Treasured Chapters

Smiling's My Favorite

2011-12-01T22:43:00.000-05:00

Today is December 1. Two fun Christmas things happen on December 1: advent calendars and Buddy the Elf. Oh, and Muddy Buddies, but I guess that would make it three things.

I asked the kids the other day what their favorite family Christmas tradition is. Surprisingly, they said it was the advent calendars with the little pieces of chocolate behind each window. Thankfully, I had four advent calendars with the little pieces of chocolate behind each window stashed away upstairs. I wrapped them last night and placed them under the tree.

We've had a little bit of a problem getting the children out of bed every morning. This morning all I had to do was tell them there was a present for each of them under the tree, and they all hopped out of bed. No pleading. No cajoling.

The advent calendars may be the kids' favorite part of the year. My favorite part? Or at least one of my favorite things? Watching Elf with the kids. It doesn't matter that we've watched it every year since it came out. It's still hilarious to us.

Of course the best complement to the movie are Muddy Buddies. A yummy snack! They may not be all that Christmasy, but they're tradition, so they stay on the menu.

Her Precious Heart

2011-11-30T16:44:00.000-05:00

Bedtime for Audrey is still very much a routine. She does not go to sleep without her bedtime prayer. And that prayer must contain two requests: that she not be scared and that she have good dreams, not bad.

Last night, I was taken by surprise when, after my prayer, she asked, "Mommy, what does 'asking Jesus into your heart' mean?"

I explained it to her after which she asked, "How do I ask Jesus into my heart?"

Of course I explained that to her as well. It's a hard concept to understand having Somebody in your little heart! After I put it into six-year-old terms, I asked her if she understood and wanted to ask Jesus into her heart.

She smiled and nodded.

And she prayed a prayer along with me admitting she, like all of us, is a sinner; asking for forgiveness; and asking Jesus to be Lord of her life.

We talked a bit about what it means to have Jesus as Lord of your life.

And I walked out of the room with my heart VERY full.

The Day After Thanksgiving

2011-11-26T22:35:00.004-05:00

One of my favorite days of the year is the day after Thanksgiving. It's the day I get to unbox all of the Christmas memories. The day everyone humors me and lets me blast my Trans Siberian Orchestra and - dare I say it? - my Kenny G holiday tunes. And the day whose end finds our home decked out in all sorts of Christmas regalia. Most importantly, it's the day I get to hang out with my family, fulfilling all kinds of traditional rituals.

First, there are the annual ornament gifts.

I try to select a meaningful ornament for each child that captures some memory from the year. For example, this year Audrey received a replica of one of her favorite books of the year.

Naturally, the decorating comes next. As usual, the Princess is the only one who ever cooperates for any photos.

After decorating is the all-important hot chocolate. It must be thick. It must be chocolaty. And it must have a maximum number of marshmallows topped by gobs of whipped cream.

I was surprised that my favorite part of the Day After Thanksgiving this year was the reading of A Wish to Be a Christmas Tree.

I was worried there would be some eye rolling, some snickering, and some "Are we really going to read this baby book again?" comments. But there weren't. Everyone sat expectantly while I retrieved the book. And they listened with rapt attention.

I hope they never get too old for the reading of A Wish to Be a Christmas Tree.

Holiday Spirit

2011-11-25T11:14:00.000-05:00

I have to admit. I wasn't feeling an ounce of holiday spirit when Thanksgiving day dawned this year. This is the first Thanksgiving we have celebrated with just the six of us. I started the day with the thought that if I don't have 30 people sitting down to share our meal, it is not Thanksgiving. But, you know what? It turned out OK, and I would venture to say the day turned on the holiday spirit more than any other Thanksgiving past.

We started our day in a relaxed sort of way. I didn't have to worry about cleaning the bathrooms or vacuuming the floors. We weren't rushing around trying to get turkeys basted and casseroles heated on a timetable. In fact, we didn't even have turkey. The kids helped us make our family menu, and they chose chicken over turkey. Mark threw in a pork roast too, just to spice things up a bit.

We had a lovely dinner together after which we settled down to watch our first Christmas movie of the season. It started to feel a whole lot like Christmas! Watching Charlie Brown sit down to a dinner of toast and jelly beans added to the festive feeling in the air.

And of course nothing says holidays better than Black Friday. Ever since we got married, Mark and I have made Black Friday an almost-all-night date night. Our move to the Arctic kind of threw a wrench in that tradition since we do not have family to spend the night with the kids. Last year the tradition was saved by a friend who graciously agreed to be just crazy enough to attack the huge New York mall with me. She couldn't make it this year, though. I was bummed. Then on a whim, I asked my oldest if she wanted to go. Of course she did! Sometimes I forget she isn't five anymore.

Unfortunately, despite the addition of a new partner in crime, this year may have marked the end of my 17 year run on Black Friday. I'm sure the retailers are kicking themselves for not coming up with the brilliant idea of opening the stores late Thursday instead of in the wee hours of Friday. Staying up late instead of dragging oneself out of bed? Much easier on this night owl. And apparently much easier on, like, 10 million of my closest shopping buddies.

You know I despise crowds. So we only made it to two stores. BUT I had an awesome time with my girl. Great time with someone you love...that's what makes an experience worthwhile, so it certainly was worth the hassle to venture out last night.

With all this holiday spirit coursing through my veins, I'd say it's time to corral the family and get out the door to find a Christmas tree.

You can't live on bread alone, but some sure is nice.

2011-08-31T16:25:00.003-04:00

(Note: This post is all about wheat and breadmaking. If you don't mill your own wheat, no worries. You can still follow the recipe and just use whole wheat flour from the store. I recommend King Arthur's. But do still read about milling your own.)

I have a lot of friends who mill their own wheat and make bread. A couple of years ago, I just didn't get it. "They sell bread at the grocery store, you know," I would say to them. They would tell me about the many health benefits of milling your own wheat, but I ignored the growing desire to follow them into the world of Make-Your-Own-Bread. Quite honestly, I was more intimidated than skeptical. (I would go into the health benefits of using the freshly milled WHOLE grain vs. what flour manufacturers do, but it is so lengthy. Google it.)

Finally, I decided to make my own bread. But I would do it my way. I still didn't fully understand what processes a bag of store flour goes through, so I decided I would just use the whole wheat flour from the store. And I bought a breadmaker.

I was so excited. I was going to do this. But I had found a short cut. The breadmaker did make things easy. About 10 minutes to throw the ingredients in, and then it did the rest. And the house filled with a wonderful bread-baking smell. And when it came out, though it was an odd square shape, it did look good. "Fresh bread!" I called to the kids. They came running...and devoured the whole loaf in 10 seconds flat.

Yeah. 1 loaf of bread for a family of 6. Not brilliant. I must note, though, that I hang on to my breadmaker for one single use on one single special night of the year: on Christmas Eve the bread machine makes perfect dough for my Clone of a Cinnabon recipe which makes a DELICIOUS addition to Christmas morning breakfast. I'm not so sure I can healthify those yummy rolls; however, I do have 85 days to figure it out. I'll consider that my challenge.

Anyway, we were visiting some dear friends in MO, and Kim is a wheat grinder, bread maker (don't you love the titles I so lovingly bestow upon people?). While we were there, she made bread for us, and I was able to not only taste how delicious WHOLE bread is, but also observe how very easy it is!

So then I had to decide - with my husband's help and wisdom - if we wanted to do this or not. It is about a $600 initial investment, but when you look at it as an investment in your health...well, I had my husband sold on that part. What he was skeptical about was if I would purchase all this stuff and then add it to my Shelf of Unused Appliances after a week or two. (It's not like he didn't have a good argument. Exhibit A: The Bread Machine (though I had to argue that the Christmas Cinnabon Rolls totally make that worth it)). But in the end, we decided to take the plunge, and I'm happy to say that my mill and mixer get much more than just a once-a-year workout.

Anyway, this is the equipment I use:

On the left is my Wondermill, and on the right is my Bosch mixer, which can mix enough dough to make like 10 loaves of bread. I only make 6 at a time, so I don't exactly remember its capacity, but it's adequate for our family. I got all of my start-up equipment and bulk ingredients like yeast and dough enhancer from Urban Homemaker.

Then of course you need the wheat. Hard red will give you that very unique "whole wheat" taste. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I only use hard red for bread. I use hard white for everything else. (Again, if you are not ready to take the plunge into the fun world of wheat and milling, use King Arthur's whole wheat flour.) You can also get soft white which is recommended for cookies and cakes. I had some for awhile, but I really didn't notice a difference between the two, and I found the soft wheat harder to work with because it didn't always measure 1:1. Perhaps if I was doing pastries, I would opt for the soft wheat. I keep my bulk hard red and hard white in big buckets like this that will store grain forever!

I used to always get my grain at Bread Beckers. That's because they are located in GA. Even to ship a 50lb. bucket of wheat to my home an hour away in GA was only $14. To CT? Shipping is about $47! It looked like my wheat milling, bread making days were over because I could find NOTHING like Bread Beckers up here. THEN I found Honeyville Grain. They ship for a flat $4.49. Yes, that's four dollars and forty-nine cents! So I recently got a 50lb. bag of hard white wheat shipped to me from California for $4.49!

So anyway, let's get on with making the bread. This is such an easy recipe. I ~~heard~~ got it from my MO friend who ~~heard~~ got it from a friend who...(I'm hearing REO Speedwagon right now for some reason). It's actually Marilyn Moll's recipe (from Urban Homemaker).

Mill enough wheat berries to get 10-12 c. flour

Warm together:
6 c. water (or 5 c. water + 1 c. plain yogurt)
2 c. of the flour
3 T. yeast
Sponge mixture for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat together 2/3 c. honey and 2/3 c. oil

Mix together:
remaining flour
1 1/2 T. salt
3 T. dough enhancer (lecithin)
1/4-1/2 c. wheat gluten (optional)

Add honey mixture to yeast mixture and stir; while mixing, gradually add flour mixture.

Knead in mixer for 8 minutes. Turn out on to oiled surface and dividein to 6 loaves. Place in oiled pans and let rise 30 minutes. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

So I start by milling my wheat. I don't know how it works, but you get more flour than you use wheat (ex: 1 cup of wheat berries generally yields about 1 1/4 c. flour). I know there's an explanation for this, but it probably involves math, so I'll leave it alone.

Anyway, in GA I had to only use 8 cups of wheat berries to get the right dough consistency. Up here for some reason, I have to use 9 (everything costs more here, so that must be why). So I mill 9 cups of wheat berries.

Then I put 5 cups of the hottest tap water possible into my bowl. I then add 1 cup of yogurt. The cold of the yogurt makes the hot water cool to lukewarm which is perfect for yeast. Add the flour and yeast and pour into your mixer.

Then you have 15 minutes to do whatever you want to. My 15 minutes included administering a grammar test to 2 wiggly boys. And cleaning up my mess so far (I am obnoxiously meticulous about cleaning as I go - ask my husband. I make him so mad because he'll call us for dinner, and I'll immediately clean up the mess before sitting down for dinner; I just can't enjoy a meal with a messy kitchen). And preparing for the next step: I put the lecithin and salt in the remaining flour. I also grind up some flax seed which I also add to the flour. Finally, I combine and then heat up the honey and oil for about 45 minutes in the microwave. This blends it better and adds a little more heat for that yeast.

When my 15 is up, I start the mixer, swirl the oil/honey in, and then start adding flour. This is very important. The mistake many people make with bread is making the dough too stiff. You don't want a consistency like pizza dough. You want a soft dough. The way you know it is right is when the dough just begins to pull off the side of the mixer NOT when it is cleanly swept off the sides like with pizza dough.

So get the right amount of flour and then run the mixer for another 8 minutes to knead the dough. Then - and here's a great trick I learned from my MO friend - you know how usually when you throw some dough on the counter you sprinkle some flour down first so the dough won't stick? Well, that flour always ends up drying out your dough. So instead, spread some oil over your countertop. Get lots on your fingers and hands too so YOU won't stick to the dough!

OK, so at this point occasionally I will use a scale to get uniform loaves but usually I do not have the time to give in to such compulsions, so I just eyeball it. I cut it into 6 "equal" pieces and form loaves with 5 of them. With the 6th one, I spread it out, sprinkle a Sucanat/cinnamon mixture on it, roll it up, form it into a loaf, and plop it into a pan.

Oh, and my pans - I got them from Urban Homemaker too. They are on the smaller side (8" maybe vs. 10"??), so I get 6 loaves. If you use larger pans, you might only get 5 loaves.

Then the loaves rise for 30 minutes (time to do school with the littles one, clean up, start this post).

Then in the oven at 350 for 30 minutes. And done!

Once they're all cooled off, into my professional bread bags - you can buy them by the 100 from Bread Beckers or Urban Homemaker (or you could just save some from the store bought bread you used to buy).

That's it! It really is an easy process, especially once you've done it a couple times. I mean, I taught my kids some school and cleaned my kitchen and baked bread all in an hour and half!

Peanut Butter, Brownies, and Pizza...Wholeness. Oh yeah!

2011-08-30T19:35:00.001-04:00

I learned two things today. First when I'm not lazy, there are more hours in the day. And second, my food processor is my best friend.

After school, I attacked my planned whole living experiences for the day: homemade peanut butter (I actually made the PB yesterday, but it's easier just to lump it in to today), Rich Peanut Butter Bars (aka, brownies), and whole wheat pizza with "special" sauce.

Homemade Peanut Butter
We have been pretty good about buying "natural" peanut butter over the last couple years; however, those jars of "natural" peanut butter still include a lot of sugar and are still somewhat processed to increase shelf life. So I figured...what do I have to lose giving it a try?

It was SO easy.

I dumped a pound of peanuts into the food processor and turned it on. After the peanuts started to break up, I dribbled a bit of oil over the mixture through the little hole thingy at the top. I let the food processor keep going until the peanuts turned to paste. The kids thought that was pretty cool. Then I dribbled a couple teaspoons of the delicious honey I got at the farm yesterday on to the paste.

That was it. And it's good! Michael even said it tastes better than the "normal" peanut butter. The only one who doesn't like it, surprisingly, is my best eater, Audrey. She's not so fond of the straight peanut taste. But 3 out of 4 ain't bad.

Rich Peanut Butter Bars (aka, Brownies)
I decided I needed to put the homemade peanut butter into some sort of snack for the kids today. I still don't have my honey granules from Bread Beckers, so I went to the Bread Beckers cookbook for help. I have a bucket of Sucanat which came with us from Georgia, so I found a recipe that called for it. Sucanat is evaporated cane juice. Regular Sucanat has a rather strong flavor, so it cannot always be substituted for refined sugar. It can almost always be substituted for brown sugar, however. If you don't have Sucanat, use regular sugar or even light brown sugar.

Anyway, this recipe from the Bread Beckers cookbook already calls for Sucanat, and the end product turns out very brownie-esque...which the kids really liked (with the exception of the Princess who still had an issue with that peanutty peanut butter). They were very quick and easy too!

Rich Peanut Butter Bars
1/2 c. peanut butter
1/2 c. butter
1 1/2 c. Sucanat
2 eggs
1 c. whole wheat flour (I used hard white)
1 1/2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/2 c. cocoa
1 t. vanilla

Melt butter and peanut butter together. Add the remaining ingredients and stir until well blended. Press into a greased 9x13 pan. Bake in preheated 350 oven for 25-30 minutes. Cool and cut into squares.

Pizza
So I got stuck with dinner duty tonight. Ugh! Even though I am only at this time focusing on healthifying snacks, I thought I'd take the challenge and make dinner worth it too. And all I had to work with was some ground beef. So I decided on pizza.

The kids always opt for cheese pizza, sometimes with some kind of meat. They don't opt for pizza with green peppers, mushrooms, fresh tomatoes, or onions. So I waited until they went outside to play, and I dumped big hunks of green pepper, mushrooms, fresh tomatoes, and onion into my food processor and pureed it a la Deceptively Delicious style.

I then added tomato sauce (someday I am going to try my hand at making my own tomato sauce) and threw it in a saucepan. I added seasoning, a couple of bay leaves, and some molasses. Molasses takes away some of the acidity of the tomato sauce and enhances the flavors.

OK, so I don't really know if that's what it does, but my mom used to always add it to her sauces. Plus I wanted to sound all Food Network-y. But here is something I do know about molasses (I read it anyway): Blackstrap molasses is the only kind that has any nutritionl value.

Anyway. Then the crust. This recipe comes from Marilyn Moll who owns Urban Homemakers, which is where I purchased my grain mill, Bosch mixer, and other start-up bread making stuff. This is quite possibly the easiest pizza crust I've ever made.

I had a sudden panic attack at 4:00 this afternoon because I hadn't yet looked over the pizza dough recipe, and I worried that I wouldn't have enough time to make it, let it rise, shape it, let it rise again...BUT this dough does not need to rise! Here is the recipe:

Basic Pizza Crust
4 c. whole wheat flour (I used hard white)
1 T. yeast
1 T. olive oil
1 T. honey
1 1/2 t. salt
1 1/2 c. warm water

If you have a pizza stone, preheat it now. If you don't have a pizza stone, get one; pizzas are so much better from a stone! I only have one and need to get another one because 1 pizza doesn't feed all these growing children anymore.

OK, so put the warm water in your mixer bowl and then add the rest of the ingredients (maybe go easy on the flour at first - not all at once). With your dough hook, mix ingredients and add enough flour to make a stiff dough that pulls cleanly from the side of the bowl. Continue to knead with the dough hook for 3-5 minutes until dough is elastic.

Roll out pizza dough on cornmeal and then place on heated stone. Brush with olive oil and prick with a fork. Pre-bake in 400 oven for 5-8 minutes.

Remove and add sauce, toppings, and cheese. Bake about 10-15 minutes.

So why no photos of my masterpiece pizzas? Well, if you know me, you know cooking is really not my thing. My pizzas did not look all that pretty. But they sure tasted good!

Whole Food Living - Week 1 - Snacks, Banana Bread

2011-08-29T18:41:00.000-04:00

Today was a busy day. For one, last night the moment Irene made her exit, our power went out, prompting us to take our frozen and refrigerated food to a friend's house. Our power was only out for a couple of hours, but I waited until this morning to go get our food.

While I was retrieving our food, I stopped by a farm. I've said before how much I love all of the farms around here; you don't see this in the south. We have 3 or 4 of them within a mile or two of our house. If you remember, I visited one last year at the end of the season. All I got was some not-so-good end-of-the-season corn. Today, though, I was seeking two specific things: farm fresh eggs and local honey. I got both at one stop...eggs only a couple hours old and honey from hives right there on the property. ("They" say consuming local honey can help if you have allergies; we'll see if "they" are correct.)

I also had other things to do like teach the kids school, sign Michael up for swim team, and find some new running shoes for me that will hopefully help my painful ankles. As expensive as they are, they ought to enable me to comfortably run a marathon.

All this to say, today was more of a prep day than a day to focus on making elaborate new and healthy snacks for the kids. I did, however, have some yummy banana bread on hand that I had made the day before Irene visited so we would have a ready-made breakfast.

In college I had this yellow cookbook that, though lost, I can still picture in my mind. I also still use some of the recipes from it, like the banana bread recipe. Here it is:

Sift together:
1 3/4 c. flour
2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt

In separate bowl, eat until frothy:
3/4 c. sugar
1/2 c. oil
2 eggs

Add:
1 c. mashed banana

Add wet ingredients to dry and fold. Bake at 325 for about an hour.

I used freshly milled flour in this - hard white wheat. I only use my hard red wheat in bread as it does definitely have a stronger whole wheat taste. Honestly, you really can't taste that much of a difference between the processed white flour you'd find in the store and freshly milled hard white wheat, but the health benefits for the freshly milled flour are plentiful! Don't be fooled by "whole wheat" flour in the store either; it is still processed in order to allow for a long shelf life. I will tell you more about fresh milled wheat later this week when I make bread.

Anyway...for the sugar, I used the last of my honey granules; thankfully, I have my new bucket arriving sometime this week from Bread Beckers. I didn't quite have enough bananas to make a cup, so I filled the rest of the cup with organic plain yogurt, which I actually think made the bread more fluffy; I may make yogurt a regular add-in!

I meant to add some ground flaxseed because, honestly, that can be added to ANYTHING, and it's so healthful! But I forgot. I also often add chocolate chips and/or finely ground nuts of some kind (the kids don't like big pieces of nuts in bread or cookies).

So that was their snack today - whole, real food, just leftover whole, real food! Tomorrow hopefully there will be less running around so I can get more creative.

In Which I Ramble On and On About My Latest Health Kick

2011-08-27T18:45:00.002-04:00

Have you seen that commercial for multi-grain Eggo waffles? A geeky looking mom dressed in sweats power-walks into the kitchen, passing her two children who are preparing for school, and then calling out, "Kids! Time for breakfast." With an alarmed look on his face, the boy turns to his sister and says something to the effect of, "Mom is on another one of her health kicks. We need to get out of here before she tries to feed us breakfast!"

That's kind of the reaction I get from my family each time. And, yes, I am on another health kick, inspired by the lead Yahoo story I saw the other day about the family who took on the challenge of 100 Days of Real Food. I am completely aware of the fact that my "kicks" are a bit cyclical; however, I do learn something new everytime, and I do typically pick up at least one new good habit. For example, I now mill my own wheat and use that fresh, whole grain flour for bread, baked goods, and breakfast foods like waffles and pancakes. I also often substitute honey granules for refined sugar.

But I do have a long way to go. I would like to get to a point where I don't use refined sugar at all. My one big obstacle is that my source of honey granules, Bread Beckers, is now 16 hours away rather than 1, and the shipping costs are a bit hard to swallow. But I did go ahead and swallow it and placed an order for a new 5lb. container of honey granules and some flaxseed, which I grind and put in smoothies and baked goods. There are of course many, many other things I can work on like getting rid of all of the terrible foods that come in a box.

I just ordered Jordan Rubin's book What the Bible Says About Healthy Living, and as the author notes in the brief preview Amazon permitted me to read, we are indeed "fearfully and wonderfully made". Why shouldn't we focus on eating what God provided for us to eat? As much as I have tried, I have not yet located the rare to non-existent Oreo tree, so perhaps we should not be eating Oreos and the like.

So I'm going to try very hard to eliminate all of those processed foods. It's tough. I'm a veeery lazy cook, so those pre-packaged, processed foods are awfully tempting. Because going cold turkey and rashly removing all of the junk food from the pantry at one time is just setting me up for failure, I'm going to take this in stages. For the first week, I'm going to focus on snacks. When the kids ask for a snack, instead of telling them to dive into a box of Cheez-Its, I am going to provide some whole, natural options instead. Some will take some work - like making my own cheese crackers - but our health is worth it, right?

Of course, I chose the very worst weekend to decide to be healthy. I just went to the grocery store day before yesterday - along with every other resident of Connecticut - to stock up on non-perishables in the event that Irene steals our electricity. So I will start our Snack Reformation after Irene has departed and our power has been restored. At that point, we can take the yet unopened boxes of Cheez-Its and Oreos and donate them to the local food bank.

Until then, I will continue to exercise. Very surprisingly, I have been very committed to exercising daily. I work out every morning on the treadmill - working on building up my endurance so that eventually I can run a 5K. A huge goal for a non-runner like me, especially since, aside from high school sports, I have never before been consistent in any exercise program.

Thankfully, I'm not alone in exercising...we have had some great family times over the last month hiking some of the many trails that traverse the New England landscape and biking. Mark and I splurged and bought bikes so we could join the kids. In addition, we got a bike attachment that turns Mark's bike into a tandem bike thus allowing Audrey to keep up with our pace.

Is she cute or what?

Unfortunately for me, I had to cut my workout today short and will take tomorrow off as well. My ankle is killing me. For no reason. That happens a lot with fibromyalgia - pain for no reason. Which is why I'm on a new health kick. I refuse to take any of the medications that fight fibromyalgia with side effects like "thoughts of suicide". I am confident that if I learn to eat healthy and stick with it, I won't be so tired all the time, and I won't have a Pain du Jour.

So raise your healthy drink...here's to getting healthy.

Pool Party!!

2011-08-22T20:55:00.000-04:00

It was a tough call for her to make. A pool party or a gymnastics party? Ultimately, she chose the pool, which I think is a winning choice since it appeals to more guests. And guests? I am feeling very blessed that my sweet little girl had 13 kids with whom to celebrate; I have had fleeting worries that, since we are new up here, there wouldn't be any party guests.

I think they all had a good time at the YMCA pool. We started in the pool where the kids had 45 minutes to splash around and play various pool games.

Following the pool fun, the kids were led to the gym for game time. Audrey chose Minnows & Sharks and Duck, Duck, Goose and was promptly appointed a shark.

After the kids were worn out running around the gym,it was time for the PARTY! Audrey had to wait a bit for her favorite part so we could have pizza. THEN she got to have cake.

Of course, the presents were what she really wanted to get to, and she wasted no time tearing into them.

Her friends were terribly creative and knew exactly what delights her sweet little Princess heart...Polly Pockets, crafts, books. Our dining room currently looks like a Michael's craft store, and since we got home from the party, she has kept herself busy NON-STOP with her new Polly's, her Play-Doh, and one craft after the other!

Back to Clubbing

2011-08-18T22:49:00.000-04:00

I'm a very enthusiastic starter of stuff. I'm not that good of a finisher of stuff. I'm trying to do better. One thing I've picked back up are the Contenders of the Faith/Keepers of the Home clubs. I started these clubs in our home at the beginning of last year, and we really did accomplish a few things with the materials.

This year, I decided to bring back the clubs for a couple of reasons. First of all, earning the badges does force the children to LEARN. And in a really fun way. Secondly, we've decided not to do the mid-week church activities for the younger three. Since Alex is now in middle school, she has moved up to the youth group which meets on a different night than the younger kids' programming. I decided that, for my sanity, we are going to do just one night out at church during the week, and since I think youth group more valuable than elementary age programming, Alex gets the night. So anyway, now the kids still get clubs, and I get to slow down my Carschooling lesson plans.

Our first order of business for this session of clubs was, of course, learning how to make something delicious to eat: doughnuts! This week we learned about the different kinds of doughnuts, and we made baked mini-donuts; we will leave the more delicious, more fattening deep-fried treats for next week.

Our baked doughnuts didn't come out all that great looking, but they did sure taste good.

What was even more fun is that the kids remembered that the last time we made doughnuts, we read Homer Price and his adventure with the broken donut machine. Love that childhood story! So we read half of the tale this week and will finish it up next week.

Not a bad way to spend an evening...and certainly a tasty way to earn a badge!

The Birthday Girl

2011-08-16T22:26:00.001-04:00

She is...

sweet,

full of life,

fun,

adorable,

just a little bit mischievous,

beautiful,

absolutely PRECIOUS.

And today is her birthday! What a blessing that she has brought joy to our lives for SIX years!

Although the festivities will continue on Saturday when she celebrates with friends, today she enjoyed some birthday fun at home with her family. She woke up to find a couple of presents waiting on the counter for her.

She wasted no time!

More Polly Pockets. Not what she needs but what she wanted. That's what birthdays are all about anyway, right?

And the sweetest part? Her big sister playing Pollys with her.

Of course her birthday treat at her birthday lunch at Chili's was pretty sweet too.

The rest of the day held some special birthday girl events: a little girl time at the nail salon, an afternoon movie featuring a birthday gift movie, and lots of time to play with new toys.

I hope she felt loved...because we sure do love her!

First Day

2011-08-15T18:57:00.003-04:00

The Northerners all think I'm crazy. Schools around here don't start for a few weeks, and I'm already a couple weeks behind my normal schedule. Traditionally, we start our academics the first Monday of August (excepting last year when our lives were in the midst of being turned upside down). Because an early start affords more flexibility in the middle, I was going to return to tradition this year, but with our guest and my general disorganization, that did not happen. A couple weeks tardy is not too bad, though. And, honestly, the kids were bored so school is something to do.

It was a good day. Everyone fell right back into a school routine, and we got a lot accomplished. It's hard to believe we have a middle schooler now!

She was introduced to Bob Jones math and English and also continues to work on her One Year Adventure Novel course which she started at the end of last year. She also informed me that she wants to learn "CSI stuff", so I found an e-book on Currclick which I will attempt to implement at some point during the year.

Our fifth grader, Michael, maintained a wonderfully positive attitude today about all of his studies, a very welcome change. I hope to find him a good outlet for building and sharing Lego creations.

Jacob is in fourth grade this year and is plugging right along with Bob Jones as well. He never exhibits whole-hearted enthusiasm for any of his studies, but he always does a good, thorough job in completing each task.

Perhaps the one for whom this year will bring the greatest change is my little first grader.

Although she got a taste of academia in Kindergarten, this will be her first year of really being thrown into the mix. She did great today and was excited to have a spelling book just like her brothers and sister.

We are taking it slow as we jump back into school. Part of that is because a friend with whom I am co-op'ing for History, Science, and Art...is a Northerner, so I did not want to force her to start against her will. We will begin those subjects in September. Until then, we will get completely familiar with our subjects at hand. One of those subjects includes French. I am so happy I purchased Rosetta Stone this year and wonder why I waited this long; hearing the kids repeat French phrases into their headset is perhaps the cutest thing EVER!

(Note: The kids came up with their own staging for the photos. They may or may not have been bribed to do so cooperatively. That bribe may or may not have included a piece of licorice and a Reeses Peanut Butter Cup.)

A Hissy Fit & a Re-Cap

2011-07-22T21:35:00.003-04:00

Before I continue recounting our summer adventures, let me throw in a little hissy fit...if you decide for whatever reason to take a peek at archived posts between the dates of 10/08 (when I came to Blogger from Homeschoolblogger) and 12/10 (when I started using Flickr), you will notice all of the photos are missing. Here's what happened: I joined Google+, which is Google's version of Facebook. They automatically uploaded all of my blog photos I had uploaded through Blogger. I saw that album of like 865 photos sitting in my Google+ profile, and I thought to myself, Self, why do you need an album of 865 photos sitting on your Google+ profile? Many of those photos won't make any sense to anyone anyway without the accompanying blog explanation. Besides, all of those photos are on your blog, so what is the purpose for them to be here?

And I deleted the album.

What Google failed to tell me as I so casually clicked on "delete" is that I was deleting the photos from my blog, from everywhere. Poof! Vanished! Never to be recovered...at least that is the answer I have discovered as I have perused various forums filled with venomous rants from various ranters who are furious at Google for also deleting their blog photos.

All is not lost, however. It's not like those photos are completely gone. They are on my computer and my external hard drive and on various CDs. You might even guess they are everywhere and thus not at all organized. But such is life. Really the disappointing thing for me is that I had planned to convert my blog to a book, you know, for posterity's sake. For the children. And now all those photos are missing. And honestly? I don't see myself taking the time to wade through my thousands of pictures to find the photos that correspond with each blog post.

What I have rediscovered, however, is my passion for digital scrapbooking, so that is where I will place all of those missing photos. And, consequently, you may not see me here as often because digital scrapbooking can consume an awful lot of time if one lets it.

OK, hissy fit over.

What have we been up to during Simel's second week here with us?

The kids had sports camp at church this week. I think they enjoyed it. Sort of. It's sad, but I do see that enthusiasm for "campy" type things evaporating from my children. As the whole group sang and did song motions at the end of each day, my children as well as most their age just stood there. I don't blame them. I remember being that age...and feeling really stupid singing kid songs with silly motions to go along. They did have fun playing the games, though, so that made it worth it.

Camp has taken up most of the week. And it has been so, SO hot all week, we really haven't felt like doing much else. We did make it to the YMCA one day to swim. Other than that, we spent the week melting. Literally. Almost anyway. I have wondered to myself often during the last week how I managed to live in Africa all those years sans air conditioning and so hot.

I have to say that, honestly, I had no idea there were still parts of America that don't have things like central air. When we came up to CT last August to look for a house to rent, it was a cool weekend, so it really didn't cross my mind to ask a question like, "Does this house have air conditioning?" It was just an assumption because, you know, we live in America and it's 2011. But anyway, apparently, my assumptions were way off. I finally bought a huge, portable AC unit for our downstairs, but with the intensity of the heat and the size of our living room, it just isn't doing a whole lot. I keep telling myself that this is certainly better than winter. I'll let you know once I actually believe what I'm saying.

Today we decided to enjoy an air conditioned theater. Of course, that's quite an expensive couple of hours just for some cool air, so we chose a movie as well - Zookeeper. It was OK. I mean, Kevin James and talking zoo animals - my expectations were low to begin with. It has its funny moments, though, and the kids seemed to like it.

Once we got out of the movie, my plan was to have dinner at Applebees because it sits next to the theater and because I have a little bit left on a gift certificate. But the crowd in the foyer hinted at a long wait, so we sat in the air conditioned car for awhile (it was 104 at 6:00!) to decide what to do. The kids voted Lunchables. There weren't many other options, so, folks, we went totally gourmet and stopped by the grocery store for Lunchables.

And some sparklers. Because what is a hot summer night without sparklers?

Laundry, Tourist Attractions, Tents, and Pop Rocks

2011-07-20T21:36:00.000-04:00

I've neglected the blog because of this:

Of course, if that were completely true, the pile of laundry wouldn't be there; all of the items would be neatly folded and put away. But certainly between roadtrips, camp-outs, outside play, and sports camp, the washing machine has been running almost non-stop.

We had a big roadtrip last week, an unplanned one, but one that was a whole lot of fun. Simel had some issues with his visa to take care of and a friend in DC who could help him, so last Wednesday we made the 5 1/2 hour trip down to our nation's capital.

Wednesday night I dropped Simel off at this friend's house, and we met back up on Thursday. We had a wonderful time seeing the sites, but the best part of all for me was that some friends from Atlanta happened to be in the area on the same day, so we got to see the sites together.

There was one shot I was SO excited to capture...yes, the one that EVERYONE captures. But, alas, it was definitely not meant to be:

I did get a little bit of the monument in the reflecting pool. Of course it was a mud puddle that captured the reflection, but anyway...

Remember that 5 1/2 hour drive down to DC? Well, it took us 9 1/2 hours to get home! I can't stress enough how nice it was to be home. Since we've gotten home, the kids have enjoyed a night camping in our backyard, and they have also been participating in sports camp at church.

We also had an outing of sorts yesterday. I saw Fizziwigs Candy Factory pinpointed on a map of Connecticut and thought it sounded like a fun place to visit. I assumed it was going to be a bit like Dylan's Candy Bar in NYC. Not really. We could have just gone down to the local drugstore for the same sugared assortment, but the experience gave me a good picture anyway:

A note to Simel's mom: No, I did not buy that giant lollipop for him; it just served as a great prop for the photo.

AND...the experience also afforded me an opportunity to give Simel a new experience: Pop Rocks. A must-do for any visitor to America! The jury's still out on whether or not he enjoyed the fizzy candy.

So the pile of laundry grows higher...it's been busy around here, that's for sure. Someday I will see the bottom of that mountain of clothing!

Playground Fun

2011-07-12T20:09:00.001-04:00

I've been feeling a little under the weather the last few days, and today was definitely the worst, which hopefully means I'll be good as new tomorrow. So we didn't have any really extraordinary plans today, but we had fun anyway. We went to a park this morning where the kids played on the equipment while I sat in the shade and rested (and chatted with a friend).

Favorite Part of the Day?

2011-07-11T22:09:00.001-04:00

I'm pretty sure our day only got better as it went on. I know this because we started the day with a short summer school session. Undoubtedly, this was not the kids' favorite part of the day.

We spent a few hours this afternoon at the pool. That's a no-brainer; the kids always love pooltime.

So maybe the pool was the kids' favorite. I'm not sure, but my favorite part of today might have been watching Simel watch his first episode of Wipeout. He was positively tickled by it.

Our Special Guest

2011-07-10T22:29:00.001-04:00

We are so excited about our very special guest! Simel is an 11-year-old young man visiting us for 3 weeks from Senegal, West Africa. We picked him up in Boston yesterday.

Poor guy was exhausted and slept all the way home. Then went immediately to bed. We didn't learn a whole lot about our guest last night, but today he has come out of his shell! He is here to be immersed in English, and I am so impressed with him. He has done great all day keeping up with the boys' endless chatter, and they have all played so well together.

We stuck around home most of the day so he could get acclimated to a different continent and get to know us a bit. We let the kids take our two room tent out this afternoon. It didn't take them long to construct it in our backyard.

Of course we had s'mores once the tent was all set up. Have you ever seen such giant marshmallows?

After some playtime in the tent, the kids busied themselves for a couple of hours catching tadpoles in the water that has collected on the pool cover. And after dinner, playtime continued with a few nerf gun and light saber fights.

The night concluded with a wonderful magic show by our new guest, a show which had my boys giggling like little girls. He is a sweet, funny young man, and the kids really like him. We're looking forward to the next couple of weeks as we get to know him better!

Just Swingin' Around

2011-07-06T21:21:00.000-04:00

It all goes to show you that when the TV and video games are turned off and the imagination is turned on, fun things happen...

This afternoon while I was simultaneously doing some computer work and placing a take-out order from the Princess' new restaurant, the boys were busy outside.

They built this:

It looks like an ordinary swing, but it isn't. It has a cardboard seat which is carefully attached to the rope with some handy dandy packing tape, and...the swing is anchored to the very tiptop of the tree. The fact that Jacob climbed so high up in the tree would have caused me a minor heart attack had I been a witness. Good thing I was enjoying pretend pizza and blueberry pie at the time.

There's more. The other half of the rope serves as an additional swing.

Like I said - a lot can happen when you throw in some imagination.

Little Gymnast

2011-06-14T21:31:00.000-04:00

"Mommy," she said as we left her next-to-last gymnastics class of the season, "at first I thought gymnastics was just doing cartwheels. But gymnastics is a lot more funner than I thought!"

She has truly had a wonderful time in her gymnastics class. This season ended with a little awards ceremony

and an ice cream party.

It wasn't lost on Audrey that some of the girls got a medal, while she only got a ribbon. She asked me about it. I told her that those girls got a medal because they were in gymnastics all year long rather than just one season.

It really wasn't necessary to ask her if she wants to continue with gymnastics; she's got her eye on that medal.

Blogging & other things that have been happening...

2011-06-01T18:55:00.000-04:00

I know I've been terrible about blogging. When I originally began Treasured Chapters, it was for the sole purpose of recording our family happenings. But along the way, I have gone through periods of time when I worry about followers and how many comments I have, etc. NOT that I haven't LOVED getting to know so many wonderful people along the way. I have, I really have. It's just that when I let that pressure get to me, blogging becomes an obsession and something that takes up time I should be spending with my kids. So I have tried to take a step back. While I still value all of my bloggy friends and hope to get back to checking in with them, I am still going to allow myself a good night's sleep if I can't make my rounds on any given day!

That said, here are some things we have been up to:

1. We joined the local YMCA and have really enjoyed that. We go every weekend and often during the week to swim or to have a good family game of basketball. OK, so we usually lay HORSE or PIG rather than an actual game, but we have fun. Tomorrow, Audrey will start swimming lessons there.

2. We are winding down our school year. The kids are finishing up their books, so we are on a lighter schedule. There will still be summer work to do when they finish their curriculum (shhhh...don't tell; they don't know that yet), but we'll be more relaxed.

3. This hasn't been the most stellar year of my homeschool career mostly because it had such a rocky start, but I'm ready to make next year a good year. After next year? Well, we haven't decided yet. Of course, it depends on how this year goes and where we end up living, but I am gathering information on one of the area Christian schools. I have found that as the kids get older, there are fewer and fewer kids homeschooling alongside them, so it may be time. If we decide on school, Alex would probably go for a year while I have a year at home with just the boys and Audrey, then the boys would go. I don't know. Taking it one year at a time, so we'll see.

4. Today we had a really good day, one of those days where you sure don't want any of your kids sitting in a classroom somewhere. We met a homeschool group at a park/lake and had a wonderful 4-5 hours of the moms sitting in the shade chatting and the kids enjoying all sorts of games of their making in the water and along the shore. A beautiful, really fun day.

And that's really about all we've been up to. And I know - this is the second post in a row with no photos. I actually took some pictures today, but I want to get this posted, and I have a little girl who is still wearing pond water, so I'd like to get her in the bath!

House Hunting: It's sorta what we've been up to

2011-05-31T14:13:00.000-04:00

As you know, we've been renting a house. I actually love renting. These days when a home is more of a liability than an asset--and definitely no longer an investment--renting kind of redefines the American dream. BUT there's this whole issue of settling in. I am not settled in to our rental. There are only 2 clocks on the wall and one poster up in the boys' room. And in full disclosure, that poster covers up a hole in the wall (no, we did not put the hole there). Plus we have stacks and stacks of boxes in the garage that have not yet been unpacked.

So I'd love to have a place to call my own so I could paint the walls the color I want them, put things on those walls, and unpack the boxes. We're aiming for November to be out of here and into a place of our own.

Even though that gives us 6 months, being the impatient people we are, we have been poring over listing after listing. A few things that bother me about homes up here:

1. First and foremost: no Central Air!! Our rental has no means of AC either. At this point it has kind of a been a game to see how long we can go before we give in and buy some of those ugly AC units you hang out of your window. In the listings, they describe them as "individual cooling units"; makes them sound so posh, doesn't it? I hate to buy them, though, in the off-chance we purchase a house that actually has added that modern convenience of central air! You might think the northeast is ahead of the times, but I'm telling you - just look at the AC situation, and you'll see they are in fact behind the times!

2. No garages or detached garages: This is actually not an issue for us because I have specified in my search that I only want to look at homes with a garage. But there are A LOT of homes out there without a garage. Again we must look at the average age of the homes here; I mean who would park a horse and carriage in a garage anyway? As for me, however, I will take a house that is just a garage if I have to, but I will not live with having to dig my car out of 6 feet of snow just so I can go pick up a gallon of milk at the grocery store.

3. If you're from the south, you know that most homes have a master suite, which means there is a master bedroom with a private bathroom connected to the room. Well, here, again probably because of the age of homes, it is not as common. So when there IS a master suite, the listing will say, "possible in-law suite". OK, I get that too EXCEPT that these are descriptions on homes that are sometimes right at 2000 square feet. That's not THAT small, but it's not huge. Throw in my 4 kids...well, I love my in-laws, but that really would be kind of crowded, wouldn't it?

4. I described our rental house in a past post and explained how there are like 12 different types of flooring in it. I see that in the majority of the homes I see on realtor.com. Each room has different carpet. Now I saw a friend's house who did that tastefully, and the different colors complemented the theme of the room, but with these, there will be one room that has bright green carpet, another with mauve, another with bright red.

5. Some of our top choices have an above ground pool in the backyard. Why in the world do so many people up here have pools that they can only use for 2 months out of the year? I guess maybe because they don't have AC. I don't know.

6. The prices of the homes aren't too bad, though CT has certainly not been hit like GA in the housing crisis, so prices aren't bombed and homes are still moving. BUT the price of a home can be misleading if you are trying to work up a budget because you have to take the property tax into consideration. The property taxes up here are outrageous. I have not found a single house with property taxes even close to the little we paid in GA. Most times, the property tax comes close to doubling your mortgage! I'm surprised everyone here hasn't just up and moved to GA.

OK, I'm done griping. There are some good points about the homes here. Because they are old, they are full of character. Also, many of them have been renovated but the character retained. So it has been interesting looking at the homes. Our top pick right now was built in 1912! It's fascinating to think of all of the voices that have echoed down the halls of that home...if the walls could talk, huh?

Disney 2011 - Magic Kingdom

2011-05-25T20:45:00.000-04:00

Well, I am sure taking my sweet time getting to these Disney pictures, aren't I? Just trying to make the memories last longer...

My kids always prefer Epcot to Magic Kingdom, but we have a good time at Mickey and Minnie's house anyway. This year was especially fun because the kids' cousins were there.

It was a little crowded (after Labor Day is always better for smaller crowds). And it was a little hot, but that problem is easily solved:

It was a good day!

Disney 2011 - Where We Stayed

2011-05-15T22:06:00.000-04:00

This is the second time we have stayed at the Animal Kingdom Lodge, and we always enjoy it. We love the decor, especially the fact that many of the artifacts are from our African home countries.

We love the African food, and the view from our balcony was awesome:

And of course we were treated wonderfully...it's Disney magic!

Disney 2011 - Getting There

2011-05-10T21:11:00.000-04:00

While I miss being so very far from the warmth of the Sunshine State, I have to admit that a 2 1/2 hour plane ride down was a whole lot more enjoyable than an 8-hour road trip. The airplane is still a bit of a novelty to the kids; the car, well, it is not. Needless to say, they were excited to head to the airport last Saturday to board the jet.

We didn't leave until mid-afternoon, but we got there early enough to have a little time to hang out at the airport.

We did not go to Disney straight from the airport. Since we didn't arrive until evening, we decided not to use any of our Disney Vacation Club points for a few hours' sleep. So we used our Marriott points instead and stayed a a Courtyard. Honestly, I didn't care where we stayed; I was just happy to be in tropical paradise again!

Things I Accomplished During My Blog Hiatus

2011-05-07T20:45:00.000-04:00

I did not intentionally take a break from the blog. I just didn't feel like writing. It happens sometimes. But I discovered during my break that I can get an awful lot accomplished when my fingers are not tied to my keyboard or the shutter of my camera. Here's a taste of what I've been up to:

1. Spring cleaning. Not that you can tell now that I was spring cleaning a week ago.

2. Planning school for next year.

3. Paying more attention to the kiddos.

4. A week at Disney World. More to follow on that if I can get my act together and wade through the hundreds of pictures. Actually, I found I did not take as many photos this time as usual because we visited our regular spots, and I have all the great photos from those spots already. Want to see them? Just click on the Disney label on my right sidebar!

5. Unpacked.

6. More cleaning.

7. And today began what I have observed to be about a semi-annual occurrence in our house: we change things around. As an MK (missionary kid), I have ants in my pants and want nothing more than to move around. The longest I have been at one address in my life is 7 years. In missionary boarding school, we left our school every 3 months to go home. When we returned from vacation, we had a new room, a new roommate. So every few months, I feel the need to change things up a bit. NOT that I'm going to get a new roomy, but I do like the change.

We just closed on the sale of our Georgia home, so we tossed about the idea of taking the plunge again and finding our forever home here in CT. But we decided to stick it out here a few more months. That will help out our landlord, and the more time we spend here, the more money we can save for a down payment.

With that in mind, I decided to better set up the house for school. Since we rarely have guests, I am turning the guest room into a school room by bringing in a table from storage. Of course, guests are still welcome, and one of the kids will be happy to relinquish his or her bed to a guest. So we have kept busy today making the move. Of course, I'm sure my husband wishes there had been a little more "me" in the "we", but it's getting done nonetheless.

Things I learned during my hiatus:
1. The world does not stop revolving if I skip a day--or 15--blogging.

2. God's creation continues to be beautiful,

and my children keep on being adorable even if I am not photographing every moment.

Who knew?

Pictures and details of Disney to come...

Easter at Home

2011-04-25T12:48:00.000-04:00

I can't recall ever spending an Easter at home. Usually we are up early, celebrating the resurrection of Christ at church, and then back home for an Easter dinner with family or friends. Yesterday, we slept in until 9:30 because we were kept awake much of the night by a restless, feverish little girl who came in looking for comfort between her mommy and daddy.

Friday Alex tested positive for strep throat and began immediately on antibiotics. By Saturday night, we clearly had two more down. Michael is the only one who has remained (so far) untouched. So while others were attending sunrise services, hunting for Easter eggs, and sitting down with family at the dinner table, we were administering medicine, washing sheets and pillowcases, holding the barf bucket for the Princess who pukes no matter what her ailment, and Cloroxing the doorknobs and countertops and any other surface a germ-laden hand may have touched.

But it wasn't all bad. It was a rather relaxing way to spend a drizzly day. And we certainly had some family time. The kids watched Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which they received in their Easter baskets, and Mark prepared a delicious meal which we enjoyed at the big dining room table. The fact that all 4 of the littlest guests at the table were still pajama clad wasn't even a problem since it was just us.

While I don't wish to make this past Easter a tradition, the fact that we were at home certainly does not diminish the true reason for the holiday. The fact that Jesus rose, victorious over death, gives us hope that one day we will be in Heaven where there is no strep throat, no barfing, no antibiotics. Until then, as long as we are a family through each event, it's all good!

Good to Wow: Faith Edition

2011-04-13T19:38:00.002-04:00

My faith is not defined by how faithfully I wake up at 5:30 to read my Bible,

how much money I give to charity,

or how often I attend church.

Are those things--church, giving, and the Word--important to my relationship with Christ? Most definitely. But those things are not the means to measure my faith.

Rather, my faith is built upon redemption and grace.

I am made in His image. He knew me before I was born, and has a plan for me. He loves me for who I am.

It's not about the things I do or don't do. It's about what He did for me.

About the Edits:
Wow - I'm really off this week!! Obviously, I had to up the exposure on both of my SOOCs - thank goodness for RAW! And here are the details of the specific edits:

On the Bible - I did a tilt and crop, ctrl-j/adjusted to overlay, and placed Kristy's Aging Estate texture/soft light 100%

On the Hands - I warmed up WB, ran CoffeeShop's perfect portrait, using color pop, brighten, urban grit on coins, skin smoother, and vignette

An Empty Glass...and Some Pictures

2011-04-11T21:43:00.002-04:00

I have finally figured it out. I have a very set amount of Creativity in my being, so when it is being used up on Project A, there is little left for Project B. It's like I start with a glass full of Creativity. Then I slowly pour it on on one thing, resulting an empty glass.

I've been pouring (see?) all of my creativity into planning school for next year, so there has been little left for anything else (ie: photography and writing). But you know what I discovered? I have skipped 3 or 4 of my regular photography challenges, and--are you ready for this? Life kept going on as normal; the world did not end, the planet did not implode.

So I've decided that, since there is more to my life than just blogging and photography, I'm not going to put so much pressure on myself to post daily and link up, link up. In fact, for this post, I am pulling photos from the archives--more from our New York City trip.

I feel that, in photography, my greatest weakness is portrait photography. The following pictures are the result of the first planned "shoot" I did, though I wouldn't even call it that since it was a rushed 5 minutes I took as Mark checked out of our hotel. I guess I should also mention I kind of bribed my children to act right; they are a little tired of the lens and are becoming less and less cooperative.

I had seen this warehouse door with the graffiti several times in our walks down the road. I thought it was a perfect backdrop for some shots of the kids. I'm not entirely happy with all of them. I shot them in manual and, I guess, got the shutter speed too slow for photographing kids because some of them were blurry. I find that converting to black and white helps cover up some of the blurriness. Anyway, there are a lot of photos here, but I felt bad leaving any out.

Here are my girls:

And my rascally boys:

Random Ramblings

2011-04-07T18:48:00.003-04:00

It has not been the most stellar of weeks. I managed to escape illness the entire winter...which is saying a lot because I generally fight a cold the entire length of the winter. Of course I'm used to much shorter winters, but maybe there is something in the air here--or absent in the air here--which has made me healthier. Or maybe it's all of the vitamins I have been taking since my doc in GA told me he thought I have fibromyalgia and might feel better with a lot of vitamins in my system. At any rate, the crud did hit me this week, albeit not as powerfully as is typical, but I've still felt pretty lousy.

So that means there has been no glitz, glamour, fun, or creativity in school. The kids have done a fabulous job completing their assignments almost entirely independently, but there have been no "extras" thrown in there, so I know it's been boring for them.

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Any of you catch the new TLC show, Extreme Couponing? While I found those highlighted on the show to be, well, extreme, I was motivated again to start couponing. I was a pretty avid couponer in GA, and I kept my supply of coupons stocked mostly by buying the 2-for-1 AJC Sunday paper. Unfortunately, I haven't found that the Hartford paper offers that deal. That kinda took the fun out of it for me; it's impossible to effectively coupon without at least 2 of each coupon. But through this show I came to realize that more and more is done on the web now. In fact, I discovered Shop at Home, which offers a lot of printable coupons, and then there is also Coupons and Things by Dede, which is a coupon clipping service. When I heard them mention this type of service on the show last night, I thought it was ridiculous, but through investigating this site, I see that I can purchase from Dede the same flyers I would get in the AJC and pay her just about the same price as I paid for 2 AJCs. And I don't even have to rush to Super Wal-Mart to get one before they're gone; she'll send it right to me. Haven't given it a try yet, but it looks promising. Of course I do not have time to be an extreme couponer--and I was a bit disgusted with some of the couponer's greedy stockpiles--but it sure doesn't hurt to save a little money!

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Though I never put it in blog writing to do so, at the beginning of the year when I decided to become a better photographer, I vowed to myself that I would not create a post on here without a photo to go along with it. Well, because of my crud, I haven't picked up my camera in a few days. It just so happens, though, that my kids went for a walk this afternoon, and my oldest took her camera. I think she did a great job:

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Alex has been so helpful this week - taking care of me, preparing meals.
She's growing up too fast. Last weekend we went to the Revolve Tour together - a Christian conference-type thing for teenage girls. She fit right in...right down to all the dancing around to the very loud music (do I sound like I'm almost 40??).

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Guess where I'm going this weekend? To the Christian Book Distributor's warehouse sale in MA! If you know me well, you know I will be in heaven! I'm knocking out most of my 2011-12 Curriculum Shopping List. I'll hit the homeschool discount table. And all the other discount tables. AND I'll enjoy a kid-free day with a friend!

Here is that list of curriculum I'm whittling down: H.E.A.R.T.S. Homeschool Curriculum.

Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers

Good to Wow: Up Edition, Edited

2011-04-06T22:43:00.000-04:00

First, I want to give a shout out to Michelle at Heartfelt Life, Handmade Balance. She awarded me the Stylish Blog Award last week. I have received this award before, so I will not bore you with 7 more random facts about me (or in my case 10 because I am so OCD I have to round it up!). If you really want to know more random facts about me, click on the About Me tab above. But thank you, Michelle! I have enjoyed getting to know you; I have been blessed by your open and honest sharing about life and motherhood, plus you are a great photographer!

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Ashley's tutorial last week was the biggest a-ha moment I've had in this challenge so far. Although I did not apply to my Up photos the colorizing technique as outlined on the video, I did have fun playing with it. I took this photo (which, incidentally, is a DOWN photo):

I wanted the water to be bluer instead of that nasty brown. Learning the colorizing technique as well as the fact that you can fill the mask with black made it so easy to get blue water:

Anyway, on to my Up photos. Can you believe that I did not know you could isolate a color in your picture on the Hue/Saturation slider? That was the biggest a-ha moment in all of the a-ha moments last week for me! Knowing that was there opened up so many other easier editing options for me! You better believe I used that tool a lot this week. Just because it was so much fun!

So the first shot:

Except for a crop, I really like this shot SOOC; however, I wanted to do some creative editing. I did nothing in RAW, just a crop. Then I cloned out some of the extraneous branches that seemed out of place after the crop.

And here was the fun part. I had in my mind that the brown color of the dead flowers would look so nice against more of an aqua background, despite how pretty blue the sky was. Before learning what I learned last week, it would have taken me forever to use the magic wand to select the sky and then adjust the hue. But this week - easy peasy: I created an adjustment layer to adjust the hue, chose blue, and adjusted the hue until I liked the color. I then increased the saturation a bit...and the plant wasn't even affected at all!

Finally, I placed Kim Klassen's chamomile texture and adjusted to overlay blending mode.

Now for my monkeys in a tree:

In RAW, I increased the saturation a tad. Then opened the photo, did a high pass filter on a new layer and adjusted soft light blending mode to 50%.

I thought about cropping so the focus would be more on the boys, but I just loved the huge spread of branches against the beautiful, blue sky, so I left it as is.

And my lone monkey:

In RAW, I increased the blacks and the saturation just a bit. I then opened the picture and did a high pass filter on a new layer, which I adjusted to pin light blending mode. I then flattened the image, created a new layer and adjusted the sharpness a bit as Jacob was a bit out of focus. Finally, I adjusted the color curves to get rid of some of the shadows on Jacob.

And my crow photo:

In RAW, I cropped and increased the blacks to try to bring out the crow a bit. I then opened the photo and created a new layer. I adjusted this layer to difference blending mode at 50%. I then created another layer and adjusted this to overlay at 100%.

And then my stormy sky photo I pulled from the archives:

I mentioned that I edited this photo once before but wasn't happy with it. I wasn't happy with it because I didn't yet know what I learned last week. This is how my first edit looked:

You'll notice how strange and fake the trees look because I wasn't able to isolate any one color which resulted in my actions affecting the entire photo.

With last week's lesson in mind, I did a slight crop to get rid of the top of the house, and in RAW I increased the blacks, the contrast, and the vibrance. I then opened the photo, created a new layer, and adjusted it to overlay. This created a very dramatic stormy sky, but also those terrible trees as in the photo above. So I created an adjustment layer to adjust the hue/saturation. I then decreased the saturation and lightened the reds and yellows to bring the trees back to more normal.

Finally, I want to share with you another sky technique I've used several times, one I learned in my early PSE days through a YouTube video that I couldn't find for you now if you asked me to. But I'll try to explain it here. I know you've seen this picture before, but it was a great one to use for this example.

I took this picture in New York and love the buildings but don't like the sky. It is too gray/white...dull.

So I used the magic wand to select the sky area on the right of the photo. I then opened a photo that had a sky in it that I liked. Using the rectangle tool, I selected a section of the sky. I then pressed ctrl-c to copy this selected area. Then I went back to my building shot and chose "Edit" and "Paste into Selection". I then used the move tool to resize and fill the selected area with my new sky.

Well, that is it. Thanks again to Ashley for a great tutorial last week!

Lyrical Photographs - Shine

2011-04-05T02:05:00.001-04:00

from Shine

by Salvador

Lord, let me shine,

shine like the moon,

a reflection of You

in all that I do.

Lord, let me be

a light for Your truth,

a light of the world

I want to be used

to shine for You.

If you'd like to share your Lyrical Photographs, link up below. You can read the rules here. Linky will be open through Tuesday, April 19.

Grab a button:

And link up here:

Good to Wow: Up Edition, SOOC

2011-04-04T03:30:00.012-04:00

I'm looking forward to editing my Up photos, which are all sky shots, because I anticipate applying much of what Ashley has taught us, including perhaps the method that was outlined in her tutorial on greening up your dead grass. Not that I'm going to present any green skies, but the same techniques can be applied here. Anyway, here are my Up shots (ha!).

Two monkeys in a tree. And, lest you think these are all archived photos, no, we still don't have any leaves on our trees.

I have developed a love for and fascination with crows because of all of the wonderful photos I have seen Julie at jules j gallery take of these birds. I previously thought of them as just a nuisance, but they really are so pretty...especially in the winter against the brown grass and white snow. I have not yet succeeded in snagging that perfect shot of a crow, but I thought I might achieve something with some cropping in this shot.

Finally, this photo is an archived photo from a couple of weeks ago. I already edited this, but in light of new things I've learned, I thought it might be fun to give it another go. I love this stormy sky:

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. V

2011-04-03T08:57:00.002-04:00

I had this post all written and scheduled today, came in this morning to link up, and found it had disappeared! How strange! So I'm just going to give the photos to you without much explanation (well, as much as I had before). Phew! What a relief for you, huh?

1. Something Tiny
I have a few tiny things around the house because I think tiny things are cute. Here is an itsy-bitsy tube of toothpaste Mark got on his flight to Germany a couple weeks ago:

More tiny things:

2. High Key
Times Square is definitely high key.

EDIT: After seeing some of your photos, I clearly did not understand this prompt. But whatcha gonna do? Not reshoot it. Right now anyway. Because I am comfortably planted on my couch in front of the TV. Not moving right now. Even for the camera.

3. Bedroom
Nothing special about our bedroom in our rental house, so here is the view from our hotel bedroom last weekend:

A better view the afternoon we got there:

And the same view but with the morning sunshine casting such a different look:

4. Off in the Distance
This is a stretch for this prompt, but this photo holds special memories for our family. Can you see it? Do you see anything off in the distance?

You can't? Well, the kids really, really, really wanted to go see the Statue of Liberty, but it was just too stinkin' cold to get on a boat. But when we were on the flight deck of the Intrepid, the kids were very excited because they were the first to spy our Lady Liberty waaaay off in the distance. Maybe this will help. A little. Maybe.

5. Stripes
Not 10 minutes after I saw this week's prompts last Sunday, I looked out our hotel window and saw this. I just love how the light plays with the shadow of the buildings to create stripes on the road. Not to mention the stripes that are painted on the street as well as the stripes created by the rows of the windows on the buildings.

Writer's Block

2011-04-01T14:30:00.000-04:00

It's been awhile since I've made use of or promoted one of my other blogs, Writer's Block. I set it up to give homeschooled students a forum on which to share their writing. Students post their writings on the blog so others can read and comment on them.

The long lost blog came to mind today because I wanted to share Alex and Jacob's writings from this week's Writing Menu. They both chose to write 10 days from a journal of a kid aboard the Mayflower. We still need to work with Jacob on punctuation, but his story just made me giggle! And I love some of the imagery in Alex's piece.

Anyway, feel free to read and comment on their writing, AND if you have a student who would like to share his/her writing on Writer's Block, email me with your name and email so I can set you up as an Author on the blog.

Homeschool Highlights...In Which We Order from a Menu and Go to a Play

2011-04-01T01:54:00.067-04:00

We Order from a Menu
A few weeks ago, Michelle from Eagle Eye Academy introduced The Writing Menu. It looked interesting, promising, so I ordered my copy from Amazon, and once I received it, spent a bit of time reading it over and planning. I was finally ready this past week to implement my plans. It went really well!

The whole premise of the strategy is to present your students with a menu of choices for writing assignments. The assignments fall into 3 classifications: Appetizers, which are simple exercises that require the student to write one or two sentences or to make a list. Main Meals is the meat of the program (pun intended) and requires the most writing. Dessert is the "fun" kinesthetic activity that is more artistic than the other activities.

This was our Writing Menu this week:

MENU

3/28 – 4/1/11

Appetizers (minimum of 2 choices)
Nachos – Copy Psalm 121 in your neatest handwriting. (2 pts.)

Hot Wings – Make a timeline using the following events: Jamestown, French and Indian War, Christopher Columbus, Plymouth, Roanoke. Make sure the events are in order. List the correct date for each event on your timeline. (2 pts.)

Eggrolls – List 5 elements from the Periodic Table. List one fact for each element. (2 pts.)

Shrimp Cocktail – Write a sentence about a specific way we use math to help us at home. Be sure to include who, what, when, where, why, and how. (2 pts. per sentence)

Main Course (minimum of 1 choice)
Fried Chicken – Pretend you rode on the Mayflower on its first passage to the New World. Create a diary/journal by writing 10 entries from 10 different days on the ship. Give your reader an idea of daily activities you are doing, how you are feeling both physically and emotionally. What is going on around you? (20 pts.)

Filet Mignon – Write a story about how you think one of the 50 states earned its nickname. (15 pts.)

Pizza – You are a chemist, and you have just discovered a new element. What would you name it? (Remember, many element names are made up of a person’s name with “-ium” added to the end.) Where is it found? How common is it? Is it dangerous to handle? What can it be used for? (10 pts.)

Spaghetti – Pretend you were present at the first Thanksgiving. Write a story about that day. How did you feel seeing all the Indians? What did you do that day? What was there to eat? (15 pts.)

Dessert (minimum of 1 choice)
Triple Chocolate Cake – Using a shoebox, create a diorama of a colonial house. (10 pts.)

Apple Pie – You are a colonist in the New World. Write a message on a note that you will put in a bottle. You hope that someone back home will see it, and you wish to share with them how you feel about life in the New World. (5 pts.)

Banana Split – Create a brochure about 1 of the 50 states. (10 pts.)

Chocolate Chip Cookies – Draw a picture of a president. Write 3 facts below your picture…clues to see if everyone else can guess who it is. (5 pts.)

You'll notice there are point values assigned to each item on the menu. What you do with the points is up to you. The points can determine a percentage/letter grade; they can buy things at a school store; or in our case, they can add up to some cold, hard cash. Before you get all judgmental, I don't always incentivize my children with the green stuff, but we have a Disney trip coming up, and I want them to earn some spending money rather than just having it handed to them.

So anyway, as you can see, the kids are required to select 1 or 2 options from each category. Any number of points they earn under this requirement will result in no spending money for Disney. Above what is required earns them the cash: more/extra points = more money.

They've worked really hard this week on this project, and I'm really proud of them. Even Audrey, who has a revised menu to suit her age and abilities, has gotten very into it and has put her all into her projects.

The only downside of this program is the work and effort it takes to come up with the assignments. There are many suggestions throughout the book, but I like to make sure they are geared towards my kids and our studies.

If you are interested in a way for your student(s) to share his/her/their writing, please see this post.

We Go to a Play
For the past couple of months, Alex has been attending a homeschool drama group. They studied various literary works, and last night put on their performance. The performance included scenes from 3 different well-known works: The Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan, and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

The theater company is a new group, so costumes were simple and mainly just made up of whatever could be rustled up at home.

The capri jeans weren't really a part of Alex's Dorothy costume, but there wasn't any time for her to change from her Dorothy costume into her Peter Pan pirate costume in between scenes.

Alex did great with a ton of lines as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, was a lot of fun as a pirate, and she finished up playing the role of a wolf in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

We were very proud of how well she kept her composure in all of her scenes.

bribe

The Final Details About What We Did in NYC

2011-03-30T23:24:00.000-04:00

The first thing that grabbed me as we drove into the city, of course, was the architecture. I'm a sucker for a photo of interesting buildings, and I took a few ~~hundred~~. Here is a sampling:

Part of Trump's Empire.

I love the colorful apartments with the fire escapes.

And I love the water towers that sit atop many of the buildings.

We checked into our hotel Friday afternoon. We were treated to a very fancy hotel in which we had 2 adjoining rooms. Mark's brother had free vouchers and was going to join us but at the last minute couldn't make it. Someone had to use the vouchers, and though it was a tough call, we volunteered to be that someone.

Parking cost a fortune at the hotel, but we turned the keys over to the valet anyway because we didn't know any better. Later we saw other parking options that were cheaper, but the penalty for taking the car out of valet parking and moving it elsewhere would have been greater than just leaving it there, so we just chalked it up to Lesson Learned for Next Time. Because I witnessed this kind of parking option in action on The Amazing Race a couple weeks ago, I was fascinated to see the real thing.

After we got settled in our room, we decided to head out into the frigid, gusty wind. We fought our way through it to Times Square.

On the agenda for Times Square: ToysRUs on steroids.

An enormous ferris wheel sits just inside the revolving doors.

And there is a section called Candyland which hocks, you guessed it, candy.

Having grown up in a third world country, I always experience a mixture of emotions when I observe overdone things like this ToysRUs. There is always still just a tinge of amazement, almost like a little culture shock to see so much. There is also disgust at the indulgence of Americans, the way everything must be over-the-top and way more than necessary. Last, there is just a little bit of amusement as I imagine the reaction of any African over such, well, what can only be tagged absurdity.

Following Times Square, we walked further to Rockefeller Center

where the kids visited the Lego store, and I enjoyed the tranquility of St. Patrick's Cathedral.

And following our long walk back, we searched for a place to have dinner. Clearly New York City is not made for families our size because there seemed to be few eating establishments that would accommodate us. We finally settled on a place that looked larger than the others and that offered some familiarity for us as well. It was called Southern Hospitality, and it served BBQ. Not the best BBQ in the world, but we did remind ourselves that we were in NYC, not Atlanta, plus we got to enjoy fresh brewed sweet tea with our meal.

The next day, we spent the morning at The Sea, Air, and Space Museum followed by our taxi drive to 59th and 3rd where we visited Dylan's Candy Bar.

The kids were permitted to pick out one item. With so many choices, it was a tough decision to make.

After our subway trip back to Times Square, a walk back to the hotel, and a few moments to catch our breath, our tummies were growling. Time for the dinner hunt again. Around the corner from our hotel is the Hell's Kitchen area, so there were a lot of choices, but again, such tiny little restaurants. We noticed driving in 3 Thai restaurants, all with the same name but with 2-4 storefronts separating them. We found that odd but later heard from our concierge that they are indeed the same restaurant and probably share a kitchen underground or in back somewhere, but they just couldn't get enough property all clumped together. So we went into one, made reservations for another, and then went back to the hotel to wait for our reservation time. It was worth the wait - the best Thai food we've ever had! A great way to end the evening...

...and to end our trip. Because when we woke up leisurely the next morning, it was time to head back home to the country. By contrast anyway.

Good to Wow: Green Edition, Edited

2011-03-30T22:55:00.000-04:00

My SOOC of the missile on board the Growler Submarine:

And my edit:

I didn't do a whole lot to this. Pulled the exposure up a bit, increased the saturation a bit. Then I ran Coffeeshop's Urban Grit and brushed it on to the blades at 65%.

St. Patrick's Cathedral

2011-03-30T02:37:00.001-04:00

I was doubtful that I would have the opportunity to visit St. Patrick's Cathedral because, well, there's just something about saying, "OK, kids, let's go visit that church so Mom can take pictures" that elicits much eye rolling and sarcastic remarks like, "Wow, Mom, that sounds like a lot of fun." But...when I saw that the Lego store was but a half a block from this beautiful cathedral, I seized the opportunity. I sent Mark in to the loud, crowded Lego store with four children while I spent several quiet, remarkable moments in a stunningly gorgeous place.

St. Patrick's Cathedral opened its doors in 1879.

(from St. Patrick's Cathedral New York website): "As Brendan Gill wrote in his introduction to St. Patrick’s Cathedral: A Centennial History, 'In the Old World, for well over a thousand years the center of a city was thought to be wherever its Cathedral stood…

We are a city that, even within its comparatively narrow confines, has always tended to spin apart. To speak only of Manhattan (the original New York City of Hughes’ day), we have Wall Street and Greenwich Village and Chinatown and Chelsea and Times Square and the Upper East Side and Riverside Drive and Harlem and Washington Heights and scores of other districts and neighborhoods; yet we have few places that convey an authentic sense of being at the very heart of things. St. Patrick’s is such a place.

Aided by the graceful presence of its neighbor, Rockefeller Center …, the Cathedral dominates Fifth Avenue as easily today as it has ever done…

Thanks to the program of preservation carried out under the watchful eye…, the building has never looked more beautiful.

There it stands for our delight and, if necessary, for our consolation.

Its front steps are a parvis, if not a Paradise, and young and old take the sun upon their faces there as a sort of benediction, while the scattered benedictions of a thousand rosy candles wink and twinkle within.'"

NYC Transportation

2011-03-29T02:39:00.005-04:00

(Linking up with Sweet Shot, You Capture (theme - Vibrant), and Live Every Moment (theme - A Different View) and Communal Global .)

In a city as crowded as the Big Apple, there is certainly nothing as important as getting around. Of course, the most old-fashioned way to get around is to walk to your destination.

We did a lot of walking.

It didn't go unnoticed that there is a subway entrance on every corner...if you can figure out the system. I had to ask the advice of a couple of people, but we did eventually figure it out.

If the subway is not the best option, there is always the iconic New York City yellow cab.

I love the vibrant color of the taxis.

Although we saw a few minivan taxis that would accommodate the six of us, there was not one of those available when we walked out of the Intrepid. And we knew the Princess's little legs were not about to make it all the way from Pier 86 to 59th and 3rd. 59th and 3rd of course is where Bloomingdales is, but who cares about Bloomingdales when Dylan's Candy Bar is right across the street? But that is a story for another day.

Anyway, as luck would have it, a limo driver approached us as we stood there freezing our butts off outside the museum. He offered to take us to our destination for a reasonable rate. Obviously, the kids were THRILLED to be riding in a limo. What is more, our driver was from Cote d'Ivoire, West Africa, which is the country where my husband was born and the country where we spent the first 18 years of our lives. It was fun chatting with him.

Funny thing about New York transportation and traffic. It. Never. Stops.

And you can still hear it...even from a 23rd floor hotel room!

The USS Intrepid (also Good to Wow: Green Edition, SOOC)

2011-03-28T02:51:00.001-04:00

Note: If you're here from Jill's blog and don't want to see a million pictures, scroll down to photo #5.

We spent this past weekend in New York City, and one of the fun things we did was visit The Sea, Air, and Space Museum, which houses the Growler Submarine, the USS Intrepid, and a British Airways Concorde.

Our tour into the belly of the Growler Submarine was very interesting.

The control panels were fascinating to see, especially considering what these types of panels might look like on a modern submarine.

Here is the submarine mess hall:

And what good is a submarine without weapons? The missile was pretty impressive.
(Good to Wow photo):

Our next stop was the USS Intrepid.

It has an impressive history. Commissioned in 1943, it saw 2 wars as an aircraft carrier, held up under the attack of two suicidal kamikaze airplanes,

served as a recovery vessel for a space mission,

and filled in as the temporary FBI headquarters following 9/11.

It is as impressive in stature as in history.

We ate in the main Mess Hall

and also got to see the Officers' Mess Hall.

We also saw some of the living quarters.

Following our time visiting the Intrepid, we boarded a British Airways Concorde.

Nothing particularly impressive except possibly the bragging rights I now have to say I've been on one. The one interesting fact that stayed with me is the fact that a flight on the Concorde was very quiet because it flew faster than the sound of its engines.

Definitely more impressive was the short movie we saw about the Intrepid. It presented a history of the ship and included interviews with a couple of POWs like John McCain. I was struck by this quote from Commander Paul Galanti: "There's no such thing as a bad day when you have a doorknob on the inside of the door." Now there's perspective.

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. IX

2011-03-27T00:01:00.000-04:00

1. Decay (old/abandoned)
When I saw the parenthetical explanation of this prompt, I immediately thought of the buildings I often drive by. I have been itching to photograph them, but in my drive-bys, I either don't have my camera, or it is just too stinkin' cold to exit the car. But Sunday was sunny, the temp bearable, and I knew I'd be driving by to pick Michael up from a bday party.

Alex came along, and she even willingly let me take some pictures. She obviously is not old or abandoned, but I grab the photos when I can!

2. In the Kitchen
When I saw the suggestion for this prompt to do a self-portrait, I almost choked on my Starbucks sweet iced tea. Unless there is a cake to bake or a mess to clean up, the kitchen is not really my domain but my husband's. He does the cooking for our family.

Of course, since he is often gone, I am forced into the kitchen...more often than I want and definitely against my will. I do have a responsibility, though. At least I assume when I birthed these children, I signed some sort of unwritten document stating that I would keep them fed.

It's not that I don't know how to cook. I do. Sort of. There is just a huge gap between my husband's skills and my own.

He cooks gourmet. I have no problem whatsoever with dumping the contents of a box into a pan.

He can make something extraordinary out of whatever is on hand.

I have to follow a recipe right down to every teaspoon and dash.

He finds cooking relaxing and claims it as a hobby. Cooking stresses me out.

He will whip up a 6-course meal just for him because it was something he felt like eating. I will throw some Rice Krispies and milk in a bowl and call it dinner just to avoid actually cooking something.

3. & 4. Groups of 3 & "Me" Time

AFAQ (Anticipated Frequently Asked Questions)
Are you wearing glasses in these photos? Because I don't remember seeing glasses in any other photos of you.
Yes. I decided to give you the real me. And when I am watching TV, reading, or working on the computer, I wear glasses or I get a killer headache.

Why do you have theater chairs in your living room? Most people put a couch or sofa in their living room.
Yes, well...we had a nice little theater set-up in our house in Georgia. We do not have a nice little theater set-up here. AND we came to CT with one less couch than we had in GA because our second couch had been abused enough by wiggly, jelly-smeared children that it seemed wiser to leave it behind. They are very comfortable and even have a cupholder. Maybe I'll start a trend.

Is that plastic I see on one of the theater chairs? What are you, an old granny or something?
There are actually 4 theater chairs, and yes, 3 of the 4 still have the plastic on the "foot" part. We thought it prudent since we put our dirty feet on them! The plastic got ripped on one of them, so off it came.

What's with that blanket? What are you, an old granny or something?
I am cold. Always cold. Especially here in the Arctic.

Are you trying to strangle that cat?
I assure you, no animals were harmed in the making of this post. I shot that middle shot 3 times, and she was none too happy with being jostled about as I re-set everything.

5. Things that make you go hmmmm...
I am pulling from the archives for this one. A couple of years ago, we vacationed with some friends in Panama City Beach. We were out one evening playing mini-golf, and I noticed this sign over a motel right down the street. It was too funny to leave alone, and of course the kids all thought it was the funniest thing ever.

Homeschool Highlights, Week 22

2011-03-25T02:36:00.036-04:00

Science
Using R.E.A.L. Science Chemistry, we have learned about atoms and that a group of the same atoms form molecules to make an element. This week we learned that molecules can bond together. If like molecules bond together, we get a compound. If different molecules bond together, you get a mixture.

I illustrated this by making some gumdrop molecules.

Of course the kids wanted in on the action too. They went a little more elaborate, however.

Socialization
That little bug that hit Alex last week hit Jacob this week, so we did not make it to church. We did, however, make it to our homeschool group field trip to the Sugar Shack where we learned all about making maple syrup.

We learned all about tree selection and tapping the tree.

We tasted some sweet tree sap.

We visited the room where they evaporate some of the 98% water content from the sugar.

We learned about the interesting history of tapping maple trees

and had a little practice drilling just the right size hole in the tree.

We had a good time, and there was even a little lull in the snowstorm that hit us yesterday so that we were able to get to and from The Sugar Shack safely.

Good to Wow: Flower Edition, Edited

2011-03-24T00:33:00.005-04:00

On Monday I told you about my poor confused Christmas cactus. As a reminder, here is the SOOC:

And here is my edit:

1. crop
2. increase exposure in RAW
3. new layer – screen blending mode, reduce opacity to 70%
4. add pink fill layer, reduce opacity to 70%
5. add Kim Klassen’s madlove texture, 50% - brushed off parts of flower with brush at 25%
6. new layer, to soft light blending mode

A Spring Tease

2011-03-21T19:56:00.004-04:00

(Linking up with Sweet Shot, You Capture (theme - Youth), Black & White Wednesdays, Communal Global, and Live Every Moment (theme - Spring).)

It's a very gloomy Monday. Two inches of snow accumulated on the ground throughout the morning hours, and it continues to fall. You would never know that just 3 days ago, the mercury was flirting with the 72 degree mark.

The day was just too beautiful. We took a break from school and from co-op and spent the day with friends at the park.

We enjoyed the beauty of the waterfalls.

We hiked

all the way to the top where a tower with few railings stood, inviting the children to climb...and giving the mamas a few heart attacks in the process.

And along the way we climbed lots of rocks

and some trees,

one of which was covered by the initials of other hikers-by.

Oh, and we saw enough bear poop to cause those of us with middle-aged legs much angst over trying to keep up with the energetic, youthful legs that insisted on carrying the children seemingly miles ahead on the path.

But the boys assured us in true Lord of the Flies fashion that, with their walking sticks, they could easily take on any bear...even a famished one just waking up from a long winter's nap.

It was a long hike--about 2 hours--and at the end, the children were delighted to become spectators on the sidelines of another visitor's remote-controlled car fun.

A lovely sunny day, a good long hike, a fun time with friends...it was definitely a spring tease, but we'll certainly take what we can get!

Good to Wow: Flower Edition, SOOC

2011-03-21T00:25:00.000-04:00

Flowers. In March in Connecticut? I thought I was going to have to a) feel really stupid taking my camera into the grocery store, b) convince my husband to buy me some flowers (not to make it sound like he needs convincing; I always tell him NOT to buy me flowers because I hate spending money on them), or c) photograph a very tired plastic (maybe silk?) sunflower my youngest daughter has been playing with for a few months.

But apparently, my Christmas cactus is totally confused about the weather after the move from Georgia...because, lo and behold, it produced a beautiful, lone bloom this week.

Here's my SOOC:

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. VIII

2011-03-19T18:28:00.001-04:00

1. Imperfection (with Scripture & a Snapshot)
Because of this:

and this: Romans 6:23 - "For the wages of sin is death..."

I am so happy for this: "...but the gift of God is Eternal Life through Jesus Christ our Lord."

And what a comfort to know that, "For it is by grace you have been saved through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9).

Because if it was up to me, the way I often live my life, and the many, many times I really mess up, I'd be in big trouble!

2. Shoes
Are these not the cutest shoes EVER?

They are a new acquisition for the Princess' little feet. I have to admit, I looked for a size 8 1/2 too. They are a Payless treasure because, well, when you have to put shoes on 4 pairs of growing feet, you go to Payless, not Stride Rite.

Of course, the shoes look even cuter on sweet little feet.

And those sweet little feet look even more adorable when you see them as part of the cutest five-year-old in the world.

3. Camera Phone
Audrey is still absolutely loving her gymnastics class. With every activity she does, this adorable little grin spreads across her face, and she attacks the activity with enthusiasm. The one thing I do not like about gymnastics class is that parents must stay out of the room and behind the observation glass. I "see" a million adorable, perfect photos during the hour I sit behind that glass. I will wait for a few more sessions to pass, but eventually I will just tell them that I MUST be permitted to spend a few moments capturing my baby's happy, adorable moments. (Have I mentioned adorable yet?) Until then, this iPhone photo will have to do. Keep in mind, it is taken from some distance and from behind the glass. I had a terrible fight with the reflection of some mom wearing a very bright white sweater (doesn't she know she is not supposed to wear white yet??).

4. Chair
We have a lack of interesting chairs in our house - I think because, at least in this children-jumping-on-furniture-and-building-tents-out-of-the-cushions phase of life, we don't invest a whole lot in expensive sofas and couches. In fact, I think the chair with the most personality in our house doesn't even belong to us but to the people who own our rental home. It sits on the porch and has been fairly ignored since we arrived here just in time for Cold. But Thursday our temps struggled up into the low 60s so that I didn't feel like I might die standing outside long enough to snap a photo. I even added a soda bottle to give it a summer-y feel.

5. Camera
Well...this didn't turn out exactly as I saw it in my head. And I have some ideas on how I could improve it, but honestly between homeschooling, cleaning, running an online class, freelance editing, being a single mom while my hubby was on a trip, and caring for 4 children, I just didn't have the time to try to perfect it. So...I hope you'll at least appreciate the idea and the attempt!

Cocoa Cakes in a Cup

2011-03-19T00:02:00.000-04:00

A couple months ago, a friend shared a simple and fun recipe with me...one I kept but hadn't yet tried with the kids. With Daddy's long absence, we needed something fun to do and something yummy to eat, so the other night I decided to give it a go.

Although I like the alliteration of Cocoa Cakes in a Cup, I should point out that the recipe is actually called Minute Chocolate Mug Cake, and it really did live up to my expectations of simple and fun!

First, get out one mug for each person. I collect mugs from our travels, so it was extra fun for me to get to use 5 of them.

Into each mug, add:
4 T. all-purpose flour
4 T. sugar
2 T. baking cocoa

Give them to the children to mix up the dry ingredients.

Add 1 egg and mix thoroughly.

Add 3 T. milk
3 T. oil
dash of vanilla and mix again.

Fold in 3 T. chocolate chips (the best part!) (I used mini-chocolate chips).

Now microwave on high for 3 minutes.

And here's the fun part: The cake will rise way above the top of the cup but not spill over - so much fun to watch!

And though it may fall just a little bit when you open the microwave and take it out,

it still tastes incredibly delicious, especially with a big dollop of whipped cream on top (ice cream would be good too!)!

Homeschool Highlights, Week 21

2011-03-17T21:40:00.001-04:00

As you know, we spent half of last week in Pennsylvania, arriving back home Saturday night. With unpacking, stocking up on groceries, and (most stressful of all) planning meals in the absence of my personal chef who was on a long business trip overseas, I did not get as organized for this week as I like to be. But we did pull it together and get some things accomplished.

The 3Rs
Readin' - I focused a lot this week on working with Audrey on her reading. We've been working through a set of 10 phonics books written by a local CT teacher and published here by innovativeKids.

They not only entertain Audrey, but they are also very effective because they build on each other so well. I like the BOB Books, but they are a little bit harder and introduce words seemingly out of the blue, whereas these take it a bit slower. For example, in The Wet Pup, the book we are reading right now, each page builds on the preceding one:

The pup.
The wet pup.
The wet pup dug.
The wet pup dug up a net.

The set of 10 books comes with 4 reward stickers for each book, and Audrey looks forward to reading each book 4 times so she can place one of the stickers in the back of the book each time.

Before we read each day, we do a little bit of letter play. I use LeapFrog magnetic letters, and we preview any words that will be in the book.

We also go over any special sounds that might be in the book (ie: /ck/ or /ink/). I often use the visual aids Abeka puts out to review these.

'Ritin' - I am already planning for next year as many homeschoolers are, and I've decided my biggest goal for next year is going to be writing. I have held back a lot with the boys because they simply have not been ready, but the rest of this year and next year I'm really going to focus on it. This week, I had the boys write a little narrative about their trip to PA. Jacob's was by far the funniest:

Pennsylvania
Once we went to Pennsylvania. We went to Choceleate World. I do not think I spelled choceleate right. We went on a tour ride, and it had creepy cows. Before we left, we went to a farm, but it kinda smelled like POOP! We went on a buggy ride on a horse. Not on a horse, in a cart that a horse pulled. And I saw POOP! that the horse left behind. Then we went to this really weird restaurant, and I got root beer to drink and chicken tenders but not real tenders. (He is, of course, referring to the tenders Kung Fu Panda got kicked in.) I had to go to the bathroom twice! And then we left to go home.

I wrote about our trip to PA.

The End

For everyone's benefit, I have added and corrected the punctuation. Like I said, clearly we need to focus on writing for these boys! I am hoping The Writing Menu will help. Michelle at Eagle Eye Academy recommended this, and I just received my copy and hope to implement it soon.

As for Alex, she finished up the writing curriculum she was working on, and I got One Year Adventure Novel for her.

This is a high school curriculum, but she insisted that she could do it, and I believe she can. She is a really strong writer, and her creative writing is amazing. So we're 3 lessons in. Had a little struggle with it today because the workbook asked her for some details about the novel she will write during the course. I think her method of writing is just to let the story play out as it goes; I don't think she plans in her head much. So she had a hard time sitting down to mull over a plan, but I think she'll get it.

'Rithmetic - Alex and Jacob finished/are about to finish their math, so I am having them return to the Teaching Textbooks courses (Level 4 & 6) they found too difficult at the beginning of the year. Funny how they're able to do it now!

Useful Resources
I tell you, ever since my GA Co-Op with my friend Tisha got messed up by our move, History just hasn't been quite right. Though I continue to flounder a bit in this subject, I am continuing to read books to the kids about a list of topics I wanted to cover for US History. I also made up 2 charts called "Important Historical Figures" and "Important Conflicts". Today we studied Thomas Jefferson, so we noted on our charts important dates and accomplishments as well as character traits that describe him.

One thing I have kept my eye open for is an interesting video series to accompany our studies. We have watched some episodes of Liberty Kids which is available for instant download through Netflix, and those sort of hold their interest. The last non-animated DVD I made us watch was so incredibly boring I couldn't even stand it! Just this week, I received the American History Drive-Thru History series. So far, it's pretty good. The guy who does it is funny in a silly, sarcastic way that entertains the kids, and I love the cinematography. Hopefully, this one'll be a keeper. I try to allay my irritation with the kids' apathy towards history by reminding myself that, really, until I began homeschooling, I had no fascination for the subject either. Moreover, I honestly don't think I remember a thing I learned in 3rd, 4th, or 5th grade social studies, and I grew up to be a high-functioning, successful human being, so we're all going to be just fine. Right?

Books We're Reading
We have just started reading Johnny Tremain, which takes place in Boston right at the beginning of the Revolution. This was my favorite of all of the books I read when I was preparing for this year, so I hope the kids find it as enthralling.

Socialization
We didn't get a whole lot of socialization this week--Alex was sick, so we missed both her drama class and church--but I think last week's trip to PA with our friends made up for that. And, hey, we're off to the park tomorrow with some friends because...are you ready for this? It's going to be 64 degrees here in the Arctic!!

Other Noteworthy Tidbits
I think it was Tisha who gave me this idea, and I think it was Pioneer Woman she directed me to for the details...it's been in the back of my mind, and I finally implemented it. I bought a laminated world map at Staples and a variety of colored map pins. I found the huge bulletin board that came with my new whiteboard was more than adequate to fit the map. We then created a code for it:

black - places we go
blue - places Dad goes
yellow - where we have family
red - missionaries
green - friends

The kids enjoyed mapping everything and were excited to affix a pin to PA for our trip last week. We know missionaries all over the world, but rather than cover the map with red pins, I want us to really focus on these missionaries...learning about where they are serving, what they do, who they are - all details I want us to collect so we can pray specfically as a family for these missionaries. Right now we have a pin in Cameroon for Shawn, a missionary the kids met at church; and we have a prayer card and pin placed for the Sanfords serving in France, another family we met during Missions Week at church.

Good to Wow: Yellow Edition, Edited

2011-03-17T00:00:00.000-04:00

I didn't do a whole lot to my pictures this week. Mainly just RAW adjustments to exposure and white balance. I shot all of my photos in Hershey on Auto mode because I was afraid I would miss something fiddling with settings. My Auto WB tends to be a little on the cool side, and the exposure a little low. So I had to warm up each photo as well as increase the exposure. That said, here we go:

BEFORE:

AFTER:

After RAW exposure and white balance adjustment, cropped and then brightened her eyes.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Basic RAW adjustments, slight crop to make it symmetrical, and high filter pass set to overlay blend mode.

BEFORE:
I had two shots of the kids at the candy machine:

I like the shot on the right best because, even though it has the pesky shadow cast by the store shelf (had I noticed it, I could have changed my position!), a crop can get rid of it easier than on the photo on the left. The problem with the right photo, however, is that it is sans candy pail. So I took a shot I had of just the empty candy bucket, selected the bucket, and copied it into the better picture.

AFTER:

Then the crop and basic RAW adjustments.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

First I cropped it. Then RAW adjustment followed by high pass filter set to soft light blending mode at 30% opacity. I thought about trying to clone out legs in background, but I really don't have the time, plus those legs belong to my other daughter as opposed to a stranger, so I'm perfectly fine with them remaining there.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Just did a RAW adjustment and slight crop.

Hershey

2011-03-16T02:44:00.016-04:00

Linking up with You Capture (Black & White Expressions).

While the highlight of our Pennsylvania trip for me was our visit to Amish Country, the kids' favorite was definitely Chocolate World in Hershey. I think I already mentioned we visited Chocolate World two days in a row!

The great thing about Chocolate World is that admission is free. And, really, unless you get sucked in by any of the extras, you can have a great time without dropping much cash. In fact, there is even a ride that is free. The ride takes you through a tunnel of various animated displays that tell the story of chocolate.

Of course, there is also an obnoxious song that plays and gets seared into your brain forever after much like It's a Small World at Disney World. And the fact that the kids want to ride the ride over and over and over doesn't make clearing your head of the song any easier.

We did take advantage of some of the "extras" as well. We took part in a chocolate tasting event. And we saw a 3D movie, which was actually 4D with delightful smells filling the theater, splashing water, and creepy things tickling our feet.

I think perhaps our favorite activity was the creating our own treats.

Alex and Michael each whipped up a wicked cup of chocolatey, creamy, marshmallow-y hot chocolate, which they stirred with a chocolate-covered spoon.

Audrey decorated a giant basketball cookie, and Jacob created a deluxe S'More.

We had an extra fun trip because some friends of ours from Connecticut came along. Matthew also tried his hand at the S'Mores. Here he bit off a bit more marshmallow than his little mouth could chew, but his expression is priceless.

Overall, it was a very fun outing. And, although, we were a little bit weary of chocolate by the time we left, that weariness does not last forever!

Because, really, who could live without chocolate?

Spelunking

2011-03-15T15:36:00.003-04:00

It was a gorgeous day the second day in a row we headed to Hershey, so we decided to stop off and explore a cave. Unfortunately, the day and night before, massive rains had caused some flooding in Pennsylvania.

As a result, our cave had some flooded areas that were impassable, and thus our tour was shortened. The tour was indeed rather short, and much of the cave floor quite soggy, but we survived.

And afterwards, we spent a little bit of time with the wildlife.

The goat even gave us a cheesy little grin.

Amish Country

2011-03-14T22:14:00.000-04:00

Despite the fact that no one quite shared my enthusiasm, I wasn't about to leave Pennsylvania without a visit with the Amish. So we took a small detour on the way home and spent a couple of hours in a small town near Lancaster. I loved our short time in Bird-in-Hand!

We enjoyed our horse and buggy ride with our two horses and our driver, Steve.

I loved the short drive down the dirt roads

I loved observing the simpler, slower, more peaceful way of life,

the friendliness and gentleness of the people.

Next time I don't plan to spend just a couple of short hours with the Amish.

Next time, I plan to park my buggy for at least a couple of days!

Pennsylvania Farms

2011-03-13T23:00:00.000-04:00

I absolutely fell in love with Pennsylvania last week. I have driven through the state before, but I don't remember noticing its beauty. I definitely want to return during spring or summer because I imagine the rolling hills in green would be even more amazing.

And the farms...I didn't realize agriculture was so big in the Keystone State. I can't tell you how many pictures of farms I took from the car (don't worry - I was very careful!). This is the first one I came to in going through my hundreds of photos. I love this photo. If the rest of them are like that, I'm sure you'll see lots more of them!

Good to Wow: Yellow Edition, SOOC

2011-03-13T20:52:00.000-04:00

I mentioned in yesterday's post that we visited Hershey for an unplanned second day during our visit to PA. Both days in Hershey included Chocolate World, a fun attraction that is free of charge to enter. Of course, once inside there are plenty of ways to blow some cash.

One such way is to purchase a candy container and then fill it with a delicious assortment of Hershey brand chocolates. This requires some special machine work. Of course, machine work can't be done without a hard hat,

BUT only one free of charge. We elected the Princess to don the hat. The others were on their own to protect their heads from falling candies.

As the lady filled the machine with the children's choice candies, they did a little practicing.

Once the machine was prepped, the lady told the kids they had to do the hard work in order to make the candy fill the bucket. Something tells me, though, that the bucket would have filled just as quickly without their hard work, but they sure had fun.

And after we filled our container, it was our friends' turn. Audrey helped Matthew get his hat just right.

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. VII

2011-03-12T22:02:00.001-05:00

We went on a little field trip this week to Pennsylvania and saw the sights in Hershey and in Amish country...but mostly in Hershey - by the kids' choice, not mine as I would be happy to move to Amish country. I have loads and loads of pictures to go through, but here is a sneak peak.

I guess we have to start at the beginning:

1. Welcome to the Jungle
I can't leave on vacation unless my house is clean because I hate coming home to a messy house, so I did a lot of laundry before our departure. It's my never-ending cycle of Crazy Jungle!

2. Square Crop

The plan was to go to Hershey one day and Gettysburg the next. You know, so we could do something academic. I have never seen such little enthusiasm for an outing as I did for Gettysburg, though, and I guess I can't blame them: except for a crash course on the topic last week, we haven't officially studied Gettysburg yet. So we opted for a second day of Hershey. We did Chocolate World two days and The Hershey Story museum the second. This photo is from the museum.

3. Under
On our way to Day Two in Hershey, we took a brief detour to visit a cave.

The other cute little jacketed boys are friends of ours who traveled with us - made for a much more enjoyable trip.

I also loved this shot of the train going under a walkway:

And, finally, this one just cracked me up. The kids hadn't posed, all 4 of them, for a picture the whole week, so while we were waiting for our buggy ride at the Amish place, I asked them to pose under the covered bridge. This is quite a pose, don't you think?

And, no, I did not tell them to stand equidistance apart with their arms down at their sides!

4. Vanishing Point
It took me a minute to figure out how I wanted this photo to look, what I wanted to capture. But when I got the idea in mind for railroad tracks, I couldn't let it go. I spied some tracks on our trip to PA, but I was caravanning with my friend, and I realize my photo obsession isn't shared by all (ahem - my children!), so I didn't pull us all over at that time. However, when we went to the caves, we crossed some tracks when we came in, so I did stop on the way out...and held up some traffic for a minute, but whatcha gonna do, right?

I love the combination in this photo of the RR tracks and the power lines.

5. Calm
And this is how we all feel. OK, this is how I feel; the kids have been cooped up in a car all day and, while they are supposed to be in bed asleep right now, I still hear them chatting upstairs. Hopefully, soon they will look like this:

Live Every Moment - Orange

2011-03-10T23:12:00.000-05:00

We visited ~~Heaven~~ Chocolate World in Hershey, Pennsylvania, this week.

Here are a couple of orange shots.

More pictures will follow...once I wade through all of them!

Good to Wow: Spring Edition, Edited

2011-03-10T02:26:00.039-05:00

So I went a bit of a different direction with the prompt this week than I was probably supposed to. Here is my spring SOOC:

For my edit, I cropped in RAW and increased the exposure and saturation just a hair. I'm getting better, I think, at getting the exposure right in the first place. After the RAW edit, I ran a high pass filter and set it to overlay blending mode set to 30% opacity. I then pressed ctrl-J to create a duplicate layer. I added a scratch texture which I adjusted to overlay blending mode and brushed off the spring at 30%. Finally, I ran Coffeeshop's Vignette action.

As we know from my post on Monday, I pulled from the bottom of my proverbial photography barrel for this week's shot, but take it or leave it, that is my Good to Wow submission for the week. Perhaps next week's Yellow prompt will yield grander results.

The End.

Dancing Shoes

2011-03-09T02:54:00.010-05:00

Audrey is taking a dance class at homeschool co-op. Apparently, Audrey's mommy is not as hip as some of the other moms because some of the other little girls are decked out in proper dance attire, while my sweetie just dances in whatever clothes she happens to be wearing. Nonetheless, she has had fun. I posted this picture the other day on my weekly homeschool wrap-up, but I like it in black and white also.

These sweet little ballet feet belong to a cutie patootie named Ella.

Lyrical Photographs - Aware

2011-03-08T02:53:00.030-05:00

Aware
by Salvador

Even in the little things
That never seem too big to me
And the things that I thought
Didn’t matter much at all

As simple as my daily bread
To the strength I need to get out of bed
When I fly, when I’m about to fall

It’s you in me
That I fail to see

Make me aware, make me see
Everything I am is not all about me

Take my world, turn it around
So that the obvious can finally be found

Make me aware, make me aware

When my life is hanging from a thread

And I think about the things you said
In this moment seems so far away

Help me see the guarantees
That first brought me to believe
So I can make it through another day

Oh, it’s you in me
That helps me to breathe

Make me aware, make me see

Everything I am is not all about me
Take my world, turn it around
So that the obvious can finally be found

Make me aware
I have been missing so much
Not recognizing your touch
All acknowledging you’re the reason I’m even here

I have been missing so much
Not recognizing your touch

Make me aware, make me aware

Help me see, Everything I am is not all about me
Take my world, turn it around

So that the obvious can finally be found
Make me aware, make me aware
If you'd like to share your Lyrical Photographs, link up below. You can read the rules here. Linky will be open through Tuesday, March 22.

Learning to Live Gratitude - Even When I Fail

2011-03-07T12:45:00.002-05:00

Today was Audrey's first "official" day of gymnastics at her regular time. She was so excited. I left with plenty of time to even stop by Starbucks for a little breakfast treat for us to share. Going my usual way to Starbucks, I encountered the first roadblock. Road closed. And the line of cars down the detour route was so very long. I turned around to take a different route, made it to Starbucks, and treats in hand, we turned out of the parking lot to head to the gym. That's when I noticed the long line of cars. And another road closed. I sat in the long line of cars for awhile then turned off on to a side street only to get tangled up in the traffic of an elementary school just beginning its day. I was going nowhere, so I returned to the long line of cars I had already been in. From there, I decided to try another side street off the opposite side. Just when I thought I was going to break free of the traffic, there it was again: another Road Closed sign. This time I was able to see beyond the sign to discover the hold-up: massive flooding.

By this time, we were already 10 minutes late for class. I circled all the way back almost back to home and attempted it from a different direction down a back road. Road Closed. So back we went to the original detour and to the long line of cars I had turned away from to begin with.

Through all of my driving and turning around, I noticed some homes that were almost completely surrounded by water, and the thought brushed my mind: Oh, those poor people. What a mess they have to contend with. Quickly, though, my selfishness and frustration would push those thoughts aside and replace them with irritated thoughts about having to sit in traffic for an hour, angry about not making it on time to my baby's class.

On top of all of this, I was almost out of gas and later as I stood outside pumping gas, I complained again. You see, up here in our new home, few of the gas pumps have the auto-fill clamps on them so I have to stand outside and hold the pump. This seems so trivial, yet it grates on my nerves to no end.

As I drove away from the gas station, I began to think about my attitude and about this new Life of Gratitude I have supposedly begun to live, though you sure wouldn't know it. Isn't the whole point of counting our blessings so we can see the amazing things God has done for us, the incredible gifts He gives us? Aren't we to count the blessings especially in the midst of the ugly? Doesn't doing so allow us to see the beautiful in the ugly? Why, then, am I so consumed with myself and the inconveniences of life that I can't stop my grumbling and replace it with gratitude?

If I had done so, I could easily have listed these blessings:

39. Living at the top of a hill, thus escaping the flooding rains that poured on us last night.

40. Only having to pay for gas in one car.

41. A little girl's arms clutched around my neck and a sweet kiss she plants on my cheeks each time I buckle her in her seat.

42. An adorable, mini notebook to tuck in my purse so I don't miss noting the blessings.

Wouldn't my drive this morning, long as it was, have been a lot more pleasant if I had been counting gifts rather than rattling off complaints?

Good to Wow: Spring Edition, SOOC

2011-03-07T02:12:00.004-05:00

My very best guess is that, with the prompt being "spring", Ashley and Jill had in mind the three-month period from about March 20th to June 20th; the period of time when warmth hugs the earth, and new life floods the world with color and fragrance; the season that, thus far, has eluded the Arctic.

Having just moved here, I remember very clearly those early southern springs. And, in fact, I am doing my best to avoid all of my friends' Facebook pictures of lovely blooming trees and children playing outside in shorts.

Though I cannot speak from experience and therefore 100% accuracy, it is my understanding from things I've overheard that spring in Connecticut does not care that the calendar is marked "Spring" on or around March 20th each year. It is my understanding that we could be well into April before we begin posting pictures of lovely blooming things and bare-armed children. These days when I look outside my window, I actually am deliriously happy because I see patches of ugly, brown grass. But, again going on assumption based on rumor, I don't think the melting snow is any promise that we won't be buried again sometime in the next month or two.

So, with that in mind, I am afraid I am forced to post this as my SOOC:

This is a spring. From a pen.

And after seeing this very intriguing photo, you might be thinking that I simply have run out of things inside this house to photograph. You would be correct.

Spring, please. Please, spring, hurry up!!

Scripture & a Snapshot - My Rock

2011-03-06T02:23:00.000-05:00

Pulling from the archives this week from my Colorado trip last year...

Sometimes I fail to trust.

But He's always there.

He is always my rock.

Solid, powerful, trustworthy.

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. VI

2011-03-04T20:52:00.000-05:00

1. Book

I have mentioned this book, One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp, several times over the last couple weeks. I haven't finished it yet, but it is really making an impact on me. I have begun again with a Blessings List I began a couple years ago. I'm trying to intentionally look for those gifts as I go about my regular routine each day. It really makes a difference!

2 & 3. Diptych & Fill-in-the-Blank

4. Reminders

I love seeing these cute little guys on the store shelves. They always remind me of my childhood.

5. Taste of Italy
Friday night Mark made us a delicious dinner of fresh pasta for spaghetti & meatballs. Sorry, ladies, he's mine, all mine!

Homeschool Highlights - Week 19

2011-03-04T19:31:00.002-05:00

Yes, we're only on week 19. Yes, we're going to be schooling until next year. Despite the discouraging fact that we are only halfway to the end, we have had a productive week.

The 3Rs
Readin' - The boys have made so much progress in their reading over the last year. There is little now that I have to help them with as far as reading goes, and they even read every now and then for pleasure {gasp!}. Granted, their free reading includes Horrid Henry and Iron Man, but they are reading.

Right now we are focusing on vocabulary. Since they were slow to begin reading and have not read a vast wealth of literary treasures, I have discovered their vocabulary is quite limited. We are using Wordly Wise to brush up on vocabulary.

'Ritin' - I have been trying to have less running-around-because-I-finished-my-work-before-you-did time. To accomplish this, I have had to come up with some activities for the kids to do when they finish early. And I don't want time-filler junk, so I have employed two different writing programs, one for Alex and one for the boys. For the boys, I pull topic assignments from a box of writing prompts I picked up at a school supply store. Alex is working from Story Starters.

'Rithmetic - I have been using Bob Jones successfully with Michael, and I think it's a great program. I plan to use the online option next year. Alex is about to finish her math up for the year, and I was going to go ahead and order BJU online for her to get started, but it doesn't start until June 1. What to do, what to do...

Useful Resources
We have a store here called Blick Art Supply. They have many, many wonderful online lesson plans for art. I had planned this week on doing the Diaper Wipe Diffusion project; however, when I went to Blick's to get the special diffusion paper, turns out it is only available online. PLUS, I also discovered that most wipes these days are alcohol-free. Anyway, the point is, the resource is still an excellent tool to use for art class, even if it doesn't all work out like you planned.

Projects
Since we couldn't do the Diaper Wipe Diffusion project exactly as instructed, I bought some watercolor paper and tweaked the plan a bit. We still used markers, but instead of spraying a diaper wipe, we painted on water over the water-based markers. The kids had fun, and I liked how they turned out.

Top left we have a Pterodactyl by Michael, to the right is Alex's sunset, under Alex's is a rather abstract flower by Audrey, and on the bottom left is a flesh-eating zombie courtesy of Jacob. (No, I couldn't be prouder.)

Books We're Reading
We are just about to finish our read aloud, Calico Captive. Though the kids were quite into The Bronze Bow by the same author, they have been reluctant to become engaged in this one. I'm not sure why as it is a very compelling story. Perhaps I did not do a good enough job giving them background information and setting up the story.

At any rate, the book goes perfectly with our history study this week on the French and Indian War, which we played out using our Risk game board.

Our Memory Verse(s)
This week, we have memorized 1 Corinthians 13:1-7.

Socialization
Besides church clubs, Audrey had her first gymnastics class, and the kids all had co-op. The boys have been involved in an official Lego class at co-op and have really enjoyed it.

The girls have been taking dance.

There is lots of fun time in the gym playing a game called Ga-Ga,

and there is always something fun to do in science, though we weren't able to stay for science today.

Other Noteworthy Tidbits
Like I said, I've been working to create meaningful activities to fill time when one child might be done while the others are not. This way, I do not have 1 child doing wild laps around the house while the others are trying to do long division. I have also cracked down a bit on the structure of our schooltime. One thing I've always liked about homeschooling is the flexibility we have with schedule and with where we school. However, we have had some serious attitude issues lately as well as some apathy towards schoolwork. So...I put my foot down. The kids must now complete their schoolwork at the table. Things have been going a lot better. I can better supervise them when they are all in one place rather than in 3 different tents and forts. While I don't have "desks-in-a-row" on our homeschool shopping list, this change has been an effective one.

Reflections - My Little Gymnast

2011-03-03T22:41:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure who had more fun at gymnastics: Audrey who participated for the first time, or me playing the role of spectator. She was so cute, and the grin on her face after every activity she did told me she thoroughly enjoyed herself.

Here she is before we left, admiring herself in her leotard:

Good to Wow: Couples/Self-Portrait Edition

2011-03-03T02:03:00.030-05:00

Well, I just completely missed out on Monday's SOOC posting, so I figured I'd cram it all into one post. And...I didn't actually take this photo for this challenge; I took it for the Joy of Love Challenge, which, if you haven't been following, ended February 28, and I only got to like Day 9. Sad, huh? I may still get those photos posted yet, but for now here is my SOOC photo for Good to Wow: Couples Edition...

That's my husband Mark and me. I've known him for 30 years, been married to him for almost 16, hope to have another 50 with him. He's my best friend and soul mate. I couldn't imagine doing even a moment of life without him.

Here's my first edit:

All I did on this was crop and then run Coffeeshop's Perfect Portrait action. I brushed on White Teeth at 30%, Eye Define at 100%, and Smooth Skin at 50%.

I also wanted a more subtle edit. So I took my last edit and converted to sepia, which I adjusted to 60% opacity.

God Sightings

2011-03-02T02:17:00.006-05:00

"Wouldn't it be great," he suggested, "if we intentionally looked back on each day for God's hand in it? You know...God Sightings."

At the thought, I smiled as a memory immediately played through my mind. We were moving from our first house and had rented a mid-size moving truck because surely our junk would all fit in a mid-size, and opting for the smaller truck would be a monetary savings. But oh how I whined and complained and threw a hissy fit when Mark called me from the rental facility to tell me that our reservation was seemingly meaningless: they had not actually reserved a truck for us. Our schedule was thrown off as they tried to find a vehicle for us. In the end, the moving company gave us--for the price of the mid-size truck--the largest truck because that was the only truck available in their lot. And later as we packed that truck full of our belongings, we realized the mid-size truck would not have been adequate.

That was a God sighting and one I always remember with a smile. God does have a sense of humor, doesn't He?

A couple years have passed since my husband's suggestion that we be intentional in our looking for God in our days. Because He is in all of our days, in every moment. It's just that we don't open our eyes to see Him in everything. We take it for granted that He's there. Worse, sometimes we just forget He's there.

I've been reading Ann Voskamp's One Thousand Gifts...and have been incredibly blessed and challenged by it. Counting the blessings, the gifts, seeing the beautiful even in the ugly. Taking note of the God Sightings.

I hear my children complain daily about schoolwork, meals, activities, inconveniences, toys they don't have. And I get annoyed at them. "Stop complaining and be thankful," I tell them. But when I stop to think about it, I realize: They learned that from me. I complain about the weather, the kids, the inconveniences of life, the things I don't have. How would our family be different if I had, from the beginning, practiced this giving thanks, replacing complaining with gratitude, counting my blessings?

I want to take on this challenge. I actually did a couple years ago, but before I even got to #12, the old life of grumbling and complaining took over, and I abandoned the life of gratitude. I want to give it another try; keeping at it for a longer period of time makes it habit. Can you imagine living a life where gratitude and counting blessings is habit?

Counting ~~down~~ up my blessings at A Thousand Blessings.

Anticipation

2011-02-28T21:24:00.001-05:00

She is beside herself with excitement. And in the few hours that have lapsed since I took her into the gymnastics place to sign her up and since we went to Target together to purchase her gymnastics leotard, in those few hours, we have had the same conversation many more times than I can count on two hands.

"What day will I start my gymnastics class, Mommy?"

"Well, this week since you missed the first class this morning, you will have your class on Thursday night. But every week after this week, it will be on Monday morning."

"What day is today?"

"Monday."

"So tomorrow I can say the day after tomorrow I'll have my gymnastics class?"

"Yep! When you wake up tomorrow, you can say that day after tomorrow will be your first class. Then the next day when you wake up, you can say that tomorrow you'll have your first class!"

"Then it will be on Monday after this week?"

"Yep!"

"But this week it's on Thursday?"

"You got it!"

And on the way to Target, there was this conversation as well as one that went like this:

"We're going to Target now?"

"Uh huh."

"To get that thing for me, that thing, what is it called again?"

"A leotard."

"To get my leotard?"

"Yep!"

"For my gymnastics class?"

She couldn't wait to get home to try it on. All the way home she talked about her new class and her "What is that thing I'm wearing called again, Mommy?" and about how she would practice her balance when she got home. And she did practice her balance on the stairs, on the wide stripes of the area rug, on the strips of the hardwood floor.

Yes, my little girl is definitely very excited about her first gymnastics class.

A Sunday Afternoon

2011-02-27T22:53:00.001-05:00

On Sunday afternoons, if I have my act together and do not have to use the time to plan school, I often go out by myself - to the store or photo hunting, just to get some time alone. I'm trying to do more with the kids, though, so when my husband suggested I take my oldest along, I didn't hesitate. Of course, I can't take one girl and not the other so we had a girls' afternoon.

We meant to raid the Closing Sale at Border's Bookstore, but when we got there, it looked like Disney World. Not the fun and magic of Disney World, but the lines and chaos. When I saw there was little in the store more than 20% off, we left and went to Barnes and Noble where my educator's discount gives me 20% off. And the books are all orderly. And the lines short.

The girls selected a book, and I picked up a couple of Horrid Henry books for the boys. As I handed the cashier my educator card, she asked if all of my purchases were school materials. I explained I am a homeschooler and that, while some may not view Horrid Henry as fine literature, if the boys are reading, these books are in my opinion school materials. I got my discount.

Oh, and how could I forget the most important part of our bookstore trip? There is a Starbucks in the Barnes and Noble. Green iced tea for me, hot chocolate for the girls. And we all shared a cinnamon scone.

On our way home, we passed a walking trail along the Farmington River. I noted a couple of potential picture spots, and we pulled over. Unfortunately, the trail is still covered by a couple feet of snow, and the girls did not have snow boots on. This lady had the right idea:

We enjoyed watching her ski by.

So we didn't stay long, but it was a fun little detour anyway.

It's Not About Me

2011-02-27T15:19:00.009-05:00

Psalm 127:3 - Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward.

"Mommy, will you please print a coloring page for me?" She hesitates as she makes her request. She knows. She can guess what my answer will be.

I sigh. "Not right now, Baby," I mumble, not looking up from whatever important task I am engaged in.

Predictable.

I glance up and see a look flash across her face. What is it? Resentment? Disappointment? Or maybe just a Why did I even bother to ask? look.

I don't want to be that mom anymore.

I don't want to be the mom who always says No or Wait or Not now or Later.

I don't want to be the mom who rationalizes that she is "here for them" just because she is physically present in the same room.

I've been thinking a lot lately. Pondering. And listening. Finally listening to the promptings. I've been bombarded by them as of late...various blogger friends who have voiced their decisions to slow down, to change their priorities; a Bible study at church encouraging us parents to remember what it's all about; words from One Thousand Gifts (Voskamp) reaching out, shaking me. Don't you hear? Haven't you figured it out yet?

It's not about you.

How do I want my children to remember me? That was our mom...she always loaded the dishwasher just right. She made sure there were no crumbs on the floor. She had a thousand Facebook friends. She really mastered the art of photography.

Or do I want them to know me as the mother who put my all into loving them, guiding them, teaching them. The mother who pointed them to the Father and who modeled a Godly life for them?

Don't I want to be remembered as the mother who knew it, who lived it?

It's not about me!

Finally

2011-02-24T20:51:00.000-05:00

We finally made it to the Science museum. Unfortunately, I did not take into account the fact that many of the area schools were out this week which means that it was a little crowded. Honestly, I prefer the school groups when visiting a point of interest because they leave around 1:00, allowing us to have the run of the place for a couple of hours. But families? They stick around longer than we do. Thankfully, we have a family membership to the museum, so we will return when school is in.

We had a good time despite the crowds. The museum is divided into 6 different exhibits, each a self-contained room so that I felt comfortable giving the older three some freedom in wandering around. Surprisingly, the windows were the most interesting, fun places in one of the rooms.

There were a lot of other fun things to do as well. Like have a car race,

try to stack nails,

follow a ball through an obstacle course,

whack a dummy head with a huge mallet,

explore space,

form a square,

or draft a new invention.

But the kids all agree that their very favorite activity was the ball race, wherein the ball was powered by the mind.

Our day through science ended with a 3D movie on the journey the not yet released Boeing 787 has taken from dream to reality.

And my favorite moment? This one...by a mile.

Good to Wow: Pink Edition, Edited

2011-02-24T02:42:00.024-05:00

It's been a busy week. I've been trying to spend less time on the computer and less time playing with pictures. And...we went to a museum today where I took TONS of pictures, pictures that are just a little more important than pictures of pink benches. So...I've been playing with those photos! Nevertheless, I did get my pinks done.

Here's the trash can SOOC:

And now:

I cropped it and increased the saturation. Using the healing tool, I removed the little red spigot thingy on the floor.

And here is the bench/trash can combo SOOC:

And now:

I lightened the shot up a lot by increasing the exposure in RAW. I still needed to lighten up the trash can and bench some more, but I didn't want to brighten the background anymore, so I selected trash can and lightened and increased saturation. Then, using the cloning tool, I made the entire back wall yellow and removed the big electrical outlet. Finally, I ran Coffeeshop's Urban Grit action and brushed it on to the rim of the trash can as well as the "fence" rail.

Finally, here is my Life is Pink shot SOOC:

And the re-do:

First, a crop. Then I increased the saturation and ran Coffeeshop's Pink Glow action followed by some cloning work. First, I edited out some of the shadows.

And last, I cloned out the poster that appeared in the store below the sign. I used the rectangle tool, pointer, alt key, and healing tool for the poster removal. To do this, I selected some of the pink polka-dotted background using the rectangle tool. Then I clicked on the pointer. This outlined the rectangle in the little moving ants. I then pressed alt and moved the rectangled selection. Clicking the alt key copies the selection rather than just leaving a hole. I placed the selection where I wanted it and then used the healing tool to clean up the line. I didn't do a perfect job healing the line, but it's sufficient. I also had to clone in a polka dot that was half missing because of the poster.

And that, folks was my Life in Pink.

Joy of Love - {18}

2011-02-22T15:36:00.002-05:00

I am hopelessly behind on the Joy of Love Challenge. Well, not hopelessly exactly, because I do intend to catch up. And in fact, I am posting Day 18 today even though I have not yet posted Days 9-17.

But it's my birthday and therefore my prerogative. It's also my husband's birthday. Growing up, I always loved sharing my birthday with him because he was a cool older kid, and here was little ol' me celebrating on the same day. Of course now it's extra special sharing a birthday with my favorite person in the world.

This year we celebrated a couple of days early. We finally found a wonderful babysitter up here in our new digs, and she came over Sunday night. When we go out, we almost always do a fancy dinner, often trying something new.

The experience this year was new to me: a tapas restaurant. Mark has been to Barcelona several times on various trips he made in the past up here to Connecticut. It is fun now to share in this part of his life that I, for years, heard about but didn't live.

Unfortunately, the lighting was bad and all I had was my iPhone, but the kind gentleman at the table next to ours snapped a photo anyway. I added a little extra noise in an attempt to make it appear like I meant for it to be that out of focus, etc., etc. It's a capture of the memory anyway.

{Day 18}
going out

To join in the fun, visit Willette Photography.

At the Cross

2011-02-22T02:23:00.003-05:00

My church asked for photos of crosses, so I took on the mission, stopping by churches and any other venues where crosses might be, including a graveyard. I find cemeteries to be so beautiful and peaceful.

I took my youngest along to look for crosses on this particular day; the others are not quite as patient as she is with my photo obsession. The cemetery we went to had the perfect cross, and I asked Audrey to stand underneath it and look up at it.

With no disrespect to those whose names are on those tombstones, I wanted this photo to focus on Audrey at the cross. Plus, as a church photo, I thought it would be best without the graves. It took awhile - a lot of cloning and touch-ups, but I finally got the photo to look like I wanted it to.

The sky in the original photo was rather gray, so I inserted a bluer sky from another photo I have.

I then decided to go black and white. I had to blur and smudge the sky a bit with this one, though, because the fun cloud texture from the blue sky looked a little odd in the black and white.

This photo is a special treasure to me because of the conversation with my sweet little Audrey that followed our little photo shoot at the cross.

"It's pretty here," she said thoughtfully.

"It is, isn't it?" I responded. "It's so quiet and peaceful. And so beautiful."

"It seems like a Christian graveyard," she continued.

"You're right! There are lots of Christian symbols, aren't there? Like crosses and statues of Jesus and of angels."

"Was everyone who died here a Christian?" she asked.

Although it was sobering for me to explain to her that, unfortunately, not all of these people likely asked Jesus into their hearts before they died, I had a sweet moment with her where I could tell her about Jesus' love for her. This was probably the first opportunity I have had to explain salvation to her in a situation where I think she really understood.

I assured her that her mommy and daddy are always here to answer any questions she has. My hope and prayer is that she will soon make a decision to come back to the cross.

Good to Wow: Pink Edition, SOOC

2011-02-21T02:04:00.005-05:00

In case you missed it, we took our birthday boy to the mall for his big day. As I mentioned before, we really know how to throw a party.

There was pink at the mall. Quite a bit of pink, actually. This is a mall in Nyack, New York, and it has kind of a warehouse-y feel. The floors are concrete, and there is a lot of grunge metalwork that is exposed. Who would think, then, that all of the trash cans and benches throughout would be in fuschia? I guess the contrast between grit and frill is what makes the statement.

And, yes, this one's really, really dark, but that is why we are editing them, right?

And of course since it is a mall, there is a Victoria's Secret.

My SOOC is a bit fuzzy. I felt a little strange aiming the camera at the store lest someone think I'm some sort of pervert.

I did ask someone in VS if I could photograph their big pink and white polka-dotted dog, being clear in my explanation that I was completing a Pink Assignment. They told me no one is permitted to take photographs in the store. That being said, I had another photo of a pink and white chair I took in the store before I asked permission. I thought about posting the contraband picture anyway, but since it appeared to have the names of the employees written on it, and since I wasn't supposed to take pictures inside the store, it'll just go in my archives. It was a really cool chair, though. You'll just have to take my word for it.

Scripture & a Snapshot - Trust = Direction

2011-02-20T02:37:00.002-05:00

Isn't it a comfort to know He can give us understanding if we just ask. And if we trust Him and lean on Him, He will direct us!

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. V

2011-02-19T14:09:00.003-05:00

1. Chocolate
WARNING: If you are chocoholic like me, don't read any further and do NOT look at the photo! There. You've been warned.

We were at Sam's the other day, and I come across these chocolates that are shaped like chips. As in potato chips. I like potato chips, and you know the saying: You can't eat just one. Well, you certainly can not eat just one of these either.

They are thin, sweet, chocolatey. Delectable. And the little rice crisps add just the right texture, just the right crunch. They also have a lovely criss cross pattern gently stamped on the back of each chip. Did I mention they are delectable?

2. Music

Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata: one of my favorites. Someday I hope to master it on the piano.

3. Numbers
School tools for math with Audrey:

4. Stack
My current reading list:

5. Canned Goods
Just for fun...

A Day in the Life of a Birthday Boy

2011-02-17T21:25:00.000-05:00

He's still my little boy, but suddenly he's 10. Just like that.

Trying to juggle 4 kids' birthday parties is tough both on us and on parents whose children get invited to our parties, so our kids alternate years in which they get a "big" party. This year is the boys' year to have small family parties, so Michael spent his birthday with just us. The day started with a his favorite part: presents!

We took the day off and went to New York to spend the day at our favorite mall. I know. We're party animals. But really, we always have fun at this mall, and the little man is in heaven because there is a Lego store there. (Can you believe that Lego's headquarters (translation: main offices) are here in Connecticut, but there is no Lego store?)

Of course, we couldn't come all the way to New York, all the way to this mall without visiting the candy store.

We lunched at a Mexican Restaurant that makes the drive worthwhile.

And we had a ball

playing Mini-Bowling. Never heard of it? Me neither. But it was a lot more affordable and a lot easier for little hands.

And there was an arcade.

We had a great time as a family celebrating Michael.

And of course there was cake.

Happy birthday to my fun, loving, mischievous, charming, witty, sweet little man!

Good to Wow: Love/Romance Edition, Edited

2011-02-17T02:28:00.003-05:00

I didn't do a whole lot to my photos this week. I guess that's good? Anyway, here they are:

SOOC:

I did a RAW adjust. Then to warm it up a bit, I added a Grunge texture from Midoriankh (Deviant Art) at soft light blend.

SOOC:

I did a RAW adjust. Then I ran Coffeeshop's Urban Grit on charm.

SOOC:

RAW adjust. I then took out reflection using the clone tool. Then I thought I'd have a little fun with this one. I cloned the strawberry and rotated it a bit. I then took out one leaf and cloned another so the two strawberries would be a little more believable as two separate strawberries.

Cookie Love

2011-02-14T22:01:00.004-05:00

I didn't get an activity planned for the kids for Valentine's Day this year. In fact, I didn't even have enough powdered sugar for the icing for our traditional goodies and had to make an impromptu trip to the grocery store. But I managed to get all supplies in stock for our Valentine cookies.

I decided to throw a little challenge in to it. We watch a lot of Food Network challenges, so the kids were immediately up for it when I mentioned we would have a challenge of our own.

We all drew names and each got one giant-sized heart cookie. Each big heart was to be decorated for the secret recipient. I purposefully gave Audrey her daddy's name, and she went about her task with enthusiasm.

Michael created a masterpiece for me.

Under all of that icing, he frosted "I {heart} U". So sweet.

As for Alex and Jacob, well, they were mostly about globbing on as much frosting as gravity would allow to stay on a heart-shaped cookie.

And of course there was much, much cookie munching.

Good to Wow: Love/Romance Edition, SOOC

2011-02-14T02:41:00.000-05:00

I really did not want to shoot wine for Love/Romance. That's so cliche, right? What I really wanted to do was get a silhouette shot of Mark and I in a romantic embrace. BUT we were never home at the right time with a bright background. I tried shooting it against the light in the kitchen, but, well, I don't think any amount of editing would have helped that shot!

So wine it is. And chocolate-dipped strawberries too...just to add a little more cliche.

Meadow Road Barn

2011-02-13T22:41:00.000-05:00

I can't wait until spring! There are so many things I would love to photograph, so many barns out there, so many New England beauties to capture. But...whenever I see something I want to photograph, I'll get almost close enough to get a shot, but then there will be a 6-foot-tall snow bank I have to scale. Or not. I am not really good at scaling 6-foot-tall icy banks.

Other times, I'll see a great shot, but the snow here has taken over the shoulder, sometimes even whole lanes on the road, so there is never a place to pull over.

So my camera and I usually lose out.

I got lucky with this one. I was able to get the shot while turned halfway onto a side street. It was just the right angle that the tall snow banks weren't in the way.

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Vol. IV

2011-02-13T02:58:00.035-05:00

1. Shadow

I'm so thankful for the cross and for the grace of God I can experience because of the gift of His Son.

2. Strong

3. Pattern (Repetition)

4. Bright White

5. Warmth

Blogging Friends

2011-02-11T22:39:00.000-05:00

One of the things I love about blogging is all of the online friends I have made. True, I have a few wonderful friends who blog AND whom I have met, like Tisha. There is also one blog friend, Linda, whom I had the blessed opportunity of meeting face-to-face last summer. There are so many others I would love to meet like Amy, Crossview, and Annie just to name a few.

Melissa at Love and Life and Christine at Our Family of Four are two more lovely, creative women I would love to meet. And it just so happens that they both honored me with an award. Melissa bestowed upon me the Seven Facts Award, and Christine awarded me the Versatile Blogger Award.

Now here's the funny thing: both awards require the same thing from me. And the same thing as the Stylish Blog Award which Arby awarded me back in December (he and his wife are two others I would love to meet in person). I am supposed to list 7 random facts about me and then forward the award on.

You know as I do that once I start listing random things about me, I don't stop (remember I went all the way to #10 when I accepted the Stylish Blog Award?). So this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to ask you to just take a look at my 10 random facts from that acceptance speech. PLUS, did you know there is an About Me tab at the top of this blog? Guess what? There are 100--I said ONE HUNDRED--random facts about me there. (Yes, I obviously have too much time on my hands. Either that, or I'm way too stuck on myself.)

And if, after just hearing me request that you read one hundred and ten facts about me, you do not see that there is just a little Crazy mixed in, here's a bonus random fact:

*I ALWAYS make my bed. Every day. Always. On the very off chance the bed is not made by bedtime, I will make it and wait 5-10 minutes before I pull the covers down to get in.*

As for passing the award on, I am not going to pressure anyone in that way. If you would like to list some quirky, fun random facts about yourself, let me know in the comments so I can get to know you a little better.

But here's where I AM going to pressure you a little: Visit Melissa and Christine. They are fun to get to know. Christine is a mom and creative in all she does...her photography especially. She also enjoys quilting, and I have no doubt her quilts are beautiful. Melissa is fun, creative, and loving. Her photos are stunning as well, and you might even catch a few of her "baby" - a dachsund named Baxter.

Thank you, ladies, for my award!

You Capture - Cold

2011-02-10T08:45:00.001-05:00

Show of hands...
Who is sick
and tired
of me complaining about the cold?

That is why this You Capture post is brought to you by ice cream. You're welcome.

Honestly, sometimes I'm not sure what gets into me...a little crazy, I guess. Or maybe I just want to be Mommy Hero for a change. Anyway, this afternoon, I decided to let the kids make their own ice cream sundaes. I set them on a buffet line with all of the toppings.

They put on Oreos

and marshmallows

and lots of sprinkles.

I had fun playing with the sprinkles:

And the kids? Well, I think they really enjoyed their make-your-own-sundaes.