You have a Big....

My little Meredith, like other three year olds, tells me exactly what is on her mind.

She loves to watch me get ready for the day as I put on my make-up and jewelry. Many times, she'll say, "Mommy, you have a BIG, BIG, BIG BOOTY!!!!"

I thank her for the uh, er....compliment.

This morning she was watching me again while I was getting ready for the day.

This time she says, "Mommy, you have a BIG, BIG, BIG, BIG BATHROOM!"

Surprised, I said, "Oh, wow, well....thanks, Meri!"

Glad I have a big bathroom!!!

The Train Obsession

I don't know if I have said much about Simeon (age 4) and his train obsession. It's becoming more apparent as time goes by and he is getting better speech skills. He has knock knock jokes about the train. We hear these "jokes" about 20 times a day. He has the GeoTrax trains and these are dragged out every single day. Sometimes they are in the car with us, in my bed with us, in his bed, in the bathroom, in the living room, lined up down the stairs, lined up on the counters, hidden in strategic places so other people can't play with them and lined up and "tracked" on our desks. They are everywhere, all the the time. He's now got them stashed in a plastic box that he sleeps with and drags around with him. When Shiloah was visiting we went to the pioneer museum and they have an electric train just as you come in. It cost .25 to make it go for about 3-5 minutes. Simeon is like a moth to the light. He's chasing it around the track, watching it, listening to it, and then it ends and we are pestered or are subjected to a jumping up and down tantrum until we put another quarter in. The last time we were there the attendant gave us a map to show us where the old trains were stored and we could get on them to tour them.

Simeon held onto that map for a week. Every morning he got up and asked if we were going to go see the trains today.

Finally, we made it over to North Platte to the old train yard so Simeon could see the trains. He looked like a speck next to these huge engines, but I think if he could have spontaneously combusted, he would have.

Ever since then we are asked several times a day "This way or that way?" We would point in some direction only to get corrected by Simeon that it was the wrong way and we needed to go this way. It wasn't until yesterday as we left church I finally figured out what he was talking about. The major highways out here go east and west. Church is half way to North Platte for us, so I think Simeon thinks every time we leave for church we must be going to North Platte, where the trains are parked. As we left church I turned west and immediately Simeon started screaming "NO!! Go THIS way!!" pointing behind us. To the trains. He knows where the trains are. For a little boy that has only been talking for about a year (who only just called me Monny less than a year ago), this is major!!

Then this morning he was up at 5:30, asking me if we can go see the trains today. Then again at lunch, snack, after nap, before dinner, after dinner, and 3 times at bedtime.

One other thing that Simeon does when we leave the house is look for the trains on the tracks. As we drove home yesterday we tried to tell him when a train was coming up, but he wouldn't see it. Then all of a sudden we'd hear "Hey, WOOK!! A TRAIN!!!!" It's so easy to please Simeon as long as there is a train involved.

The library is the only other place Simeon really likes to go because he'll check out Thomas the Tank Engine books, or any other books with a train on it. He also knows that T stands for Train, so that's good. I wonder how easy it would be to teach him to read with trains somehow. Hmmm...

On a side note, we live a mile away from the John Deere dealership. As we pass it on our way to town he will notice the combines and other machinery in their yard. Then he'll just say "Wook! Toys!!!" Yeah, very expensive big boy toys.

The life of a four year old. What would it be like?

Family Movie Reviews

We rent movies from Netflix and if we love them enough, we will buy them. We have seen so many wonderful movies lately and I wanted to share them with you.

Our movie standards are strict. I'm not opposed to turning it off at the first inappropriate part and getting rid of the movie never to finish it. My husband and I feel that a good movie is one that is wholesome and that teaches you about life through good examples. If you can watch a movie again and again and each time learn a good principle or grow closer to God then it is a movie worth owning and watching.

Some recent movies we've seen and loved are:

Christy (With Kellie Martin) It is a 4 disk series and is wonderful. We want to own this one.

Our Mutual Friend (1998 version)- based off a Charles Dicken's book. Intensely interesting and I loved the romance in it.

Wives and Daughters (1999 version)- a touching story of a daughter learning to be patient with a new step-mother, becoming best friends with her step-sister, and serving others. Her reward for being such a good woman is the best part of the movie...

In the Arms of Angels- a very short film, but an excellent story. The twelve minutes of movie time taught us all a valuable lesson.

Horatio Hornblower (2003)- He is a naval sea captain who is a wonderful example of a righteous man. He is heroic and modest, faithful to his wife and an example to all his crew. The movie is based during the Napoleonic war. This does have war scenes with some blood. I didn't think it was gory. I feel that it was a good opportunity to teach the children the sacrafic men go through to fight a war. Excellent series!

The Buccaneers -A television series created in the fifties. My kids found it amusing and enjoyed the antics of these pirates.

Many of these movies are based off of books. We haven't read them yet, but they are on our "to read" list!

Swimming

I love going swimming, it's just getting there that I don't like. Today was 98 degrees and I don't think I stopped sweating from 9:30 until 6:30 when we finally got to the pool. I'm also a nervous ninny when it comes to my kids being around water. I really try not to freak out, but there's so many kids to keep track of and my head doesn't swivel 360 degrees. But besides that, I decided to put the anxiety behind me and we packed up and headed to the pool.
We got the swimming diapers on Ammon and Joshua. We got everyone in their bathing suits. I squeezed myself into my suit (I must say I looked like a fine, blue sausage), and we had shoes, the bag, the pool cards, the towels, the extra diapers, wipes, and swimming trunks, keys, and everyone had been fed. Ready, finally!
So we got there and I really thought since the day had been so hot and I had been so hot, the water would be refreshing. It was actually kind of cold. We divided up the kids:half to the baby pool, half to the big pool. I only asked for 15 minutes in the big pool so I could swim a couple laps, and, um, take a turn on the water slide (my most favorite, unashamedly, water activity EVER!)
I thought since I had been carrying Ammon around in that car seat and holding the chunky monkey all the time, I'd have some better upper body strength, but boy, it was hard to do 3 laps in the pool, and it was like there was a current or something in the pool I had to swim against. Maybe I need to do this more often.
The last time we went to the pool Joshua was just a year old and he's grown a lot. He had no fear about putting his face in the water or jumping off the side or crawling through the "deep" part of the baby pool. Hannah actually jumped off the diving board. Hannah wants to learn to swim so I was trying really hard to show her how, give her pointers, spot her a bit on Saturday night, but thank goodness it was in 3 feet of water because I think she would have drowned me. Glad I wasn't the only one thinking that because she almost pulled Curtis under when he caught her off the diving board. Simeon was doing really good too and must be related to his mother because we can't peel him off the water slide either. The boys have learned to swim, somehow, and do pretty well for not having swimming lessons. Even little Ammon splashed around in the water.
For all the trouble it's worth, it was still nice to get out of the house and do something as a family. This week is supposed to be really hot, so maybe I'll make that extra effort to get out and go more.

Frogs, Tadpoles and Other Creepy Crawlies That Make a Kid's Life Exciting

This is Isaac, Dawn's oldest holding his proud catch of the day when we were visiting in Nebraska. I thought it was such a cute picture.

Here in our new house we have a drainage ditch that is full of frogs and tadpoles. At any given time the kids can find frogs hopping around the area. When we were first moving in and still making trips home at night, Makenzie kept trying to smuggle the frogs home to the old house. I was able to catch her before the slimy things would enter the truck, that is until one night.... She had found a mommy frog and two little, tiny babies the size of a finger tip. She wanted to take them home and I told her she shouldn't or they would miss their family and friends. They would be sad and wouldn't know how to get back home. She agreed in words only. Apparently she put them all in a plastic cup to come home with her. That night the truth was known when she lost the baby frogs in the truck! GROSS! She learned her lesson about taking frogs on car trips, though. She was so sad all night. Crocodile tears poured from her blue eyes as she thought of the fate of those baby frogs in the French fry infested car.

She did not give up her love of finding the frogs, carrying them around, and looking for tadpoles in the ditch. The other day, she found a swarm of tadpoles and all the neighborhood kids were in nature heaven collecting and harassing the little creatures. That afternoon she came joyfully in the house announcing that she found a little, tiny baby frog. She was holding it in her fist and I wanted to see and share in her joy. She opened her hand to reveal the most vile creature I had ever seen! It was a tadpole in the process of changing or splitting rather, into a frog. I almost puked right there and insisted the nasty thing go back to the ditch where it came from! I'm okay with them playing with the frogs, but not the vile creatures from deep in the drainage ditch! Yuck! She was sad to see him go but relented when I told her the thing needed to be in water or it would die.

I remember being a kid and loving nature. I collected and played with all kinds of bugs and other creatures. I smuggled jars of lightening bugs into my bedroom at night. I was so sad to see them dead in the morning light. I loved ladybugs most of all. Me and my three sisters would collect them and put them in cassette tape holders and make little homes for them. Sadly, again, they were all dead in the morning. My most triumphant and pleasant experience with nature was when I found two caterpillars and named them and made a home for them. I made a shoebox their home and filled with all the things the Ranger Rick magazine said caterpillars lived on. Sadly, my mom wouldn't let me keep them inside. I chose to keep them on the front porch. I kept them and took tender loving care of them for about a week. One morning, I woke up and found baby caterpillars crawling all over the box! I was so thrilled beyond belief! I thought my eight year old heart would burst from excitement!

Coming from such a nature loving background, I'm as supportive as I can be with their love of nature. I draw the line with frogs in the house and truck, though.

"Nature will bear the closest inspection. She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain." -Henry David Thoreau

All Because of ONE thing

I know we are going to have to move in 6 weeks (destination still unknown), so I figured we had to start packing and sorting through stuff anyway. About a month ago I put two dressers on lay away and we were supposed to be getting them this week, however, the store that I bought them from has not been open all week. Still, in preparation for getting these two dressers, which will be put in the boys room for four of the boys to share, I decided this needed to be done:

Move the boys' dresser to Hannah's room.
Move her plastic boxes downstairs to the boys' room for toy storage
Clean out their closet so I can have storage room for the stuff in the garage to be moved indoors (garage is leaking)
Sort through all kid clothes and store some, get rid of some.
Switch the book shelves back to what I originally had: 3 separate shelves pushed together
Move the new plastic shelves that can't hold all the books to the storage room we aren't using and sort through food storage, crafts, books, and other miscellaneous boxes of crap I haven't used or seen for 2 years.
Clean the garage
While I was sorting through the storage room, the kids destroyed upstairs so today we had to clean everything upstairs, while downstairs still looks like a tornado came through.
Pledge polish the furniture
Clean the bathrooms
Clean my desk

This thought comes to mind:
THROW IT ALL OUT AND START OVER!!

Why do we do this to ourselves, or should I ask, why do I do this to myself? (Please someone tell me they think like this or I'm going to really think I have some kind of OCD). Instead of cleaning out one dresser and moving it to make room for two dressers, I think I have to overhaul the whole entire house. It's a snowball effect.

On the bright side, we are low on money this month, so staying home cleaning, packing, sorting and doing huge mounds of laundry should save us some money and keep me busy.

Out of Place

I love animal stories. I like that animals can have personalities and how apparent and part of the household they become. I had a lot more stories when I had my two dogs, but they used to "alert" me to changes too. Now the cats have taken over, and one in particular, Missy.



Missy is the big cat. She weighs about 17 lbs., more than Ammon right now. Nemo bows down to her, although they go at it for a couple hours at night play fighting and chasing each other around. Missy has lost some weight since Nemo came, I think because she actually DOES something now rather than saunter around like Queen Sheba.

Yesterday we did the bed shuffle. Ammon has outgrown the cradle so I put up the crib and moved him into it. Joshua needs to move to the "boys room", since he's been sleeping with Hannah and I don't want him in her room anymore now that she's sharing with Ammon. Joshua likes to get in the crib and we've been having issues with regression (first kid of mine to ever do that with a new baby). Eventually everyone settled down, except for Ammon who decided he needed to stay up until 1:30 a.m. last night. Finally, everyone was asleep. Ammon wakes up this morning. He's crying (and I wasn't responding as I was having this dream about Matthew McConaughey playing the drums...wonder where that came from?)and Missy gets worried and then she is jumping on and off the bed and then she is meowing, loudly. As if to say, "Hey, your baby is missing and I can't find him! Get up!! Get up NOW!!" I finally go get Ammon and after getting him settled and happy, Missy was up against my back, purring. I was sandwiched between a hot baby and cat in a fur coat, but Missy was happy because the baby was found and a moments later she was jumping around on the bed like "something" was on it.

I call dibs on nap this afternoon.

I guess I never realize how structured the cats are and how they notice, with all this commotion with 6 kids in the house, that something has moved, or changed, or is out of place. Missy in particular is funny to be around because she is pretty snooty and acts so indifferent, until something changes. Usually she just doesn't grace us with her presence if she is upset. It's nice to get a laugh out of her antics though.

Pioneer Stories

I've been reading this book "Nebraska Pioneer Cooking". What a treasure that turned out to be! Not only did it have recipes on how to cook food from the time era, it had little bits of pioneer stories through out it too. I'd like to share some.

Pinnacle Jake was a cowboy/ranch hand. He worked in Nebraska helping with cattle and fulfilled various jobs, like standing in as cook when the regular one handed cook fell down a ravine with his mules and broke his remaining hand and both legs. He tells a story of how he didn't know how the "grub" was loaded in the wagon, so he had to unload almost the whole wagon to find what he needed. Then he had to load it all up again and when he turned around, here was a 100 pound box of dried apples. There wasn't anywhere he could fit the box on the wagon unless he unloaded it and loaded it up again, and not wanting to do all that work, plus not liking the apples much, he decided to get rid of the box. He didn't want to leave the box just sitting on the prairie though, so he looked around for a place to dispose of it. Nobody was around so he went over to the creek bank. The creek was almost dry, but it had potholes and some of them were pretty deep, so he chucked the apples, box and all into one of the potholes, where it sunk to the bottom. They returned to the area a couple weeks later and Doc, the roundup boss, yells "What the hell is that in th' creek?" All the cowboys went over to see. Pinnacle Jake knew what he saw but he went over anyway. The apples had swelled and swelled until the pothole was filled with apples. There was no sign of the box, just a haystack sized pile of dried apples. Doc and the boys tried to figure out what it was and guessed different things. Jake suggested it was an old excelsior mattress, but nobody made any better guesses. Jake never did tell anyone what it was.

I shared this story in church yesterday and one of the ladies, Theola Merrell, told me she is related to Pinnacle Jake as he was her great uncle. His wife used to ride on a horse to help round up cattle and would quilt while up on her horse. Theola also shared another story about her grandmother. Her grandmother often had visitors stop by on their way through and ask for food. This included Indians. One day she was out making soap in a big kettle and here came two Indians wanting food. They kept pointing to the kettle, thinking it was soup and she kept trying to tell them it wasn't soup, but soap. Still not understanding, the Indians insisted and got some "soup". They spit it out on first taste and then started yelling "Bad cook! Bad cook!" She said they never did come back after that. I guess word got around she was a bad cook.

These are the effects you can expect if you were to indulge in six "Free Silver Fizzes" (also known as a gin rickey, but renamed for the support of McKinley's nomination).
One free fight; escape in hansom cab to avoid arrest, kicking the windows out of the said cab later; awful clubbing from the policeman called by cabby to arrest kicker; one night in station house, sharing same cell with habitual bum; one $20 fine in court next morning and a promise to pay cabby $33 for injuries to cab; subsequent bill from doctor for dressing wounds caused by policeman's club; one new suit of clothes to replace that ruined in two fights; one terrible family row caused by bogus explanation of absence from home; several terrible shocks to self esteem caused by reading in newspaper full accounts of disgraceful happenings; unkind jokes by friends; chilly greetings by women friends of wife; one call from minister and long lecture on folly of intemperance; one cyclone battle with mother in law, to say nothing of ruffled feelings, loss of self respect, bodily pains from policeman's clubs, monetary loss and mental suffering equal in all to $1,000.

There was an account of a dinner served in Buffalo Bill's house. The cook had a large kettle sitting at the end of the table and the guests passed their plates down for servings. The soup was so tasty and the guests were asking for more. The cook got down to the bottom of the kettle and there was something in there that wouldn't cut up. He fished it out with a fork and there he pulled up the dirtiest, greasiest rag for all to see.

This was an observation of the Mormon women that were noted for their resourcefulness.
They could hardly be called housewives in etymological strictness, but it was plain that they had been at one time and most distinguished ones. With their entire culinary material limited to the milk of their cows, some sort of meal or flour, and very few condiments, they brought their 1001 recipes into play with a success that outdid for their families the miracle of the Hebrew widow's cruse. They made their butter by the dashing of the wagon, and their barm (yeast for bread) in the jolting heat that as soon after the halt as an oven could be dug in the hillside and heated, their bread was ready for baking.

Good Yeast
1 lb flour
1/2 c. moist sugar
1/2 ounce salt
2 gallons water
Boil these ingredients together for one hour
When nearly cold, bottle and cork it closely. Fit for use in 24 hours and one pint will make 18 pounds of bread.

American Field Guide

This site has some nice videos that you can use for homeschool projects or just FYI.

http://pbs-afg.onstreammedia.com/vss-bin/vss_SR/pbs_afg/search?&=&=&query2=&query3=in&offset=0&

Shiloah's Visit

AAAUUGGHHH!! I thought I had posted about this!! Sorry, I guess I'm falling behind here. Well, actually, I visited Shiloah's blog on the Homemaking Cottage site and we have such similar pictures I guess I got confused. I could also offer up the excuse I got strep throat really bad which fried my brain and therefore caused all my confusion. Or I just have too many kids and just try to survive from day to day.

Anyway, Shiloah's visit was awesome!! It was so needed, I think, on both our parts. It has been almost three years since we had last seen each other so in that time we had 3 babies that neither of us had had the pleasure of meeting..um...ok, that didn't come out right. Bella, Joshua and Ammon have been born in the time we've been apart, so it was fun to see each other's babies and to see how much the older kids have changed and grown up. Charissa and Cailynn were so helpful and grown up. Charissa helped me make some homemade laundry soap and cooking. Cailynn helped me out several times with kitchen duty. The boys (Isaac, Benjamin and Jesse) seemed to just fall into step again. They spent time making forts, playing swords, army and sneaking out the hammers so they could build stuff and just pound on stuff for the fun of it. Hannah was in heaven with all the girls in the house. She especially loved Meri and Bella because they were "baby sisters", just what she's dreamed of having her whole life (that and being the oldest sibling, which isn't ever going to happen).

So, our first "field trip" was to Boot Hill. This is a cemetery for cowboys and pioneers, and a few Indians. The grave markers are wooden planks and say things like "Shot in the Bar" or "Died of Snake Bite".





This grave was of a mother and child.


Our next stop was the lake. I posted those pictures in the previous post. We had a few days that we just hung out and visited. We went out to Ash Hollow, which is a stop on the Mormon/Oregon trail, so there is a lot of pioneer history. Shiloah got most of the pictures of that trip. I don't know where my camera was...I thought I took it with me that night? That afternoon we climbed Windlass Hill, which was one of the steepest parts of the trail for the pioneers. We got to see the sod house too. That night we went to the pioneer pageant. It was kind of cheesy, although some of the stories were funny. That night we went to the beach side of the lake and let the kids play in the water at sunset. Some people started a bonfire and it was really beautiful. We were tired, sunburned and kinda hungry, but was was a beautiful ending to a really beautiful day.

We attended church on Sunday. Monday we hung out and Tuesday we went over to North Platte to the Lincoln County History Museum. I love this museum! Behind the main building they have a pioneer village. It has a train depot, a train engine, log cabin, "gingerbread" house, Sears house (see the post in Life's Little Thrills for those pics...GORGEOUS!), church, school and trapper's cabin, plus some shops, a blacksmith and a couple of barns with machinery and "inventions" on display. I love the red barn. It's a good back drop for pictures!

Hannah, Joshua and Maddie


Simeon


In the train


Salisbury Kids


Ammon traumatized after his picture taking experience in the grass..which none of turned out


Cool Picture (for Blacksmithing)


Log Cabin Kitchen


Two Story Log Cabin


Chrissy in the dress up house


Isaac in WW1 uniform


Perfect! All contained!


Trapper's Cabin




How'd you like to trip over that in the middle of the night?


Stain Glass window from the Sear's House


If I could collect them, I would. This is the old school house. There are many "country schools" around here, some which are still in operation. My dad even attended one up until he was in the 8th grade. I love the old desks and wish I could find some replicas to buy. We didn't get a chance to see it, but the Mansion on the Hill here in Ogallala has a school that you can actually get into to "play" in, and that one was in operation until 1961.


Hannah and Simeon. *Sigh* Notice the "evidence" of the sign making?


Meri. She was so nice and took her paci out for the picture. I just got the biggest laugh out of her paci bouquet.


That pretty much concluded the trip. I still haven't been able to find my pictures of Ash Hollow. Hmm...going in search of those now...

No Winer Babies

To expand on Shiloah's post previous to this one, I thought I would post a few pictures of their visit here. I for some reason thought I had done these already, and I guess I didn't finish the post. So, this was Hannah and McKenzie's "rock sale and museum". I don't know if you can read all that was written, crossed out and written again. I think some of it was written in chalk. "No Winer Babies" was the one that stood out to me the best. *chuckle*





The second night they were here we drove out to the lake. There are two sides of the lake seeing how it is a dam. The first time we went out we went to the lower side and it was during sunset. The water on this side comes from the bottom of the dam so it's exceptionally cold. That didn't seem to bother the kids any who had to get in and try it out.







Benjamin was the bravest that ventured out the farthest.




With the exception of the "eviction order", the visit was great and really needed by all, I believe. I think it's so interesting how you can live somewhere for awhile, get used to it, and kinda forget about what there is to do. It's nice to have a chance to see your own town as a tourist again.

All but Two

Here are Dawn's and my kids (all but two) in the 1960's. (JK, I just edited the photo to look 1960's.) LOL





We had a BLAST visiting Dawn, Curtis and their six kids in Nebraska! It was so fun to see our children playing together.... We talked after I left that we only got one picture together during the entire stay and neither of us are happy with how we look in the picture. Oh well, for memories sake, here it is: (Forgive me Dawn!)



or can we count this picture as one? I'm not too unhappy with it! (LOL)



The kids picked up where they left off in their old friendships. Dawn and I had many laughs over how cute they were. At one point Makenzie and Hannah came in from outside sad and forlorn that no one was coming to their "garage sale". We asked what they were selling and they said, "Rocks." Oh.... We were so sorry for their situation. The next day they decided to improve their original idea. Instead of selling the rocks, they created a "Rock Museum" under the deck. They even made a sign from some old scraps of wood and chalk. Throughout the week we noticed new rules for their museum, like "No boys allowed". It was quite cute!


At one point we went out to Windlass Hill and saw the wagon ruts from the pioneers. Afterwards we went to a Pioneer Pageant that is held annually. It was quite "interesting". Dawn and I exchanged some eye rolls at how cheesy it was. We sat near a whole group of Mennonite women and men. We were surprised at how brightly the women dressed and with their dresses they all had flip flops or other very casual shoes. To be honest I was also surprised as how modern the guys looked, but with clean cut hair cuts. I must be away from my husband too long because they all looked rather attractive too! (ROFL). Speaking of husbands being gone so long...I remember when Ben was in Iraq the first time (2004) and Dawn's husband was in Quatar. We went to the movies together often. One night we went to see Harry Potter 3 I think it was? Anyway, on our way out of the movie theater we were both making comments about how good looking Harry was getting! ROFL We had a good laugh and chalked it up to being without our hubbies too long. I digress....

We stayed with the Salisbury's for 8 days and I had 5 days of traveling from and back to North Carolina. The night before I left, Dawn surprised me with the sweetest gift. She went to bed before I did as I stayed up to chat with Ben online. On my bedside was a gift bag. Inside was a folder with all the brochures of the places we went together, a beautiful white bird house with a pink roof (which I had been eyeing her's with the turquoise roof), and a journal. Inside the journal, Dawn wrote every day of our stay about what we did, what we talked about and the memories of each day. I was in tears as I read it. She is such a wonderful friend and that was such a perfect end to a wonderful stay!

And remember, Dawn, you can't die first!

P.S. More of our trip is here

Happy 4th of July

My husband did up this movie from You Tube of the fireworks here in Ogallala, NE. Enjoy! Oh, not pictured in this was the 4-6 grass fires that were started from the fireworks. Those almost distracted from the display.

Summer Drinks

I wanted to share this story with you. I checked out a book from the library about Nebraska Pioneer Cooking. It has a bunch of recipes in it from pioneer times, which are really interesting to read about. It also has little clips of stories added that were very amusing. In this one story about Mollie, a traveling school teacher who stayed with various families along the way, she shares her experience with the "beverage".

...This one family just about used me up. For breakfast we had salted pork, cornbread and coffee. For dinner, wild greens, boiled pork and cold corn bread, washed down with "beverage". For supper, hoe cake, cold greens, and pork with coffee. The "beverage" was put upon the table in a wooden pail and dished out in tin cups. When asked if I would have some of the "aforesaid," I said "yes", thinking it perhaps was cider, but found out it was vinegar and brown sugar and warm creek water.

In light of this, I thought you might like some summer drink recipes. These are all from the pioneer recipes as well.

Would this be a float or like an Italian soda?

Broken ice
2 T. chocolate syrup
3 T. whipped cream
Milk
soda water
Vanilla ice cream if desired
Stir well before drinking

Raspberry Shrub
Four quarts red raspberries
1 quart vinegar
Let stand for four days and then strain. To each pint of juice add 1 pound of sugar. Boil 20 minutes and bottle.

Grape Wine
1 quart grape pulp, skins, and seeds
1 c. sugar
Put in a jar and let stand until fermented, strain it, return to jar and let stand for a week or two. Draw off wine, bottle and seal.

Lemonade
Upon the very thin rind and juice of four good sized lemons put sugar to your taste, and three pints of boiling water. Make this 36-48 hour before using it. Leave the peel in one day and strain before serving.

Ginger Beer
1 pound sugar
1 ounce cream of tartar
1 1 /2 ounce of best white ginger
1 gallon of boiling water
Pour water on these ingredients and let it stand till the next morning, when it may be bottled Strain through muslin when bottling.

ADHD...Hey look, a squirrel!!

I wanted to share this with those of you that have children with ADHD/ADD and certain types of autism. I recently picked up a booklet on treating ADHD naturally. Isaac had been put on Metadate recently. I was apprehensive of putting him on medications again. He had been on them about five years ago and they didn't work very well. We had problems with mood swings, insomnia, and zombie like behavior. After six months of frustration on both our parts, I took him off of it. I attempted to change our diet, albeit half heartedly, but there wasn't a big difference there either. This year after having many tests and trying out different curriculums, I threw my hands up in frustration and marched Isaac back to the doctor for help, where they prescribed a new (but same type) of medication again and the same problems from before started over again.
There are three things listed that these kids usually lack: Fish Oil (omega 3 and 6's), magnesium, and zinc. I went off to the nutrition store to see what I could find. Hallelujah!!! VAXA Attend!!! It is homeopathic, it's got magnesium and zinc in it, it's got Gotu Kola (helps with attention/focusing) and it's got a number of other remedies in it that are supposed to help with ADHD. It has been a godsend!
Isaac has been on it for 4 days. I coupled this with Fish Oil and so he's been taking a dose in the morning and in the afternoon. He's not gotten in trouble, he's been able to sit down and do his school work in LESS than 15 minutes!!! This was unheard of when dealing with Isaac before. We still have a bit of work to go in the impulsive department, but I think he's doing very well, and he says he feels much better on it than he did with the Metadate. Isaac has been a hard kid to get along with sometimes and does things we just do not understand, but for the first time in probably his whole life, we are making progress and communicating and it is great to see the real Isaac under all his frustrations and distractions.

This is Vaxa's site for the "Attend" (Suport for Attention Difficulties):
http://www.vaxa.com/636.cfm

I was so excited for Isaac and his progress I just had to share.


By the way, I did actually see a squirrel today. He was running off across the road with a rolled up sock in his mouth. Wonder what he was going to do with that?

FYI: Know your Landlord and Tenant Laws

I've debated about sharing this situation on here, but I learned today that I'm not the only one this has happened to by the same company, which means it has probably happened to some of you. Brace yourself, this is going to be long.

We rent a house through Cobb Realty, here in lovely Ogallala, NE. This is our 3rd house with them and to be honest, while this house is bigger than our last one, it had a lot more problems, like grout and tiles falling out, trim falling off, it's a house on a hill and 90% of the time the wind is blowing, so it's caused some weather damage. We had some plumbing issues and eventually they replaced the water heater. Most of the things I complain about were never addressed and several times I got chastised for reporting the issues, well, because none of the other tenants had the issues. The refrigerator had a fan go out in it. The dryer vent is clogged and it takes at least 2 cycles to dry our clothes. I guess this is considered normal wear and tear. I was a little worried when we moved in and one of the realty ladies told me not to expect much to be done because the owners do as little as possible to keep up the house.

Fast forward to Shiloah's visit. Everything was going along great. Monday, June 16, Cobb calls and wants to do a walk through with the owners who have not seen the house in almost 4 years. Even though I warned them that we had friends visiting and the house was not going to be perfect, they still came. They tried to come Sat. night but Curtis turned them away seeing how he was by himself and with several kids. Mrs. W. shook my hand and only said two things to me on the walk through: how'd the hole in the wall happen and what happened to the fan/light in the kids room. She stomped through the whole house and then just left and never said anything else.

Tuesday night we have the Sheriff arrive. He serves us papers that we have 3 days to fix everything (18 things: fix screen door, doorbell, security light and siding on garage ((all of which blew off in a wind storm)), clean the appliances as they were "filthy", and fix a window (3 of which were broken when we moved in), fix a lock that fell off a door, fix holes in the wall, etc), and if not fixed, we are evicted. Enter PANIC. First of all, where are we going to go, a family of eight, in a town that has NO rental housing at all for a family our size, unless we want to squeeze into a 2 bedroom apartment, which I've noticed a lot of places have a set amount of tenants allowed for apartments. Second of all, if the owners had read their lease and walk through report, they would see that the majority of these things were listed on the walk through and have never been tended to. The biggest "violation" we were committing: we had 12 children and 3 adults living in the house and our lease clearly states that only 9 can live here. Apparently guests that have been visiting for week now qualify as tenants?

Wednesday morning I meet with Cobb to bump the letter up against their incomplete copy of the walk through. Conveniently, nobody had the original and conveniently, when we went in to get a copy of it the next morning, our file was at home with one of the realtors that was "working on it". When we finally did get all the paperwork situated, the walk through papers were still missing the original copy that had more stuff written on the back. They presented the information to the owners and that night we got another letter stating we had to fix 13 things by July, 2 or we were getting evicted. Still, many of the things on the paper were from the walk through and many of the things on the paper were wear and tear and could be covered by their insurance company (like the wind damaged items). And the "extra tenants" issue? Our neighbor called to tell on us because she swore the other family moved in June 1st and have no intention of ever leaving. Instead of believe me or call me about it, even after I told them we had friends visiting, they chose to believe the neighbor.

Thursday morning Shiloah had to leave. Not only have we now panicked, but we had the last two days of her visit ruined by inconsiderate people. I contacted a lawyer about the situation, after I had asked the realty company what defense we could expect from them and they shrugged their shoulders and stammered around the subject. After asking several questions about the issues and they couldn't answer me, I figured that was a smarter thing to do. I really think Cobb Realty expected us to just slink off in the middle of the night. I don't think they expected us to fight them on this issue. The lawyer helped me write up a letter of non-compliance, basically stating we would not fix the things listed on the letter because it was damaged by weather and wear and tear. Next we listed things that would be clean or put back in as good or better condition as when we moved out (like clean appliances and cleaning the carpet and wiping down the walls).

I think they dropped the issue after that. Although, they called to say they were bringing out a smoke detector on Friday and wanted to do another walk through on Saturday, but they never showed up. This after chewing me out about not being in the office at 8:00 a.m. to promptly return a signed copy of the 2nd letter saying we would comply (but I got there at 12 with the letter of non-compliance). This after I panicked again and cleaned like a raging lunatic to make sure the house was in perfect order for their arrival.

By Sunday I was on my death bed with Strep Throat.

So, what's the lesson learned here? You cannot be evicted from your home if you have paid your rent on time and the house is clean. If the owners want you out, they have to pay YOU a fee, usually three months rent and your security deposit if they want you out before your lease is up. If they really want you out they also have to have a court order stating you are being evicted. Know your rights!

I've also learned another lesson while living out here. Be careful coming to these small towns. The housing is not always available. What may be left over could be a complete dump. Many out here seem to do the bare minimum to maintain the property, often expecting the tenant to keep up on these things. One last thing: if you rent your house out, it is NO LONGER YOUR CASTLE!!! Do not expect it to be as pristine as you left it. Do not expect someone to love it like you did. Unfortunately it is a risk you take when you rent your home out, but flying off the handle because it's not as perfect as you let if it (say, four years ago), is out of control.

Good luck to all you renters out there. I know this is not our forever place so we have refrained from buying a home here; maybe we would have more options if we did buy, therefore we are forced to rent.

And the Strep Throat? This has been one of the worse cases I've ever experienced. Goes to show you what stress can do to you sometimes. Also, one more comment from my little soap box. I may joke on here and to friends that my kids have trashed out my house. But I have learned there is a difference between "lived in" and "filthy". I have gauged this based on other friends' houses. Our children will drag out clothes, toys and books. Our house will get messy, but by the end of the day, it's usually straightened up. Our carpet may have stains on it, but we won't hesitate to lay our baby on it. Laundry is cleaned, but waiting to be put away. This is normal living. Something's got to be said about being able to clean your house to immaculate status in 3 hours, right? Ok, off my box.