My middle son turned 11 yesterday! My Zebra guy. The middle child of 5. The middle of 3 boys. How many people can say that they have one older brother and one younger brother, and one older sister and one younger sister? :)
Here are some pics through the years:
4 months
1 year
3 years
7 years
9 years
11 years
One recent Friday afternoon, we drove out to a local park to look for wildflowers. We found some!! I was able to identify some, but not all of them. My field guides rarely help me when I need them!!! The internet helped me more than my field guide. This is something new for us, actually getting out of the car and taking pictures of wildflowers! So, do something new, #4!
Red Owl Clover:
Bird's Eye Gilia:
Fiddleneck:
Lupine:
Do something new, week 3!! I can't believe how much new stuff I am really learning with my new challenge!
The last couple of weeks I have been reading Dave Ramsey's books, Financial Peace Revisited and Total Money Makeover. I have created a budget that makes sense, finally! A budget to show us what we actually have to spend on certain things. What a concept, only spend what you have right now!!! It is so simple, yet so hard. It is definately a work in progress, but I have started it and plan to keep at it for a long time.
I do have other things to post, but I have been so busy, um.....reading! :)
Learn something new, week 2!!
We removed wallpaper for the very first time! Thanks to some great advice, I wasn't fooled by the easy to remove pieces that my daughter ripped down earlier. We bought just three items to make it much easier: Dif, a spray gel that helps the wallpaper come lose; a scorer, that makes little holes in the wallpaper so the Dif can get underneath; and a scraper:
Before:
Scored wallpaper:
Stubborn places. Hint: If you like your wallpaper, and the seams come lose, please do not repair them with superglue!! (I don't know if that is what they used before, but it is STUCK on there!!)
After:
What I have learned:
Do not let the Dif dry! And it doesn't take long, so do only small sections at a time.
Scorers are awesome, and so is Dif!
Before removing wallpaper, be sure you are prepared to remove molding around doors and windows, eek!
Do not use superglue to repair loose wallpaper.
Even though 75% of the wallpaper does not even seem attached to the wall and therefore comes down easily, the other 25% will take much longer to remove!
Next: Spackle the nail holes in the drywall. Remove molding to get the wallpaper underneath. Replace molding. Pick out paint. Paint.
My Tiger, 7, has learned to ride a bike! Last summer, we took her training wheels off while camping, hoping the big area would help her learn. Her Uncle R ran beside her for quite a long time trying to get her to balance. She would always wobble. He suggested we take her to a grassy hill, to help her get momentum, yet be soft enough for falls. It took awhile, but we finally went this week. I can't believe how easy it was for her! I gave her a little push down the hill, (we started close to the bottom) and she just took off! She had to practice stopping right, and turning, which she did. She had a hard time getting started without a push, so I told her she could practice in the back yard at home. Yesterday, she spent almost every spare moment on her bike out back, riding in circles around the yard! I used to love riding my bike and I can almost feel the thrill of her newly learned "freedom"! She'll be riding with the big guys in Yosemite this year!
A push from Mommy:
And she's off!
Happy girl!
Sometime ago, I told my mom that I wanted to learn 5, no, 10 new things this year. I learned to knit from my mil.! (I still need to practice that.) I forgot about my goal until yesterday. My tiger & I made lemon meringue pie for the first time! And it tastes good! Though it doesn't look picture perfect. :) So that reminded me that I wanted to learn 10 new things! But maybe I could do better than that. I want to learn, try or do one new thing a week. That may be too much to ask, but I am going to try. There is just so much to learn out there! And what a better way to teach my kids that learning is an everyday thing, not just a "school" thing? Retrying something we have tried awhile ago and didn't do too well counts. Here are some of the things I want to learn, try or do:
finish an embroidered project (I really need to relearn this)
learn tatting
learn gardening the right way
learn the piano (ok so some of these won't happen in a week, but getting started counts!)
learn the guitar (again. I had lessons in high school, oh so long ago!)
knit a scarf
make good bread in my Bosch mixer that we can use for sandwiches
learn how to add cool things on my blog
learn how to use my camera
learn about herbs
draw wildflowers
go bike riding on the bike trail with the kids
quilt a quilt on my sewing machine
learn needlepoint
make a decent pie crust from scratch
find a nearby hiking trail
How about you? :D
Here are pics of our lemon meringue pie!
Every now and then, I buy a few books. I always track them on the computer so I know exactly what day they are coming. It is such a fun thing to open a box of new books. The kids eagerly look to see if anything is interesting for them. Sometimes there is, sometimes there isn't. Usually, we browse through all of them, picking one or two to read. Then on the shelf go the rest, until I have time to read it or when it is needed, as in reference books. But this box was different. I just love all of these books, I want to read them all now! Well, except the dictionary :)
My list:
1828 Webster's Dictionary ~ Wow, that is a big book! But that means the print is big! It has old fashioned words like "sin" and "marriage".
Twice Freed by Patricia St. John ~ A story set in Ancient Rome. A must read that can't be found in my county's library system. I will read this aloud the the kids later.
Financial Peace Revisited and the guide that goes with it by Dave Ramsey ~ A great book to help people better handle their finances. This is the one I decided to read first. I really try to only read one book at a time, besides the read alouds with the kids. Otherwise, I have too many unfinished books lying around!
All New Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew ~ More of a reference book, but I'll definately read through it next. My hope is to teach the kids, and learn myself, how to grow some of our own food. We don't have a lot of room, but a little bit is a start.
Do Hard Things by Alex & Brett Harris ~ A book written by 19 year old homeschooled twins. "A teenage rebellion against low expectations". In other words, my kids need to work harder!! ;)
Whatever Happened To Penny Candy by Richard Maybury ~ A popular book on teaching kids about money. And their mom.
Plus two videos:
Fireproof A great Christian movie about marriage.
Flywheel Another great Christian movie by the same people. About honesty.
And a game:
Bananagrams A word game using tiles. Looks fun! It's really a school item, but don't tell the kids! Yeah, they'll probably figure that out anyway!
I'm sorry I wasn't able to put the actual picture of the books on here. I haven't figured out how to do that yet. At least I put up links! :)
