Ok, I had some carrots and celery and a few frozen potaotes. What to do? Make a soup. So I looked up celery on the internet and found a recipe. Now, I hardely measure when I cook, but I found out the ingredients and put them together. I made two soups, a carrot soup and a celery soup. The carrot soup is made with chicken broth, potatoes, carrots, onion, dry ginger and some butter. I added some fresh parsely from the garden. The celery soup is made with celery, carrots,onion, potatos, cumin, curry powder, thyme and the recipe called for an apple. But I didn't have any apples ,so I put a little orange juice in there to sweeten it. Of course salt and pepper both. Well, I went to blend them and the celery soup became a disaster! I accedently blended up the little plastic top on the blender. It fell into the soup! So, I had to throw that out. Bummer. Oh well, it may not have been good anyway, because of the orange juice instead of the apple. Anyway, the carrot soup came out well.

Ahh! Work, work work. The kids are busy today. They have been working on capacity in their math books. They really got into it. Water was everywhere. But I don't think they will forget ml and Liters! Aidan said he felt like a scientist measuring everything. I need to start doing some science activities with them, but when to fit it in is the question. I have been reading a lot about Charlotte Mason lately. I like her ideas, but getting away from workbooks is hard for me. We have been using Rod and Staff. It is such a thorough program. I am afraid I would forget to teach something without those books. But oh! to have hours of exploration would be nice. It takes them so long to finish their workbooks. We don't always get outside. Maybe I need to stop reading Charlotte Mason- I'm feeling torn.

Now That's A Bag of Oatmeal

Little did I know when I joined a grain co-op that we would be surviving off it. With my husband making less and less money per week and being gone so much, I have had to be really creative with meals. Thank you God for Wheat and Oatmeal! I must say I had no idea what fifty pounds of oatmeal looked like until I picked this up from the drop off point! Now, I am going to split it with a friend, but still...it's a lot of oats! At the rate things have been going I think it will get used. The wheat, which is under the oats in the picture, has been really allowing us to make ends meet. I have made bread three times a week along with some cookies, waffles, and muffins. It has filled my family up. And we haven't had to purchase much at the grocery store, except for eggs and milk. I am so glad I had had my freezer stocked with frozen veggies before all this happened, especially bell peppers. I had bought two big bags of them at BJs in June. I didn't use much of them until this squeeze. Now I put them in everything, pasta, potatoes, rice and meatloaf. They give flavor and vitimins that we need. We sure aren't losing weight on this budget. Healthy foods are so expenseive. Fresh vegtables add up. Eating potatoes, pasta, bread and beans isn't going to make you skinny. That's for sure. But it will save you a dollar. My garden didn't come in real well this year. My tomatos are still green! We have eaten a little bit out of it, not as much as I would have liked, though. What has helped us is the food I had stocked up on before all this. For example, things are really dwindling in the pantry, but I did have a can of stewed tomatos, a can of black beans, a can of corn and some frozen spinach. I also had some really yucky Cambell's Select soup that I didn't toss after tasting the nasty stuff. Thank goodness I didn't throw it out, because it, along with the other cans, gave us a wonderful bowl of soup. I also added a little extra garlic and Pace Picante sauce. It turned out real well and it was easy. With all this bread baking, homeschooling and cleaning I need some easy meals. I even have some left over for another meal. Just realized I'm out of milk and eggs. Been going through those really fast. I guess I'm going to have to go to the grocery store. Got to have milk to go with oatmeal in the morning.:-)

I wanted to post some pictures of our last week. Also, I had made the most perfect bread and wanted to remember it. I tweeked it from a recipe I got from a lady named Clara on youtube. She makes a bread called Depression bread. No measuring!! Here I was trying to get the best bread recipe- measuring things out to the tee. And this lady pours a whole bag of flour into a bowl, adds some yeast to the middle and keeps adding water while kneading until she has a dough. Lets it rise. Puts it in pans. Lets it rise again. Then bakes it at 350 until crispy on top. Ta Dah! Depression bread. I tried this with my own grinded wheat flour mixed with a little bread flour. I also added a little sugar and salt. But I didn't measure a thing and Ta Dah! Wonderful bread! The other pictures are of a butterfly funeral the kids had. Aidan accedently hit a butterfly while swinging his tennis racket. No really, it was an accident. He was devastated. They nursed it as long as they could, but then it died. So they decided to make funeral. It was a big production. Let me tell you! Now they think they are BUG SAVORS. Brianna has made business cards. Yesterday, when we went for a walk she began handing out her business cards to people on the trail. What surprised me... was that some people thought it was for real and asked for the website and phone number! BB said that her mom wouldn't let that information out.

"It's finally fall, Aidan. You can tell". I hear my little girl exclaim to her brother as they run to get their long sleeve shirts on. Yeh! I love the fall. And it is about time!!! I am just not a heat person. I'm sitting here wanting to play, but knowing I have work to do today. I have all their boxes ready to go. Each filled with a subject. They have art, reading, vocabulary, math, spelling, memory work, History, correcting, and a chore to do. These are their time sheets. I decided to go with this instead of a scedule strip. Each box gets a number. When they get done with their box they put the number on this poster board. As you can see there are yellow tags on the poster already. The tags are their breaks. They get a ten minute break, a snack break, a lunch break and a recess break in between their boxes. Once they fill in the empty squares with their numbers they come to a break. Sometimes I have allowed them to schedule their own breaks after they have seen their filled boxes. This works well, because it gives them a little choice in the matter. My biggest struggle with the box system is my own laziness. I HAVE TO MAKE SURE I FILL THE BOXES EVERY NIGHT or early morning. Also, timing can be a problem. We have had to rearrange break times or haven't finished all the boxes in a day. See, unexpected errands come up. Then it throws us off. I'm still trying to figure out how to work that. For example today is a beautiful day! The boxes are filled. I want so bad for the kids to enjoy the beauty of this day a bit before they get started on their boxes. But they have drama class at 2pm. Already, those two things throw a wrench into getting their work done. I guess that's when I have to decide what is the priority. Is it savoring Gods creation or preparing God children to serve. They are both important. And each day a different decision will have to be made. But for today... we will first...savor this wonderful weather. For today is the day God has made.:-) We should rejoice and be glad in it!