ABC Blessings of Homeschooling

Abundant time together

Backyard studyhall

Cooking good food from scratch

Delight in learning

Endless hours of parent/child time

Field trips with friends

God as our superintendent

Home together all the time

Intimate chats on the big comfy couch

Jesus helps write our curriculum

Keepers of our home

Learning lessons WE think are important

Mornings that aren't hurried

Nikki our homeschool dog

Opportunity to learn at our pace

Place to be ourselves

Quick, flippy baby goats, bunnies, ducks, and chickens in our backyard

Sleeping in and being well rested

Teachers who love us unconditionally

Unembarrassed kisses from kids

Visiting grandparents during the week

Weekly trips to the library

Xtra time for hobbies

Years to develop our talents

Zaniness all day long

Valentine 4-H party

Made Valentine bags

Filled them with treats!

The kids also had snacks and a demontration on ice fishing (yes, in our neck of the woods ice fishing and valentines go together).

Easy to Knit Dishcloths

These dishcloths are fun to make and are a good way to work on increasing your knitting speed. Each of one can be completed in a night or two. They are all made with cotton yard (I use Peaches and Cream but there are other brands) and if taken good care of will last for many years.


This one is the easiest to make. Cast on 32 stitches, knit 72 rows and bind off. Can't get any easier than that! This is a good first project for kids. It doesn't take as long as a scarf and they have a usable product right away.

This is my favorite pattern to knit. It gives the cloth a bit of a design and the pattern is so easy you don't have to pay close attention to what you are doing - which is great for a really intense movie or t.v. show.

Cast on 32 stitches, knit the first row.

In the second row knit 4, purl 4, knit 4, purl 4 to the end. Do this for 4 rows and then switch to purl 4, knit 4 to the end of the row and continue for 4 rows and switch back to knit 4, purl 4. Continue this pattern for 40 to 44 rows (how ever big you want your cloth).

Knit the last row.

Bind off.

To make this zigzag pattern in the cloth, start casting on right where the color changes in the yarn.

Cast on 32 stitches.

Knit the first row.

Row 2: knit 2, then knit 1, purl 1, knit 1, purl 1, to the end knitting the last two stitches.

Row 3: knit 2, then purl 1, knit 1, purl 1, knit 1, to the end knitting the last two stitches.

Repeat row 2 and 3 until it is the desired size.

Knit the last row.

Bind off.

This one is quite a bit larger than the others but uses almost the entire ball of yarn so you don't have the left over yard to hang on to and keep thinking that you will do something with it some day. I know I am never going to use some of those little balls of yarn in my knitting basket but I can't bring myself to just throw them away.

Cast on 4 stitches.

Row 1 - 3: increase in the first stitch and then knit to the end of the row. By the end of row 3 there should be 7 stitches on your needle.

Row 4: knit 2, increase in the 3rd stitch (4 stitches on the right needle) yarn over and knit to the end of the row. There should be 9 stitches on your needle.

Row 5: Knit 3, yarn over and knit to the end of the row.

Repeat row 5 until there are 60 stiches on the needle. The cloth is now half done.

Begin decreasing. Knit 2, knit 2 together, yarn over, knit 2 together and knit to the end of the row.

Continue decreasing until there are 8 stitches on the needle.

Decrease to 4 stitches by knitting 2 stitches together for the entire row.

Bind off.

The importance of key chains

If the keys are taken out of the ignition of our truck they don't go back in without a lot of manipulation. Because of this we don't take the keys out but leave them in and just lock the door. Dad goes to work and grabs his keys, the ones with one of these oh so attractive key tags. Those dirty, gray plastic things are the tags they put your keys on when you bring it into the repair shop. The ones most people would take off, throw away and put their keys on a cute key chain when they get the car back. Not frugal Dad, he just uses those plastic tags. But notice how both sets look alike. Dad goes to work and grabs what he thinks are his truck keys but instead he grabs the van keys. He gets in the truck, drives to work, locks the truck with the ignition keys in it and goes into the hospital. I get ready for bed that night and find a set of keys on the bed and wonder what they for because Dad has his with him. Next morning the phone rings and Dad says "send Spark out to open the front door". He had no house keys either, explains the keys I found the night before. Luck was with him though, three people he worked with live out our way so he are was able to get a ride home. But now his truck is at the hospital that is 30 minutes away. So we have to run in there to pick up the truck which equals an extra trip to town, 2 gallons of gas (about $4 dollars). Since we are in town let's go out to eat ($22). Now the fugal, dirty, plastic, unattractive, repair shop key tag cost us $26! You can bet we will be taking those tags off as soon as we get home from having the vehicle fixed from now on!

"I'll have two of the chicken dinners--NOT"

We were out to eat tonight at popular national restaurant chain when I heard this interesting exchange. All of this was loud enough to hear as we were departing the place.

A young lady working at the counter began quickly walking away from her till towards the back of the restaurant and exclaimed, "I had the chicken dinner special and my stomach hurts super bad, I feel like I'm going to puke!!"

A male working at the next cash register turned and told her (loudly, since she was already around the corner) "There's a huge bottle of generic TUMS over by the sink. try that."

So, lets recap, your workers are going to puke from eating the chicken special AND you have a HUGE bottle of generic tums at the ready? What a ringing endorsement from the workers and sort of takes the shine off the "Free meals during you shift" perk.

Well, our meals were good--and so far no puke! I guess it didn't make the chicken feel very good either.

Just Thursday

A few things that happened here today.

We had some company stop by. The ducks came charging up to the door and we half expect them to ring the doorbell.

Played with the goats. This how big our baby goat Desdemona has gotten in the last week.

Trekked out to the garden. In some spots the snow is about three feet deep. Not problem if it is hard enough to walk on top but when your foot plunges through the hard crust it is cold in your boot, which hopefully stays on your foot when it is pulled out.

Dug for snow peas. Actually, they are digging a cave in one of the big drifts in the garden.

Found some garden tools that got left out last fall. We have some work to do on those.

Bored the cat. He was following us around and then we must have not been exciting enough for him because he meowed and left.

Sat on the deck and soaked up some sun.

Drew some pictures and savored chocolate ice cream.

Worked the calories from the ice cream off on the treadmill

and the trampoline.

Who keeps turning on the barn light?

Outside of the side door to the barn is a motion detector light. It is always on. If you look out in the evening, it is on. Before going to bed, it is on. Middle of the night, it is on. We could not figure out what, or who, would be out there roaming around all night long. It has been creepy actually, like is there a person out there, a coyote, rats, something blowing around. Our minds have been churning with ideas of what could be causing this. It just had us baffled. Finally, Dad figured it out. It is the ducks! The hay is about 10 feet outside the door and we keep it covered with a tarp. As we have been taking bales out it has made a little cave in between the bales and the tarp makes a nice wind breaker. The ducks have taken up residence in this little cave. Who can blame them it has been below zero every night for over a month and while they have a house, I am sure it is not as cozy as the hay stack. As they are in there, when the light goes out, one of them runs out to the barn door therefore turning the light back on and then scurries back to the hay. Since we have figured this out and have been watching, it seems to always be the same male duck who has the job of turning on the light. Is he scared of the dark? Is it to protect his flock from predators? Did he pull the short straw and that is why it is always him? Do the rest of them sleep while he keeps watch? When does he get to sleep? Do they make wing shadows on the hay? Oh the questions we would ask if they could only talk.

Winter celery crop

These are two celery stalks were are growing. The one on the left was a cut off part of a stalk of celery hung in a glass of water with tooth picks. It has really grown well and is getting a good root system. The orignal stalk is getting icky moldy. The one on the right is the inside of a stalk. This one sits in a glass of water. It isn't hasn't shown as much growth and has no roots. When they get bigger, or if they slow down in growth, we are going to put the leafy parts in a pot of soup.

I was taken by surprise

by how quickly the dinner hour snuck up on us. I am use to it getting dark before 5 p.m. and tonight it was 5:20 and still light out. I knew it has been getting later and later each evening but didn't realize how far we had come in having longer afternoons. Dancer came up with a game to play and when I looked up at the clock to see how much time we would have to play before needing to start dinner it was already 5:20. Dad worked tonight and we have dinner on the table when he works at 5:45 which gives him just enough time to get up, get dressed and eat before needing to run out the door. I always have prebrowned hamburger in the freezer so Dancer and I were able to throw a dinner of cheeseburger salads together quite quickly. In the fall I am always surprised at how early it gets dark so this is just the flip side.

Basketball head

Dancer had a basketball tournament today - 2 wins 1 loss. This picture we got of her makes her look like she has a basketball for a head! Every other picture we took she had her back turned. We could really use a faster camera.

The best raspberry oatmeal bars

Dad took these to work last night for a snack and the other nurses were mad he didn't bring the whole pan. They all said they were very, very good. We loved them so much we made another pan tonight.

Raspberry Oatmeal Bars

1/2 C. brown sugar
1 C. flour
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/8 tsp. salt
1 C. oatmeal
1/2 C. butter
3/4 C. raspberry jam

Combine dry ingredients. Blend softened butter in with a pasty blender or hands. Press 2 cups of the mixture in a 8X8 pan. Spread jam over crust within 1/4 inch of the edge. Sprinkle the rest of the mixture over jam and press into jam. Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes.

These are good cold but serve them warm with ice cream and they are to die for!

Desdemona's other mom

After spending a couple of days in the house our new little goat Desdemona has really taken a liking to Dancer. She follows Dancer around and if Dancer sits on the floor Desdemona climbs on her. She has also gotten very comfortable with being held. We are having warmer temps and she has gained two pounds so she is spending the night in the barn with her mom.

She just snuggles right in and makes little signing noises when she is being held. By next week at this time she will probably be to big to pick up.

Potato love

Dancer pulled this heart shaped tuber out of the potato bag tonight when she was peeling potatoes for supper. I always seem to be in such a hurry when getting diner ready I think I would have missed it. This is a Yukon Gold, our favorite variety of potatoes.

Desdemona

Our first goat kid of the year - Desdemona. She was born sometime early afternoon. Spark went out about 12:30 to check the mom and she was all alone. At 2:20 when he checked again this little one was in the pen with her. Sad that we missed the birth, but happy she is here with no problems. When we first saw her she was standing but still wet. She is still quite wet in this picture. To dry her quickly we blow dryed her hair. The temps here are suppose to be -16 tonight so she will spend the next few days living in the house. Every few hours we take her out to the barn to nurse from the mom Millie. She settled right in and watched some t.v. with Spark while warming up in front of the space heater.

Right brain party

Scribble art pictures Spark made today. He drew a huge continuous line scribble and let his right brain take over and see pictures in the scribbles.

Going to the chapel and he's gonna get married

Spark, for an eight year old, spends a lot of time thinking about getting married. He already has his wedding all planned out. He and his bride will get married under our apple trees while standing on a log. The apple trees sound romantic but not sure what the log is for. He also wants lots of children, but only girls.

Tonight he and I were driving in the car alone to pick up Dancer from an activity. Out of the blue he says to me, "what do you think I will do for a job when I grow up?" Now, this is a boy who puts way more effort into avoiding doing chores than it would take to do them, and he is thinking of full time work. I guess that is encouraging. He comes up with things like, make t-shirts (he doesn't even like to wear clothes), work for Webkinz, write a comic strip ("if they are still in style then"), be a math teacher or grow and sell potatoes. I said to him maybe he could stay home with his kids and his wife could go to work everyday. Oh no, he says quickly, he would never expect her to work. Besides his kids need to be homeschooled because he doesn't ever want them to have to go to school. And as an after thought he threw in, "and we will have a lot of video games". It made me happy to hear that he appreciates the way we live and that he wants to duplicate it in a family of his own.

Lights out

This afternoon, right after pulling dinner out of the oven, the lights flickered a couple of times and then went out. Put in calls to all the power company phone numbers and they were always busy. Called a friend in a town 15 miles away that has the same company and they didn't have power either. While eating our toasty warm supper in the dark, we realized that we are not very prepared for a loss of power and had no idea how long it would be out. There were no batteries in the radio or flash lights. With no power we have no pump for water. Once we run the water out of the lines that is all there is, which usually amounts to a toilet flush and one bucket. That means no water for our animals and in the winter we have to thaw the water that they did have to put new water in. Nothing to thaw the water with. Dancer was sick today with a stomach bug and kept throwing up - really want to be able to flush the toilets in that scenario (thankfully she was okay during the outage). We heat with fuel oil but to get the fan on the furnace to run we need electricity. We keep our house at a frugal 64 degrees and with the temps outside below zero it doesn't take long to cool down. Only one of our cell phones was charged, we meant to plug the other one in but never got around to it earlier in the day. Dinner had just been made, and we left the oven door open to take advantage of that heat, otherwise we have no way to cook in the winter with out electricity. We can grill, which we do in the winter, but not in the dark and with these temps. It also would have been mighty cold to go out and start a bonfire. It would have been jelly bread all around!

Two things we did have was the one cell phone and the computer. The computer would have only lasted for a couple of hours but it sure seemed like we weren't so cut off. Our house is also full of candles, I love to have one burning and therefore always get a ton of them for gifts. In fact, I had one already lit when the lights went out. How handy was that?!

The happy ending is that the lights came back on about an hour after they went out. Otherwise, we would have traveled to Grandma and Grandpa's house to darken their doorstep for the night. They only live about an hour away from us. We have learned our lesson and will getting somethings together to be more prepared should we find ourselves unexpectedly in the dark again.

Knitted neck cozy

The cold weather is back with a vengeance, it was -11 this morning when we left for a basketball tournament. To combat these frigid temps I knit Dancer this simple neck cozy. I saw a picture of a fancy one of these in a magazine and thought I can do that only with an easier pattern. To make this cast on 72 stitches. Knit the first row. All other rows, knit 2 purl 2 to make ribbing. Just keep going until it is the desired length. This one was knit on straight needles and sewed together. It would be even easier knit in a round. This is so versatile.

As a neck cozy just fold down like a turtle neck.

Pull it up for a head band

As face mask and it still covers the neck

The perfect hat for a girl with a ponytail.

Hey, Let's Go Bowling

We spent a fun day with homeschool friends bowling and lunching. For the second game the lights were turned off and everything glowed (including all our white socks). There was also music like the hokey pokey, the chicken dance and other oldies but goodies. The kids may have danced more that game than they bowled. Things have really changed in bowling since the days of keeping score with a paper and pencil. The score boards even tell you how fast the ball went down the alley. Amazing.

A Sunday afternoon on the Isle of La Grande Jatte

I love, love, love, love, love this picture by George Seurat. This is me with my tied blanket of the picture. I was so happy when we found this at the fabric store. I sleep under it every night and the people have to have their feet up towards my head so they are facing me or I can't go to sleep. Last year for Christmas I got a coloring book that had the beloved George Seurat picture in it. I colored it and then put it in my portfolio of this years school work. And when I am done with this year, I am going to take the picture out of it and put it another book. This year for Christmas I got a jigsaw puzzle of the picture. It was a 1000 pieces and really hard because the puzzle looks just like the painting, made up of different colored dots. Much of the grass and the trees looked exactly alike.

I also love the play "Sunday in the park with George" starring Bernadette Peters (she is awesome in the play "Into the Woods" as well). I am always looking for more items with this picture on it.

Some interesting facts about the painting:

• Measures 6 feet 10 inches by 10 feet 1 inch
• It took Seurat two years to paint it
• The painting technique is called pointillism
• Today this site is a public garden and housing development
• The painting is displayed with a pure white, wooden frame to make the painting more vivid.
• The painting is on display at the Art Institute of Chicago

All the little birds on 370th street

love to hear the robin go tweet, tweet, tweet.
It's winter here, little bird
Come in April, when it's spring
Oh rockin' robin well you really gonna freeze tonight

I almost couldn't believe my eyes today when I saw a robin. As we drove further up the road there was a whole flock of them! We usually don't see robins until most of our snow is gone which is normally the end of March or the beginning of April. We have had a couple of weeks of below normal temps for us, wind chills have reached the -50 degree mark, so we don't know what they are doing here. The only thing we could think of was that someone has a really rockin' bird feeder. We are in the middle of farm country where they could be living in a corn crib but that just seems odd. For what ever reason, they are here we can put in the record books that we saw robins on the 21st of January.

Today we had wonderful temps, almost 30, and in the sun it felt like spring. We took advantage of the beautiful weather to be outside and releave some cabin fever. First thing was to get the deck shoveled off so it is easier to take the dog out. There was about two feet of snow on it with a thick layer of ice underneath the snow. Tomorrow is suppose to be even nicer than today so hope the ice is gone as well or at least melt enough that we can scrape it off. I know we will get lots more snow but at least we will start with a clean slate on the deck. Spark took a little break and perched on the corral gate to soaked up some sun. The ducks were excited about the water that was dripping off the barn. You can't see the drips very well in this picture but as they fell they would catch them in their beaks and stand under the eaves like it was a mini shower. This is Wooton one of our roosters. He doesn't really like to be inside unless the weather is really bad or cold. He does spend a lot of his time looking in this window at all the animals inside the barn and it is where he sleeps at night. We have another rooster who doesn't like to be outside and they are not best of friends. It may be a domain/territorial issue between the two of them and Wooton hates it outside but other one is at the top of the pecking order. Who knows with chickens! It seemed such a treat to do chores and unload feed in the warm weather today. It is actually very enjoyable to be out there on nice days. The snow was soft enough though that the truck got stuck, the snow was up to it's axel, and so we had to shovel and push to get it back out of the yard. Even with the nice weather it is obvious all over the yard that it is still winter. It is days like this though that get us through to spring.

Ice Man

Take a block of ice....

Chisel a face and hair into it......

Pour hot water on top of a block and stack another block on top of the first block so it can freeze on. Pack the edges with snow and pour on more water slowly so that it just runs down the sides and mixes with the snow to make a strong bond with the blocks of ice.

Ice man.

He has a face, it just isn't showing up well on the picture. Wondering how long he will last into the spring.