Slice of Heaven

It's been a crazy winter!

2012-02-15T13:29:00.001-05:00

Like most people in the eastern US, our winter has been quite unusual as far as temperatures are concerned. The wood stove is roaring one day, and then we have to let it die the next, because we are chased out of our 80 degree house! Though I do not like warm temperatures in the winter, and prefer dreary, snowy, gray days, we have tried to make the most of the days as they are given to us.

An especially warm weekday trip to play frisbee golf...

Dennis taking advantage of a warm day off work!

And then just to prove that it is winter, but really only to tease, a smattering of snow just a couple of times. This particular snow, the kids went out and played in it as if there were 2 feet on the ground!

I have been able to take advantage of the time indoors to organize parts of the home that have been neglected lately. This hallway in particular houses several small bookshelves. They were literally over-run with books and piles. I added a warm lamp and some linens and the end of the hallway looks so much more inviting now!

And on a completely different note...Bay and Leah participated in our local homeschool science fair in January. Leah did a display about her favorite subject, "Cats". She had a great time and did a fabulous job researching each of the wild cats, taking notes, and organizing/decorating her display poster.

Bay did a display about the "Life Cycle of a Star". This also was his idea as anything involving space interests him. The concepts that he was trying to display were certainly at times quite complex, and he really only hit on the basics as far as the life of a star goes, but it was a great learning experience for him. I think the thing that he learned most was the importance of knowing your material and practicing beforehand....over and over and over!

Eric turns 13

2012-02-07T10:49:00.003-05:00

Eric turned 13 in January...officially

but he's been acting like he turned 13 quite some time ago! We have enjoyed seeing the many ways he has matured emotionally, physically and spiritually and academically over the past year.

Since this was a special year/number, Dennis took Eric and a friend snowboarding for a day as his present.

Eric commented that this was the best present he could ever ask for

We still had a small family celebration on his actual day...with special dinner (lasagna and red velvet cake for dessert)

Uncle Andy was here to celebrate too!

And to celebrate and remember how big our #1 boy is really getting, a few pictures from his past...

One of Eric's earliest and fondest memories from his childhood was when he was 3 and after an extended period of rain, I let him go out and play in the giant mud puddle that was our back yard.

When he turned 4 we had a really fun pirate party-games of walking the plank, treasure hunt-I had a lot of fun planning elaborate parties back then!

He started out on skis...here he is at age 7. He switched to snowboard I think when he was 10.

Eric at age 8

Skip a few years to 2011- Eric the 12 year old. What a difference just a year has made-he grew 4 inches over the past year!

Eric at 13...almost

Knitting and other projects

2012-01-31T13:39:00.000-05:00

I have actually done a large amount of knitting...since before Christmas, and some projects have lingered afterwards. I am finally getting into knitting what I started learning to knit for in the first place...SOCKS! Although before Christmas, I made several gifts, but neglected to take pictures of any except one...yikes. There were 2 scarves, a ruffled cowl, and a hat. One of the scarves is pictured below. They were all pretty much very quick knits-1 or 2 skeins on large needles.

I also practiced knitting my first pair of socks for myself, but have no picture to show. They turned out very well, and so I went on to making a pair for Leah. They are sized exactly so she doesn't have much room to grow, so next pair will have a little more wiggle room. I am using the book "Socks from the Toe Up" which I've read is the easiest way to knit socks-get the toe out of the way first. Anyways, there are many variations, and everyone in my family wants a pair, so I ordered lots of sock weight yarn from my favorite yarn store, Knit Picks.

Naturally, now I need a place to store my ever-growing stash of yarn. I though some fabric bins were in order. I found a great tutorial from Like Mother Like Daughter's blog, measured for size where I wanted the bins to fit, found some leftover matching material from my ottoman slipcover, and they were a breeze to stitch up. The hardest part was making the pattern (which really wasn't that hard).

I did learn a few things for future reference. When making large bins (mine are 11x 11 x 7) I need to use a stiff interfacing. The first one I made did not-only the batting as per the instructions, and it flopped completely down. So I machine quilted the sides vertically, which added SOME stiffness, but really it needed more as you can see. Still too floppy for me.

In the second one I sewed some super stiff interfacing to the lining before sewing together and it improved the stiffness quite a bit.

Either way, they hold my yarn quite well, and coordinate with my living room! I may make some in smaller sizes, which I expect will stand up a little better on their own.

Flying

2012-01-19T11:01:00.000-05:00

Recently, a family friend who has a private plane took us up for a ride. It was a fabulous hour flight! I have always loved flying-especially in little planes-you really appreciate the sensation of flying. Of course, it is important to be with a pilot whom you trust, and Terry is a most reliable and conscientious pilot! Bay and Leah had never been up in a small plane before, so they were understandably a little tenuous. Eric, however, had done this before, so he was prepared.

A little recap...

Bay: "Mr. A, what happens if something goes wrong?"

Mr. A: "Bay, in my many years of flying, nothing has ever gone wrong. But, that is a good question. If something does go wrong, you just pull that little handle and the door will open for you to get out."

Bay: "Why would I want to open the door? Wouldn't I just fall to my death from up in the air?"

Mr. A: "Okay, Eric, Let's go dive bomb that beach over there."

Meanwhile, we banked a big turn and felt a few G forces. I turned around and saw Leah with arms and legs outspread, holding on for dear life! She did not expect anything like that! She recovered well.

A couple of views of our house, creek and the family compound as we like to call it! You can see our shared garden, my parents tear drop driveway , house and big barn in the field as well. Ours is the brown house.

Our gracious and accomplished pilot!

Christmas Post

2012-01-04T16:22:00.000-05:00

I know this is a little out of order, however I am just now getting Christmas pictures organized. We had a fabulous Christmas break...the kids really enjoyed their time off from schoolwork, Dennis relaxed as much as he could (actually a couple of days he stayed in his pj's most of the day!), and I got LOTS of knitting done!

Leah makes little signs for herself and others all of the time-this one she made for herself to wear each morning. It says "Do not have sereal (cereal), Leah" For some reason she has decided she doesn't like cereal for breakfast, and so to make sure she doesn't forget her tastes have changed, she made a reminder to wear. Funny.

At first, the crew was a little tentative about changing up the morning routine to go to church on Christmas morning, but it worked out just fine and I think it really was a blessing to put the focus even more on Christ by going to worship him on Christmas Day. Usually we have our own time of worship as a family on Christmas morning anyways, but taking the bigger break to go worship with our church body was refreshing! The kids came out Christmas morning to a few presents under the tree.

I must comment on Bay's gift-the Build-a-Bear car. He and Leah are passionate about their Build-a-Bear animals. Bay has asked for this car for 2 years now. I found it on ebay for a fraction of the price in the store, and felt much better about getting it. He and Leah were so excited to have Pups and Spots (their dogs) get to ride around in the car. They also both asked for pajamas for their animals, and so I used scrap fabric to make the coordinating pj's...I guess I'd better get a picture of those up here too, eventually! This was the most exciting present for both of them. Fun to be able to get them what they want and make half of it at the same time!

Everyone got Christmas pajama pants of course....

Having Uncle Andy around the whole break was a special treat-he got lots of time in with everyone-working on a go-kart with Eric, playing nerf with the boys, target shooting at Dennis' brother's house, lots of help working on painting one of his boats.

Granni & Gramps (Gramps has on his knit hat from me)

Granni hoping her farmer's almanac is predicting snow here this winter!

Out with the Old...

2012-01-02T12:53:00.000-05:00

...in With the New!

It's a new year, and so time for a new mailbox of course!

Dennis really tried hard to relax over the Christmas break, and he did a wonderful job of doing just that. However, he couldn't let the time off go by without a little project in the wood shop. I think it's fabulous, and certainly was time to replace the other one which is old as our house! The old one is going to be re-purposed into a nice bird house!

Gingerbread House Fun

2011-12-20T22:56:00.000-05:00

The gingerbread making was a huge success....though it took me the better part of today to roll, cut and bake the pieces to make the houses for each child, it was so very worth it. They each commented many many times that decorating the houses was MUCH fun-even better than watching movies!

What was so cool to me was to see the individuality of each house-

Granni & Gramps came over to help and it was perfect to have one of them helping each of the little ones-we decorated the houses for about 3 hours, and nobody had any idea how much time had passed!

They are on display on my kitchen island at least until Christmas and they are so fun to look at and find all of the details as I study them! Enjoy the pictures...

I had the houses assembled about 1/2 hour before they started decorating so the icing could harden

The key to making it work without falling apart as you go is to use Royal Icing-it hardens very quickly and is very strong. They just piped it out of simple plastic decorator bags.

Busy hands at work...notice Leah is eating her candy scraps-she finished decorating first.

Bay's House: there's a bonfire out front with a fish roasting over the fire on a pretzel.

Eric's House: He took the longest..notice the pink rocking chair on the front lawn!

Leah's House: She put Christmas lights (jellybeans) along the front of the house.

It's Beginning to Look a lot like Christmas

2011-12-20T15:00:00.003-05:00

some Christmas happenings around here...

Bay and Leah after their Homeschool Christmas program

Enjoying a break from school and staying up late, sleeping in late, staying in our pj's way too long...

The crafting bug has hit our house-though I don't consider myself a big crafter, God has given me a lover of crafts in Leah, so I am learning to encourage her-Dennis is too-she even got him to do a craft with her this weekend!

Eric making a new star for our tree

Some of Leah's creations-mostly I require her to find crafts she can do on her own, such as making these bows....

but occasionally she convinces me to do one with her, like help her sew this stocking. She drew and cut out all of the applique, I just stitched them on.

The product of her crafting with dad

One of the activities all of the kids really wanted to do this advent was make real Gingerbread Houses-Eric got a cool book from the library for inspiration and the stockpile of goodies awaits.

The house smells delicious-I mean our house-the gingerbread cooking for the little houses.

Eric's finished star-3D popsicle stick art-fun with the hot glue gun

Bay wanted to get in on the hot glue gun action too, so he made a stable for the mud doll nativity set

Amazing what a can of paint can do!

2011-10-23T21:42:00.002-04:00

By some amazing stroke of luck I remembered to take some "before" pictures before I did the painting!

Leah's bathroom is one of the 2 remaining rooms that hasn't been touched by paint since we moved in, now 6 years ago!

So I've been debating what to do with that pink tile! Certainly not the color I would choose, but I had to work with it and get rid of the off-white eggshell color on the walls that was standard throughout the whole house, trim and all. Plus, I really didn't like the oak cabinet under the sink. What I forgot to take a picture of was the HUGE medicine cabinet on the wall over the sink. 3 mirrored doors, dressing room style lights above-it just had to go. So we ripped it off the wall and got to work.

Gray paint, white trim, and a few accents that I had picked up over a year ago at the thrift store (pictures, lamp), clean tile grout and what a transformation!

All that's left is for Dennis to make a frame around a mirror and put a new vanity light up.

She's a very happy girl to have her bathroom back!

Fall Hike

2011-10-22T20:12:00.001-04:00

This afternoon we went for a wonderful fall hike with some friends at Calvert Cliffs State Park. The trail was an easy walk-about 2 miles-down to a beach on the Chesapeake Bay.

The kids had a blast all the way down the trail, running ahead, hiding behind trees, and then jumping out when we approached howling like a bunch of Indians! They also loved seeing all of the places where beavers had dammed up the creek. Evidently the park rangers have a full time job clearing parts of the dams away to keep the trail from being flooded!

Once we got to the beach the kids spread out, looking for shells, fossils and shark's teeth.

Someone had built a make-shift bridge over the inlet where the creek water was rushing out into the Bay. Here's Bay next to the Bay! We love saying that!

Tall grasses, sand and driftwood made a great place for a temporary fort. It was amazing to see the gang of kids play and run hard the entire afternoon. Even being wet and cold, they still ran and chased the entire 2 miles of trail back, and then played on the playground for another 1/2 hour. I think the fall weather really energized them- I know it does me!

Also, a little school project in this post from this week. Bay and Leah are studying land animals this year. One project was to look at tracks. So we went down to the beach where we see tracks all of the time. We took plaster of paris and poured it into the best defined ones we saw. They turned out amazingly well!

This day we found raccoon (on the left), house cats (on the right), as well as some type of bird. We think it was a crow print, based on our animal tracks book.

Camping...Finally!

2011-10-19T14:30:00.000-04:00

We finally managed to steal away for a weekend to a place not far from home-Cedarville State Forest. The weather was perfect fall weather.

Mostly, it was about doing a lot of nothing...campfire, hot coffee for the grown-ups, hot chocolate for the kids...sitting by the fire and catching up on reading...there was a little mountain biking done by the big boys though!

Cooking dinner over the fire (see Dennis' new/old hot dog cooker he got for his birthday? It was intended for the Ohiopyle trip, but now is the first time he's gotten to use it!) We love the hamburger cookers too-2 is not quite enough.

Even Elsa came along this time. There was plenty of room for her to roam on her long leash, and we found a nice big field by the playground for her to have some time running off the leash as well.

Bay and Leah always bring quite an assortment of toys, animals and such to create a miniature city outside. They really get into their imaginative play!

We also had a belated birthday cake for Dennis, since he didn't have one on his birthday. We stretched it out to last the whole weekend!

One afternoon we went to a local fall festival (which was really disappointing) but the kids did enjoy painting some medieval swords and shields. However they were dismayed to find out that their hard work and creativity was only going to be put on display...they couldn't bring them home! Oh well-sounds like a fun project for us to do at home anyways!

2011-10-10T15:47:00.001-04:00

Smiling is over-rated anyways

Eric-my handsome and stoic 12 year old tries to convince me of this often

Especially when asked to stand still and get your picture taken. it's really just not worth it. See that fierce determination? He is a strong boy-inside and out-one of his better qualities. it may challenge me at times (many times), but I hold him in prayer that God will use this strength for his glory

Oh yes, strength, and also determination. He is determined to grow so quickly into a man-but he has so much childhood left. So much time for laughing, and forgetting about being serious and cool. He just doesn't realize that I am also fiercely determined to remind him of that!

I think he's breaking-he tries so hard, but the light in his eyes gives him away.

Don't look at me, Eric, or you will lose the serious face contest, because you know

smiling may be over-rated but it's always worth it in the end!

Pumpkins!

2011-10-10T15:35:00.002-04:00

Pumpkins!

Granni took the kids on their annual pumpkin picking trip to a farmer who lives very close to us. I just went along as official photographer since it was such a beautiful day. My instructions were clear to let this still be a special Granni/grandkids time-I was just the fly in the cornstalks!

The new siding on the big red barn was perfect for a backdrop-

Leah looking adorable

Leah has been practicing her sideways glances and funny looks on her dad lately-she gave me plenty today as well.

Bay-always ready to give a smile, and then a big hug after I took so many pictures, just because that's how he is!

Eric really is quite a bit taller than Granni, but not THAT much! I can't tell if she's leaning on him for support or what? Anyways, it's the captured smile on Eric that is priceless in this picture. More on that later....

Circles

2011-10-07T08:55:00.000-04:00

Circles

At the middle school youth group meeting on Monday night, theyouth pastor talked about our knowledge of God being likened to a wideningcircle. Imagine that everything that you know about God fits inside a circle. Everythingthat we don’t know is outside of that circle. Over time as we get older andgrow in wisdom, experience more and learn more about God, what happens to ourcircle? Of course, it grows larger. But what happens outside of our circle-whathappens to what we don’t know about God-what we don’t understand and can’tcomprehend? Why, as our circle grows larger, the outside also grows larger, notsmaller. It is a humbling thing to come to the point in life where I realizethat, in fact, the more I learn about God and life means that the more Irealize how much I don’t actually know, and how vast and limitless He is. Ihave been so naïve fooling myself into thinking that God fits inside a circle,and as my circle expands, his gets smaller. How tiny and immature I have beenin my thinking. I can only pray that God continues to humble me with faith and knowledgeof him that serves to increase Him and diminishes me.

2011-10-05T09:20:00.004-04:00

Irene and other stories

I realize that I have been very absent from the blogosphere lately-life otherwise seems to have consumed us, but in good ways.

This, our generator, kept us operating at home for 5 days without power during and after Hurricane Irene. We did not have significant damage, but did have numerous trees down.

Notice the nice little shed Dennis built to keep the generator in. It doesn't look quite as nice now-on the first day he ran the generator, it vibrated itself too close to the shed and the exhaust caught the shed on fire! Thankfully, my mom's keen eyes spotted smoke and the fire was quickly extinguished, but the shed now has a nice large black hole! Lesson learned: secure the generator during use so it doesn't move around!

Our very large Bradford Pear tree with the nice cedar bench around it did not make it through the storm. I'm sure the bench will be rebuilt at some point.

I rescued our sunflower heads from the garden before the storm, and gathered all of the seeds out of them. In order to save the seeds for bird food, I roasted them in the oven at a low temperature. I'm sure the birds will enjoy the black oil sunflower seeds this winter!

Our basement suffered a bit of water seepage...Eric's room got the worst of it, and so the carpet had to be pulled and dried. Nothing a bit of steam cleaning and lots of fans couldn't take care of!

After Hurricane Irene was gone, we had a brief respite from the rain to celebrate Dennis' birthday. This year, the Blue Angels came and we went out for a sail on the grandparent's boat to watch. We all agree that watching from the boat is the way to watch the Blue's!

Our Labor Day Weekend was scheduled to end with our annual camping trip to Ohiopyle. Unfortuantely, rain was in the forecast for the entire week. Undaunted, we decided to go anyways, hoping for the best. We arrived, set up in the rain, spent the night listening to pouring rain, woke up to rain and read forecasts calling for 100 percent chance of rain all week as well as flood warnings. Both us and the family with us decided it was not a good use of vacation time, so we wimped out, packed up, and left.

It turned out to be a good decision-there was heavy flooding in the area, as well as the danger of trees falling within the campground-so we are sorry we missed our big trip this year, but glad of our decision.

2011-08-25T09:36:00.004-04:00

Getting Ready

Last week I embarked on my annual "dump out the contents of the school room and put it all back together" spree. Dennis asked me if I really thought I could rearrange it all ANOTHER way? Really? Of course!

So the major changes from last year are: de-cluttering the walls, moving Bay and Leah into a couple of old-fashioned school desks, and getting rid of the large table from the room. It really opened up the room and feels much more spacious!

Leah has been in her desk every day, looking through her books and I think she is the most enthusiastic about school starting on Monday!

We enjoyed a visit from Uncle Kevin. I am always amused at how our kids are all over their aunts and uncles like flies on flypaper whenever they come to visit. I hope that all of the aunts and uncles feel very loved when they come to see us-they certainly are!

There have been lots of fishing trips lately since Gramps has had more time. Eric went out with him this week and they had a blast. They caught 3 rockfish, 4 spanish mackerel and 4 blues. We'll eat all but the blues-those go to the crabs and then we'll eat the crabs once they have fattened up!

The happy fishermen-always a good day when you come home with this many fish!

2011-08-15T10:09:00.009-04:00

Summer Recap

I know that I have been absent from blog world all summer...it's just that we've spent more time doing all of these things than writing about it! It really has been action packed around here for the past 10 weeks-but lots of fun and tons of memories!

The kids all swim on a summer league team and it was fun to see improvements in all of them this year.

The kitchen pantry cabinet doors are covered with their ribbons from swim meets. Bay is in the picture above, getting ready for the "clothing relay" at the fun, Carnival Meet.

Poor Bay is always cold...even when it's 90 degrees out! I guess it makes him swim faster so he can get to his towel!

A little project that had to be done to control water flow out back...still a work in progress

We took a week-long sailing trip with Heather's parents over the 4th of July.

The weather did not cooperate as much this year as it did last year. We only had one day where there was enough wind to actually sail.

But we did pull anchor each night and go to different locations to do lots of swimming

more swimming

a couple of nights in a marina to enjoy some night-time air conditioning

and exploring on the dinghy

We also enjoyed a visit from some of Dennis' family.

Andy came by with his gas powered R/C car to tease Elsa and give her a workout chasing it around the yard

Dennis, the boys, brother Johnny, brother Mike and not pictured, Mike's wife, Debbie, Aunt Kathy & Uncle Fred, cousin Debbie & her 2 kids came for a cookout and pool party. Johnny also stayed to enjoy some of our kids' swimming events.

Most recently we enjoyed a visit from an old friend, Amy! What a wonderful treat it was to see her again and also to see her kids. Her mom and dad were along on the trip too, and it was fun to get to know them. The kids had not seen each other since our oldest 2 were 5 years old, and despite not remembering each other, they all really hit it off like old buddies.

We went to D.C. with them one day and had a great time, despite a little rain. Bay and Gavin spent the whole time wrestling every where we went. I wonder who had the advantage?

The big boys, Aiden, Eric & Jack enjoyed a little bit of freedom on the metro and within the museums.

Leah and Olivia on the metro

Dennis won some tickets to our local minor league baseball game, and since it was during the work day, Gramps went with Heather and the kids. It is a great family activity-and during the day, almost empty! Bay enjoyed unlimited climbs on the rock wall.

Leah made a little "Go Blue Crabs" sign for her stuffed animal kitty to hold up!

There has been lots of rockfish catching this summer too! Eric and Gramps went out one morning and had great success-lots of delicious fish tacos in our future!

Of course this brief blog post does not even do our summer justice, but hopefully it will get me back in the habit of posting and will give you a glimpse of what we have been up to.

2011-06-03T15:23:00.005-04:00

Flying Free

I've been considering lately how it is sometimes hard as parents to let our children fly on their own.

I personally struggle with control: wanting to protect them from the natural consequences of their mistakes and so I try to control their behavior.

I know that sometimes they must fail in order to learn-and sometimes those lessons are harder than others-but for me to step back and let those things go without the lecture-that, for me, is giving up some of my control.

What is even scarier is that I am sometimes afraid of myself...will I withhold my love to prove a point? Will I treat them with contempt when they mess up? It is so hard to love them unconditionally and watch them make mistakes, mistakes that even let me down.

But Jesus then reminds me of my sin, my failures, and reminds me that he loves me-accepts me-unconditionally. So I know it can be done.

I experience his grace when I take my eyes off others and examine myself and then turn to him.

And that brings me joy and freedom to do the same for my children.

So, as we went out to fly kites yesterday (a long awaited promise finally kept)

I forced myself to step back and let go

To let them take the line and run with it

And despite many steps and mis-steps, pretty soon they were flying free.
I am so thankful for the tangible lessons God gives me to remind me of his unfathomabe love.

2011-05-28T22:29:00.002-04:00

Just a Peek...

just offering up a small peek of what we've been up to this beautiful Memorial Day Weekend so far

mechanic in training...he changed out the voltage regulator on Dennis' motorcycle, changed the oil in my van, and added air to the tires
pool is finally up and swimmable...lots of that 'been goin' on!

a homemade water slide cooled them off till the pool was ready...they're still loving it

seafood feast...frogmore stew, rolls, lemonade, and if you look closely enough, a dozen crabs-

Breakfast and dinner on the deck all weekend...you can tell summer is on its way!

2011-05-19T09:16:00.002-04:00

{pretty, happy, funny, real}
Today's post is again inspired by "Like Mother Like Daughter".

There are always projects going on at our house, particularly in the spring. The garden, flowerbeds, kitchen, house and even the sewing machine have been busy. But that does not mean we haven't had time for fun either!

{Pretty}

This spanish wall planter has been hanging empty on my brick wall for over a year now. I finally planted a trailing flower in it and it catches my eye every time I step outside our front door! Much prettier with something growing...we'll see if it stays alive all summer. I am horrible at keeping things watered in planters!

{Funny}

Eric had a friend over last week to go fishing in the morning. Fishing didn't last long, but an ensuing canoe ride turned water and mud fight soon followed! The boys were covered in stinky creek mud, but it was certainly funny to watch and they had a fabulous time!

{Happy}

I'm not real big on posting pictures of myself, but here goes...I have gotten two separate things sewn for myself lately, and that makes me very happy. I found two really versatile patterns, and I plan on making a few more of each of these with little variations. The first top is Butterick B5345, and the bottom dress is McCalls M5893. I used repurposed fabric for the purple dress-
that was a fun challenge!

{Real}

Many years ago as our first housewarming gift, my parents gave us a pair of these rocking chairs from Cracker Barrel. We used to love to sit on our porch and rock in them. Since moving, they have been neglected and relegated to the back patio, where the weather has taken a toll on them. When we built the deck out front, they came to mind as the perfect thing to sit on out there. Why is this real? Because it was a real lot of work! So I pulled them out of hiding, sanded them down....

....covered the seat and backs with paper and went to town. First a coat or two of primer....

....then the final coats. They look so much better and it always is such a joy to fix up something that was once loved and now is like having new chairs all over again!

2011-05-17T10:40:00.003-04:00

Camping Season has started!

We enjoyed our first camping trip of the year this past weekend. We went up to Gifford Pinchot State Park in PA (actually made the same trip the exact same weekend last year!). Though the forecast was for rain the whole weekend, it actually rained very little.

We did lots of bike riding (lots of little trails around the lake) and Eric and Dennis did some actual mountain biking. Dennis taught Eric how to jump logs and go up steep hills-Eric worked on the same hill for about 12 tries!
We had a Friday morning adventure with this young man, but thankfully everything turned out alright.

Leah LOVES camping.

Other fun camping activities included: frisbee golf, roasting giant marshmallows, fishing, playgrounds, tossing the frisbee & football and otherwise relaxing.

This was our little bike ride to Boulder Point. Nice stop for a snack.

We also took a little drive to a nearby Amish furniture market. We enjoyed taking pictures of some upcoming projects that Dennis wants to take on-the main one being a chicken tractor. On the way there we stopped at a yard sale. It was mostly junk until I turned the corner at a long table, looked down and saw a crate full of large mason jars with zinc lids. Four of them were the 1/2 gallon size. I love these to store grains and other things in my pantry, and the zinc lids are usually pretty hard to find affordably. I got the jars/lids for $1 apiece...20 of them!

2011-05-16T10:27:00.002-04:00

Strawberry Season!

The day we decided to go strawberry picking it was the perfect temperature...not the usual sweaty hot I'm used to. My mom and I took the kids and they each filled a bucket, and we filled more...38 pounds to be exact. It was not until we loaded all of those delicious strawberries into the car that we realized that we had to do something with them fast!
That evening and the following day our hands were permanently stained berry-red as we sliced, smashed and stirred. Leah helped the whole time too!

When it was all done, we had made: 3 batches of jam, 2 strawberry shortcakes, 6 quarts of sliced/sugared frozen berries, 3 trays of frozen whole berries for smoothies, and one extra large pie for mother's day...plus some just for eating!

Do you think I'm crazy if I'd go picking again tomorrow? Strawberries are by far my favorite fruit of all.

2011-05-04T12:43:00.002-04:00

Bay has a birthday and other news...

Bay turned 8 this past weekend. He is such a handsome boy and the smile you see on his face is a true reflection of his heart. He is a joy to our whole family.

We went bowling for his birthday. Bay and Leah shared their own lane with the bumpers down. They bowled 2 games...the adults bowled too, but we had more fun watching them drop, throw and push the ball down the lane!

Poor Leah could barely pick up the ball!

In other news...my dad recenly retired from working. It has been so much fun for the kids (and me too) to get to see more of him during the day and evenings. He loves to take them out to breakfast, come over for dinner sometimes, go fishing, or just lay on the couch and read a book to appease a hungry lion!

He also has more time to do some other things he enjoys (besides all of those projects waiting at the house) like go fishing with a friend of his. They brought back 7 HUGE rockfish...he shared his fish with us. I made fish tacos with some of the meat---delicious!

2011-04-28T08:24:00.007-04:00

I follow this blog, and one of the features on it is {pretty, happy, funny, real}. The idea is to show an example of each on your blog and then link back to hers. So I thought I'd try it out...here is my {pretty, happy, funny, real}!

{pretty}

Not much prettier to me than my little girl in her Easter dress hunting for eggs. Each kid had 40 eggs and this year I took a tip from someone and labled each egg with the kids' names so that the finding would be more fair. It was also easier to hide them because of this.

{funny}

Oh yes, if you know Eric, this is very funny! The look of shock of a bit of yellow pollen on his favorite "flat-brim" hat is very genuine!

{happy}

Dennis and I couldn't be more happy with how our new front patio/deck turned out! We had this project in mind for a couple of years now and finally turned it into reality. It as a full weekend to dig out for the footers, lay and level the hanging joists, back fill with gravel for drainage and then put on the decking, but it really opens up the front of the house and gives us a nice place to sit and watch the kids as they play in the front yard. It is also a very happy place to sit with my coffee in the morning if I happen to get up before everyone else!

{real}

Really, this is the state of each of our rooms as I tackle the big seasonal wardrobe changeover. Doing all of the laundry, packing away the winter clothes, getting out the tubs of clothes for spring/summer and sorting, folding, putting away and storing. It is quite a process and I will be glad once I'm done!

2011-04-22T10:56:00.003-04:00

Little Musicians

Eric has been taking piano lessons for 4 years now. Bay started taking this year. Leah just can't wait until she gets to take piano lessons. Already, she plays things on the piano that she hears Bay playing. But what has really been neat is to hear her blossom already as a young composer. She loves to sing...sings in the shower always...sings with her CD's, and makes up her own songs. This morning she brought me lyrics she had written for a song that she made up, so we transcribed it before she forgot the melody. So simple, yet so Leah.

Click on the link to open the file. Below are the lyrics...if it doesn't work, I'll work on fixing it!

"I Love Jesus"
I love Jesus, He is my Savior!
I-I-I love Jesus, He is my Savior!
He is my Savior!

2011-04-08T13:59:00.004-04:00

Leah turns Six!

or as Leah likes to say, "I've made 6 laps around the sun, Mom" That makes me smile! Both boys made something for her present. Eric freezer paper stenciled a pair of jeans and matching t-shirt. I was quite impressed..

He came up with the designs on his own and did everything except the cutting with the exacto knife. Bay made her a set of star-shaped crayons from recycled bits of crayon. He arranged them in a silicone star-shaped cupcake mold and we melted till they were blended. Then cooled, popped out and now she has a set of 6 cute individual color blended star crayons.

Turning 6 (and indeed the months preceeding) has found Leah spending more time in the kitchen with mom...either helping prepare dinner or making a recipe of her own. She loves to try out new recipes from her Highlights magazine or from the Mini Pages and other sources. Today she made turkey-veggie pinwheels for her lunch. She almost always cuts up the lettuce, tomatoes and other veggies for our salad at dinnertime, sets the table and butters the bread. Some other recipes she has made are Oreo Surprise Cupcakes, Orange Pancakes and Chocolate Caramel Pretzels.

She would like to share the recipe from today's lunch with you.

Spread on 1 tortilla: mayonnaise or cream cheese (she chose cream cheese), 2 slices of deli turkey. Sprinkle with grated cheese and your choice of veggie (grated zucchini, grated carrot or sliced cucumber-Leah chose grated carrot).

Roll up the tortilla.

Have an adult slice the roll into pinwheels. YUM!

2011-03-29T12:07:00.003-04:00

Seattle Trip

Just recently I was fortunate to be able to accompany Dennis on a business trip to Seattle. It is hard to know exactly what to say except that it was a fabulous trip! We were there for 7 days, and it rained only on the day we were leaving. The sun shone and the air was most certainly spring-like for the entire trip. While Dennis was at work, I did quite a bit of exploring, and saw many parts of the city and outside the city too.

A familiar landmark, all it got from us was a drive-by...

Down by the Puget Sound on the SW side of Seattle in Lincoln Park My favorite part of this trip was how different the forests are to what we have back East. I was enthralled by the giant trees, root systems and moss and other green stuff growing EVERYWHERE. The forests seem to be so magical...I kept expecting to see fairies flitting around between the ferns or peeking out from behind a clump of moss.

We drove and walked over Deception Pass. The history behind this place was neat...explorer George Vancouver discovered the area and sent his mate, Whidbey, to find out if there was a peninsula or what the water was like. He returned to say that there was a small island and a narrow pass through the mountains. George Vancouver felt decieved by how the land appeared, so he aptly named it Deception Pass. The large island was named after his mate, Whidbey Island (which happens to be the 2nd longest island in the U.S.).

Of course I visited Pikes Market. The rows and rows of flowers, vegetables and seafood were just beautiful. And there was much throwing of fish!

We spent an afternoon playing frisbee golf across the Puget Sound in Bremerton, then drove to Bainbridge Island and had dinner at a waterfront place. Good food, good views.

Mostly though, I was so often struck by the natural beauty of the area. I know it was a rare treat to have so much sunshine, but am so thankful that there was. I visited the Washington Arboretum near Bellevue. Also, everyday, we woke up to a gorgeous view of Mt. Ranier from where we were staying.

My most ambitious day I spent hiking in Discovery Park. It was an arduous climb down to, around, and then back up to see a lighthouse and panoramic view of the Sound. But so worth it, and I was pretty much the only person on most of the hike, the solitude added to the beauty.

The only disappointment was that we didn't see any gray whales...this was the time of year that they migrate north and are often seen in the Puget Sound. I did see a seal, though, at Deception Pass, and we saw plenty of bald eagles, a coyote and lots of beautiful sea ducks.

I am so thankful for a wonderful Mom who was willing and able to keep the kids while Dennis & I were gone! Good memories!

2011-03-14T14:34:00.002-04:00

Best Use of Shot Glasses Ever!

My brother just celebrated his birthday and requested a different type of dessert. Instead of the typical cake, he wanted some of those mini-desserts that are being served now at restaurants. Conveniently, he has quite a collection of shot glasses from Hard Rock Cafes from all over the country!
I found after searching that there are not really special recipes for this, you just take your favorite trifle or layer type recipe and make everything smaller. I made tiramisu: ladyfingers chopped into tiny bits, layered with espresso, the mascarpone cheese mixture and topped with shaved bittersweet chocolate. YUM!

Andy's favorite dessert is cheesecake, so these little desserts packed all of the flavor and a fraction of the calories! For the cheesecake shots I layered graham cracker crumbs, a white chocolate cheesecake filling (no-bake), homemade raspberry sauce and topped it with a fresh raspberry. Yum for him (I'm not so big on cheesecake, so I didn't even taste this one!)

The pumpkin gingerbread shots were adapted from a Paula Deen recipe for Pumpkin Gingerbread trifle. This was layered gingersnap cookie crumbs, a pumpkin mousse, and gingerbread cut into tiny cubes. It was topped off with chocolate shavings also.

The last one was very interesting. The basic recipe came from Big Red Kitchen for apple salad. Essentially this is vanilla pudding, cool whip and granny smith apples. I cut up the apples teeny tiny for the shot glasses. This was layered with graham cracker crumbs, caramel sauce and snickers candy bars cut into tiny pieces. This one was second to the tiramisu in my book!

This ended up being a REALLY fun dessert to make and create. Everyone loved it and we all got to have a couple and not feel horrible about a horrible amount of calories.

2011-03-14T14:22:00.002-04:00

Bay's Shadow Box

It has been difficult for me to find Bay's niche in expressing himself artistically. Painting, drawing, writing...not so much his corner. I have known it is in there somewhere, but finding it and giving him an avenue to bring it out have been the challenge. I should have known sooner that it would be something that uses his spatial skills. He chose to make a shadow box to summarize a book he read for school. He didn't really even know what a shadow box was (so we had to look up a couple of samples on Google). Once he saw what it meant, he was ready to go. His reading curriculum provided the pictures of the animals to color and cut out. Besides a little help from mom in getting the tree to stand up, he designed and did it all himself.

Maybe sculpture is in his future?

2011-03-02T13:49:00.004-05:00

******disclaimer: if the sight of dead rodents makes you squirmy, just don't read this post*****

Normally the sight of this trail of holes dug in the yard by Elsa would make me very upset. In fact, Dennis would probably be tempted to get rid of her when he got home, if she had not succeeded in catching.....

THIS!!! these guys sure do tear up our yard beyond belief. Even the cats have never caught a mole that we are aware of. Eric had to finish the job for Elsa ( I really didn't want her eating it) though I'm sure she was capable of finishing him off.

This puppy has earned her keep around here for a little longer!

2011-02-24T08:38:00.004-05:00

Ottoman Slipcover Project

We brought up this ottoman from a chair in our basement to use in the living room. I really enjoy having a place to put my feet up, but, boy, the color combination just makes me cringe. Since it is already slipcovered, I figured it would be easy to make one with a fabric that coordinates, since nothing really actually "matches" in our house ;)

So I made a long-overdue trip to Joanne's to find fabric and also some other things on my growing sewing list. I found a nice print on sale, and spent the afternoon yesterday putting together the slipcover. What a huge difference I think! And it was actually one of the easier projects I've done. Just a bunch of rectangles, some piping, fitting, pinning and done.

Of course, my sewing room has been neglected for a while now, but after Dennis and I spent a day a couple of weeks ago cleaning out the clutter and reorganizing, putting up shelves, hanging pictures, I felt compelled to use my nice space again! I'll give a little tour of my sewing space.

I love this wardrobe we kept from Dennis' mom's bedroom set. We sold everything else, but I held onto this. Dennis put some shelves in and it is the perfect place for my fabric! I've never had my fabric so organized in my life!

I keep my larger pieces in here, and in the drawers my notions. You can see in the above picture (of the sewing desk) to the left a white plastic storage thing...that holds my smaller pieces of fabric, loosely organized by color family. What I am now looking for is something to hold my many scraps...something I can dig around in easily, but also is easy to access. Right now, they are all in that plastic bag to the right of my sewing desk.

Here is a picture of the front of that wardrobe and also my little sitting corner. This is the chair that matches the ottoman, but the ottoman was always sticking out too far into the room, hence its move upstairs. It's such a nice, sunny little space...now if I can just keep it tidy I can get to that pile of mending I have stacking up!

2011-02-20T16:15:00.002-05:00

Leah wrote a little story during church this morning. Just writing it down for posterity.

"Once upon a time they lived happily ever after. Ha ha ha. Just kidding. Ha ha ha. Ok, that was just funny and weird. I meant just weird. Ha ha ha."

I'm glad she's paying attention to worship!

2011-02-17T09:16:00.002-05:00

Here there and everywhere

Besides battling the virus that has been going around for the past several weeks, we have managed to get a few things done around the house. I must say that I have enjoyed lots of time cuddling on the couch while my babes were not feeling well, doing some knitting (pictures to follow once all of the knit gifts have been given!) and doing some relaxed schooling. On the days that everyone has felt well, we have been able to squeeze in some valentine crafts and other art projects for school.

After reading about the mosaics on the walls and ceilings of the Hagia Sophia (in our history lessons) we made our own mosaics. We went with a small square of paper and the kids were so thankful that we went small. At first they were complaining that they couldn't make such a small picture, until they spent several hours covering their picture with squares of paper. It certainly gave new appreciation for the mosaics that covered entire walls with tiny pieces of tile!
I found this pattern for these cute hearts on this site and enjoyed stitching up a bunch of them to turn into garland. Literally, this is the most decorating I have ever done for Valentine's Day in my life. It must be said that I am not much of a Valentine's girl, but God has given me a little Valentine's girl who loves all things hearts and sweet notes and such. So, this heart garland was really for her. But we did end up having a fun Valentine's day despite my usual non-participation. I made heart shaped pancakes with a red-raspberry sauce for breakfast, and I helped Leah with some Valentine crafts from a book she has had for some time now. Of course, she hand made all of the cards she was going to give out at our co-op party with no help from me. That girl can get a plan in her head and carry it out all on her own!

My handsome boys (the younger two) played in a recital on Saturday. I was very proud of them both for playing so well, especially after missing 2 weeks in a row of lessons because of our sickness!

I have done way too much baking the past 2 weeks...I have made 3 batches of these Cream Cheese Sheet Cakes Squares (for our Valentine's party i topped each with a conversation heart) and also this YUMMY Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcake. Next up is a Boston Creme Pie for my mom's birthday. I think the mixer and I are going to take a break from each other for a couple of weeks after that.

Lastly I just had to include this picture of Leah posing with her foam curlered hair and her new pony dress and matching tights that her Granni brought back from Colorado. This was taken after a week of her being sick, and the night before she felt good after such a long time of feeling horrible that she wanted to take a shower and put in her curlers before bed. She was so excited to wear her new outfit and have fancy hair the next day!

2011-01-26T16:22:00.001-05:00

#1 is now 12

In so many ways I can't believe that these two pictures are of my same boy, but really, not much about him has ever changed. I don't guess it ever really will, and for that I am thankful.

Eric has always had a clear sense of his own self. This may be because he is first-born, I don't know. He knows what he likes and is unwavering in that. He has always been my biggest helper. In fact, when he was 2, I wrote him a little book called, "The Big Helper". I can leave him with any list and he will get it done, any time. He has a particular taste and preference for his clothing and hair, for as long as I can remember. Eric's personality is strong and powerful...his electricity and energy can light up a room just when he walks in. Eric brings so much joy to the house through his musical talents...he has gotten to a level where it is soothing (and not painful) to listen to him play!
Our prayer for Eric is that he will allow God to use his particular qualities in mighty ways throughout his life...what a wonderful and special boy we have in our home!

Happy Birthday Eric!

2011-01-24T12:46:00.002-05:00

First Knitting Project

I have been itching to try knitting for some time now. Not really sure why, though it probably has to do with the many blogs that I follow that feature people who knit lots and lots. I also love the idea of using my sitting and waiting time do something productive with my hands (dr. appts, homeschool coop down time, etc.). Also, I recently played around with Leah's knitting mushroom that she got for Christmas and found that actually doing it was very relaxing and I could do other things (like go over schoolwork with the kids, watch tv at night with Dennis) at the same time.So I went to our local yarn store, found a beginner book, some yarn and kneedles and came home with the idea to knit Leah some legwarmers...something she LOVES to wear and only has 2 pair that don't match all of her dresses. I won't bore you with all of the details, but I must say that it wasn't as hard as I expected it to be. Granted, I did knit one entire legwarmer according to the pattern and the proceeded to rip it out because I didn't like the shape, and I made lots of little mistakes (please don't look too closely), but overall, for a scrunched up legwarmer, I am pretty happy with how it turned out. Then I knit a miniature trial version of my next project, simply because I wanted practice making stripes and also decreasing to join the hat at the top. Turns out it wasn't a wasted scrap of knitting, but actually turned into quite a cute little cap for this elephant! His ears were getting cold with all of this cold weather we've been having anyway!

For any of you fellow knitters out there, I have posted the details of the project on Ravelry...

2011-01-05T09:43:00.002-05:00

Newest Member of the family, and other things...

Meet Fireball...Bay's pet Betta fish. Actually it's his 3rd fish, 2 others already died, but so far, so good with this one. It's now been over a week and he's still breathing! He loves his pineapple house, and when you come into the room, he swims out of his house and up to the edge of the tank as if to see what's going on! This was Bay's Christmas present...he has been asking for a fish for a long time. He's very happy with his new companion.

One of my favorite Christmas presents this year was this book...and when we got home from our trip, both Bay and Leah already had projects picked out for me to get started on. I was happy to oblige them!
This is Piggy Pie

And here is Bay's Space Man..not sure if that's an actual name or just a description, but either way it fits him well!

2010-12-31T14:54:00.003-05:00

Christmas was...

...focusing
...baking

...resting

...gifting

...boarding

...crafting

...skiing

...driving

...knitting

...bundling

And so much more!

2010-12-09T13:45:00.002-05:00

Crafts and Experiments

We spent the afternoon doing a couple of crafts. None of which were my original idea, but they did come together very nicely. Sometimes you find craft ideas, but they turn out to be flops. I don't think either idea was a flop. They can be linked her for the fabric covered styrofoam balls, and the recycled Christmas cards.

They are now hanging nicely from the curtain rod in front of our sliding doors in the living room.

I think they look very elegant.

Completely unrelated, but happening on the same day, is the following surface tension experiment performed by Eric. We went to the Walter Wick exhibit at the Walter's Art Museum in Baltimore last week, and there were some photos of things like below. Eric wanted to try this one out and was pleasantly surprised with the results.

Cool, huh!

2010-12-08T12:18:00.003-05:00

Key to Christmas

Dear boy, don't you know that all the best things are invisible? Sometimes you have to believe in order to see.

-Auntie Claus and the Key to Christmas

2010-12-02T11:18:00.002-05:00

Advent

I have seen many posts lately about Advent...my good friend Sarah has a link on her blog to some wonderful Advent ideas, many of which we will use this year. For our family, we have traditionally used Advent as a time to keep our focus on Christ during the Christmas season. It is so easy to get caught up in busyness and activities, so the daily Bible reading centered around the Christmas story, and some activity that encourages us to think beyond ourselves really helps us to celebrate Christmas in a meaningful way.

We started one new advent activity this year, and I wasn't really sure how it would go over with the kids. Though it has only been 2 days, I am quite impressed. The idea is called "Stocking Stuffers". The rules are this: Each person has to write one note each day, and you have to rotate to whom you write. Write a note that is encouraging to one of the members of our family, fold it and put it in their stocking. The note can be short or long, and can say anything you want, as long as it is encouraging. Christmas morning, when stockings are opened, each person will have a handful of notes to read from each other.

The reason we decided to do this activity this year was because our children struggle (and oftentimes we do as parents) with finding positive things about each other. It is so easy to focus on the negative. Instead, they will be looking for those little things about each other which they love and will be writing them down.

So, as I said, I wasn't sure how it would go over. This morning, without any prompting, after breakfast, each of the kids got out their little slip of paper from the basket and wrote their note, and slipped the notes into the stockings on the mantle.

2010-12-02T10:33:00.003-05:00

Laundry Room Clean-up One of these days I will remember to take a before picture! Either way, I can tell you that the laundry room was cramped and poorly organized. Before Christmas and all it's busyness arrived, it was my goal to get this room in better order. The first order of business was to take out the large and cumbersome old refrigerator. That alone made a huge difference.In its place I put the hutch that Dennis made many years ago. It was recently kicked out of it's home by a new hutch. This hutch looks so much better in the laundry room and provides me with tons of storage! I was also able to hang up my accordian clothes drying rack on some newly found wall space, so now it will actually get used.

I decluttered the corner around the deep sink, and Dennis moved the shelves that were on that wall to another wall, and made me some corner shelves and a long shelf to go above the sink. Everything is so much more functional and I actually have empty shelf space...which I know will not last for long!
The only adjustment is going from two refrigerators down to just one. I guess that means I will just have to keep my kitchen fridge cleaned out!

2010-11-11T13:49:00.002-05:00

Oyster Dissection

At our home-school coop, Eric's class is doing anatomy through dissections. So far they have dismantled an owl pellet (which is NOT owl pool, as I once thought-it is regurgitated remains from the owl's last meals), earthworm, oyster and next a frog. It has been a wonderful science unit.

Because my dad farms oysters at his house, I volunteered to lead the oyster dissection. It turned out to be a fascinating experience. In my experience home schooling, whatever I teach, I end up learning so much more than I thought possible. Just goes to prove that learning is a life-long process.
The oysters were shucked just minutes before class, so they were still very alive. What was so cool was that the kids were able to see the tentacles (yes, oysters have tentacles!) respond to stimuli.

They were also able to see the oyster's tiny heart actually beating. It was amazing. If ever you are interested in doing an oyster dissection and you are in the area, feel free to let me know. Or if you can get your hands on a live oyster, it is a really cool experience. The lab I used as a guide was at this link: Oyster Dissection Lab

If you click on each of the links that are named -Figure 1-, -Figure 2-, etc. you will get some great pictures, but there is nothing like the real thing!

2010-11-11T13:10:00.004-05:00

Veterans Day Parade

I have heard that our county hosts the largest Veteran's Day parade in our state. Whether it is or not, it certainly is quite a production for our rural little corner of America. All 3 high school marching bands are there, all of the scout troops, each of the JROTC squads from the schools, each of the rescue squads and fire departments, a set of Clydedale horses, bagpipers, a Confederate Army group, and a host of other patriotic groups.

We haven't been to the parade in a couple of years, but Leah was asking when we would go again. It is a beautiful fall day, so we went. Sometimes it is bitterly cold and not so pleasant! The kids have a great time...

My brother was coming into town and joined in the parade at the last minute with his Humvee. He cracks me up :)

Leah and Granni hanging out on the sidewalk waiting for it to start. The whole parade lasted more than an hour.

Where did she go????

Despite looking extremely bundled up, it really wasn't that cold. We were just very prepared!

Thank you to all those who have served...including my dad, brother and husband...

Happy Veteran's Day!

2010-11-01T11:50:00.002-04:00

Halloween

It is finally cold enough to get the wood stove going. I was so excited to start a fire this morning...and it feels soooo good to have that warm heat radiating in the bones. Elsa has officially claimed her spot for the next 5 months. She literally did not move from this spot the entire morning.

The kids had a packed weekend. The kids started it all of for me on Thursday by all making changes to their costumes. Leah was originally going to be a giraffe and Bay the Transformer character, Bumblebee. As you can see, they changed their minds. Leah has a ton of costumes and dress up clothes, so her change of mind was easy. Bay's was a bit more involved, but I was able to use a pattern from another costume to create the basic yellow suit and improvised for the rest. He did get his head shaved for the bald effect. He wanted it TOTALLY shaved, but we just couldn't bring ourselves to do that!
In case you can't figure it out,
Eric is Billy the Mechanic
Bay is Ang, the last Airbender (from this show which our family loves!)
Leah is Tiger Lily (from Peter Pan)

Quick visit with Granni

Dennis thought up our costume this year.

We're M&M's. I am plain and he's with nuts.

We went to a birthday party for our friend, Sam. He was born on Halloween 3 years ago, so he will alway get to enjoy quite a Halloween party! Naturally, everyone dressed up. The kids painted pumpkins, had a pumpkin hunt, and ate scary food :)

On Sunday, we went to a festival at the church we have been attending. The kids had a great time. Eric helped out with the fire-pit and cooking hot dogs for the younger children. Bay and Leah enjoyed themselves playing games for candy and prizes. They had trunk-or-treating and bounce houses.

The only thing we forgot to do this year.....carve our pumpkins!!!! Guess we'll do it after the fact!

2010-11-01T09:25:00.001-04:00

Hand Tantalizer

Leah got some of this in a goody bag. She calls it hand tantalizer. It cracks me up.

"Mom, can I use some of my hand tantalizer? It smells good. "

2010-10-27T12:01:00.002-04:00

Family Visit

My grandmother from Ohio came to visit this weekend (my uncle drove her). Although she is getting along in years, she still gets around. The boys played in an All-Boys Piano Recital. This was Bay's first recital. I played the duets with him. Afterwards he said, "That was really fun!" Eric also played two very exciting pieces. Great-Gram really enjoyed herself.

My two handsome boys :)

Leah and Great-Gram chatting before the recital.

My grandmother loves yard sales and always brings suitcases full of yard sale finds for the kids. She loves it because she gets more bang for her buck, and never feels badly if they don't particularly like something. The above yard sale find, however, didn't fit in her suitcase, but I think Leah really loves it!

Look at that girl, already driving and talking on her phone.

Lots of people always think that this grandmother is my mom's mom. If you know my mom, you would understand why. She has the same build and pretty much the same hair as my mom. And, they look strikingly alike; however, she is in fact my dad's mom. All of her kids had dark hair and dark complexions.

2010-10-22T11:59:00.002-04:00

{this moment}

a single photo...no words...capturing a moment from the week. A special, extraordinary moment, a moment I want to remember.

From Leah's Perspective

2010-10-22T11:48:00.002-04:00

Recently, Leah likes to get my camera and take shots of things around the house that interest her. Usually she has set something up with her animals and wants to take a picture of that and then she ends up taking about 50 more pictures around the house. It is always interesting to get the pictures off the camera and see what she has captured.

Funny how she's already figured out the self-portrait pose!

Looks like he's been caught at something!

Is this a subliminal glimpse into her personality?

Treasures

***I found this post in my drafts from quite a while ago, but I really liked it, so I'm sharing it now!****

2010-10-08T21:18:00.002-04:00

{this moment}

this moment...inspired by Soule Mama...a single photo, no words, capturing a moment from the week. A special, extraordinary moment, a moment I want to remember.

2010-10-03T21:49:00.002-04:00

Any guesses?

No, our sad pathetic puppy did not break her paw. yes, she is wearing the "cone of shame" as my kids so fondly put it.

Unfortunately for Elsa, she has a fondness for chasing and barking at car tires. Saturday morning she insisted on putting her paw under mine as Leah and I were heading out to run some errands. Nothing broken, but ripped the pad off one of her digits. The vet cleaned her up and she's bandaged for a week and wearing her e-collar because she just can't leave it alone. I sure hope she has learned her lesson, but I can't say I won't be surprised if she hasn't.

Did you ever see such sad pathetic puppy eyes?

2010-09-27T12:26:00.002-04:00

One morning recently, Eric took the camera and got some shots of Bay and Leah with the dog. Elsa loves to go for rides in the car. Anytime she is outside and the car trunk is opened for some reason, she hops right up as if to say, "Okay, I'm ready, let's go!"
I think the little ones went out to get some toys they had left in the car and Elsa followed them out there. The silliness caught on camera is great, and even more fun for me to see because I wasn't out there at all to see this taking place.

I guess the lousy Redskins game was too boring for Eric to stay awake for!

2010-09-23T22:12:00.003-04:00

County Fair

We just got back from our county fair. Our little Leah came home with the big prize...Junior Champion on her painting of an alligator! I think it is totally cool that she won this prize...she just told me today, "Mom, you know what I really love? Doing drawing and coloring the best." Well, I guess it shows because she gets plenty of practice. If she is not doing her schoolwork, she is ALWAYS drawing or coloring something.
Look at those happy faces! Actually they really were very happy, I just told them they didn't have to smile for my picture if they didn't want to, so Eric took full advantage of the opportunity to give me a too cool for the camera look.

Eric won 1st on some beaded jewelry he made me for Christmas this year.

Dennis won 2nd on a pool que rack he made for my parents.

Eric entered lots of items...a total of 9 I think. Here is his 2nd place on his lion cubs.

Leah drew a picture of Luke, our cat and won 1st on that also. I'll have to scan it and load a better picture of it...it is actually quite impressive. She has butterflies and bees buzzing all around that you can't see from this angle.

One of Eric's watercolor birds.

One of Leah's potholders made on her Klutz potholder loom

A pajama set I made for Leah

And Bay's bathrobe...he actually only entered one item (a lego model he built). I felt badly that he did not have more things to enter (Bay is not a very crafty little boy in the way of scissors and paper and crayons, but actually very crafty when it comes to being clever :)) So he will get the prize I won for his robe...poor guy will wake up cold the next few mornings and will be missing it anyways!

As usual, the county fair is always so much fun...especially when we get to see on display the things that we have crafted with our own hands. I didn't show you everything we entered, but there was much more: canned goods, sunflower heads, more artwork, Lego models, stuffed animal collections, etc.

But even more than seeing all of our items is to see how valuable the craft of making things by hand is still alive and well...there were so many familiar names on those hang tags...things sewn by young people we know, and older people still practicing their craft and proud to show it. We love to walk around and say hello to the folks from the county we know from so many different venues all together at the one place.

2010-09-22T08:25:00.006-04:00

Ohiopyle Camping Trip

We've been back now from our annual trip to Ohiopyle PA for a while now, but I am just getting to posting about it. We came back and dove right into school and routine and laundry...needless to say our 10 day trip was fabulous!
We did lots of bike riding as usual on the Great Allegheny Passage. We completed two new sections this trip...our trip from Meyersdale to Frostburg took us over the Eastern Continental Divide (dividing line for whether streams/rivers on the east coast flow into the Atlantic or the Gulf), over the Mason Dixon Line, and through 2 tunnels, and a gorgeous panoramic view of the mountains.

Lots of old train bridges repurposed for us bicyclists.

A beautiful picnic spot along the river...

We had a different camping trip this year than in year's past. We had some friends camp with us, and here Leah is playing with their 2 year old, Sam. Also, for the first weekend, Heather's parents camped with us, as well as her brother and his girlfriend. We celebrated Dennis' birthday over the weekend and it was fun to have all of those people around to celebrate with him!

In the town of Ohiopyle they had a festival over Labor Day weekend. It is the only time of year that they allow kayakers to go over the big falls. We got to see lots of kayakers make it over, and to our knowledge they all made it safely! Along with the many booths and vendors set up, they had pony rides. Guess who wanted to go for a ride?

Patient anticipation...

Back on the trail...Dennis with Leah on the tag-a-long bike, and John with Sam in the bike seat. Though we bike many many miles (this time over 3 days a total of 54 miles) the kids have a great time. We bring lots of snacks...this time someone had the brilliant idea to put the trail mix and cracklin' oat bran (or dog food as my kids called it) in the nalgene bottles for easy dispensing!

To pass the time when the scenery was a little boring, Bay made up a game we affectionately dubbed "Name your poison". Essentially he would think up two different scenarios and we'd have to choose which one we would rather take. Here's an example:
Bay: Would you rather be eaten by bears or fall of this steep cliff into the rapids?

Heather: Definitely fall off the steep cliff

Bay: Would you rather roll around in poison ivy for 3 hours or get attacked by the bees in that hornet nest?

Heather: I think I'll choose the poison ivy

We played this game for hours...with Leah occasionally piping in her own "Would you Rather..."

Leah: Would you rather be a purple unicorn or a blue teddy bear?

We got some good laughs out of their wit :)

The first day we were up in PA, we drove down (the whole big crew) to Cumberland with our bikes and got on the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad. This steam train took us and our bikes up the mountain to Frostburg (it took about an hour). We got off and then rode our bikes back to Cumberland along the trail (which ran alongside the train tracks). It was an easy ride (all downhill) but a fun way to introduce Heather's parents to the riding that we do when we go up there every year. Of course the kids loved the train ride....

Here is Mountain Thunder (engine 734) pulling into the station in Cumberland. Bay (with Granni) loved it...until the smoke and steam engulfed us waiting on the platform!

Bikes all loaded on the back of the car. Poor Dennis loaded and unloaded these bikes so many times! I think he developed it into an artform!

Everyone at the train station

2010-08-19T19:51:00.004-04:00

Getting Ready

I've spent the past week getting ready for school. This is my favorite part of the year...maybe it's the teacher in me coming out, but I love sharpening the pencils, arranging and organizing the books, planning our schedule, and just getting ready. What amazes me is how terribly messy our schoolroom can get in the last month of school and what a couple of months of neglect does to the room. Piles, dust bunnies and some really scary empty cups have made for quite a marathon of cleaning and organizing! We even had the dog's crate moved into the school room over the summer, so she had to be kicked out for the school year. Every year I do some re-arranging of the room, this year's arrangement has been brewing in my head all summer, so I was excited to see it work logistically. Now hopefully it will work scholastically! Essentially, each kid has his/her own work area for independent work, and we have a project table where we will do art/science/etc. projects. I think that actually the kids are excited about starting school, something about a fresh new space and the anticipation of what new things mom has in store :)

Art supplies...

Bay's area and bookshelf

Leah's area and bookshelf
My plan is to give each area a cork-board but I haven't gotten that far yet.

Eric's area and shelves above

This is 3 bookshelves stacked on top of each other. It is pretty much all of our other supplies: math maniuplatives, flash cards, non-fiction resource books, and some other books.

2010-08-12T12:56:00.002-04:00

Kit Goes Swimming!

Remember "Kit"? Well, Leah plays with her actually more than I expected her to. Of course, like all of the other animals that are her "babies", they get put on rotation, but Kit seems to be revisited more often than not. Which of course makes me happy :) Anyways, Leah has been asking for a bathing suit for Kit so she can go swimming (pretend) and so I took an old suit of mine that the elastic had stretched out and cut it for some fabric. Now Kit has a stylin' suit worthy of any poolside or beach!

2010-08-10T10:29:00.002-04:00

Leah and Bay gave a little piano concert for Dennis yesterday. I had them redo it because it was so darn cute.

2010-08-09T10:44:00.002-04:00

Camping in the summer

Usually, we like to camp in the fall and spring, not so much in the summer. But when the weekend looked to be less humid than normal, and our destination involved a swimming lake and beach, we had to take the chance for some relaxation and family fun. We also took the dog, which required that we camp in the "pet loop" which had no hookups. So we tried "dry camping" with our camper for the first time and it went very well. Of course, it would not have been so nice if it had been the typical hot and humid August, but because it wasn't, we were very comfortable, and even cool at night.

Saturday the kids and I went to the lake and they rolled around in the sand, literally; they swam, and they buried themselves waist down (Eric was buried all except his face). I only got these 3 pictures as my camera battery died right after and I did not bring an extra!
It was loads of fun. We went down to the lake each evening after all the crowds had gone and let the little ones play in the sand some more while Dennis, Eric and I threw the frisbee.
Now, after that brief respite from the heat and humidity (which has returned this week) I am ready for fall to arrive!

2010-07-11T14:28:00.003-04:00

Swimming in full swing

It is clear in our family when summer swim team is here...there is a permanent marking on each of the kids' hands with E H L....for those of you not familiar with swim team lingo, this stands for Event, Heat, Lane. They have their hands written on at the begninng of each meet to show them which events they are swimming. It is always a challenge to get one meets' markings washed off before the next meet a few days later!

What is so much fun is to see how much each of the kids has really matured and grown in the course of a year.
Now that Leah is swimming, Bay seems so big and grown up. He can swim all of the strokes now, but is really working hard toward winning his heat in freestyle. That's where the biggest competition is. He is at the bottom of his age-group, so he's competing against some pretty big 8 year olds!

Eric missed a couple of weeks due to his second foot surgery, but he is happily in the water and swimming now. There aren't too many boys his age on the team this year, so he is in high demand for relays!

And Leah has made great strides and is now going the entire length of the pool without stopping once. She is so excited to be swimming on the team. Her favorite part is wearing the team suit of course!

So proud to show her big brother what event is written on her hand.

The kids practice every weekday for 1 hour and have meets twice a week in the evenings, plus a few special Saturday meets as well. It is an action packed 6 weeks of chlorine, ribbons and pop-ice!

What is amazing to me is that when we get home from swim practice, the kids are still begging to get in the pool at home! Of course, they have to compete for a little pool time at home with mom in the pool teaching swim lessons.

As you can see, this is what we have been doing, hence the blog silence. I'll try to update more often, but most likely it will have to wait!

2010-06-10T12:48:00.000-04:00

Pool Deck 360

We were able, this year, to finish the deck the rest of the way around the pool. It was a joint effort over Memorial Day Weekend...Eric helped, John (a friend) helped, Gramps helped and even I helped when everyone else had given up on Dennis! It was very hot and there were lots of dips in the pool in-between to cool off. Dennis is waiting for some cooler evenings to get the railings and benches done. Since this side of the deck is not as high as the other side, we're not worried about anyone falling off and hurting themselves in the meantime.

I also made relish from the radishes in the garden. Other than the fact that the fermenting radish and vinegar mixture stunk up the house, it turned out beautifully, and tastes delicious too! Basically, it was chopped radishes, red onion, celery, spices, sugar and vinegar. This fermented for several hours, then I boiled it, packed it in jars and hot water bathed it to seal the lids. We had it on hot dogs last weekend at a cookout and it was delicious! My mom served it with some fish and she said that was wonderful too!

2010-06-04T14:06:00.000-04:00

The Giving Garden

The garden is starting to produce...I am so excited by some new veggies we have tried out this year and so far have been very successful. Of course, we have been gathering lettuce and spinach as needed for salads, but we don't ever do a mass harvest of those, so no wonderful pictures.

We tried radishes this year and they were wonderfully plenty. I got about 4 cups of radishes- all different colors and shapes! I found a recipe for radish relish, so I am in the process of making that. if it turns out, I'll share the recipe.

And carrots...I have tried carrots before, only to be dismayed by root nematodes and other critters. But evidently our soil must be pretty good and not too much clay, because they have actually flourished! Of course, with all the greens attached, they certainly look like a lot more than when they are trimmed! But I am excited to try them again and plant a whole lot more!

2010-05-24T09:31:00.000-04:00

Happy 13 years of marriage!

17 years ago I met my wonderful husband...it seems like yesterday...yet so much has happened in those years!

This weekend Dennis and I went camping to celebrate our anniversary. It wasn't until our 10th anniversary that we got the bright idea to go away for a weekend together to celebrate, and we've done it every year since. This year we decided to go camping...we realized that camping without our children is quite different! It is so quiet!

We camped at Gambrill State Park, and just about had the camping loop to ourselves. (some people were in cabins nearby)

We biked the Western Maryland Rail Trail (22 miles one way). We have wanted to do this section of trail after hearing about it last summer from the folks up at Ohiopyle. It parrallels the C & O Canal Trail from Fort Frederick State Park, through Hancock and 12 miles beyond. Instead of being right down on the river, it runs a bit higher up on the mountain and is paved all the way. It was a very moderate grade, or mostly flat, though at times it seemed we were always going uphill! The weather was perfect, cloudy and cool. We stopped in Hancock and ate our sandwhiches in a little gazebo (that's the picture of us at the picnic table). At then end of the trail (see pic above) we stopped only long enough to take the picture because the mosquitoes found us. After 30 miles we were exhausted and stopped for coffee in Hancock. We were also soaked completely since a steady rain started at about mile 24. After a break we finished the last 10 miles, slowly and painfully. It was a great accomplishment and a wonderful ride. However we were soaked and sore, and agreed that 30 miles was probably more our limit for a ride!

We also spent some time walking around downtown Frederick and enjoyed browsing the many antique and specialty shops. We stopped in at a Yamaha piano shop and I got to play on a couple of beautiful grand pianos! The lady in the shop gave us a great lesson on the difference in mechanics between a grand and an upright piano. Fascinating!

2010-05-18T16:20:00.000-04:00

"Local Family Retreats and Finds Peace and Rest"

I don't know why we just don't do this more often or sooner every year...nothing beats a weekend camping trip for our family. There aren't too many escapes where we feel absolutely no obligation to anything and can truly relax and enjoy each other. We visited a park that is new to us: Gifford Pinchot State Park and loved it.

We found hiking trails down to the lake and all around the woods...

Beaches to lounge on with playgrounds for the kids...

Plenty of space to let loose and goof off....

A tadpole pond and soothing fountain (couldn't actually find any tadpoles this early in the season)...

A spacious campsite with no bugs, cool weather and a playground across the street...

We liked it so much we may just add it to our favorites!

2010-05-08T17:27:00.000-04:00

Bay turned 7

Bay celebrated his 7th birthday recently. I can't believe my sweet, compassionate, nurturing Bay is getting so big. Just so long as he'll still cuddle on my lap!

Bay and Leah with their recently new pj's and Bay with his birthday breakfast...cereal with milk...

One of Bay's big interests is space. He has had the space helmet for few years now, but got the space suit for his birthday. He plans to live on the ISS someday...

The ice-cream cake that I have made now for 3 birthdays is gaining in popularity...

Gramps going through Bay's new tackle box and a coupon for a fishing trip with Gramps.

One of the most wonderful things about Bay and his developing personality is seeing his tender heart develop. The other morning I had made some oatmeal and offered some to Bay for breakfast. After a short contemplation, Bay said to me, "Mom, would it hurt your feelings if I didn't want any?"

2010-04-26T19:27:00.000-04:00

Homemade Birthday Gifts

Bay's birthday is approaching (turning 7) and since he is not a regular reader of this blog, I think I am safe to give you a sneak preview of what Eric and Leah have created for his gifts from them. I have wanted to do freezer paper stencils with the kids for a long time, but just didn't have the occasion, or maybe it was the time, or was it the organization and pre-thought? Anyways, I buckled down and got all of the materials ahead of time and we did it! They were sooo much fun and I think are a wonderful way for the kids to showcase their artwork. It required a bit of help from me with the exacto knife and ironing, but other than that, it is their work.

If you would like more detailed instructions, there is a great photo tutorial here.

It started out with a drawing. This is Leah's sketch in her journal. I then traced the presents onto freezer paper and spaced them out just a little to fill up the front of the shirt. Then I marked the parts that would be painted and cut them out with an exacto knife.

Next step was to iron the freezer paper on the shirt and then get to painting. Once the painting was done, we let it dry. Then I used silver fabric paint to fill in the ribbon. I did this part because it was a little too detailed for Leah's hands.

Here is Leah's, all done! I think it is adorable.

Eric's went much the same way, except he just had to be so much more complicated. I had all kinds of teeny tiny pieces to cut out of the space ship and the lettering. But I exacto knifed it, ironed it on, and he painted. Then we peeled off the paper and here it is. Front side is the green alien.

Back side is the alien's space ship heading off to his planet!

I think Bay will love his shirts and will appreciate being able to wear the artwork of his brother and sister!

2010-04-19T20:35:00.002-04:00

Comfort in Routine

We got out of our routine last week for a couple of reasons, but are thankful to be back in the routine starting today. There is something comforting to the kids and to me with our daily schedule, with the regular chores and school assignments. I have found that it is good for them to have free, unstructured time, but it is almost as if they need to first earn it. After a good day of work, to give the boys some free time makes it so much more valuable to them.

Leah (above photo) worked very hard to pick up her room today. It had gotten quite messy. And once it was all cleaned up, she was able to enjoy herself in there and spent the rest of the morning entertained by her favorite things---her little animal toys.
Of course for Eric, the demands during the day are much more: school assignments, practicing violin and piano, chores, etc. So when he was given free time this afternoon, he quickly retreated to his room to chill. What a difference I see in his attitude when he has been productive beforehand. Last week we had such problems with bad attitudes, and I can almost certainly say it was because we were out of the routine.

Science experiment-pH indicators with homemade test tubes!

Bay LOVES having his desk in his room. I used to keep all of the kids together in the school room, and it still is the central point from which we do things such as social studies, and keep all of our stuff. But when it's time for concentrated work in reading and math, it seems to help the boys to have a space without the distractions of each other to get their work done.

It is getting to be that time of year where I start planning what we will do next year. It is my favorite time...I'm pretty sure that I get more excited than my kids about school at this point in the planning stages.

2010-04-14T15:32:00.002-04:00

What a Steal!

I like to visit our local thrift store on occasion. Normally I might find something small that is a good deal, but I have never really ever found anything I would consider a steal...until now. Tucked up with a bunch of fishing rods and cheap curtain hardware was this bolt of fabric. There was no price, which is usually a good sign. I asked one of the ladies in the back about the price, and she said it has been sitting there for a long time and she'd give it to me for $5.

FIVE DOLLARS!!!!

I did not know exactly how much fabric was on this bolt, but even if there were 2 yards it would have been a good deal (though I could tell there was much more). This kind of fabric goes for anywhere between $10 and $20 a yard at the fabric store. So I took it home and unrolled the whole thing....19 yards later I can totally say that this was a STEAL. I am so excited because now I have something that I can use to make some type of curtain for the sunroom/dining room. We love the windows and view in that room, but in the summer, those windows let in sooo much heat that there has to be some way to cover them when I want to. Now I just need to figure out what I want to do with it! I am so super excited!

I also found this oak chair that just needs a new cover on the seat and it will be beautiful. It wasn't such the steal, $10, but still a great deal for a nice chair.

2010-04-06T17:00:00.002-04:00

Easter Day Fun

Archery buddies

Toothless Bay in the sandbox

Easter egg bread

Happy to be finding eggs

If you're not sure how many eggs are up in that tree, just shake it and they will all fall down!

And if you can't reach that egg up in the swing set....

Toss a stick at it

And climbing up into the rafters is okay too

2010-04-04T11:27:00.001-04:00

Garden Fairy

A garden fairy visited our house this weekend....
She planted peas, lettuce, spinach, carrots, radishes and onions

and then she went on her way...I hope she comes back to help us weed!!!

2010-04-04T10:24:00.002-04:00

Easter at Sunrise

Church service on the waterfront
Rejoicing and remembering Christ's sacrifice for our sins and power over death

Egg decorating

Eggs...symbol of our new life
Two handsome young men

We have been blessed this Easter weekend to have gorgeous weather...usually it is rainy or cold or both. Happy Easter!

2010-03-27T21:28:00.002-04:00

Tea party for Leah

Leah is turning 5 tomorrow. She has been talking about and planning a tea party since she turned 4. It was wonderful. I was totally shocked at how quiet and relaxed and "tame" the party was. You see, I was prepared for what I have always experienced, boys' parties. We have had lots of them and by the end of the party, I am hot, tired and worn out. This totally took me by surprise. Not to say that the boys' parties aren't fun, because they are loads of fun! But this was soooo different :) If you have a girl, I am certain you know what I mean and have been keeping it secret from me all of this time. Probably better that way!

The girls dressed up with accessories...scarves, earring, necklaces, purses and then got their pictures taken. Then we had our tea...delicate china tea cups, fancy gloves, lots of delicious treats, and blueberry tea or pink lemonade. The lemonade was a big hit. Everyone ate with their gloves on, at least to start.

Leah is not a big fan of cake I have learned. Since we were having fancy tea...I decided to make petit fours. If you want to know about the whole experience of actually making them, you'll have to ask me about it sometime. Anyways, she got 5 individual petit fours, with her name spelled out and the number "5" on the last one...we put candles in them for her to blow out.

She was thrilled with the whole day. When she talked about her party while we were preparing, she made reference to "when my girls come....I'm going to..." or "I will show this to my girls" or "Let's get out these pretty dresses for my girls".

After tea and cakes, we played games and did crafts-

Pin the butterfly on the flower

Relay race to set the table for tea

Sticker hunt

Make and decorate a fan

Bracelets

I just can't believe how grown-up our little girl is getting!

I have posted MANY pictures of her party to snapfish. There is a link in my sidebar to the photos.

2010-03-25T22:15:00.002-04:00

Much Progress

Leah's room is coming along very quickly. Almost all of the sewing is done. Above are the Roman shades...one up, one down. Let me just say that I LOVE sewing soft fold Roman shades. They are by far my favorite window covering to sew...so simple and so effective. I am actually considering sewing them for the 10 windows in my sunroom! I know, I'm probably crazy, but they seem to be the best solution and they are so easy! (did I already mention that?)
Here is a before shot of Leah's vanity stool. It opens up and has storage under the seat. I think originally it was a sewing seat.

I was torn between wrapping the fabric around the bottom of the seat, like it was before, but thanks to the urging of a friend, and the girlyness of all things ruffly, I went with the ruffle around the bottom. I just attached the seat back over the ruffles. I put a very generous piece of foam on the seat, but it was such a low seat to begin with, that when you sit on it at the vanity, it actually brings your face just to the right height. Well, I like it, but more importantly, Leah loves it. Really I think she is a bit overwhelmed by all of the stuff going on, but she is having a great time with each new thing that happens in her room!

Lastly, Dennis and I have finished the window seat. I really can't imagine this part of the room being any other way. It fits so naturally in this nook. The storage underneath is for her many stuffed animal friends. I made the two pillows already, but am waiting to get a piece of foam long enough to cover a cushion for the bench.
I can forsee many hours of her childhood sitting on this bench, reading and playing make-believe with her animals.

My little baby girl is so growing up...

2010-03-20T22:42:00.002-04:00

Shades of Blue

These are the fabrics I am using in Leah's room. The walls are the light blue on the paint chip. The bottom fabric will be the cushion cover for her vanity seat. The next up is the Roman Shade fabric (they are almost all done!), next up is the cushion cover for her window seat (which Dennis has made, but I am still painting), and isn't the top fabric adorable? It is the illustrations from some of those old Golden Books with the little girl and boy! Leah loves those books...Fix it Please is one of her favorites. Anyways, i will make some throw pillows proably for her window seat. And the window seat, it will be painted the middle shade of blue on the paint chip.

Lots of sewing to do.

More painting still....thanks to my wonderfully talented husband, the window seat is beautiful and I just can't image the space without it after seeing it there now.

I am so enjoying blessing our children by creating fun and exciting spaces for them in our house.

2010-03-14T15:00:00.002-04:00

Something's Growing...
Leah's room is painted a pretty blue. She is using an inherited mahogany bedroom set from my grandmother. I have fond memories of this dressing table in my Nana's room...sitting and going through her earrings and jewelry, trying them on... The stool is a yard sale find...plans are in the making to re-cover the seat. In the meantime a seed was planted in the corner and it started to grow....

and grow.....

and it stretched its branches all the way onto the ceiling!

It grew leaves and I found a little girl in the coolness of its shade

Some birds have made their homes in the branches...

I think it is here to stay!

2010-03-11T08:36:00.003-05:00

Boys will be boys!

This post is not meant to imply that I am in any way unhappy with my boys...I love all that makes them boys and all of the energy they bring to our house...

We are in the process of moving Leah (the last bedroom move) into the boys' old room. My first task (once the furniture was moved out) was to fill the holes in the walls. I expected the normal amount of holes from picture frames and such, but what I found was eye-opening! I filled so many dinks and nicks and holes in the walls it was unbelievable. I can't say for certain what they actually did in that room that caused the wear and tear on the walls....maybe flying matchbox cars...or lego wars....or...who knows??!! Also there were many places where little artists and contraband sharpies got together and made their marks on the walls as well. **Gasp!***These were no surprise to me, but I still had to deal with them.

There was a day before children when Dennis and I were house-hunting and we entered a vacant house and the walls had writing on them, the paint was nicked and smudged dirt evident. It was clear that children lived in that house, and I remember wondering how a parent could ever let that happen. I mean, the destruction seemed appalling! As I was filling the holes and covering the sharpie scribbles I was reminded of that house. And now I know, and if you have children, you probably do too. I am sure that not every kid damages the walls like our kids do (I know for a fact that I did not, nor did my brother as children) but for whatever reason, ours do. And I'm not worried about it. The boys play hard and have a ton of fun. I know that God must be at work in me, because for such a controlling person like myself to let this go it truly is amazing!

Nothing that a little paint won't cover up!

Teaser warning: the room is now blue and has something growing in the corner

2010-02-22T09:45:00.004-05:00

TaDa!

We finally got everything moved into Eric's new room this weekend, and it turned out very nicely. The room is actually very cozy, and even though the walls are a cool gray, the red brings a certain warmth to the room, along with his wood furniture.

Almost everything is the same from his room upstairs, with a few exceptions. We got the bedding on clearance at Bed and Bath, and that was the inspiration behind the whole color scheme. The red book shelves along the bed and behind the desk were ones that Dennis made a long time ago for the boys and used to be green. They work nicely to hold all of those books that he reads in bed. We put one behind his desk to keep clutter off the desk (for pens and such).
The desk wasn't in his room previously, but we've had it stored for awhile, waiting. It used to be mine, and then it was our computer desk for many years until Dennis built the built-in one in our kitchen. The clock was a "room-warming" present that Leah picked out for Eric at Wal-Mart!

Of course the chair-that has already been posted about. Dennis is planning on building a floating shelf on this wall, high up, for Eric to get his trophies off his dresser.

The closet doors were a real challenge, but they are up. I might add that Eric's closet doors are the ONLY ones in the whole house that are actually painted the matching trim white and actually installed. All other closet door are either not hung, or are still that contractor grade off-white color. They look so nice I am inspired to finish the rest of the closet doors in the house now!

And the closet shelving we got from my dad, some leftover he had from organizing his attic.

One project done, another has already begun....next up is Leah's room.

2010-02-17T12:41:00.002-05:00

Sneak Preview

Eric's room is ALMOST done. The painting is DONE. The carpet is IN. The doors are HUNG. All that's left is for him to move in...and he sure is excited! We will probably do that this weekend, so be sure and check back for pictures.

2010-02-11T11:31:00.003-05:00

Snow and a remodeling update

Remember that wheelbarrow that was partially buried after our last blizzard? Well, here it is now, well, at least the snow around it anyways. I just can't believe how much snow we've had this winter! It is beautiful and I may be a nut, but I absolutely LOVE being snowed in. Cabin fever is not part of my vocabulary. Anyways, I won't bore you with a million pictures of snow around here. Obviously the kids have played in the snow till they aren't begging me to go out in it every minute, though each time we get more snow, they are discussing how much better their jump is going to be, or how much longer it is until Leah can no longer walk through the snow!
You may wonder if homeschooled kids get snow days...well, yes they get to play in the snow, but not until they get their school work done first! Fortunately they have the best of both worlds! We won't be doing school until July, and they also get to sled and have fun.

Since the weather outside has been frightful, Dennis and I have gotten lots done on the bedroom. As of right now, the painting of the walls is done (no pictures yet) and the ceiling light fixtures are up. I am painting the trim and doors before we put them all up. Very exciting!

The gray walls being cut in...ceiling fan and track light for over the desk area are up.

We also punch out the wall to replace this doorway between the sewing room and the playroom side leading to Eric's room.

Above: doorway before

Below: doorway after, looking through to the exterior wall of Eric's room. The picture is deceptive. You can see in the far room a door...that is actually the old door from where the french doors are now. To the left in the background is the open doorway leading into Eric's room. I'll post a better picture where you can see it all more clearly later.

And me, painting the primer on the walls. Please disregard the Navy coveralls that used to be Dennis'. I'm not trying to make a fashion statement here :)

2010-02-03T08:38:00.003-05:00

Little Author

One of Leah's favorite treats is when I buy Honey Nut Cheerios (I usually don't ever buy any cereal) and she can do her Cheerios book. I think most people have seen this book before:

Leah evidently was bored with the book and so she decided to create her own with the pictures she would like to add cheerios to. The only thing I did for her was to transcribe exactly what she dictated to me for the words. I love it.

2010-01-31T13:07:00.002-05:00

Beautiful Winter

Well, our family missed the big snow here in December because we had already headed down to Florida, but we are fortunate enough that it snowed big again. I think we got about 12-14" here at our house. It snowed all day yesterday and into the night. The kids had a blast of course...and I took some shots this morning when taking Elsa out for her morning walk.

You can hardly see their faces on account of how cold it was and with the snow in front of the camera. In between Eric and Bay is their friend, Carson.Leah, trudging her sled back up the hill.

And on another note, I got to finish the cushion cover for Eric's chair. He loves it now, and will love it even more when he gets it into his new room!

2010-01-28T11:03:00.003-05:00

January Birthdays

Eric and I share birthdays 1 day apart from each other, (I actually went into labor with him on my birthday, but that is another story!) so it is always a fun week when our birthdays roll around! Leah and Eric baked me a cake and then each of them decorated a third of it. I took a cooking class at our local kitchen store and my mom, brother and 2 friends joined me for the class. It was a superb way to spend my birthday...and it was one of the best classes I have taken.

Eric had a great day as well. I can't believe he is 11 years old! He opened half of his presents in the morning, and the rest at dinner when my parents came over.
I'm not sure who's more excited in this picture, Eric or Leah!

Shortly after breakfast, Eric and Bay took their bows and arrows outside to practice with Eric's present, a free-standing target! This is a big deal for them...no more trying to find a place to tack up the paper target anymore. And this can be left outside, which is a bonus because they always forget to bring stuff in anyways!

Eric and his Gramps

Eric chose lasagna, salad and bread for dinner with an ice-cream cake (that I usually make in the summer) for dessert. Yummy!

2010-01-25T09:40:00.002-05:00

It's the little things...

One of the benefits of living near my parents is that the kids have a wonderfully close relationship with their grandparents. One of the ways that this relationship is fostered is through one-on-one breakfast dates. Either Granni or Gramps will take one kid at a time out to breakfast, and they cycle through the kids so each kid gets a turn. This has become something they each look forward to, but there is something else that really touches my heart as their mom.

While each kid cherishes the alone time, each one always comes back with something for the siblings left at home eating oatmeal with mom. It might be a half of a bagel, or a pack of hash browns, or an extra pancake. Whatever, it is almost like they don't want their siblings to be left out. It doesn't matter that each one always gets a turn, but they always, and I mean always, bring something back.

It is this sibling love that touches my heart.

2010-01-23T19:51:00.005-05:00

It looks like a room...

Dennis and I hung the ceiling drywall yesterday. If you have never hung ceiling drywall, count yourself lucky. We had to tag team each other toward the end with the drilling of the screws. By the last few peices of drywall, the drill gun started to feel like a lead weight. Wow that was exhausting to say the least.

not sure what all of the spots are in this picture. maybe reflection from the flash off all of the dust particles?

Today Dennis and my dad hung the drywall on the walls. Tomorrow they will start mudding. I got a break from downstairs and was happy to be upstairs doing some cleaning...cleaned the dining room hutch, the computer desk and the refrigerator...very satisfying...:)

Look...I actually have shelves in my fridge!

I always forget to take the "before" shot, but just imagine a mess of papers, notebooks, books and the daily stuff of life keeping this area from being remotely useful.

The pocket door from the outside. Still waiting for drywall on the outside of the room.

And the pocket door from the inside looking out of the room.

2010-01-20T13:48:00.003-05:00

Little Artists

Eric has enjoyed his watercolor set he got for Christmas and has graced the empty wall above the piano with some of his new creations. I also love the frames...they are antique frames that I recycled, and I think they look lovely surrounding his artwork!

Leah also is constantly drawing...I framed one of my favorites to hang in the school room.

Meanwhile, Bay is doing cartwheels and handstands throughout the house. Not much artwork from him, but lots of entertainment!

2010-01-18T12:06:00.004-05:00

Swim Meet
On Sunday night, I swam in a Masters swim meet up the road. This is the second meet I have done since getting back into swimming. Several of my girlfriends whom I swim with swam in the meet, as well as my brother, Andy. Dennis and the kids came along, and so did my parents. We had a great time, though my muscles are yelling at me today!

Very nice pool
I swam the 50 backstroke...took almost a second off my time and came in 2nd in my heat. That's me in the pink cap.

I also swam the 200 IM. If you are not a swimmer, this means that there are 2 lengths of each stroke (butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke and freestyle). I am all the way at the far end of the picture in the pink cap again. Andy raced against me, and though I give him grief about it, it is fun to race against my brother, something you never get to do in US swimming...in Masters swimming, the events are mixed, meaning guys/girls compete and across all age groups (ages 18-90+). Though both of us were exhausted, the 200 was fun to swim, and Andy took 2 seconds off his time (I did not have a previous time in this event)

Here is Andy swimming is 100 free with me yelling at him from the sidelines. He took time off and I am pretty sure it is because I wouldn't leave him alone!

Afterwards we all went out to eat at Famous Dave's...then came home and collapsed in bed. It has been a busy and fun weekend, now back to school and routine!

2010-01-18T11:54:00.002-05:00

Progress

Saturday was spent working on the basement...pretty much the entire day. Dennis and I got lots done, all of the walls up, electrical done, pocket door in, and the insulation hung. Dennis got some help from Leah on one of the outlets.

She was proud to tell her brothers at dinner that she got an electricity lesson with daddy. She could tell them that black wires are hot and white are neutral. And, never touch any wires unless you are helping your daddy and he is sitting right there with you!!!

2010-01-13T10:39:00.002-05:00

More Basement Remodeling

Since being back from our Christmas trip, the kids were really hoping to get some snow...they were not disappointed! We got about 3 inches last week and they had a blast playing in it. Since it has been so cold, there is still some snow on the ground, and the creek is frozen over with a light layer of snow on top of it, so it feels very much like winter. Not to worry, we are cozy and warm inside with the woodstove and I am very content! Winter is by far my most favorite season of all!

So we have started on the next big project here at our house (though there are others that have been started and not finished), but we are anxious to get the kids' bedroom re-arrangement finished. We are turning a corner of the basment into Eric's room. Eventually we will add a window along the left wall, but for now, we are just trying to get the room built and get him into it.

The kids' toys have all been shoved to one little tiny corner to make room for construction supplies. We will still keep a large rectangle down here for toys, ping-pong and a couch/tv.This is the space where the room will be. We will be insulating the concrete walls as well which will help with temperature control.
So far the studs along the walls are up and the bulkhead around the hvac duct is up and a closet is framed in. Dennis still has one free-standing wall to build and is putting in a pocket door. Then electrical wiring, insulation and drywall. Exciting!!!

2010-01-07T09:11:00.002-05:00

December Camping Tour

Post #4

Probably my most favorite day of the whole trip was the day that we went to Sanibel Island. We brought our bikes along on this trip for this very reason...to bike around the Island and are so glad we did it! It was a peaceful, restful day filled with things our nuclear family unit loves to do together. We started out riding in the Ding Darling Nature Preserve. Elsa even got to go along with us for the whole day...she is doing very well learning to walk/run alongside my bike. There were tons of birds and other wildlife, but the highlight of the time here was seeing alligators, close up and in person! We probably biked about 4.5 miles, not a whole lot, but it was beautiful and we took our time and stopped to see lots of things along the way.

We ate lunch at a restaurant recommended by our friends Sara and Ryan, Cheeburger Cheeburger, in the little town on the island. It was good, and since the milkshakes were recommended, we got those too. The menu for the milkshakes included every flavor literally imaginable, probably 100flavors listed. Eric could read and decide for himself, and Leah already knew what she wanted without looking at the choices, but Bay wanted to know what his choices were. He could have sat there and read it himself, but it would have taken him an hour, so told him i was going to read it to him only ONE time and he would have to listen carefully and stop me when i got to one that sounded good. So, I read through the ENTIRE menu, all 100 of them, (all listed in alphabetical order). When I got to the last one...V for Vanilla and he still hadn't said which one he wanted, I said, "Bay, which flavor do you want?" he said, of course, "Vanilla!" We all got a good laugh out of that!

Lastly, we visited Bowman's Beach on the Island and had a fabulous impromptu time. It is amazing how the beaches are so different all along the gulf coast. The first one we visited was calm water, chilly water, wide flat beach, and tons of shells. Bowman's Beach was totally the opposite...the water was rough but much warmer, no shells and a much sharper drop-off at the surf line. Anyways, the kids had no bathing suits, but we took off our shoes and let them play in the waves. Bay got soaked all the way up to his hat. Elsa had a blast letting the waves chase her and then she would attack the foam. The sun was sinking in the sky as we were there, so the pictures captured our mood very well. It was a great end to a great day.

2010-01-07T08:49:00.004-05:00

December Camping Tour

Post #3

Have you ever seen a banana tree? I had not, so when we went to visit a friend of my cousin, they had some growing at their house. Can you see the little bananas growing above the little purple flowers? Too bad they weren't yet ripe, that would have been neat to eat a FRESH banana!

Christmas Eve night, we spent some quality family time in the camper setting up our own tiny tree and tiny ornaments, listened to Christmas music from the ipod through the camper stereo, strung multi-color lights and hung the stockings on the bathroom door with care :) The kids were excited to say the least. It didn't matter to them that we only brought stockings with us (no other gifts), it was pure Christmas excitement.

Christmas morning proved to be special even 1000 miles from home. We read the story of Jesus' birth from Luke, ate leftover stale doughnuts, and the kids opened their stockings. Even after we got home and the kids opened their regular presents from Granni & Gramps and us, Bay's favorite gift was still the mini bowling set he got in his stocking! Go figure :)

Heather's cousin, Laura, was a magnificent hostess! She was up every morning with her husband, Kevin, cooking up something different for breakfast, fresh fruit out, fresh squeezed orange juice, coffee...we had such a good time visiting and catching up. Some time ago, our kids began calling her Aunt Laura because she has endeared herself to them so much like an aunt (even though she's my cousin). Needless to say, we felt very much at home with them and are so thankful for their hospitality.

2009-12-27T21:53:00.002-05:00

December Camping Tour

Post #2

Christmas Eve at the beach

We spent Christmas Eve with Heather's cousin, Laura, at Bonita Beach in Bonita Springs. It truly was "bonita" (beautiful!). What a totally different feeling to be at the beach this time of year. Very foreign to me. I am used to much the opposite, in fact, normally I would choose to be snow skiing over being at the beach, but we had a wonderful time. The weather was perfect, not typical hot and muggy summer beach weather, but in the 70's and breezy. The water was quite chilly, but we all managed to actually swim in it (why come all the way to Florida and not swim in the Gulf?). The kids made sand castles, sand snowmen, collected more shells than we will take home, ate lunch at a beach cafe, and played in the water. An added bonus was that this beach is the home of the Gopher Tortoise Preserve, so we got to see lots of these tortoises throughout the park.
Heather and Laura....our dads are brothers

Eric found a live hermit crab in this shell

Our family

eric working on his sand castle

Bay and Leah looking at the gopher tortoise

2009-12-27T21:22:00.002-05:00

December Camping Tour

Post #1

We are in the middle of our December Camping Trip and I finally have time to post some highlights of the trip. We left the week before Christmas and drove down to Florida...brought along the camper, bikes, car-top carrier...loaded to the hilt. Everyone is having a great time.

First stop was Faver-Dykes State Park near St. Augustine. We drove down to Daytona Beach after we settled in to visit with Dennis' step-dad, Sam. Took Elsa to a local d0g-park to let her run, and the kids to a playground to let them run! We love the abundance of the live oak trees with all of the spanish moss here...so pretty. We also drove on the beach for a bit, but couldn't get out to walk...no dogs allowed on the beach in Daytona.

The state park we found is a hidden gem I think. It is very small (only 30 sites) and extremely well maintained. It was well secluded and also gated at sunset, so we felt very safe. Here is the view of the marsh from the playground area. We were told to watch out for the local wildlife: armadillos, alligators, snakes and racoons. Never saw any, but heard many things in the brush at night. Not to worry...there is much to be seen further on in our trip!

Visited old St. Augustine and enjoyed the town very much. The kids enjoyed all of the cannons on the fort, Castillo de San Marcos. It was a really neat fort. We didn't do any tour, just ran through the fort at kid-speed! We also walked through the shops in the town and did the Holly Jolly Christmas Trolly to see the Christmas lights...the whole town and many of the bed & breakfasts go all out to decorate everything!

Here we are at the fort with the sun sinking in the background. We are used to the sun setting at about 4:30 pm this time of year at home, so we have enjoyed the full extra hour of daylight while down here. Same time zone, so we figure it must be because we are a bit further west, as well as much further south.

Look for the next post to be from Ft. Myers on the Gulf Coast. So far we've logged over 1500 miles on the truck!

2009-12-07T14:09:00.003-05:00

Christmas Surprise for Leah & a dissappointment
"Kit"

I am so excited about my handmade Christmas present for Leah. One of the things that is so surprising to me about her is her lack of interest in baby dolls; but on the flip side, her extreme interest in animal dolls and how she treats them as if they are baby dolls. She dresses them up, feeds them bottles, and all of the things that little girls do with baby dolls, except she wants nothing to do with human babies! Anyways, in this interest, I found a cute pattern for a handmade baby doll here and the alterations to make it into a kitty (she loves kitty cats), plus outfits to go with it.

I've never sewn anything like this before, and was wondering how it would be to work with tiny garments and such. The whole thing took me just one afternoon, kitty and 2 outfits. It was very fun to do, and I sure hope she likes it!

"Kit" in her little pink dots pintucked dress

"Kit" in her birthday suit
Reversible jumper and shirt

the other side of reversible jumper

On another note, I also got a new foam cushion for Elsa's bed and sewed a nice fleece cover for it with a zipper so it could be removed and washed. The one she had previously was super thin, falling apart, and smelled horrible as well. I got her a nice 3" cushion for her to cuddle up on. I thought it turned out very nicely.

However she was very wary of it from the start, and wouldn't even get in her bed unless I physically put her in. So I thought it just smelled funny to her since it was new, and it would take her a little while to get used to it. Well, she had other plans. yesterday when we got home from church, she had ripped the fabric apart at the seams and chewed up the foam! I guess she was telling me that she really didn't like it after all! We got a good laugh out of it, and now she's sleeping on the floor of her crate with no cushion for the time being. She seems to like that just fine! So much for appreciation from the dog!!!

2009-12-02T09:34:00.002-05:00

Advent Already!
Wow, I can't believe it is quickly approaching Christmas already! The kids are excited to be decorating the house, are drawing pictures of idyllic Christmas tree and snow scenes at every chance they get, and the preparations have begun with gift shopping, baking, etc.

We usually do a family advent devotion throughout December each year, and so when a friend sent this link, I was excited for something new! There is a daily scripture, devotion and prayer (standard devotional fare), but also very soothing music that continues to play in the background even when you are done with the reading.

Following the Star (click to follow link)

It is fun to see what types of questions arise from the kids out of our conversations about God and heaven with them. After a reminder discussion about Jesus' birthday, Bay asked Dennis and me,

"Since Jesus is God, do you think that when Jesus died on the cross, he really actually died? Or do you think he was faking it?"

What wonderful windows into their hearts. We are often reminded to be thankful for these little souls God has entrusted us with and what great opportunities we have been given to share with them this eternal hope from the very beginning.

Have a wonderful Advent Season!

2009-11-24T22:29:00.003-05:00

Christmas List

We told the kids that they could make up a Christmas wish list. The boys quickly sat down together to corroborate on what they each wanted to ask for to make sure each thing worked with the others' requests...no repeat legos or DS games...

Leah promptly went off into her own space and got her paper and marker and made up her own list. No help from her brothers, no input, other than the 4 years of brainwashing she has endured from them! See if you can't find the brotherly influence in her list. We think it is adorable. I have translated her writing below the picture of the list if you can't figure it out yourself :)

It reads, "Leah's Christmas List"

legos. cat. leapster barbie game. horsey (meaning horse). tinker bell book. scooby doo game. racetrack (she explained this to mean one like Bay's that he never lets her play with)