Schoolin'

I haven't posted much lately. Ball season has hit and our lives have kicked into high gear! We have pretty much 1 weeknight a week to sit down with the whole family for supper. Weekends are pretty good, and Dad does a great job making ball-time some quality one-on-one time with the kids. He has to work extra hard to work in some middle-kid time, a tea party or book just for her. She is the only one of the 3 not playing ball this year. Dad is coaching Daniel's team and he is a really good coach - he doesn't just coach, he really teaches proper technique.

The weather has been so beautiful, it has been hard to stay inside for school. We are still watching the OWLS from a link I told you about here. At least 4 of them have hatched, maybe more. It should really begin to get interesting as they get big and begin to move around. It has been such a neat thing to watch! The man who owns the boxes does a live question and answer time as well, and we have learned a lot. Just the little behavior things this owl mother does, like pushing aside the older ones to feed the youngest first - it has been amazing.


Maria was the winner of the Lizz Curtis Higgs book giveaway! I am sending that off to her today, and looking forward to even more great giveaways in the future!


We are still waiting for the completion of everything to buy the land we have been looking at. I am not in a particular hurry because we have so many activities around here, and moving will create a lot of busy-ness and driving right now. I wouldn't mind waiting until ball season is over. BUT, I have all these seeds I have started and no ground to put them in! And 3 really big chickens in the backyard! I'm considering moving to a container garden plan for this season, but I have so many plants! I can just see all these 5 gallon buckets overflowing with watermelon plants.


We are planning a busy Easter weekend with family! We will have our traditional Easter Resurrection Buns as usual. We have some neat Easter activities from here and a Resurrection file folder game here. I am adapting these for use with our Resurrection Egg set for some daily devotionals. I hope that where ever you are, you are enjoying some beautiful Spring weather and family fun.

Getting Going - WFMW

I have those days where after a morning poured into homeschooling and everything else; I hit a HARD afternoon slump! Yesterday housework and laundry put me over the edge. There was a 1/2 inch of dust on the mantle, dishes in the sink, and my bedroom was about to be lost under Laundry Mountain. You ever have those times where there is so much to do you just kind of walk around; overwhelmed and confused about where to begin? It was bad.

When things get really bad I just want to curl up in my bed behind a locked door -overwhelmed and worn out. So after mobilizing the kids to help me out and a quick prayer for strength-here's my attempted cure to get myself going:

1. Tennis shoes (preferably with some nice, new athletic socks, I don't know why). Just makes me feel athletic, puts a bounce in my step, and gets me going. I'm more likely to run and play with the kids and less likely to sit with my feet curled up under me.

2. I lite candles in the house. Usually it is the messy house that has gotten me to this point, and it just makes me feel like AT LEAST the air is clean. Plus - it's just hard to feel bad when you've got some Yankee Candle cinnamony sweetness floating around you.

3. Some praise music. Maybe KLOVE blaring from my computer, or if things are really desperate I'll put on some Toby Mac or Super Chic. If you can manage it -loud singing helps, too.

4. Tea. Sweet. and lots of it. Actually, I think a lot of time when I lack energy a root cause of it is actually because I am dehydrated. I just don't make enough time in the morning to drink enough water.

Does it always work for me? Most of the time. It gets me moving, and after all some progress is still progress. It is better than Laundry Mountain Denial.

Seed Starting

We have lots of seeds started in a sunny window! The dog's kennel makes a perfect growing surface. They need to be planted soon! I'm waiting to see WHERE this garden is gonna be planted! A local move to the country is a strong possibility, so I am waiting - possibly for a garden of several acres!

I have big plans for making pickles and picante. I also found several seed packets of spaghetti squash. I've never grown it before, but my kids LOVE it! I rarely buy it because of the price, but I like to use it in place of pasta in recipes and casseroles. If you don't know what I am talking about it is this strange squash and you bake, then scoop out the insides which look like spaghetti. When I first cooked with it I would mix it in 1/2 and 1/2 with cooked spaghetti noodles and no one knew, but they sure raved about the greater-than-normal-spaghetti.

Review: Raw Energy

Raw Energy By: Stephanie Tourles

Wow! What a neat book! Kind of overwhelming - and convicting. So, I am into organic food -as much as possible. I would go totally organic if I could afford it. I could even be a vegetarian and be TOTALLY happy. But, raw food is a whole 'nother level. I do remember my parents got a juicer in the 80's and kind of got into this raw food phase. I have heard of many people who have moved to a "raw" diet and been cured of various health problems. In particular, these foods are revolutionary in giving people more energy (as the title suggests).

This book is full of really interesting recipes, but the front half of the book is very informative - lots of interesting facts and research about eating this way. The recipes are not gross - they are actual real recipes with real ingredients that I actually recognize and kids will actually eat. There are a lot of smoothie recipes and even some neat desserts. Recipes include brownies, fudge, and Zucchini Chips - also a lot of useful recipes if you have fresh garden produce to use. There is a lot of blending and chopping, but basically the time and difficulty put into preparing these recipes compared with cooking is about the same, if not even easier. I can't wait to try all the bar recipes for my family when we go hiking. These are ideal recipes for backpacking, exercising, and even traveling, especially considering the energy benefits.

You can purchase Raw Energy from the Storey Publishing site HERE -and what a neat website, too. Lots of neat books on preserving foods and gardening.

Retail Value: $16.95

Disclaimer: Mama Buzz and reviewers received a complimentary copy of this book for review purposes.

Review and Giveaway!

I am so excited to get to review a Liz Curtis Higgs book! Although, I have to say that I most think of this author for her neat children's books -like The Parable of the Lily or the Parable of the Sunflower. She is probably best known for the Bad Girls of the Bible series. Here Burns My Candle is her latest book and it is based on the story of Ruth and Naomi. Now, what makes it really interesting is that it is set in Scottland in the 1700's. She takes a lot of liberties with the story line. Truly, we aren't given many actual details into the life of these Biblical characters before the death of their husbands, so I was anxious the read this book and see what her interpretation was.
This was a good book. Of course you go into it knowing the general plot-line, but that didn't spoil it because I was intrigued at how she would develop these characters. I think I had some pre-conceived ideas about the real Ruth and the book really challenged those. I had to go back to the Bible and verify what facts we do have on these characters - which might have been the point. The character who is based on Ruth's husband was a bit of a scoundrel and I thought the book dwelt a bit much on his extramarital affairs.
Liz Higgs has on several occasions written about Scottland in this time period and she handles that era in a very insightful way. You can click on the book trailer below for a sneak peak.
The book only covers Chapter 1:1-18, so it was just getting good! I would like to read the sequel and see what happens next!

Go here for more information about the author, HERE to order the book!

Okay - now for the really fun part! I get to do a giveaway! I am giving away a free copy of the book Here Burns My Candle! So, in order to be entered in the giveaway:

• Become a follower of this blog and leave a comment to this post with your email address letting me know. If you are already a follower, leave a comment to that effect as well.
  
• For an extra entry - If you have a blog, blog about this giveaway and send me the link in a comment.

This giveaway is open to US residents and ends on Saturday, March 27th at 9pm. One winner will be randomly selected and notified by email on March 29th.

This book was provided by WaterBrook Multnomah for the purposes of review only.

Signs

I had a fun day of crafting today! Ally worked on a neat new zig-zag quilt and we all stayed inside all day. The weather went from almost 80 degrees yesterday, to barely 40 degrees all day here! CRAZY! I've been getting so excited about planting my garden and feeling Spring-a-Comin'! Today was just YUCK - There was even talk of SNOW on the news! Here's some of our projects! I got the idea for this neat sign from my crafty blog friend whose name happens to be Tara on her blog The Trendy Treehouse
She has some great crafty ideas on her blog. I had a lot of fun on this sign! Here's a close-up of it.

This is a verse I think I am speaking over my Gracie Pearl in faith especially that speaking worthwhile things kindly part!

This is a sign for our bathroom - "Who may ascend the hill of the Lord? Who may stand in His holy place? He who has CLEAN HANDS and a pure heart." Psalms 24:3-4. Kinda fun, I thought!

Owl Website

I have blogged before about our adventures on KIDWING - an online owl pellet disection site HERE - For 2nd grade each of my kids does a science emphasis on owls along with reading There's an Owl in the Shower by Jean Craighead George - one of my all time favorite first chapter books for kids! I love Jean Craighead George anyway. Tons of her books are on my kid's reading lists.

Today a friend sent us an INCREDIBLE LINK HERE - an online webcam which is aimed at a mother barn owl sitting on 4 eggs (she ate a cracked one this morning and a whole rabbit too). They should start hatching any time! It is kind of addictive. I suspect they might be like chickens and you don't start counting the days to hatching until the last egg is laid - so that would make for hatching next week. We have the sound down low and the window closed because no one was getting any schoolwork done. Just like with the hatching of our chicken eggs -nobody wants to miss the big moment!

I loved a recent blog post I read HERE about looking at your homeschool program as a whole instead of day or week by week. It was very reassuring to me. Especially with science and history we tend to get in several intensive periods of study over the course of the year. Daniel this year got into a bookmaking kick and wanted to write and copy all the time, since then I haven't really made him do much handwriting. He probably wrote more in that 2 -3 week period than I would've asked him to all year. I know when I first started homeschooling I felt that everyday had to include every element on my list. Now, I see the value of letting a child thoroughly get immersed in a subject matter without squelching their interest so we can go on with a language worksheet or something.

This was really brought home to me when someone asked me to look back at the elementary lessons (particularly science and history) that I still remember from my childhood. It is those projects where I did something out of the ordinary, built a model or really got involved - not the stuff I learned from a book.

By the way - immersion is cool; but in our school the rule is - do your math and spelling first. Reading isn't actually a subject for my kids -it is the fun thing I make them stop doing so they can get their other work done.

Folding A Fitted Sheet

Go HERE to see a neat video on HOW TO FOLD a fitted sheet. It's worth it - she really does it a neat way, too. It's not brain surgery. It ought to be something I know - I literally kind of wad my fitted sheets. It's the kind of thing that drives my OCD husband CRAZY! Does everybody know this except me?

Tacky Day

Every now and then around here we like to declare or make up a special holiday for our school day. Just to make school a little more fun on those RARE days where we aren't going anywhere! Today we declared it Tacky Day (one of the kid's all time favorites). We have pajama day a little too often, backwards day, and the list never ends. Clearly Ally won the Tacky Day award for being the tackiest!

Only Gracie can make Tacky hip.

Poor Daddy

Our Ally is a softball pitcher. She is what is known as a "junkball pitcher." That just means she is really good at throwing tricks - making the ball curve, drop, spin. She is up to about 50 mph or more. So, Saturday she broke her Daddy's nose in two places. It is just beginning to turn purple today, but it hurts like crazy. You can't really tell from this photo, but his nose is a bit crooked. I guess he'll start wearing that catcher's mask grandad gave him now! It is really hard to ice it so I went and got him some fine snowcone ice in little baggies. It'll be fun in a few weeks when he goes to the doctor to have it straightened! Ouch! What a fun ball season this is starting out to be!

Review Handmade Marketplace

The Handmade Marketplace

By: Kari Chapin

The Handmade Marketplace is a great, modern guidebook to selling your crafts locally, globally, and online. This book is FILLED with personal experiences and advice from all kinds of crafters who have had a wide variety of success with handmade businesses. These personal thoughts were really interesting and made the book fun and easy to read. I have seen these kinds of books before, but never one so thorough and up to date! To sell things over the Internet is to keep up with a fast changing marketplace, and this book really helps to navigate the Internet segment of selling handmade crafts.

I have seen a lot about Etsy, but I really didn't understand how all that works, so this book was really helpful in that area. It actually includes an interview with an Etsy VP. Twitter, Facebook, local fairs, blogging, marketing, and even photography and bookkeeping, the author is really thorough in her descriptions and details.
This book is a really well done, comprehensive guide for anyone looking to expand a crafting business - or start a new one. I'd love to use this book to expand my sign business -so now maybe I can put some of these ideas into practice myself!

The book sells for $14.95

Here's the link to purchase the book from Storey Publishing

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary copy of this book from Storey Publishing and Mama Buzz for review purposes.

Not Again...

I know, I know! You are all tired of my chicken posts! But, I am still so fascinated by them! I can sit out there and watch them chase bugs for hours (as you can see in the photo so could the dog). I have to show you how strange they are looking now with most of their baby fluff gone. I like them so much better now that they are out of the garage and permanently in the coop. Now, they can poop in the yard like good chickens are supposed to. This orange one is SO going to be a mean rooster when he grows up. He pecks and corrals the others and flaps his wings and fusses at them.
See the comb starting to grow on the top of their heads? Kinda punk -like he's growing a mohawk or something.

I'm sorry, I'll try to post more about kids and less about chickens. I read somewhere you are supposed to let your kids handle them alot when they are this size so they'll be used to people and friendly when they get bigger. So, you'll find my kids walking around the backyard playing & holding one scared and freaked out looking chicken lately. Is that strange? Maybe I should get out more.

Watercolor with crayon resist

Kids have a hard time with watercolors. They bleed around on the page and mess things up. It is hard to be patient and take your time to allow the layers to dry. One of my favorite things to do is to use crayon to help out. Here's what you do:

1. Choose a picture and trace lightly in pencil. We put ours on the window to make the tracing easier. Tape would've helped, but keeping tape in our house is next to impossible. My kids must eat it or something.

2. Color over your pencil lines with a white crayon. It there are other areas you would like to stay white, color them with the white crayon as well.

3. Now, paint. It works! This is even helpful for preschoolers - it looks neat even when you "get out of the lines."Here is Gracie's. The crayon helped her flowers and the fawns spots stay white when she painted.

Here is Daniel's Troy Aikman picture. I think allowing kids to paint from a photo gives them more confidence with painting, lets them learn HOW to paint first without worrying about creating their own original works too. I keep a tub full of pictures from magazines, most of them laminated for art and for writing as well.

Ally's turned out really well! This technique works well with white, or snow scenes especially - or as in this picture when two objects are touching each other.

Mud and a tea party

Gracie is very into another "Fancy Nancy" phase with tea parties and speaking French and dressing very oddly. She fixed a very fancy tea party meal with lots of finger food.

We helped Max plant his garden, cut some limbs and helped build a burn pile. The kids enjoyed helping with a trench for drainage - it gave them plenty of opportunity to get really good and dirty. Ally was pretty worn out from a morning of pitching.

Gracie planted the onions.

Mud + Boy always =Fun

The dog learned to chase a frisbee - she has a ways to go to learn to catch it in the air. Maybe she needs to lose about 5 pounds before she is able to do that. This is a great photo of some of the pecan trees at my parent's house.

Mother Daughter Duet

Mother Daughter Duet is one of those books that explores things that really concern me. When I see Christian people with difficult relationships with their adult children, I can't help but wonder, is there an underlying cause? What went wrong? What could've they done to prevent it?

And when I see my daughter turning 12 and showing the signs of fierce independence, I can't help but wonder about my relationship with my girls in the future. There is such a delicate line between mothers and daughters in so many areas. A mother's comments can cut like no other, or hit on just the right thing to escalate into battles, bawling, or both. I love the quote at the front of this book:


"We all hope to feel our mother's arm around our shoulders when we're worried, to feel it gently let go when life calms down. It's an intricate duet that moms and daughters dance - one backing off when the other needs space, moving up close when the unfamiliar threatens."- Cathie Krycza


Each issue in this book: (generational differences, letting go, communication, church, forgiveness, and so many more) is tackled by both Cheri Fuller (mother) and Ali Plum (daughter ) so we have their different perspectives. This made the book really unique. The mom would relate an incident, and the daughter would explain what she was feeling about the same situation. Together they have really faced some incredible circumstances. My favorite thing about this book is all the research these two authors did. They really talked to a lot of mothers and daughters about the issues they face. It is nice to me to see the mother-daughter relationship kind of laid out for me in preparation of things to come.

This would be such a great book for so many women I know who are struggling with strained relationships. But, even for those of us who are years ahead of the major issues of this book - there is a wealth of information about what not to do as well.

Believe me, our experience in youth ministry has taught me that when John 16:33 talks about tribulations; he's talking about things like the teen years! For now, this book inspires me to savor the beauty of my relationship with my girls in all its phases! Especially - those phases where they still think I'm great! ;) This book is really well done -and really full of thought-provoking insight!

Go Here to view several pages of the book - or to buy this book - It sells for $13.99

Thanks so much to the Waterbrook Multnomah Publishing Group, who provided this book
for the purposes of review.

B-U-tiful

Finally, the weather is nice enough that we can put the chicken tractor coop out and let the chicks run around and scratch in the grass. They seemed kind of hesitant to come out - mainly because the dog keeps barking at them when they do.

I'm pretty sure at least one of them will be a mean rooster who will someday put the fear of feather-kind into this dog. In the meantime, she just doesn't know what to make of these little clucking, peeping fluff balls. Birds of a feather stick together and they seem to be pretty brave as long as they are all together, but if one runs for cover, they all do.

Gracie is on the lookout for hawks -or something like that. Who really knows when it comes to Gracie.

Daniel is on the lookout for -something? Who really knows when it comes to Daniel.

Ally is finishing her schoolwork. She has her last volleyball games today and softball tonight. We love it when it is warm enough to do school outside. Spelling on the sidewalk and science in the woods - there's nothing like it!

Come on SUNSHINE! On the agenda for today for mama is starting all those seeds for the garden - I should've done it a few weeks ago! I heard on the news last night that tomatoes are supposed to triple in price this year because of crop failures! Better plant plenty!

Dancing With My Father

I've gotta admit I have been in a bit of a spiritual strange place for the past year. After almost 6 years of being consumed with youth ministry, and other church ministry my quiet time has been kind of bizarre. I have felt so much of my spiritual connection with God through my times of lesson planning for ministry - I felt God speaking to me and moving through me in that venue. But now ...I've felt odd with that huge piece of my spiritual life missing.

I've muddled through it -and I see now that it is a good thing. I need to be able to relate to God -kind of just He and I. But, wow did this book Dancing With My Father by author and speaker Sally Clarkson really speak to me! How timely it has been for me! I've just got to quote some of it to you...(I've got like 20 pages dog-eared). This kind of sets up the author's quest throughout the book - and these are certainly feelings many of us feel.

"When I first fell in love with the "Lord, I was so much happier. I was willing to read my Bible for hours, hungering for understanding and truth, discussing into the wee hours of night with my college friends the wonderful truths I had never heard before. Praying fervently and eagerly awaiting miracles was the call of my heart. Enthusiastically I would foray into the lives of strangers, eager to tell them about his redemption and grace... My whole life was genuinely wrapped up in God, not in a religious ritual but in an excited, passionate, grateful, purposeful way.

That was the place I had left, the place from where I had fallen. Since then, mundane duty had propelled me forward through the many corridors of my life. Yes, I'd enjoyed occasional waves of excitement and a heart choosing to love him...But more often I'd been just putting one foot in front of the other. I wished for the reality of God to be true, but sometimes I had difficulty believing it or grasping him."

This is the author's story of moving from a place of mundane living - to seeking the joy, the renewal of a loving, passionate relationship with God. I hated to end this book! It is a great guidebook to find joy in the midst of the burdens of daily life. Sally Clarkson is a great storyteller and this book is such a great journey! She shares in a vulnerable way and her trails are the kinds of things every mother and wife can SO relate to. This would be a great book for a group of women to read together, especially since it contains some excellent insights for Bible study and there are questions for reflection at the end of each chapter. I know for me it has really ushered me into a time of renewal, encouraged me, and given me some amazing perspectives!

Go HERE to purchase this great book! It sells for $13.99 - and is well worth it.

Thanks so much to the Waterbrook Multnomah Publishing Group, who provided this book

for the purposes of review.

Chicken Update

Well, our little science fair chicks are quickly replacing that chick fluff with feathers. They aren't cute anymore. As a matter of fact, what they are doing to the floor of that little coop is downright UGLY! Mercy, these babies can produce - and it ain't eggs! I'm still not sure what we are doing with them. They can sure make a mess, they root around and poop in their food and water, and they are starting to stink. Once they are outside it won't be so bad. The coop has to stay in the garage until things warm up around here. We let them free-range in the yard a bit one day, but it has been really cold lately. Technically I think they are really supposed to spend the 1st 6 weeks with the heat lamp, but I don't know if I can handle them in the garage for that long. We put up a roost and they seem to really enjoy it, they just look like they are ready to get out and scratch in the grass. I think they are getting ansy in the confined space they are in.