Stuff

I've been going through all the closets and cupboards in my home and re-thinking, purging, and organizing.  I think it's my way of relaxing.  It all started with one little thought...."If I had glass fronts on these kitchen cupboards, what dishes would I want to be seen?"  That was the beginning of moving everything around and in doing that, I sorted and purged too.  WOW!  I had no idea I had accumlated so much stuff. 
After I went through all the kitchen cupboards, I went through bedroom closets and linen closets, through file cabinets and desk drawers.  All the while, I just kept asking myself, "Do I use this?"  "Do I need this?" "Is this the most logical place for this?"  "Is there a better way to keep it?" "Could I use this for a different purpose?"  It was kind of a whirlwind cleaning and decluttering spree, but it feels so fresh and nice. 
If you want some inspiring ideas about getting organized, visit the Homestead Revival website.  Now, SHE is one organized woman!

From the garden

Yesterday's garden gatherings...a handful of the sweetest peas, and a variety of lettuce and beet greens for a BIG salad.
{Here is a great post about how to care for lettuce fresh from the garden.}

Today...thunder, lightning, and rain.  No need to water the garden today, God is doing that for me.

Enjoy your day! :-)

The Debut of the Daft Scotsman

A few posts back I alluded to a very special event that happened in our family…Caleb’s high school graduation.  Several families in our church had children that would be graduating this year so we all decided to do a combined ceremony and celebration. These are a fun bunch of young people!

(From L-R)...Caleb, Jonathan, Jesse, Eshte, Jessica, Bijou, Stephanie, and Emily

We broke down all the aspects of the day and had each family take responsibility for just one aspect.  This worked out really well.  It helped each family to not feel too overwhelmed and just to focus on the particular details of their portion.

Our family was responsible for the specifics of the ceremony itself.   Eric and I had some ideas about how things might go and flow, but we also wanted the input from the other families and the graduates themselves, if they had specific things they wanted included.

The graduates would be sitting on a stage facing the guests.  Thinking through how to get them from the foyer of the church to their seats,  I thought it would be neat if they entered to some music.  Of course, "Pomp and Circumstance" was an obvious choice, but one of the graduates, who happens to be Caleb’s best friend and a very gifted musician, had another suggestion for a song, “Thor Kills the Destroyer”.    YIKES! But if you could hear the music without the title you would agree, it was an amazing symphonic piece and was the perfect entrance music.

Another idea one of the graduates had was that each graduate, when they walked down the isle, would present a rose to their mother and a card to their father. 

He's a natural in a kilt

The ceremony began with an opening prayer by one of the fathers.  Then each graduate spoke giving a tribute to their parents – thanking them for their love, support, sacrifice, and tears in raising and schooling them.   It was so touching.  Each graduate spoke from their heart and articulated their thoughts so well.  Truly, a proud moment for all the parents!

opening prayer

Caleb was last to speak and made quite an impression on several accounts!  First, with his debut of his kilt.  He looked sharp.   He turned a few heads.  Secondly, he began his tribute with a Scottish accent.  I’m sure that many guests who didn’t know him, thought he was straight from Scotland until he switched to his American dialect and introduced himself.  Lastly, as he neared the end of his tribute,  he began to cry.  There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.  There are not words adequate to describe how proud Eric and I are of him.  

The switch from Scottish to American got a laugh

tearing up

us too!

After the graduates' tributes, our Pastor gave an inspiring and insightful charge to them.  The fathers then presented their graduates with their diplomas. 

Pastor Cary's charge to the graduates

"Congratulations, Son"

"I'm so proud of you!"

A well-deserved diploma

The graduates sang a group song called “A New Generation”.  Caleb accompanied on the guitar, along with Jesse on the piano.  That was a little nerve-racking for him, but all his practice paid off.   It all sounded wonderful!

Singing "A New Generation"

After the ceremony,  the graduates had a receiving line in order to meet and greet the 300 or so guests that attended.  Everyone enjoyed lovely light snacks and cake.

We all had hoped and prayed for a sunny day, but the Lord allowed “liquid sunshine” that day.  The elegant display of food was under cover and the people just kept on visiting in spite of the showers.  It really was a lovely day from start to finish.

A very special detail for us was that Gramma Barbara and “Uncle” Bill could attend. (I know, weird spelling, but it’s how we’ve done it since the kids were babes.) They literally blew in the day before and left that evening.  Short and sweet, but so special.   It was the only family who could physically attend, but we know all the thoughts of those who couldn’t were with us that day.  

Uncle Bill, Caleb and Grammy

Proud parents!

The whole family + Grammy and Uncle Bill

Group hug

 

What’s next for Caleb?  He will be attending The Guild through Lamplighter Publishing.  It’s a week-long discipleship/internship that will take place in New York at the Mohonk Mountain Resort.   When he returns he’ll search for a part-time job and begin studying topics for which he can take CLEP tests for college credit.  The first test he’ll probably take is Interpretations of Literature.  He is a bit of a literature fanatic (specifically, Shakespeare) so studying for that one should be pretty easy for him.   

He is a fine young man and so much fun, we (kids included) are glad that he’ll be home for a couple more years.

Brothers and best friends

Caleb - June 30, 2012

A day with friends

Often on Sunday afternoons after church, we'll either have people over to our home or visit with friends at their home.  It makes for for a wonderful, relaxing, fun day. That was the case this last Sunday when we visited the Clements family.

Here's just a few shots of our fun time.

Ellie brushing Wildfire

Hannah with Wildfire...owner Emily in the background

Ellie with Hannah riding Wildfire

Now it's Abbie's turn to ride with Hannah 

Not sure that helmet is doing a whole lot of good

Hannah with Em leading

Matt and Wild...{cowboy boots and a hat just might be in his future}

2 of the 7 sweet sisters

It's always a fun time with a LOT of laughs when our families get together!

Gardening

This year we tried square foot gardening instead of the more traditional rows.  If you'd like to know more about that method go here.

This is what I have learned.
Pros:

• You can get a lot of yield from small spaces.
• You have less space to weed and water.

Cons:

• The kids don't really know where they can and can't step until the veggies and herbs really start to grow.
• The paths between the vegetables need weeding.(These about about 3' wide.)

I love the idea of square foot gardening, but I've come to the conclusion that it works best for raised beds.  That way you don't have to weed the isles between the beds. With raised beds, you are only turning over the dirt inside the bed, not the whole garden, so you can let the grass grow, or use pea gravel, or bark, or whatever you want for the paths that you walk on.    

We didn't use raised beds because we thought it would be easier when gardening season was over to just rototill the whole garden.  Thinking ahead to next year we will either revert back to traditional gardening with rows or do the square foot method with raised beds.   I'm leaning towards raised beds since we have a chipper and because our rototiller is a beast to run.  I'm just not sure how to keep the slugs out of raised beds.  Time for more gardening books from the library for ideas. 

Matthew is adding some string for the beans (that must be why they are called string-beans ;-) 

Pictured clockwise from the front:  grass I need to weed out, lettuce, green beans, herbs, zucchini, blueberry bushes (not pictured) peas and beets are in the center.

Look!  There's one!

Have you ever read the children's book, "A Garden for Groundhog" by Lorna Balian.  It's one of my very favorites!  I can't help but think of it when I see zucchini.  I sort of hope that when Eric and I are empty-nesters that we have a sweet, bit of a farm like the O'Leary's in the book.

A few more things I've learned from this garden (and notes for next year...)

~ Peas grow really tall!

~ They would provide the shade needed for the lettuces.

~ Slug-go works great. 

~ I misunderstood how to plant the green beans using posts and the square foot method.

~While, we don't have tons of things planted, we went slow and easy this year so that we wouldn't get discouraged.  SO glad we did it that way!!

Just a few musings from the potiger.

The Avengers - Guest Post by Matthew

Sometimes movies are just that much better than what you expect. The Avengers was just that. I watched it the day after its theater release date, fully expecting a fun, action flick, but I was pleasantly surprised to find the film full of good character models, self-sacrificial themes, and relatively few clouded morals.



Handsome devil, ain't he?

My favorite Avenger is Tony Stark AKA Iron Man. Robert Downey Jr. reprised his role as Stark in this film, and his acting was superb, just like it was in the two previous Iron Man films. Except this time, the "Genius, Billionaire, Playboy, Philanthropist" was much less the playboy, due to his steady relationship with Miss Potts, and more the hero that most of the other characters and the audience know he can be when he isn't only looking out for himself. Actually, he's one of the most sacrificial characters in the whole movie. In one sequence, were I an emotional movie watcher, I would have cried.
Another reason for my liking of Stark, is that he says more than half of the movie's best lines.  



Did I mention he has a flare for style?

Loki, the film's villain, played by Tom Hiddleston, is what you expect from a villain. Enjoys being ruthless, likes to monologue, thinks he's unbeatable, and always has a plan.He's also in possession of an army. Hiddleston did an amazing job as Loki, evil and arrogant, but perfectly willing to surrender if it will help his master plan in anyway. 

As already stated, Loki has an army and plans to use it to enslave earth. The result is a brutal battle between "Earth's Mightiest Heroes"(The Avengers) and legions of alien troops in a epic scale battle. The PG-13 rating is well given, almost the entire movie is one intense scene after another, especially the fight sequences. The cuss words are minimum, for which I was quite glad. Compared to many of the other PG-13 rated movies this year, it is almost as clean as a whistle in that aspect. 

Another reason I love this movie is the character development. All of the Avengers have had their own blockbusters, but Joss Wedon, the Director, devoted more than half of the film to introducing each Avenger and their reactions to the rest of the team. The result is a greater appreciation for each character, as well as giving us a still deeper insight into why each character is willing to put his or her life on the line to fight Loki.  

On a scale from one-to-ten, I put Avengers at nine. This from me is rather high. Only one movie is at 10, which is my all time favorite movie, but that's for another time.

The Blue-Ray release date is September 25th, while I won't shell out the fifty or so greenbacks for it on release day,(Because I'm cheap...) I will certainly buy it when the price drops. Would I recommend it? Most certainly! (Hence this post.)

one thought leading to another

L.O.V.E.

I love hydrangeas! I love their big, cheerful blooms.  I love that they can be bright or pale pink, deep purple, or even blue, or even some of those all in one bloom. I love that they are hardy and don't need much tending.  We have a little hydrangea garden in our front yard - 10 bushes in all and they are blooming now.  It's heavenly! 

Our soil is acidic so we mostly get periwinkle colored blooms.  I had to replace one plant this year.  Originally it was a different variety and it never flowered.  (What's the point, right?)  I bought a replacement when Costco had them.  It's the only one with pink blooms.  Kinda fun.

Another reason I love hydrangeas is because they love the salty sea air like me!  Lots of homes on Nantucket or Martha's Vineyard have tons of hydrangeas.  They are the perfect beach cottage bloom! 

That makes me think of this...

I'm needing a beach fix!  I need to smell the salty sea air, to feel the sand between my toes, the hot sun on my back and catch a terrific right swell. 

That makes me think of my childhood days.  Lots of beach days!  It was either Redondo Beach with my Gramma and her dear friend, Dottie; or Zuma 0 with the neighbor girls who lived up the street.  We always arrived early - like 9 am. It would still be overcast and kind of cold.  We'd set up our area with beach mats/blankets, pop up the umbrella and place the little cooler under it for shade for later, then watch the surfers and the seagulls.  Little by little the sun would peak through the clouds and it would warm up. 

Then we'd play in the sun and waves all day long. Those days at the beach are my most favorite childhood days.  Eric grew up on the opposite coast...different beaches, but doing the same things - swimming in the waves, body surfing, collecting treasures found on the shore and in the sand.

Even now, when we make it to the beach, we both get giddy at the first glimpse of the sea, and first breath of salty air! 

We used to say of ourselves that it wasn't blood that ran through our veins, but the ocean!  I still think it's true.

Funny thing is, years ago when we lived at the beach, I dreamed of a farm life.  Now, if only we could meld our little farm with the sea coast.  Hmmm.  We can always dream!

  

STOP (biting) and smell the roses!

Do mosquitos love you as much as they love me?  I think the scout goes out and calls to all his little buggy friends, "Hey - y'all come and get it - all you can eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner!" {Aka ~ ME}
I have discovered something new and now it's my a new weapon.

Lavender Rose goat milk lotion

You already know how much I love Anderson Family Farm goat milk lotion because it's an all natural product.  That's nothing new, but here I am using my lotion and lo and behold the bugs have stayed away from me.  THAT is new!  AFF offered this special edition scent for Mother's Day.  It's lavender rose and it works amazingly at keeping the mosquitos away.  I brought it with us to the Independence Day party.  Several people tried it and all have raved at how they were not eaten alive that night, when normally they would have been.
I didn't know that bugs don't like the scent of rose geranium?  Did you?  I always thought that scented lotion attracted bugs.  Not this one!
Another great thing is that it is safe for children.  I'd use this long before I put OFF on my children.  {with the exception for those who are allergic to goat's milk.} 
If you are looking for a natural, effective mosquito repellent with the side benefit of wonderfully nourishing your skin, {which really is its first benefit and the mosquito repellent is the second} then you should give this lotion a try! Either the Rose Geranium or the Lavender Rose - both contain rose geranium essential oil which is the key.
Happy outside summer evenings to you! :-)

4th of July 2012

Isn't this little Uncle Sam too cute?

We had fun celebrating Independence Day.  Our friends hosted a big party (open to our whole church!) that they have done for years.  It's always "weather dependent" and we weren't sure if we'd end up celebrating at home in front of a good ol' patriotic movie since just the night before (and the whole week before!) it was pouring.  The sunshine arrived right on schedule.  It is said that summer doesn't start here in the good 'ol Northwest until July 4th.  Sadly....it's true.

Abbie, the puppy

Dan, the tiger

Ellie, the butterfly

Hannah with friend, L'Abri

But, summer has arrived!  The day was filled with fun things like face painting, cotton candy, tug o' war, sack races, delicious food, and an old fashioned cake walk.

Captain America's shield...good enough to eat!

This year Hannah made Captain America's shield for her cake in the cake walk. 
Once it's finally dark (around 10 pm) they have a terrific fireworks show.  On our drive home, we could see lots of other fireworks too.  That made a long drive a little more fun!
Today, we are plum tuckered out, but we had such a fun time.
Happy Birthday, America....The land of the free and the home of the brave.

Sneak Peak

I'm waiting for more photos, but until then....