2 Halloween Wallhangings done!

I finally finished my 2 wallhangings for Halloween. I don't like to eat candy corn, but these guys turned out really cute! 

Cleaning out the extras!!!

It is the time of year, when things are somewhat slowing down and I have time to clean my house, or maybe clean out my house, Every fall, I have started going through different places in my house and eliminating things that I haven't used in a WHILE.  But what I have found that helps, so that it isn't just me eliminating things, is the garbage can that I have placed in our upstairs hallway. This is the place for things that are too small or don't fit. IT is for toys that the boys have decided that they have outgrown playing with. It is our Goodwill can. Now the things in it don't always end up at Goodwill. It has been emptied to our church's rummage sale and this month it will be going to the Venango County 4-H Trash to Treasure Sale (October 28 & 29 and Nov 4&5)  I have also started a box downstairs that I am filling up with things like the bulletin board that is too small anymore. Or the cup dispenser that we never use. Any time I find something that we haven't used, I just simply drop it into the box or can and then I know when I am making a trip to donate stuff that they are all but ready. Just pack up and go.

So to help with the fall cleaning before the holidays. start a drop it in box or can or bag and let the whole family know what it is for!

Recycled Jar Pumpkins

I am always looking for fun things to do and this is one that I did when Robert was a baby, but I stumbled on a whole box of these. Take an empty, clean baby food jar, spray paint the outside with orange spray paint and let dry. Once dry, take a fine black paint brush and black acrylic paint and add the faces for a jack o latern. Add some green raffia and a tea candle or a LED candle and you have a cute little pumpkin. These are great for each person coming to dinner sometime or for just on the mantel at this time of year.

The recycled baby food jars are on the ends and the stained glass pumpkin in the middle

Now the reason I stumbled on the box of recycled baby food jars, because I am working on table decorations for a fundraising dinner at our church for the Kids Klub this coming Sunday, Oct 23 at 12:30. For the dinner I took this idea and changed it a little bit, but not much. I took ivy bowls and used orange stain glass paint. I painted the inside of the ivy bowl and let it dry. Then once dry, I added the green raffia tied near the top and I will put in the LED tea candles. This was really an easy way to make centerpieces. With a few leaves scattered on the tables, it should look nice and not be too full for the table.

But either way this is a great way to use or reuse unwanted glass jars and containers.

Fire Safety Month!!

This is fire safety week at our school, but Fire Safety is the focus of the whole month. This is a great time to revisit some of those very important life saving lessons and drills.

Maybe if you can find 30 minutes with your family take time to do the following

- make an escape plan for each person from different rooms
- Select a family meeting place outside of the home in a safe place to meet
- PRACTICE the escape plan and meeting place
- TRY to practice a night time drill! See if your children will get up to the fire alarm
- Replace the batteries in the fire alarms regards less if they still have charge
- Have a list of emergency numbers by your home phone and programed into your cell phone
- Practice with the kids dialing 911 (on a play phone) and what they need to be able to tell the dispatcher

Remember to discuss Stop, drop & roll

Discuss get out and stay out when there is a fire.

Please take just a little bit of time to practice and discuss with your family to protect them!

If you live in the area,
the Fire Safety Night at Cranberry Mall is tonight Oct 14 from 6-8 Go and let your kids enjoy the fire trucks and bright lights, but let them be reminded of safety rules!

Robert's 4-H successes

Robert receiving one of his awards

Robert with his awards

 Last week at the 4-H Leadership dinner, there were project book awards awarded. Robert had done really well on his books this year, but I guess I didn't know how well. He received the award for his Goat project, and his Swine Project and then he was overall winner from the animal science areas. He also received the Family Living award, which was for his genealogy project year 2. So he was thrilled with 4 awards for just filling in his project books well and completely. Once again he has done well and I'm proud of his accomplishments!

Kay and Gary

Gary also received the Outstanding Leader award this year along with a friend, Kay. Congrats!

Tomato Picking!

Okay this is one of those things that I kind of skipped over in the craziness of the summer. But the week before school started, Robert & Garrett and I made a quick trip to Lancaster County, PA My best friend's parents plant and harvest tomatoes commercially for a PA tomato packing/processing company. Well the tomatoes were ready and I loaded up the boys and took off so they could see the large equipment that is used for picking tomatoes. Robert was just tall enough that he was actually allowed to ride the tomato picker and try picking himself.

Robert sorting good tomatoes from bad tomatoes on the tomatoe picker

Garrett and Abby played on the back of the pick-up with ME!

Robert with the tomato picker

The tractor on the left is pulling the tomato picker while the tractor on the right is catching the tomatoes as the fall into the dump wagon that it is pulling.

 After the 1st tractor trailer was filled, he was looking a little green. There are many moving parts on the picker itself plus there are extra wagons and tracotrs moving around. Well, needless to say all of the stuff moving gave him a taste of motion sickness. But I just wanted to share what the tomatoe picker looked like and how it moved through the fields. Unfortunaely, with the flooding rains that followed a ew weeks later, I don't know if the farmers were able to get all of the tomaotes harvested or not this year, but it certainly wasn't looking real good.

For those that are curious how this works, there is a large cutting head to the far side of the tomato picker that cuts off the plant and a conveyor belt carries the plant and all up into the picker. At the back of the picker the plants are shook and the tomatoes move to a different conveyor belt moving to the other side of the picker and the plants are dropped out the back. The tomatoes are then moved to yet another wide belt, where they move in front of the sorters. These are the people riding the tomato picker and they are sorting out the good and the bad tomatoes. The bad ones get dropped back into the field while the good ones continue to ride the conveyor belt and are dropped onto the conveyor belt that goes up the shot to the dump wagon that is being pulled thruogh the field beside the picker. Here is a short video clip that you can see some of the action, but there really wasn't a good safe place to be able to see everything that was happening.
Thanks for letting us come visit!!!!!

Chance for a years subscription to Highlights or High Five!!!

If you get a chance stop over to www.teachmama.com and read her post for "Magazine Hunt". She has great ideas on how to better use resources and in this post how to stretch the learning possibilities of a magazine, but at the bottom, she has if you leave a comment you could win 1 of 5 - 1 year magazine subscriptions!!! So take a few minutes and maybe you could win a great magazine for your home!!!

Fun Spelling Words

As a parent, I know that the words "Spelling Words" can be like nails on the chalkboard to some. But here are a few things that we have done to make spelling words fun, interactive and maybe different each day Here are some ways and things we have done!
Monday - We have wrote our words on paper (I know boring, but at least then I had a copy at home to use)
Tuesday - We wrote on the windows with Crayola Window crayons or markers (fun things!) or used refrigerator letters for each word
Wednesday - we would take a test on the computer (I would say the word and then wait forever for Robert to find all the letters on the keyboard any of the ones he missed he would type them a few more times)
Thursday (big day before test night) depending on how he was doing we might write them in shaving cream on a tray; write them on a dry erase lap board; use letter tiles and arrange them like in Scrabble or go outside and spell them out loud but maybe walk up a step for each letter.

I have also seen spelling words in sand (just use your finger or it might be mud around here right now) or use sidewalk chalk and write them outside as big as possible.

But my creative spelling words have been sidelined for now as Robert is learning to study on his own and Garrett doesn't have spelling words just yet. So I hope these ideas help someone who is tired of spelling words the same way for the past 5 weeks and is looking for a new twist on spelling words - if nothing else for Mom's sanity!!!

Apple Cider making Night

Nothing tastes better at this time of year than a hot mug of apple cider, fresh from the press. On Friday night we had the chance! My parents have the cider press and both my parents and us had apples. We only had about 5 or 6, 5 gallon buckets of apples but ended up with over 9 gallons of cider.

Our starting bucket of apples

An Apple in the grinder part of the press.
Chop, chop

Garrett cranking the grinder

Andrew cranking the grinder

Now it was Robert's turn

After sliding the tub forward, the boys start cranking down the press

Fresh Cider -YUM!!!

Once the cider is made, we strain it to make sure there aren't any particles from the stems or cores, but each batch of apples taste different. The first batch was very tart the other night and the second batch was really mild, but not super sweet. So we mixed them together for a nice mixture of flavors! Thanks Nanny & Papa for letting us use the cider press again this year!!!

Pumpkins & Mums

Pumpkins and Mums have arrived at our house! If you are interested in stopping by they are for sale. Pumpkins range from $3.00-$5.00 and the mums are 8" mums for $5.00.  The mums are white, yellow, maroon and rust colored. I don't currently have any lavender, but if I get some I will let all know.
Thanks!

Leaf Collage

With the turn of the seasons, and upcoming 5th Grade Leaf Project, our house spent some time on Friday night out in the woods looking at leaves. We had the chance to observe how different in shape, size and color the leaves are. Not only that but we also looked at how big or little the trees were. As Robert was identifying leaves with his tree book for the ones that he need for the leaf collection, Garrett was just looking for unique shapes and sizes and colors of leaves. Both boys came back to the house with leaves but for completely different purposes.

Garrett and I created a leaf collage and 2 simple supplies. Contact Paper and leaves.  I took 1 piece of contact paper, took the paper off and let Garrett place the leaves that he had collected onto the sticky side of the contact paper. I then took another piece of contact paper, cut it to the same size and placed it sticky side towards the leaves. And we now have our Leaf Collage. Currently it is being used as a place mat, but we have also hung it up on the window before for our leaf stain glass. Either way it is a great way to let the kids sort leaves by size or by color or if they are really into it by shape. But not matter what it is a fun fall decoration and a great way to get the kids outside for a fall walk too!

Do you recycle?

Just an FYI to those who live locally - if you recycle aluminum - the price is up! We have been collecting most of the summer cans - from our house, the neighbors and places like the family reunion. Over the weekend we finally cleaned out the garage! $50!!! Can you believe it? From just picking up and collecting cans?!?!? Now the boys are looking for any kind of metal they can gets their hands on!(beware!)

Chore Charts made Easy!

Both of my boys have chores here at home that when they have completed all the chores for the week, they do get an allowance for. And after several attempts we finally found that a chart that had blocks on it and was enough for a whole month worked the best. At first I couldn't figure out why Garrett wasn't using his chart, he had completed the jobs, but nothing was marked off. Then it hit me that he couldn't read the titles of the blocks. So back to the computer I went and I added little graphics to help him identify each of the chores. This had been working rather well, but I had to keep running off chore charts, which meant that if I was running behind then the chores didn't seem to get done. But now I have made yet one more adjustment to our chore charts. I slid each into a full page photo sheet. Now the boys can mark off their chores with a dry erase markers and I'm no longer printing out chore charts! (well except for at the beginning of each season- we do try to rotate jobs and what is expected depending on the season!)

So now I know that chore charts need to be readable (or picture readable) and dry erase markers and photo pages work great!

First weekend of Flag Football

Okay I know the weekend is long over and I didn't get these up as quick as I would have liked, but sick children tend to change plans and how much time is available in a day!

So last weekend was the first weekend of flag football for this year. This year brought 2 players to the field instead of just one as Garrett is old enough to play this year. I'm not sure that he gets the game sometimes, but he enjoyed the mud last weekend and had a good time. Robert, on the other hand, has a team that looks like they could be really good and they have game plans and know what they want to have happen.

Robert snapping the ball

Robert is the ball carrier (in front of the kid with the red ball cap)

Garrett's 1st game - Boy does he look serious!

Garrett is the ball carrier! Just looking for the most mud!

 Good Luck with the rest of the season. Hopefully it is drier!!!

Luchbox notes for a 5th grader

This year Robert and I have been doing unusual mind puzzles. We started with just riddles, but now we have moved to the Rebus puzzles or in other words the Word Picture Puzzles.

For example

MCE
MCE
MCE


answer: 3 blind mice (there are no I's)

 These are simple puzzles that I drop into his lunch and then the next day I put the answer on the back of the new puzzle. Towards the end of last year he had several friends helping him figure out some of the puzzles (including the lunch lady.) These are so simple to print out and then cut into slips and drop in.

Here are 2 websites that I turn to for these puzzles and other fun ideas.
http://kids.niehs.nih.gov  (go to the Brainteaser and puzzle link

or
another great site
http://www.brownielocks.com   once on this page I go to the riddles and jokes link.

Children's Sermon From an ear of corn

As I prepared for Children's Sermon this week, my hands were busy husking corn and then cutting it from the cob so that I could put it in the freezer. But this is what came to me and this is what I shared with the kids.

I held up a small kernel of corn and asked what we could do with it. IT was just 1 simple kernel of corn. After some discussion we decided that we could pop it, or plant it. Well if you go drive around the countryside, you can see field of corn almost ready for harvest, but what do you think about those farmers? Did they go out and plant the seed in the dirt and leave it alone. Wait correction - not dirt soil, or did they go out a week after planting it and dig up the seeds to see if anything was happening? Well if the went and dug it up there wouldn't be any corn, but they were patient and waited on who? God- right. God provided the rains because we don't normally see farmers out there with watering cans watering each plant? And he provided sunlight and heat for those plants to grow. But still what can 1 simple kernel give us? Well you see with God great things are possible and from 1 kernel God can multiply it (at this point I pulled from my bag a large full ear of corn with hundreds of kernels) into hundreds of kernels like on a full ear of corn. But that is only corn. How does this effect us?

Well in the Bible it talks about the tithe, or tenth of the harvest and income is to be offered to the Lord. So if you get a $1- 10 cents should go to the Lord. And you will still have .90 cents. Sounds okay doesn't it? He can multiply that money to do great things for his kingdom. How about your time? Could you give an hour to help someone? If we all gave just one hour- well we would have a whole work day (there was exactly 8 kids on Sunday!) So we could be like that simple corn kernel and plant ourselves in God's word and grow in the ways that he directs and he can use us to multiple the number of Christians in his kingdom or increase the time available for his use or increase the amount of money available for him to do great things with.

So the next time you see an ear of corn or just a corn kernel, remember that you can multiply things for God just like that kernel will multiply from 1 kernel to thousands of kernels!

-I then gave each a package of microwave popcorn and we closed in prayer.

Life with 2 boys in School

Okay, many people have asked what I would do while the boys were in school with all of my time. When asked this I have reassured them that I could easily fill the time.

So Monday - I got to straighten the house and get caught up on laundry from the crazy weekend. I got supplies returned from Horsetheif Parade float And oh yeah, I got to have breakfast with Gary and actually talk with him!

Tuesday - I took off for the Produce Auction to see if I could scoop up some produce deals! Jackpot - a bushel of peaches and a couple pecks of peppers! I ran a few errands while I was out.

Wednesday - Now here is what I will be doing for the next few weeks off and on - canning or freezing produce. It is that time of year and I enjoy seeing what we have raised and how I can save it for later this winter. Plus it always tastes so much better. So I canned most of the bushel of peaches, but I did make a batch of Peach Jam! It was so easy and delicious. I think I may make another batch for gifts for Christmas (an those will be done:)

Thursday - Sweet Corn. Cleaned, blanched, cut off the cob and put into the freezer. Also did a few things for Gary's birthday!

Anyhow so far this school year, I think I'm doing okay with being by myself - but I will admit - Boy is it quiet around here and that is with the radio on!!!!

First Day of School for both boys!

Well, it has been a whirlwind last 2 weeks since the fair as you can tell since I haven't posted anything. Anyhow today was the BIG day - Garrett started kindergarten and Robert started 5th grade (where does the time go???). Garrett must have been excited as he was up before the alarm. Robert once up got moving quickly and was ready in plenty of time. Garrett on the other hand took all the time he had to get ready. Then 8am rolled around and it was time. Both boys stopped and got their pictures taken and then on the bus they went.

Robert on 1st day of 5th

Garrett all ready for Kindergarten

We are ready!

There they go

 Around 4pm both boys returned with smiles on their faces. Garrett seemed to have had a great day as he was "ready to go back tomorrow!" Robert was a little concerned with changing classes and making sure he understood his class schedule- I think it was the confusing format that caused the concern rather than him actually being worried about finding the class. But it seems overall that the boys have a great start to the 2011-2012 school year. HMMM now which project should I start first?

Garrett is first up the drive and all smiles!

Wow they both made it through the 1st day!

4-H Fair & Auction

Here are a few pictures from the end of fair and the auction.

Mud happens at fair, especially when you pick on the wrong person!

Frog jumping contest

Venango's Edge tug-of-war team



Robert & McKenna with pig after auctioning it off



Robert & Midnight in the auction ring

Garrett in the pedal tractor pull

Garrett teaching the next generation of pullers! "Here Haylee try this!"

Venango County Fair

Okay this week has been busy for the first few days, but here is how things have worked out here! Robert received a blue in goat showmanship and in fitting and he placed 2nd in the 4-H market goat and 3rd in Open Market goat class. Garrett, placed 1st in his goat class and he participated in pee wee showmanship on Monday. On Tuesday, Robert entered his hog in the hog show, and he received a blue in showmanship, 1st in 4-H Class and 1st in Open.  The boys also entered many projects in the open and 4-H areas that were not animal related. Robert received 1st in Genealogy, 1st on his Spring Wildlife, 1st on his Wildlife poster, 3rd on his Crank It Up, Small Engines. Garrett received a 3rd on his bracelet, a 3rd on his painted t-shirt, 2nd on his creative flower, 2nd on farm display, 2nd on sunflower, 2nd on his watercolor painting. Honestly, I know that there is more that the boys entered but I can't remember right now.

They are having a great week and a good time!

Childen's Sermon - Be prepared!

As I sat with the kids at church on Sunday, I confessed the following to them....

"Okay this week has been really busy at our house. We have been busy finishing projects because well at our house it is fair time. And the other night as I was working on my quilt trying to get it finished, I was talking to God. I asked him what should I do for children's sermon. And do you know what popped into my head - The Boy Scout Slogan "Be Prepared!" I was like okay what does that have to do with the children's sermon. I am trying to be prepared.  -- Wait kids can you tell me what the word prepared means? (the kids looked at each other and then someone said "to get ready)" Exactly!!!! I need to get ready. So I started thinking about all the things we should get ready for. So what do you get ready for? Vacations? (Yes and I pulled out a tour book), School (Yes - I pulled out a book bag and markers),  At our house, the Fair (out came the fairbook)company ? (Yes) How do you get ready for company? (One little one said "Clean-up!") Do we get ready to go outside in the sun? (Yes and out came the sunscreen and sunglasses). But do you what hit me that I had missed getting ready for?  I have been SO busy, that I haven't taken time to get ready, or Be Prepared, for when Jesus comes back. Hmmm.

How do we get ready for that?  Well we should be reading our Bibles, and praying with God and sharing with others about God. Now Jesus is going to be like the unexpected visitor that just shows up at the door and says" Hey are you ready to go to heaven?"  He tells us so in the Bible, in Luke 12:40 it says "You also must be ready, because the son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him." I hope you will be ready and your answer will be  "Yes" and that you don't answer Jesus with "Hey can you wait just a few minutes to go to heaven, I need to get ready."

So as you are "getting ready" for school or vacation or the many other things that summer offers, don't forget to make sure you take time to "Be Prepared" for Jesus.

Garrett's broken finger

Okay so it has been a long week!!! A week ago Sunday Garrett accidentally closed his index finger in the car door. Of course he screamed and it swelled up and turned black and blue. I didn't think much of it, but Monday it wasn't looking too good, so we went off to the Dr's. They ordered xrays for Tuesday morning. That was something new for us!! Garrett was a champ through all of this. He held really still, but while we waited he asked all sorts of questions about the camera and what would his x-ray look like. Fortunately, we had a great nurse who let Garrett and Robert look at the actual x-rays up on the light box. They could see how all the bones worked together.
Well, it turned out that on Thursday we got a call that his finger was indeed broken and we needed to go to a specialist. (I was like REALLY?!?!?) But we were scheduled for today with the specialist. So yet another set of x-rays, which this camera, Garrett noticed, was different than the first camera and he was right. This was a digital x-ray camera. So as we waited (a while) he looked around the room and asked questions about the different bones that he could see in the room on the models and we talked about where those bones were in our bodies. On the counter there was a knee, with a torn ligament/tendon(?). He could see how there are 2 bones in our lower legs, but only 1 in the upper leg and how the ligament/ tendon(?) held the knee and leg bones kind of together.
So he has been asking about our skeleton and how the bones all work together.

So if nothing else out of this small injury, we had time to learn a little bit about our bodies. Hopefully, next time we can just learn about it without the injury and maybe have some fun with it instead of pain. But it has really opened up some interesting discussions!

Have a safe summer!!!

Birding for 4-H Project

Well we are in the last stretch for this year's 4-H Project Books as they are due soon!!! So we have some activities that need to be finished up. Today we needed to listen for birds again. We did this a couple of weeks ago in our backyard and found that if we saw the bird we could identify it, but to figure out what it is by sound is much more difficult.

So today we went to the ponds near our house , where there are usually loads of geese. But today we saw maybe 8. We hear a great number of birds, but still can't identify them well by sound. But we did see a hawk and a great blue heron. All very cool. The boys were very excited about seeing these birds.  And the fun part was being able to come home and once again going to the computer to http://www.allaboutbirds.org/ and learning more about them. So go try listening for birds and find out what you can identify. Then open your eyes and see if you can do any better!

Yogurt Parfaits

This morning it seemed way too hot to have a cooked breakfast and cereal didn't seem to fit either. But we have fresh raspberries and I had opened apple pie filling last night. So it was a Yogurt Parfait morning, where the kids had to make their own breakfasts!  plastic cups, vanilla yogurt, raspberries, apple pie filling, and Cherrios and we went to work. The boys could make up their own recipe, layer in those ingredients in any order, they could mix them together or keep them seperate.

Garrett isn't too into raspberries so his was just the apple pie filling, yogurt and cereal. While Robert took the apple pie filling, added raspberries and heated the 2 together  before layering them into the cup with yogurt and cereal. No matter which way they were layered we had a really fun, simple and creative breakfast - and that doesn't happen around here very often (creativity doesn't kick in until I am completely awake!)

This was a great way to start the boys into experimenting with ingredients!