What To Do?

So we’re pretty much finished all of our school work for the year. Just a few more assignments and we’re done. The downside is that I am already hearing rumors of boredom. Why is it that they work so hard all year to get done and then complain three days into their vacation that there is nothing to do? And you know, complaining to your mom about nothing to do is never a good idea because she can always come up with some chores. 🙂

I need to keep my children busy but I want it to be fun too. After all, this is supposed to be their summer vacation, and they did work very hard all year on their school work. They deserve/need some downtime. So what are our plans?

First of all, there is our garden, of course. They’ve been having fun putting scraps in the compost and digging for worms to add to the compost bin. Soon there will be plants to water and weed – although with square foot gardening there aren’t a lot of weeds. The boys also have our lawn to mow and a neighbour’s lawn. They’d like to get more.

I found a programme online called “Around the World in 60 Days” . This is put out by www.thrivingfamily.ca. This takes you to 27 different countries over the summer with simple activities. It is a way to help my children learn their geography in a fun way and also to remind us to pray for others as we “visit” these countries. We will start in New Zealand and end in Canada. I’m looking forward to this. I like geography.

We are also going to do a photo scavenger hunt. Here is June’s list. I’m going to make individual folders on my computer for each child who wants to participate to store their pictures in. I’ve done something a little similiar to this before and enjoyed it. All my children like to take pictures so I think they will like this activity. The beauty of digital cameras – no film to worry about wasting.

We will also participate in our library’s summer reading club. Our children certainly don’t need to be encouraged to read, but they still enjoy joining in with the library’s programme.

Finally, I encourage my children to set 1-3 goals of what they hope to accomplish over the summer. Every day when we gather after breakfast to pray and read a chapter in Proverbs we discuss what their goal(s) for that day is. I want to encourage my children to start making a habit of purposefully striving towards a goal. In the past, we have “scheduled” our goals to help them get used to this. For instance, one day would be a spiritual goal (pray for someone, memorize a verse, etc), another day a physical goal (a certain number of repeats of an exercise or learning something new like jump roping), a mental goal (learn a new skill, write a story, etc), a social goal (write a letter, call a friend or relative, make a gift for someone). It’s always fun to hear what they hope to do. I make sure to include myself so they see me setting an example. Last summer several of them challenged themselves to see how long they could stay outside one day before retreating to the coolness of the house. Most of them made it to mid-afternoon. That was fun to watch.

So yes, I will try to keep them busy and away from boredom, but I will also make sure that they have downtime to unwind from school. When we start up again I want them to be excited about the new school year.

What will your children be doing this summer?

Walking

Today I needed to go to a couple of stores and the library, and I had to do it by myself! {gasp} No help from another adult or an older child with the toddler and baby! So, my husband dug our tandem stroller out of the back of the garage and off we went. Absolutely wonderful! I had totally forgotten how wonderful this set-up is. First of all, it’s a great workout. I’m pushing between 75 and 85 pounds between the children and the stroller. Secondly, with my toddler sitting in the front seat we don’t talk much so I’m just pushing and quietly thinking. Occasionally my little guy would call out “digger” or “truck”, but it doesn’t take much thought to agree with him and go on with my own thoughts. To have that time to just think without interruption was wonderful. I really need to plan on doing this more often.

The shopping wasn’t fun – couldn’t find exactly what I wanted and what I did go with just seemed overpriced (maybe I’m just too picky?). We stopped at the library midway to return something and for a nursing break. The baby was too distracted though so he nursed a little and then quit – at least it was enough to hold him until we got home. I normally don’t shop. My husband does it all – wonderful man that it he is he loves shopping. Today reminded me why I hate shopping so I’m so glad that the walk made up for the disappointment.

If you’re not one for walking you should try my mom’s idea for inspiration (not that she needs motivation herself – I think my love of walking is inherited from my mom). Every time she walks she clocks how far it was. She’s following Google Maps and “walking” to visit my sisters. So far she’s made it to my sister in Illinois. Now she’s on her way to my sister in Wyoming. Check out her blog where she talks about how she does this and how far she is.

On the garden front I still don’t have my veggies in yet. 😦 In my defense it has been cold and rainy quite a bit. However, my oldest son made a compost box for me. We followed this pattern. So I’ve been having fun putting scraps in it. The problem is I want to see it changing now, but this is one of those projects that’s going to take a while. He also made me another garden box which is approxiamately four feet square. Hopefully this week my plants will go in!

I know it’s been a week since my last post. Hopefully, next week I’ll get back to more posting. I hope you had a fruitful week too.

Starting Our Garden

This has been a cool, overcast and sometimes rainy week for us. It’s been so cool, in fact, that I was glad I hadn’t planted my garden yet. However, today seemed like a good day to get started. We didn’t plant anything today, but we cleared out our garden box and the plants that were overtaking it. I couldn’t believe how many weeds had started to take over. My oldest son chopped out numerous branches of a bush that was trying to take over that particular corner of our yard. We tossed weeds out of our garden box, and two of our middle children took our wagon around to the other side of the fence to gather up all the weeds and toss them in the deep bush in the ravine behind our house.

Then we set up our fence. Every summer we unroll a length of snow fence and attach it to stakes with tie wraps. We initially did this to protect our garden from the labrador we had. If any of you have ever owned a lab you know why our garden needed protecting. 🙂 We no longer have our dog, but we do have toddlers and little ones who don’t understand that plants grow best when you don’t dig around them.

Every year I struggle to come up with some way to create a simple “door” in the fence so I can get to the garden and my clothesline. I think I have something workable this year as you will see in the picture. I’ll let you know how it holds up over the summer.

Tomorrow my husband and oldest son are going to build another garden box for me. We’re also hoping to set up a compost pile. I really want to stop giving my compost scraps to the city and use them myself for my garden.

Sometime in the next few days we’ll be putting in our plants – tomatoes, zucchini, green beans, mint, carrots, pumpkin and I really want to try a watermelon again. I love square foot gardening, and I love the excitement our children have in planting, watering, watching and harvesting. Gardening really doesn’t feel like a chore, but that could be because space constraints keep our garden fairly small. We buy from local farmers to get the bulk of the vegetables we need for preserving in the fall.

I hope you had a good week and that if you have a garden it is going well.

a very sad “before” picture

my hockey stick “gate”

a close-up of the “latch”

a much improved “after” picture

Check One Off

Today I sewed a skirt for my youngest daughter which was one of my goals for this summer. A skirt for Rebekah was not one of my explicit goals. However, my husband recently decided one of his shirts was no longer wearable. I really struggle with throwing clothes away even when they are no longer any good to the person who owned them. So I started thinking, and I thought I could make a skirt out of this shirt.  When my girls were smaller I made summer nighties and dresses for them from my husband’s shirts. The fact that he is 6′ 7″ and has larger shirts helps. 🙂

It would work better if Rebekah was a little younger/smaller, but as you will see I made it work.

First, I cut off the sleeves.

Then I trimmed the shirt off  at just below the underarms and trimmed the bottom. I liked the idea of the buttons on the shirt running down the front of the skirt. As it turns out I was right – it’s cute.

Since I needed more length I made a casing for the elastic which I sewed to the top. Then I sewed a piece of fabric to the bottom to add length and to make it prettier.

This project cost me nothing because I had all of the materials. The fabric was something I had had in my stash for years. I always buy big spools of black and white thread so I have lots of that. The elastic was also something in my things.

My daughter is thrilled with her new skirt. I had a lot of fun with this one.

Victoria Day

On the Monday before May 25th Canadians celebrate “Victoria Day”. It is the unofficial beginning of summer; the day a lot of us plant our gardens (We didn’t today – hopefully this weekend). We set off fireworks, have barbecues and enjoy family. Check out this article for a history of Victoria Day – a uniquely Canadian holiday.

Who was Queen Victoria? She is the queen for whom the Victorian Era is named for her. During her long reign of over sixty-three and a half years the world changed a lot and became much smaller. Industry grew expotentially with so many new inventions that made life easier. People were on the move. Education and living standards were improved. Amazing scientific discoveries were made.England reached its zenith as a Christian nation. Scores of missionaries left England for all parts of the world.

It is said that Queen Victoria once said that “m”  was her favourite letter in the alphabet. Without the letter “m” the Bible would say that not any rich are saved. With the letter “m” it says that not many rich are saved. I have hopes that we will one day see Queen Victoria in heaven.

Pictures of Queen Victoria show her as a small woman but she certainly had a large influence on her country and the world. I am a “small” woman in this world, but through my children I can have a large influence on the world. A sobering thought. I pray often for wisdom and strength as I try to teach our children how to be a light in this dark world.

enjoying Victoria Day as a family

…We All Scream for Ice Cream

This has been a momentous week for our family. Our second oldest child became a teenager. He’s a wonderful boy. I love to watch him playing with his toddler and baby brothers…makes my heart melt. It has also been a wonderful week weather-wise. We’ve been enjoying hanging the laundry out, having our windows open, lots of walks and playing outside. The Vitamin D is great, right? We’re all sleeping better with all the fresh air.

Last year I started making homemade ice cream for our children’s birthdays. I was constantly searching for a way to do this without eggs and without an ice cream maker. Then several months ago we found an old-fashioned hand-crank ice cream maker at our local flea market. It’s a bit beat up but it does the job. I’ve finally found a recipe for ice cream that doesn’t use eggs. You can see the recipe here.  This is not a cheap recipe, but we only have ice cream on birthdays so we don’t mind spending a little more for these special occasions.

Noah has discovered that leftover homemade ice cream is much better than fresh so tonight he and his brother made the ice cream for his birthday party tomorrow night. It takes a good thirty minutes of cranking to get ice cream. It is soft serve style but after “curing” in the freezer for several hours it becomes harder. I didn’t think of it soon enough, but next time I will use unflavoured gelatin to try and thicken it a little more. One tweak I did make to the recipe was changing the sugar to honey. In order to make the honey mix properly we had to heat the honey with the cream and then cool it before we started cranking.

We’ve had a little taste of the ice cream tonight – you know, just to make sure it was okay. 😉 I’ll let you know next Friday how it tasted. Making our own ice cream is a lot of work but very satisfying. It’s great to know all the ingredients that are in our ice cream – all readable and all edible.

How was your week?

Healthy, Frugal AND Tasty!

You probably already know that beans are a frugal way to extend your grocery budget. Many people also know that they are healthy – they provide protein and fiber, are low on the glycemic index, improve disgestion to list just a few of their benefits. However, many people – especially children do not enjoy them.

We have been eating more beans lately for all of the above reasons. I was fairly skeptical at first but I am quickly becoming a believer in the tastiness and versatility of beans. I have found one way to make them more palatable to my children is if they are mashed. Recently I made white beans and mashed them up like potatoes, and they were a big hit. My children enjoy refried beans in tortillas. Of course, the cheese and sour cream probably doesn’t hurt either. 🙂

Tonight we had one of our new favourites – Black Bean and Quinoa Burgers. Basically you use cooked black beans and then mix them with whatever you would normally mix with meat for making burgers. We also add quinoa – about a quarter to half a cup for every two cups of beans. You can use canned beans, but I prefer to cook ours.

Cooking beans used to scare me. I thought I had to soak them overnight which is a bit too much pre-planning for me. I have learned that I can measure out what I need cover them with at least one to two inches of water and boil them. After they simmer for a couple of minutes I turn them off for an hour. Then I drain the water, add more and cook them until soft. I used to do it in my slow cooker, but it recently broke so I’ve found that I can cook them almost as easily on the stove.

These burgers are so delicious. My children love them especially when I pair them with homemade baked fries. We don’t often use hamburger buns. I consider them extra carbs we don’t necessarily need, but we have eaten them buns. They are every bit as good as their meaty cousins.

a yummy, child-approved suppe

As I try new bean recipes I’ll let you know how they go down with our children. What is your favourite way of fixing beans?

Reading Again

We love reading in our family.

So, I told you I was addicted to reading. Being a busy mom (what mom isn’t busy?), I look for ways to work reading into my day. My oldest daughter introduced me to a way I have used off and on over the last few months.

There is a website called DailyLit. They have taken thousands of books of every genre and broken them down into bite-size pieces. You set up an account and pick a book(s). They then email you a segment every day. You can have a short, medium or long selection.

So far I have read two books this way. Well, truthfully, I started Bleak House, but when I reached about the 80% mark I kept pushing the button to get the next segment right away. Then I started “North and South” by Elizabeth Gaskell. I only made it about 20% before I gave up and borrowed the book from the library. As an aside, Elizabeth Gaskell is becoming one of my favourite authors. I have quite a few of her books on my Kindle (that I got for free). She writes about all different social stratas in the Victorian era.

Anyway, I have enjoyed using this system. It helped me take a book – “Bleak House” – which seemed daunting and make it readable. I’m thinking about going for “War and Peace” next. I could never read this in time borrowing it from the library, but a portion a day even if it takes more than a year is doable. I just signed up. It will take me almost two years. The good news is is that if I want to read it faster I can ask for longer segments or keep clicking the “send next segment” button. I know that process well.

The shortest segment they send only takes about five minutes to read. Anyone can spare five minutes – even a busy mom. Check it out. I’m sure they will have something that would interest you.

A Hard Week

This has not been an exactly healthy week for our family. There has been some nasty stomach running the circuit of most of our children. It really hit two of our younger ones quite hard. It is so hard to see your children sad and sick and not be able to do much more than offer them comfort. We do have a “Sore Tummy Tea” that I made but it didn’t seem to help much. Thankfully everyone is better now and eating lots to make up for lost time. 🙂

On another note, I recently started studying about why we should have more gelatin in our diets. I have started to add it to my smoothies. Maybe someday soon I’ll write a post on this subject.

We’ve had much warmer weather recently so I’ve started taking walks again. Let me assure you that taking a walk with a twenty-pound baby in the sling is quite the workout! When my husband isn’t available to walk with me the children enjoy taking turns. It’s some nice one-on-one time with whoever comes with me. And let me just say that none of our children are ever at a loss for words. 🙂 We have some great conversations along the way. I always come home feeling refreshed emotionally and physically. Walking is one form of exercise that I really love.

How was your week?

My Summer Sewing List

Soon school will be over and I’ll have more time to do one of my favourite things – sew.

I thought I would put a list up of what I hope to accomplish before school starts up again. I’m hoping to accomplish two things by this. First, I LOVE lists to organize myself, and second, having it out there for everyone to see will keep me motivated to get these projects done. Some I’ve had in mind for quite a while. So without further ado here is my list in no special order…

quilts for my nieces in Illinois (you did NOT just read that Joy 🙂 )

a package of homemade gifts for my sister’s family in Wyoming – I’m really excited about the projects I’ve chosen for them

finish the quilt I have started for my oldest son

start a quilt for my second son

a jumper for my youngest daughter for Canada Day with some fun fabric I bought about a month ago

a skirt or two for my oldest daughter

a skirt for my middle daughter

a table runner for my dining room table

something for my mom for Mother’s Day and my dad for Father’s Day

a gift for a friend who is due with a baby in June

a StoryBook (this link will take you to my mom’s site for selling the Creative Memories software I will be using for this gift) for my brother-in-law who is graduating from the Army Reserves

boxers for my two little boys

a clothespin bag

From time to time I will update this list and tell you how I’m doing. I will also let you know how much each project costs me. I love to raid my stash for making gifts.

What are your plans for this summer?