "stretch" goal for a second style, and there are three days left to do it.  

We are getting a lovely soaking rain tonight; we haven't had a good rain since we planted the garden over a week ago, so I am thankful!  We have a few small shoots coming up and our tomato plants all look pretty good, but hopefully the rain will help encourage things along a bit.  Everyone but me is in bed; Julia was singing along to the lullabies on the iPod a few minutes ago, and I am headed for dreamland soon myself.  Hope you are all having a great week!

Links, Pictures, and More

I gave myself permission to take some blogging time today. :)  First, I posted in my pregnancy blog for anyone who's interested . . . and now I'm going to chatter here for a little bit!

I'm making homemade yogurt today for the second time ever.  I made 3 quarts a couple weeks ago, and it was so easy, and came out great!  I used Trina Holden's recipe found here.  I'm also trying a new granola recipe.  I tried a molasses granola a few weeks ago which was pretty good (Jim and I both liked it, but the kids didn't), and then a friend shared a chocolate almond granola recipe which is what I'm making today.  It smells really yummy!  I actually didn't have any almonds on hand, so I threw in a bunch of coconut instead.  And I used coconut oil instead of canola, and substituted brown sugar for some of the honey to make it cheaper.  Granola and yogurt is a nice, fairly healthy breakfast or snack, and I used to make granola all the time, but got out of the habit in the past year or so.  I really need to get back to it!

Another thing I need to get back to is menu planning.  Can you believe I haven't menu planned consistently since mid-April?  Oops!  Now that I have more energy again and actually feel like cooking more often, I need to make a plan. :)

We had 3 new baby chicks hatch this week, so that was the big excitement around here!  Our Henny Penny is such a good mama.  This was her third time going broody, and her second successful hatch.  Last fall she hatched 6 chicks (only 5 survived).  This time she hatched 2 on Memorial Day, then the third egg hatched sometime between Tues. night and Weds. morning.  The babies are sooo cute, and we enjoy the fluffiness while it lasts (because it doesn't last long!!).  Here are a few pics.  No names yet, but I'm sure the kids will come up with some soon. :)

These are the first two hatched:

 Then after we moved them all to the little coop for extra protection, this little guy hatched:

Jim is finally done with the work on his truck!!  It's put back together, repainted, and it looks like we might even have a working air conditioner soon (which would be awesome, since we plan to drive it to Ohio later this summer)!  Anyway, Monday was the day he painted it.  Our garage is under our house, so I spent a lot of time outside so I wouldn't breathe in too many of those nasty fumes.  With the way the timing worked out, he was going to need to put the clear coat on around 3 am the next day . . . so we decided that the kids and I would sleep in the camper that night.  The kids slept great, but it was a short night because none of us went to sleep till after 10:30, and Sam woke up (and consequently woke the rest of us up, except Josiah) sometime between 4-5 am.  YAWN . . . But at least we weren't breathing in paint fumes. :)  And after the two older kids got up and out of the camper, I went back to sleep for a while . . . until I was awakened again by Jim and Julia sweetly delivering breakfast in bed!  Meanwhile, Josiah (our champion sleeper) kept snoozing till sometime between 7-8 am, I think.  By afternoon, the rest of us were pretty tired and Julia actually fell asleep on the couch . . . and we got everyone to bed early that night!

Last weekend was a busy one, too, as I was working on sewing reversible aprons for graduation gifts for two sisters, whose party was on Saturday.  Here's how they turned out (some of you long time readers might remember that I made aprons from the same pattern for gifts about 4 years ago, too)!  The only "problem" is that I have always made these for gifts, but so far haven't made any for me!  I think I need to change that this summer, since some of my old faithful aprons are starting to fall apart. :) 

The blue one is my favorite . . . 

 But I also love how bright and cheery the pink is!

Julia will be getting some cute new skirts out of the leftover fabric from these, too! :)

One more link before I go . . . I think I raved in my last post about the Read Aloud Revival podcast, a brand new one that I am loving!  Through that podcast and site, I heard about this summer reading program, Traveling Through the Pages, that I am thinking about having my kids do.  It looks like a lot of fun--I just need to get organized and think of some rewards/incentives I could use. :)  

Well, gotta run and put leftovers in the oven soon for supper . . . so happy I don't have to cook tonight. :)  Hope you are all having a great week!