We have been in the fixing up mood around here lately. Fixing up our home by getting rid of things and cleaning it up is what I have been in the mood for. This week I was able to get rid of 10 bags of extra clothes by giving some away to friends and family and then donating the rest to the Disabled Veterans of America. They just put up a handy drop of box on our side of town so donated to them is very easy and I like to do it.

  What I am really excited about however is a bartering site for our area that is on facebook. I just learned about it from another mom at baseball. There are nearly 1000 members and it is extremely active. You simply list (with pictures included if possible) the things that you have to get rid of and you can also list things you need or want and then people can comment on it or message you and you can figure out a deal. No money is allowed though they do allow the bartering of gift cards.

  I just became a member today so I haven't made any deals yet but I am excited about listing up things that we want to get rid of and seeing if we can find things that are useful to us instead. You can also barter services and a lot of people were offering food (from their garden or even stuff that they had purchased) for things that they wanted. I am really excited about the whole bartering thing. I have long thought this sort of website would be fun and so I am delighted to find it all set up.

Today besides cleaning and dreaming of all the things we can get rid of I have also been doing some fixing up of wedding flowers. Since they are more photogenic than my dreams I thought I would share a few with you. :-)

First here is my wonderful little helper!

 The Pomander is for the flower girl to carry. We are going for a somewhat vintage/rustic look which is why there are some twine accents and canning jars.

This is the groom's boutonniere.

I didn't get the bouquets photographed yet but I am enjoying the whole look of the wedding. I am looking forward to filling the reception tables with flowers in canning jars tomorrow.

I am curious... Have any of you ever been involved with a bartering group before? If so, what are your experiences?

Homeschooling works for me!

 I know homeschooling isn't for every family but it works well for ours and I am getting excited about starting another school year. I love the fact that our family doesn't have to split up for learning to happen, that the kids' books and learning can all have a christian world view, and that we can shelter our children from much of the nastiness that is happening in our world and that we can have more time to work and minister together.

   I have been having fun looking figuring out all the books that we are going to use this year and the activities I hope to do. I'll be honest I don't even begin to get everything scheduled out that we are going to do during the year but I do figure out our basic books and then start looking for books and activities that would add to our learning that we can do together. Throughout the year more books and activities are added as we come across them. Our school year is fairly flexible (other than the basics) and I strive to have us do as much of our learning as possible together and in a fun way.

  Here are some of the books that we plan on using this year:
(I am trying to really make use of what we have on hand rather than going out and buying new books if possible. We will also use our library heavily.)

For Bible:
We are reading through the New Testament (generally one chapter a day) in the morning and the Old Testament (again usually one chapter but if we are engrossed in it we keep reading) after lunch. We also do scripture memory work in the morning and the older kids also do their own memorizing with the ACE curriculum and they do their own bible reading at nap times or at night.

For History:

I want to read aloud The Church in History (a book that I used in bible college but it is interesting, has pictures and I will read it in small sections and I think my kids will enjoy it.) and The Story of the Constitution by Sol Bloom and Lars Johnson. We have also been focusing on Jewish history lately. We have been reading aloud the All of a kind family books and also reading through the Old Testament. Our Jewish neighbor and friend recently loaned us The family treasury of Jewish Holidays and we are hoping to try celebrating some of them this year. Here is a Calendar of holiday dates that I found.

We will also be reading a bunch of biographies both together and on our own.

 For Math:
We are using Saxon Math for Mara, Jonathan and Aaron (87, 65 and ,3 respectively). For Megan I have some Work sheets and will be during other hands on math.

For Science:
We plan on reading aloud and doing together these books and hopefully more as we have a lot of fun ones on our shelf.

• Science in the Creation Week (to be read and with hands on activities) by David Unfred
• First Aid for Children Fast by the John Hopkins Children's Center (This is geared for performing first aid on children not necessarily for children to do first aid but it looks to be a well written book with interesting pictures and instructions and in my quest for my children to have a well rounded education I thought this would be valuable learning.)
• Skin and Bones, a beginner's guide to your great insides by Joanne E. De Jonge

We also plan on doing various activities that help wiht our learning of science like: Beekeeping and study on that, watching videos, hopefully making soap, helping with cleaning fish and butchering chickens.

For English, Spelling and Vocabulary:
For Mara and Jonathan we have ACE workbooks (English and Word Building).  For Aaron and Megan we have a variety of workbooks and I will be working with them a lot on reading (Aaron still needs to get a lot better and I am hoping that Megan will learn how this year).

For Geography:
We are still studying through the countries of the world using a book on countries that we have and also books that we get from the library. We are just finishing up going through the countries of Oceania and are getting ready to study the countries of Africa. Another way we focus on geography is by reading together the Voice of the Martyrs publication, Prayer Point sent out by Samaritans Purse and Missionary letters that we recieve. We also talk about maps quite a bit. Eating and preparing ethnic foods is another way we enjoy learning about countries.

For Literature and creative writing:
I don't have books picked out yet but we try to read a lot of good books. Both me reading aloud and the older two on their own. Mara and Jonathan are voracious readers and so keeping ahead of them in supplying good books can keep me busy! We are just getting ready to order a new bunch from CBD and I am very thankful for the library that I put together when I was their age and all the books my parents have to borrow and for our public library.

As far as creative writing, Mara really enjoys this and does it on her own a lot (this summer she has written several lengthy poems and some stories) but I have been encouraging her in it more. She is working on a book that she tries to work on at least a couple of times a week where she spends time writing and researching. We have also found some essay contests for her to enter.

With the younger three we haven't focused on this much but I do have them write letters every so often and that gives them at least some writing experience.

For Home Ec:
This is something my kids learn a lot naturally and I won't go in to all of that but I did think about some goals that I would like to set for this year and they are that by the end of this year Mara will know how to make 4 different meals with no assistance from me, That Jonathan can do 2 and Aaron can make a simple one. I also want them to practice up more on their baking skills. I want to make progress on their ability to clean the house and maybe do laundry on their own.

For Art and Music:
This spring I started the boys and Megan on piano lessons along with Mara (I teach them) but then summer got busy and I just couldn't seem to keep that on the schedule. We hope to get that started again soon. The boys are also taking drum lessons from a friend and I am hoping to start teaching the girls violin soon as well. Though if we start feeling overwhelmed with too much I will happily cut back.

 We also make sure to sing pretty much every morning together.

I have lots of ideas for art and things I would like to do trying all sorts of different art mediums but at the moment I am not making any specific goals. We will just see what gets done.

For Foriegn Languages:
We are using Rosetta Stone for Latin American Spanish. We love it but took a break over the summer so we need to get it back in our schedule.

I would also love to learn American Sign Language and so I have been exploring routes to learn it as a family.

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 Looking over what I wrote that looks like a ton of stuff but it really isn't overwhelming. Math, English, Reading and Word Building (spelling and vocabulary) are the basics that each child needs to do each school day (though if a vacation is needed we will take it- we love the flexibility of homeschooling!) and that is what they work on mostly by themselves or one on one with me during the morning of the school day. Megan and Aaron do not take all morning to do their work, they have time for playing too and sometimes the older kids can get done early as well.

After lunch we sit down together to read our books which includes History, Geography, Science, Bible and literature. Usually we do all of them a day but stuff like history and science will sometimes just be done for a while and then we will take a break. This time is totally a fun time for us, the kids will beg me to keep reading. We learn a lot but it doesn't feel like school work.

 Art, Music, Creative Writing, Languages, and Science activities usually get done in the afternoons as we have time. I do try to schedule the music lessons so they get done on a regular basis. Home Ec happens all of the time! :-)



  A side note.... I found out that I am not the only one excited about school starting. Megan had books out and we begging me to teach her both yesterday and today. This morning when Mara and Aaron's math books arrived Mara asked if she could do a lesson. Then the boys came in from playing baseball in the yard and announced that they wanted to do school work. I am glad they are eager!

Meals filled with our own homegrown food.

 If you are a regular here at all you will have heard that we are feeling very blessed with all the produce we are getting from our place. Since things are growing well I have challenged myself to not buy any fruits or veggies this month but rather eat stuff that we have been able to get out of our own garden and also what we have been blessed to have others give us (Like cabbage, garlic and now apples from my parents and Beets from a friend). It has gone quite well. We have eaten more vegetables than ever. Most meals we have at least two types of veggies and often many more. There has been some adjusting as we got used to not having apples or other fruits (my parents just gave us apples today and they sure tasted yummy after going without for the month) to snack on and learning to just appreciate what we did have in plenty.

 There is something so fun about fixing a meal and realizing that we knew exactly where basically everything came from. Take for example our Sunday Dinner that consisted of: Steak (Hormone free, grass fed and raised by a man in our area), Baked Potatoes (Gleaned by us last year- we will be going again soon Lord willing), Corn on the Cob (from our garden) and Cabbage Salad (With cabbage from my parents garden and cucumbers and onions from ours). Most meals have been like that lately and it has been so much fun!


   I don't think we will ever eat totally just local foods as I do enjoy chocolate, coconut, some bananas and other things that we simply cannot grow here (though I do have a banana tree in my house- maybe someday it will produce a few). I do have a goal however of having the majority of our diet made up of food that we either produce or get from somebody that we know around here who raises it naturally. Step by step we are making progress and I am enjoying the journey. There are thinking adjustments that have to be made along the way. Recipes that might need tweaking, new favorite foods discovered and enjoyed.

Here are some photos of some other Local food fun that has happened around here lately:

 Today we went to my parents for lunch and enjoyed another homegrown meal. Above my nephew Lars is helping grandma to make applesauce which was sweetened with our honey.

 Aaron and Mara went out and picked chokecherries which we are making jelly from.

Our garden isn't picture perfect (in fact it is pretty weedy!) but that isn't stopping it from growing food!

Do you try to raise a lot of your own food? What is one of your favorite homegrown foods?

Abounding with blessings

 "He who tills his land will have plenty of food, But he who follows empty pursuits will have poverty in plenty. A faithful man will abound with blessings, but he who makes haste to be rich will not go unpunished." Proverbs 28:19 and 20

I am glad it says "tills his land" rather than "keeps a weed free garden"! Joking aside, we have been extremely blessed with lots of good food and I remember over and over that it is all because of God!

  This verse is a good reminder of the priorities we need to make in our life. God wants us to lead useful not empty lives. He cares about all parts of our lives. He wants us to work hard but yet not be obsessed with getting rich. We need balance and we need to always seek His will!

Just google it!

 In our family we as a general rule have very inquisitive minds. We like to figure out the answer to things that we have questions about. When I was growing up the answer to that inquisitiveness was to look it up in the encyclopedia or dictionary but in our ever changing world what we tend to say now is "Google it".
We have to be careful because not everything online is true but still being able to search through the wealth of information online has helped us to learn a lot!

Here are some of the things I have been googling (I actually use Swagbucks search engine because I am able to earn swagbucks which I can then use to buy Amazon gift cards) lately:

How to keep bees through the winter in cold climates~
This is something I am thinking about though most in our area just kill their bees off. I think this video is helpful:


Here are some more links that are useful:
~Another video (I like videos for learning!)
~An Article on preparing them for winter.

Natural Beekeeping/ Not using antibiotics automatically~
This goes against what I have been told around here but it is something I would really like to look into more as giving medicine when there is not problem is not my style at all. Especially when I find out that the diseases are becoming resistant to the antibiotics anyway.
~I found this man's take on it interesting.
~Someone else who practices natural beekeeping.
~Natural Beekeeping looks like a book that I would like to read.

Ways to use chokecherries~
Mara and Aaron were able to pick quite a few on our property and I am sure we could find a bunch more if we went looking. Most people don't use them as they don't taste good without preparation and some sweetener added.
~A nice article on Chokecherries.
~Jelly Recipes

Making Coconut Milk~
Tropical Traditions sent me a bucket of coconut (I'll be reviewing it and hosting a giveaway soon!) and I wanted to try making milk with it. I found that they have a nice video and recipe to teach you how.

Can Elephants Paint?~
That was the question of the day when our friend was over the other day. She read a fiction book to Megan that said that the elephant loved to paint and our friend said her sister had a picture painted by an elephant. We wondered if that could really be true so we checked it out online and had so much fun watching several videos of elephants painting (and better than we can!). It was fun. Here is one of those videos:



Harvesting and Using Wild Hazelnuts~
We have these on our land and I have tried to use them before but they got wormy when I had them drying. I am hoping to figure out how to make use of them without them getting wormy.
Here is some of the things I found:
~A blog article with nice pictures and a bit of info.
~How to husk them.
~Roasting them.

How to make lye (for soap making) from ashes:
This has long been a project on my mind ever since I read about it in a foxfire book. We had a fire outside this evening so now I am thinking on it again. Here is some of the information that I found:
~A step by step instructions list
~More info
~A lot of practical sounding info.
~How to make wood ash soap

How to make wool dryer balls~
I had read about wool dryer balls and figured that I could make them rather than buy them in order to try them out. I have wool clothes on hand that I would like to use. Here is some of the info that I found. I may kind of use their ideas but do my own thing. Here are some of the ideas that I found:
~Making them from old sweaters.
~Made from yarn.
~Some for sale on Etsy that look more like what I am thinking about making.
~Here is the info I was looking for! How to make wool dryer balls from old clothes.

That is some of the things I have been googling- How about you?

Pinwheels!

 I had mentioned a while back that I was having fun working on making pinwheel things for my brother's wedding. I didn't show you the projects then but now that the wedding is all over I thought it would be fun to have a "show and tell" (though I failed to take any decent pictures of one of my favorite projects).

  My sister in law, MollyBea had decided to use pinwheels for wedding decorations and then she also made some really fun big ones out of scrapbook paper to put in the bouquets and decorate the reception area with. She wanted pinwheels for the bridesmaids hair and the groomsmens' "boutonniere". I volunteered to make them out of fabric the way I had seen done on this blog and she took me up on it. My sister Martha and Mara helped me make them.

For the bridesmaids' hair

To go in the groom's boutonniere and the Mothers' corsages.

For the groomsmen to wear as a boutonniere

 Luke also asked me to make flat bottomed ties for the guys. They were pretty easy once I figured out how to do it.

Above is a project I had fun making but then failed to take any good pictures of. Instead of a guestbook I made them a table runner with 3 large pinwheel quilt squares in it. There were two red pinwheels and a yellow pinwheel in the middle with a white background. People could sign their names on the white areas of it. I thought it turned out cute and it made for a unique and fun "guestbook".

 Here is the happy couple. MollyBea had 3 medium sized pinwheels in her bouquet and the bridesmaids each had one large one.

MORE PINWHEELS:

 The had a very cute cake with pinwheels on it too (which I did not make). They just had a small cake and then lots and lots of cupcakes.

 I had fun making them pinwheel hot pads for their new home.

I had fun trying out making pinwheel cookies (but they did not use that particular idea) and you can see my tutorial here.

 Do you like pinwheels? Do you have any other creative ideas for using them?

I am linking this to Fix it up Friday at Blessings Overflowing.