And the day begins...

This was how my day began: 

Itch itch itch, tingy tingy tingy dog tag flapping for 5 minutes straight (dry skin). So I kick the dogs outside. Back to bed, 1 min of peace. Furry cat takes the opportunity to wrap herself around my head on the pillow meowing the whole time. I give up and get comfortable with fur. 1 minute of peace. Dogs start barking like they're dying, for 5 minutes waking all the neighbors I'm sure! I give up and go let them in. The smart cat runs out the door and I end up chasing him in the backyard in my PJs. Drag him back in. Then there is a mass of whining and crying and pawing and climbing all over me because its breakfast time apparently. 2 cats have a spat over having to share a plate of food, while the other blissfully eats most of it. Have to drag one dog off the other dog's food because she was done so she wants his. Welcome to 745 am. This is how I started my day... #itsazoohere

How is your day so far?

With this 'experiment' of letting the child choose what and when she works on stuff during the week, she has gotten the idea she can sleep in every day. I don't like that idea. Then she is doing schoolwork late into the evening which really tires her out. So 830, I flipped on the light, 845 I played music and started requesting her appearance. Finally at 9 am she arose from her slumber.  This is how she spent the first 1 1/2 hours of her day:

Doing what I normally do, organizing papers (please ignore my scraped door. One day I will get it painted.) But if she is going to be in charge of her schooling, she needs to see that she needs to keep it all organized or it gets overwhelming. She had fun mumbling to herself putting things in date order 'oh we have an earliest winner! 11/21/11!'  Most were from the last month though so don't think me that much of a lazy bum. 

Listed a few homeschool books on Ebay if anyone is looking for some:

         

                 Artistic Pursuits, Gr 4-6, Bk 1             Type It Typing Program Book

It's going to be 83 degrees out today. Time to get lettuce, more Kale and spinach planted. We had such a mild winter that my kale has still be growing out in the garden. Very exciting!

Planning, Boiling and Waiting...

HOMESCHOOL UPDATE:

Homeschool planning is in full swing. And to make matters more immediate, I decided to just jump in, without so much as planning one day. No really. The only reason I did this was because I was insane. Just kidding. But we have a friend whose daughter is beginning the Apologia General Science like we will be using this year and they started it last week. We thought it might be fun to try to keep pace and occasionally do experiments together. So this is why we find ourselves immersed in homeschooling. In July. In the middle of homeschool piles. In the middle of a heat wave. What was I thinking? Heat stroke probably.

Monday we had our first day. No problem on the science. Latin we reviewed since we haven't done any for months and we're in the middle of the Latin for Children book A. Math, we did review times table sheets and a Saxon Placement test to see what level we should be at. For English a friend loaned me a McDougal English program. Basically a public school's textbook. We jumped right in with minimal complaining. I also printed spelling lists from online although we didn't get to any of those.

Tuesday rolls around and I'm sick and we're both tired. Just great, on our 2nd day back to homeschool. So we read. All day. We started The Hobbit last fall but never finished it. I picked up The Lord of the Rings trilogy on tape and in 3 books at a garage sale so we plan to read those soon. Time to finish Hobbit first. And here is what I realized on our 2nd day of homeschooling. I don't want to shove textbooks at my child just to make sure we have 'something' to cover a subject. I don't want to have it all planned out. I want to be free to explore, to try out new things, to spend a whole day reading if I feel like it!  I like our science program, daughter needs experience with textbooks a bit if she is ever going to go to college (you know the backwards way they learn there, right?!) Latin is going okay, but its mostly chanting and fun things. I'm okay with that. I don't want to use a stale ole' English program or generic spelling lists from online. I realized while we were reading Hobbit, there were words we both didn't know. We started a list. Those definitions will have so much more meaning because we can apply them to what we've read. I like that. I have no plan for history yet. I keep looking at Sonlight's Core 100 just for the basic fact that it is all about reading, and is similar to a Charlotte Mason style of learning. We can do dictation and narration from the readings. We'll read up and discuss current events from magazines such as The Economist, Time and Newsweek. We don't have to be entrenched in boring ole' textbooks. Don't ask me what I'm planning on doing for math. Winging it???

Boy, oh boy. I can foresee an interesting year if I'm already feeling this way. Check back with me in a few months to make sure I haven't slipped back into textbook mode after I panic about whether we're learning enough or not. I'm praying that doesn't happen!  

* This homeschool update is linked to Back to (Home) School 2011. *

GARDEN UPDATE:

It's been 2 weeks of scorching hot heat. It's a miracle if I get out to water the garden and don't die from heat and mosquito bites. Basically it's so hot out, I'm surprised plants aren't boiling! But watering hasn't seemed to matter. Our wonderful plot of squash looks like a meteor landed in the middle of it. I guess it can't take the heat. It's still producing but it seems only a matter of time. 

We have, however had a few good points! The okra is FINALLY starting to bud! It is the slowest growing plant I've ever seen! But it's making up for lost time. See the adorable buds. I can't wait to have some!

The tomato plants look like Brer Rabbit's brer patch but they are still producing green tomatoes. This week I found one adorable red tomato! Yay! Finally. I'm counting on many more. I think they like this heat. I glad someone/thing does. All in all, the garden this year has been 'okay'. We've harvested some things but not as much as I had hoped. I have canning supplies all primed and ready but no use for them yet. We plan to do a fall planting soon. Maybe mid August? Need to read up on that. I also plan to Lasagna garden so the beds are ready for next year. All in all its been a good learning experience. I'm thinking we need to look into a watering system as well, maybe underground? We'll see...

*This garden update is linked to Tuesday Garden Party and Homeschool Village Garden Challenge. *

CHICKENS UPDATE:

We're in waiting mode. We're 13 days into the 21 days for our incubating eggs. So far so good. The temperature in our homemade incubator is doing pretty well. We've candled the eggs twice. First time we couldn't see anything, so hard with brown eggs. We candled on Monday as well and saw these. 

Don't know if they mean chicks or boiled eggs. We'll candle again on Monday August 1st, our 18th day and then we go into lockdown with hopeful hatchings on August 4th. Check back for an update!

Also, the other day we drove past a guy putting this at the end of his driveway.

We stopped and asked if it was trash, it was, so we excitedly offered to come back with a truck for it. FREE! Doesn't it look like a start to a great coop?! Our backyard is filled with scrap woods and paneling. Can't wait to get started creating a coop-de-ville!

This Week's Gardening...

Last week we only had one day that dipped below 95. This week the forecast is for 100's all week. Guess where I am? Yup. Inside. Guess where I'm not. Yup, the garden. I do go out and water, and the family picks various produce but we're just not spending the time outside, lest we be cooked to death. Our pledge/goal is to work outside a couple nights this week, ie: after 8 pm where hopefully God's fan will help us work cooler. We'll see.

(linked up to Tuesday Garden Party and Hip Homeschool Hop.)

In the mean time, we're growing sweet potatoes. Yes, I know they take 100 days (November 1st!) Yes, I know I'm behind and too late and foolish. I don't care.  Someone posted this video on Facebook last week and I couldn't quit thinking about it.

So when we stopped into Trader Joes this past weekend, I grabbed up a bag of organic sweet potatoes and I'm determined to make them my own! We'll grow them inside for a few weeks until they vine and then my goal is to plant them in 5 gallon white paint buckets. This way, when October rolls around and we can potentially have some freezes, I can pull all the buckets in the house, into the dining room to line the wall under the window for the last few weeks of growing. I'm determined. Can you tell?

I had the pre-teen watch the video and explained about pesticides and how they can harm us. She helped me fill jars (given to me for canning by hubby's boss. So thankful.) with water and stick toothpicks in the sides. I put them up on top of the hutch, hoping the cat doesn't find them. He's awfully curious and will want to pull them all out!

Chicken update: We've had a couple crackages. We're down to 10 eggs now. We tried candling on Sunday night but couldn't see anything. I think we'll wait until next Sunday (at 10 days) or maybe even the next Friday before we candle again. We're just nervous Nelllies, being that this is our first time hatching. Crossing fingers.

Okay, back to planning our homeschool. An update on that coming soon...

Wordless Wednesday... Hydrangea Blooms

 

** Linked with Tuesday Garden Party **

Eating Local: Farmer's Market

We have this garden, see? And I don't like to use anything that isn't healthy for the garden. We bought organic seeds as much as we could, organic dirt with compost and used untreated wood for the beds. If there are problems, we try to handle it with natural remedies (like the soap and water with the caterpillars.) And now that we're getting chickens, I've been thinking more about eating healthier with no pesticides, growth hormones and the like.

The problem is, I was reading this book. Two books actually: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and the other Year of Plenty. Now I want a farm!  But seeing as we can not move to a farm at this time, I'm thankful for the room we have in the backyard. But it got me thinking about all the foods we DO purchase that are not pesticide free and are not local. I mean, do we really know where our food comes from? I live in Missouri and my cataloupe is from Florida, strawberries from California and the tomatoes are from Chile. I mean really... CHILE?  We do have gardens here.

(trucked in fruits from who knows where)

So today we went to the farmers market. It's a bit of an eye opener when you're used to frequenting Wally World and most everything is so cheap. Some things were a bit more, but I think this just made us choosier, hopefully we'll waste less food (did you know American's throw away about 253 lbs of food per person, a year? I bet most of it's produce!) They did have part of the farmer's market for non-local produce. It just seems so wrong to go to the farmer's market to buy the same trucked in, pesticide sprayed goods I can get at the grocery store. I tried to buy as much local as possible.

I was excited to see there were a few meat farmers who raise grass fed cattle and chickens with no growth hormones, no pesticide ridden feed. We didn't buy any meat at this time but maybe sometime in the near future we'll try it out. I like the idea of going to farmer's market and purchasing my foods for the week. You can really get to know the farmers if you chose, they always say 'come on down to the farm' so you could actually SEE where your food is from. What an opportunity, especially for us homeschoolers, to be more conscious of what we're eating. To learn why our local farms are dying and where our money for food goes. '85% of every food dollar goes to the processors, marketers and transporters. Only 3 nickels per buck go back to the farmers.' (quote from: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, p.13)

In the excitement of being at the farmer's market, and the fact that it was the July 4th weekend and everyone and their mother were at the market today... I didn't get many pictures taken. None of vegetables. But the flowers and herbs were so beautiful! I wanted them all.

I brought home local: tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, rhubarb, beets, blackberries, eggplant, lav ender plants, pepper plant starts. Hubby didn't get the idea really, and bought blueberries... from New Jersey! lol Oh well, it's a start in the right direction. I'd rather support local farmers than big business money makers. Just sayin'...

Homeschool Village Garden Challenge

This evening we spent a fair amount of time in the garden. It has been neglected because of wet and then hot weather. Today we hit 100 degrees so an evening of weeding is what we had to do.

 (see the empty bed back there? Swiss chard is now planted.)

The turnips we pulled last week have been replaced with swiss chard seeds. My mom says the plants are beautiful reds and purples so I can't wait to see them. Not sure how you eat them, but I'm game!

A couple garden posts ago, I talked about our worm problem. Someone suggested using soap and water and spraying it on the plants. I did that. However, I think they did not like it or something, especially the cauliflower because the leaves are now all brown. 

We went out and tied all the cauliflower leaves (what there was left) around the cauliflower heads to blanch them. Some were already turning purple and while you can eat that, I read that the purple parts are more bitter. So its best to stop that as soon as possible.

The little one is not a fan of gardening this week. She's not really a fan of heat though so you can imagine what she feels like today. She does, however, enjoy harvesting things! We found several LARGE squash today. They're special striped type squash. I can't wait to cook with them. Tonight I found this Squash Bread recipe, hoping its similar to zucchini bread. I'll let you know.

I've been reading the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and it is an eyeopener. I plan to teach the little one the difference between organic, heirloom, genetically modified plants. I don't think she had much of a clue where our food came from before we planted a garden. We plan to shop more organically and locally from here on out. Read the book, wonderful.

 

Our tomatoes are growing so wonderfully, although they're like a wild fire bramble bush!  Hubby tied up the plants he could, by scrounging around for sticks to use. He got a bit inventive when he found a broken old broom handle. 

Pretty soon we'll be doing a fall planting. Things you can pick in the fall such as lettuce, spinach, peas, beets and swiss chard. I'm looking forward to beets. Have you seen some of the ones you can plant? Stripes, like a candy cane! I can't wait. No one in my family will eat them but me, Yay me.

Believe it or not, I'm already thinking of next year's plantings. I've decided to go with organic heirloom vegetables and have been ordering catalogs. I shouldn't be so eager for another planting. I should be crossing fingers for this year's crops! lol

Feel free to follow me through Google or Facebook to be updated about my gardening and homeschool adventures. I'll follow you back as well. Have a great weekend!

* Linked to Homeschool Village Garden Challenge *

Hungry for Garden Food!

This past weekend I took a few pictures of the garden with the cell phone (since I was too lazy to come in and get the camera.) Things are growing!

I forgot we had planted bush beans. With all the squash hoopla, I neglected to go look at the beans/pea bed very much. The peas are dying because of the hot weather but we will replant sometime in July I think, to have a bumper fall crop. (Did you know beans had adorable little purple flowers?!)

The tomatoes have started forming and I can see that although I stuck sticks in with the intention of tying the plants upright, I have not done that. Didn't I say I was a terrible gardener?! The plants are hanging over the side of the beds, not good. It's on my list to do today!

Squash, squash, squash! I counted 12 different little baby ones and some about 4" long. I can't wait to eat some squash! I'm already planning meals and dishes with it. I'm looking forward to using my squash, tomatoes and basil to bake a homemade lasagna. I'm thinking vegetarian so everyone in my house can eat it (teen is veg) but hubby might want some meat. We'll see. 

Last fall I made my own Basil Ricotta (which is perfect for vegetarian lasagna.) So easy and SOOOOO good! You have to try making some (although, to be technical, real ricotta is made from leftover whey, not fresh milk. So we're really making a paneer or queso-fresco cheese.)

BASIL RICOTTA

Supplies:

large pot for cookin'

cheesecloth lined colander (or use 2 layers of paper towels)

stirring spoon

reliable thermometer (I used a candy one)

milk

fresh basil

coarse salt

acid based item (ie: vinegar, lemon juice)

* Note: As to measurements, I don't do a lot of that (aka: precise measuring), but you can start with 4 cups of milk, or if you want a creamer, less dry ricotta, subtract 1/2c milk, add 1/2c cream.*

Steps:

1 - Pour the milk, (and opt: cream) and salt into a 3-quart saucepan. Chop up the fresh basil and add to the pan. Add the candy thermometer to the edge and watch for a temperature between 175 to 190°F.  

2 - Make sure to stir it occasionally with a non-metal spoon to keep it from burning on the bottom. When it reaches the desired range (shoot for somewhere near the middle numbers), turn off the heat, remove from the hot burner and add about 3 tsps acid based item. 

3 - Stir in slowly. Then let the pot sit, no more stirring. Curds will begin to form and the whey will start to separate. Let sit for 5 minutes.

4 - Carefully spoon curds you see into your cheesecloth/paper towel lined colander (make sure to have it sitting in a bowl to catch the whey.)

5 - Let it drain for 15 minutes to 2 hours, depending on the consistency you desire. The longer it drains, the drier it will become. DO NOT pull a rookie mistake and squeeze the whey out. You will get dry, gritty, coarse cheese.

Eat right away or store in a container for up to 3 days. Enjoy!

P.S. If you're like me and hate to waste, remember that whey you were straining and catching in a bowl under the strainer? It can be used in a variety of ways. It is an acidic whey and I found this great article on uses. 


Blog is linked with: Tuesday Garden Party and Hip Homeschool Hop.

Un-Chicken Update

Yes, I know. We are still chicken-deficient. I have wonderful excuses; I was out of town on and off for two months, hubby redid the floors and all extra stuff got moved to the basement where we planned to house the new chicks, we've had other problems to take care of,  it's been hot...

(my mom's friend has chickens)

But truth be known, we just haven't gone to get any chicks. Finding the exact breeds we want locally has proved not as easy as we would think. Plus, the little one wants to see the baby chicks grow up but I'm getting to the point in my thinking that I might want pullets that are about ready to lay. We could use some free food about now. As I see it, if we get chicks, they won't start laying for another 6 months. We're talking December. Eggs for Christmas. That seems like a long time away! Then, to add insult to injury, if they come into maturity (ie: 5-6 months old) during the winter months, they won't start laying until spring. What's up with that?! 

I've read if you provide a light source in their winter home that stays on longer than the sun is out, like it is summer, they will continue to lay. All this information and I'm confuddled as to what I should do. I think the best thing to do is to start building a coop. And a winter coop as well. Then, after I've felt like we've committed well enough by building the coops, I will feel happy to get the chicks. The other idea was to get a couple pullets and a couple chicks. Although I'm not so sure the pullets won't start pecking the chicks to death. Anyone know?

(I want my chickens to be helpful like these!)

I found this wonderful advice today at 2nd Generation of Homeschooling, for if ever I get me some chickens; "We rake the fall leaves from our many trees into a one-foot pile in the chicken run. When the leftovers from our kitchen (rinds, peels, scraps, scrapings, etc.) and chicken scratch are thrown into the run for the chickens to eat, the chickens scratch around, trampling and tearing apart the leaves, which mixes with their manure. After a few weeks, the one-foot pile is just an inch or so high and it is raked out and into our compost bin for use in the garden in the spring! This is wonderful fertilizer that we make for free."

See? Something else for free! Poop!