LITTLE WOMEN 2018 Movie Review

   So I was recently asked if I would like to do a movie review for "Little Women". I thought that sounded pretty fun as "Little Women" has been a much enjoyed book around here and we enjoy a good movie from time to time. I didn't notice at first that it was a modernized version. I would have been a lot less eager if I had. But we went ahead with it anyways.



 Personally I think this movie would probably be most enjoyed by people that don't love the book. But then again some might really enjoy the modern twist. I did find it interesting to see what things they kept the same and what things got changed and then of course how they changed them.



  Some of the strong points of the movie:

• The love of sisters even though sometimes you think you might hate them.
• The need to respect the different life goals of others.
• The beauty of helping others.

 We had a rough viewing time as my computer was having issues and the movie would start and stop on us regularly so that didn't help me to get lost in the movie like perhaps I could have otherwise. So I stayed pretty detached and not emotionally caught up in it. Which led me to wonder things like: "If I hadn't read the book would I understand the different characters with the speed that they sometimes flew from one time to another?" They did a lot of changing from one time period to another and then back and forth again. I think it worked okay but was sometimes a little challenging to follow. In the movie Beth was completely lovable as always, Meg was pretty sweet, Amy was a "brat" which follows the book pretty well in my opinion, Marmee was a little hard to take (again my opinion) but Jo was the real challenge. I liked her in many ways but I think they went way over board in displaying the bad side of her - almost to the point that it was hard to like her. In the book she certainly deals with faults but there is the very lovable side that is really trying to do what is right too. That wasn't so apparent in the movie.

  Over all I would say that it isn't a bad movie to watch. You may enjoy it and you may be inspired by some of it but it is also possible that you, like my children, might find it a little painful to watch. I think it is a personal taste thing. 

 Check out the Trailer and see what you think.

The movie was released in movie theaters today. You may be able to find it in you area this weekend.

Disclaimer: I was asked to review this movie and I did so after being provided a free viewing. All opinions expressed are my own.

Wayfaring Stranger- A Family Project

This was a project that we were able to complete this summer. We had a lot of fun working on it. We sewed the costumes, worked on the music, recorded it, filmed it on a very wet and rainy day and then Jonathan edited it. We have much room for improvement in all those areas but we enjoyed the results - we hope you do too!

Life Is Ever Changing....

Mara and her apartment mates

Whenever I take a long hiatus from this blog, which has happened far more than I would wish this year,  it is always hard to know what to write about first when I blog again. I decided I should start with some big things.

  Our life has changed quite a bit around here because Mara has moved away from home. She is now down in Texas and Adventures In Missions. We have now been home without her for 2 1/2 weeks. It still feels strange not to have her at the dinner table, not to tell her goodnight and have her sweep the floor. Our floor is struggling to stay clean with Mara gone. She is with 33 other like minded young people who have a pretty intense schedule for the next 8 months to work at learning their Bible better, to learn some skills needed for being a missionary and grow in their walk with Jesus Christ.

  Mara is sharing an apartment with 3 other girls. It is in an apartment complex with all the other students as well. The learning opportunities go far beyond her actual classes as living with people she didn't know and making many other new decisions have been learning experiences as well.

 She is happy to be at AIM but it hasn't all been fun and easy as the major fatigue along with dizziness that she had been experiencing a lot earlier this year has come back pretty full force with the busy schedule she has. So I am doing a lot of praying for her, trying to advise from afar and seeking to give it to God and not worry. I covet your prayers for her as well. We had visited a doctor several times this past year and had gotten a lot of tests done (blood work, echos, etc) but the only thing that the tests brought out was low Vitamin D and B and low Iron. She started taking supplements for all those and also started using electronics less (mostly because her college classes were done) and her headaches really got a lot less frequent and she had some more energy. We were really hoping she was better but unfortunately she wasn't truly all the way. We don't know if there is something more causing problems, that mono is still hanging on from a year and a half ago or what the deal is. She has the classic symptoms for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome but there are no "fixes" for that and I would like to see it fixed. But for now she is working to find ways to manage it and we are seeing what we can do about fixing it and we pray.

 I would not be accurately reporting to not mention another change of sorts this year. Thomas, a special friend of Mara's was in our neighborhood this summer and we got to see a lot of him. It was fun to get to know him better and we are assuming that we might be seeing a lot of him in the future as well. Sorry for the weird photo for this one.

 Life is changing for this boy of mine as well. On Monday he started classes at the Local Technical College. He is taking the Electrical Construction course. Jonathan is a junior in highschool (homeschooled) and so is taking this with the PSEO program. Jonathan already been my pretty independent boy as he got his drivers license as soon as he turned 16 and before that he had bought his own car. He enjoys working and this summer put in 50 plus hours many weeks working two different jobs.

  Poor Jonathan started school this week while dealing with a bad cold. So his take on it has been up and down. He came home on Monday saying it was going to be a lot of fun, on Tuesday he was ready to quit and today he thought it was going to be okay. Change isn't always easy for him and I don't think all of this course is going to be a ton of fun but I think he will do fine and will actually enjoy a lot of it.

So those are the big changes at our house. We are left with just two students for our homeschool and Aaron is working a couple of days a week. So then it is just Megan and I.

 Life changes but much stays the same....
Late summer still brings a bountiful crop from the gardens and my parents' orchards. So the canner is being used, the dehydrator is humming away in the kitchen and we are eating many delicious straight from the garden meals.

 This time of year brings many weddings and henceforth a lot of playing with flowers for me.

 We still love spending time together as a family. We still have a Savior who loves us and who died to take our sins away. We are so blessed!

Animal Update

 I wonder if maybe I have forgotten how to blog. I guess we shall see. Between busy days and a slow computer I just haven't done much blogging for a while. But I have a different and faster computer (following the old one completely crashing which was a little nerve wracking as all of my business stuff was one it) now so hopefully I can blog a little more again.

I thought I would share some pictures of some of our new additions to this homestead....

 I had mentioned earlier that we lost our Mr. Sippi cat to an eagle this winter so we have been keeping our eye out for a new cat. Neighbors of some friends of ours had kittens that needed homes and so we ended up getting this little male cat. There was much debate over the name as Jonathan and I thought we hadn't gotten enough use out of the lovely name "Mr. Sippi" but others thought that we shouldn't name another cat that right away. It wouldn't be properly remembering the dead so that name was out. Our new cat is Mr. Nary. Named after the community that he came from.

 He is a pretty lively cat. And we have to keep our eye on him when it comes to our chicks. He thinks they are good wrestling partners.

 We did get 50+ chicks again this year. They are pretty big now though and the broilers are nearly ready for butchering so our numbers will go down. We got over 30 broilers and we have over 20 layers now again.

 Baby bunnies we the exciting surprise this Spring. One female had 6 bunnies then a month later she had 3 more and the other female had 2. The first 6 did well. The Mama of the 6 didn't take kindly to having more so soon however and she let the next 3 die. Concerning the 2 that the other female had, only one survived. He has been a very interesting bunny however. He was born to Naomi so Mara named him "Obed".  He (possibly a she - we don't know) has been dubbed Obed the Adventurer because of the many jaunts he has taken. He has had the amazing ability of wiggling about and finding cracks that he can get through since he has been very young. We have found him in his Dad's cage next "door", in the chicken run which is below and then 2 times Kitchi (our dog) found him out of his cage and carried him down to the house. He squeaked then and we rescued him and took him back to his mom. We are amazed that he survived and has actually even thrived.

 They love to be fed greens stuff to eat.

I do also have bees again this year. I am looking forward to lots of honey, Lord Willing, this fall.

Kitchi gave us a little scare this Spring by getting Lymes disease and getting quite sick. He didn't want to walk anywhere and limped majorly when he did move around. Thank-fully we are familiar with Lymes and figured that was the problem and the vet quickly agreed and prescribed an antibiotic for him and he improved quickly after that. In the picture above Aaron was helping him get back to his place on the hearth after he had gone out to relieve himself.

  The animals take work but they are also fun. With the boys gone to camp these last two weeks (they got home yesterday which is SO nice!) I have done most of the chores- it is actually kind of fun. They provide us with enjoyment, eggs, meat, honey, guarding the property and keeping mice away. We are also hoping to get fur in the future. I am thankful for our animals and that God provided them for us to have and use.

 Do you have any animals? 

Mara's Open House

We have never really hosted big parties that center around one child (such as a birthday party - we do have family over for birthdays but not your traditional party) so it was different and pretty fun to be hosting a party in Mara's honor.

   Mara really enjoys traveling and going on adventures so that became our theme for the open house. It seeemed especially appropriate since she plans to go to Adventures In Missions this fall.

We had people sign in at our guest book. For decorations we had used maps various places, verses (mounted on maps) that talked about going places/the world etc. , I had a bunch of small pictures of Mara framed that highlighted different travels/adventures she had enjoyed throughout the years. I had those all labeled. We had flowers in little jars scattered around as well.

On the tables we put down brown paper then maps and then the picture, verse and flowers.

We had tables set up both inside and out. We were blessed with a super lovely day so most of the people sat outside but there were many inside as well.

My sister Keren brought over their hammock which was enjoyed.

The boys then put up theirs as well (we hadn't thought of it earlier) and all of them were used a lot of the time.

A lot of eating and visiting went on. We were really blessed by all that came to celebrate with us.

Church family came, Homeschooling friends,

Friends from Theater,

Lots of family, neighbors,

Employers,

and many long time friends. We are truly blessed by the friends that we have. I had hoped to get pictures of everybody but that didn't really begin to happen.

For food we continued with our travel/adventure them. Mara thought of foods that she has enjoyed from travels that she has been on and we then figured out what would work to serve a crowd, adjusted some ideas, tried out some new recipes and came up with a pretty yummy menu if I do say so myself.

One of her favorite things about Honduras was all the fresh fruit. So we have a large fruit tray in honor of that trip.

When she went to Washington DC she enjoyed Philly Cheesesteaks so we decided to have those. This was what felt like the trickiest thing to have enough to feed a crowd and to keep it warm for the 4 hours of the party. I used a combination of roasts and steaks and with tons of help from my brother-in-law got it all sliced up into little slivers. Then I fried it up with seasonings and put it in a roaster pan to stay warm. It was delicious! We also sauteed sweet peppers, onions and mushrooms together and they went in another crockpot. Then we made a cheese sauce that went in a third. We also had homemade hoagie buns. I found this recipe to use and it worked very well (even with my using 1/2 wholewheat flour).

I also made refried beans something she had learned to enjoy in Mexico.
We also had the fixings for Ham sandwiches something that Mara enjoys and that we have fairly often on road trips or picnics.

Trail mix is something we have quite often on backpacking, biking and canoe trips. It worked well for the party too.

We had Banana pops (another fun memory from Honduras) for dessert. That was a super nice dessert to make ahead of time and it was truly enjoyed by many. I made them basically like this link. Since the open house we enjoyed finishing off the leftover banana pops and have even made more. I am about to make another batch. It is a nice easy cool treat that is healthier than many.

To drink we served Horchata (enjoyed in Mexico) and iced Mint tea (a favorite from our foraging adventures around here).

We also had the fixings for s'mores, a common camping treat. It was really windy earlier in the day and because of the fire danger we didn't start the campfire until the party was officially over but we still have a nice group to enjoy the s'mores.

We had plenty of food but not a huge amount of leftovers and we have been able to enjoy the leftovers. So nothing really went to waste. Yea!

Tree base (a favorite game with kids around here) was played.

So was horseshoes.

Some also went kayaking, played Frisbee, looked at bunnies, played with the kitty, played music and sang and a lot of visiting went on. I believe a good time was had by all.

Mara was super blessed with all the gifts she received. I had fun using a suitcase for a place to put the cards.

The party was officially over at 7 pm but we had people here until after 10:30 (and then of course our overnight guests stayed even longer :-) ). That was super fun! Visiting and eating s'mores around the campfire was a great way to end the day.

Mara's Graduation

We just celebrated the first highschool graduation for our children. Mara has learned far more already then I could teach her (I am so thankful that I don't have to know everything in order for my children to learn it!) and she is ready to spread her wings.

We are excited for the new adventures in store for her but it is pretty bittersweet too. She plans to head off to a mission training program in August (all the way down in Texas and then off to another country) and we will miss her terribly but I am so excited for what she will be learning and doing. 

But that isn't until August... meanwhile the graduation. 

  With homeschoolers a plan for graduation isn't all set in stone like those that go to public school. I guess just like the rest of our schooling for our children we make our own choices, we try to figure out what will work best for us and for our children.

  We discussed various options for graduation and we were leaning towards just an open house with a special time of prayer, a diploma presented and a few words said at the open house but some other friends with a graduate as well really liked the idea of having a group graduation. Mara liked the idea too and so we decided to go with that as well as having an open house for Mara.

 Just in case there are other homeschoolers out there looking for graduation ideas I thought I would share what all we did. I know I have enjoyed hearing what others are doing and how they made it personal to fit their child.

  The group graduation idea was presented to the homeschooling community to see if others wanted to join us. We only ended up with 3 this time. Both are friends that we have known for a number of years so that is neat. In future years with other children I could see this growing but we shall see.

 We are super blessed to have good photographers in our family and my sister Keren took all of Mara's pictures and her husband Benjamin edited them.

 There were many decisions to be made when it came to planning the graduation service. Things like - would they wear caps or gowns or not. What colors? And so on.... They did decide to wear caps and gowns and have the colors of black, royal blue and silver.

  For the ceremony a well known pianist from our community who was also one of the graduates piano teachers played some prelude music, "Pomp and Circumstance" and also played while we sang "The Star Spangled Banner". Andy, a graduates dad, gave the greeting and opening prayer and then my Dad led the national anthem.

Then all 3 graduates did something. Mara read/told a story that she had written. As you may notice her hat fell off during it so it is laying on the floor. :-)

Louisa played a song on the piano.

JJ gave a speech.

Then we parents took turns giving out diplomas and saying a few words to our graduates while a slide show that they had made showcasing pictures of themselves played on the wall above.

Then Ken introduced our special speaker, Tim Tinglestad. He had a very neat talk for the graduates (but for all of us) on walking in the fear of the Lord. The whole ceremony was a blessing as much of it was focused on honoring Jesus Christ and following Him.

 Then, Jason, the other dad gave the closing remarks and a closing prayer.

It lasted right around an hour. It was simple, fairly traditional, pretty emotional and it was a blessing to those who came. I know that Mara loved how it turned out as did all of our family. I also heard that over and over from guests who came.

   We were blessed by all who came to the graduation. Pretty much my whole family were able to come as well as Ken's parents and many friends. Mara's good friend Thomas, from Kansas, was able to come up as a surprise which was pretty fun. He is actually up here now for the summer staying with my sister and brother-in-law (his brother).

We had a display table for our graduates.  On Mara's we put some information about what she plans to do next in life. We displayed things she has made over the years, some things that are important to her (such as her Bible, ocarina, etc), a picture or so, some newspaper clippings and awards and such things like that.

Early on in the planning I had mentioned the idea of girls wearing white dresses in graduations around 100 years ago. Mara and Louisa liked that idea. Louisa bought a dress and we had the pattern and stuff to make one but didn't manage to get at it until around 18 hours before the graduation. But my sister Martha, Mara and I got it done. Okay the lining wasn't actually all properly sewn in but it was done enough to wear. It ended up being pretty amazing that Mara and Louisa's dresses were very close in style to each other.

We are pretty proud of our graduate.

We did decide to have a bit of a reception afterwards. We ordered a couple of cakes, got some M & Ms (the 3 families worked together to get everything done) and had coffee, lemonade and sweet tea. We also got balloons to decorate the tables and some of us had gotten together earlier to make some simple table centerpieces.  

 This is what the balloons were tied to. On the other side was their "class" verse - Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of good courage: do not be afraid nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go."

 After it was over and most people (other than family) had left the kids started messing around and they were able to get all the table centerpieces (balloon weights and all) balanced on top of Mara's head.

 We also had an open house for Mara the next day. I had a lot of fun planning that and we had a ton of fun at it but I will have to tell you about that in my next post.