It's been a long time

I know, I know. It has been forever since I've blogged. And it has almost been so long I don't even know where to start. So what have we been doing?

Well, in April we went to the homeschool conference and picked up some awesome new art curriculum (more about that in another post), spent a weekend in the cities and rode the rides at the Mall of America, I worked a bunch of overtime, and I quit blogging. I didn't quit intentionally; it just sort of happened. Well, really, life happened and it got pushed to the wayside.

For several years now, instead of showering our kids with presents for their birthdays, we have taken them somewhere to do something special with the rest of the family. Part of the reason that we started doing this is that I don't like having lots of stuff around. It just creates more stuff to clean and the kids generally lose interest in the new toy after a couple of weeks anyway. It just seems like such a waste of money. Plus I want to help shape children that value time spent with family over "stuff."

Ellie and Kara's birthdays are only 5 days apart in November and we usually spend a night in a hotel with a water park. For several years we went to the Holiday Inn in Owatonna, but this past fall, since the older girls were outgrowing that water park, we went to the Dells.

Darin and Natalie's birthdays are about a month apart in the spring so we celebrate theirs together as well. For the past couple of years we have stayed in a hotel and then ridden the rides at the amusement park at the Mall of America. We all had a blast. It is especially fun riding the roller coaster with Ellie, listening to her hyperventilate and watching her knuckles turn white. Sick sense of humor, I know. But she was willing to ride it more than once as long as she was with me.

Here are some of the pictures of us:



Darin and Natalie had a blast on this ride. It whips you around the ends and elicits loads of giggles from the kids that ride it.






We happened to be there a couple of weeks before Easter and they had an Easter-cookie decorating station. Free snack for the kids!!





Both of the kids loved this ride too. And the people who were watching got an absolute kick out of watching Natalie. She was giggling uncontrollably and unlike her fellow riders, she let her legs flop up and down along with the ride.





Here are Natalie and Darin on the bumper cars. Natalie thought it was pretty funny when she'd run into Darin.


Here are the girls on one of their favorite rides. Last year when I made Ellie ride this with me, she had the same hyperventilating response that she did this year on the roller coaster. But she liked riding it anyway because it made me laugh.

Cream Cheese Tomato Soup

'Tis the season for soups! Here is another one of our favorites from Dining in the Spirit of Naniboujou.

Cream Cheese Tomato Soup

2 T butter

1/2 cup finely diced onions

6 ounces cream cheese

2 cans (11 oz each) condensed tomato soup

3 cups milk

2 cans (14 oz each) diced tomatoes, with juice

2 tsp basil

Melt butter in pan and saute the onions until tender, about 3-5 minutes. Add cream cheese, stirring while it melts. Mix in the tomato soup until smooth. Add the milk slowly, mixing well. Continue cooking and add the diced tomatoes and the basil.

Ice Skating

Ever since Dan started his new job where he doesn't have to work such crazy hours, the kids have been begging to go ice skating. So we decided that yesterday would be the day. The local ice rink has rather limited free skate hours so our only options were Saturday evening from 7-9 or Sunday afternoon from 1-3. The choice was obvious.

Unfortunately I didn't bring the camera. I figured there wasn't really any point since there were four children who didn't know how to skate, one adult who really knows how to skate, and one adult who knows how to skate but can't for the life of her figure out how to stop (without running into a wall). Plus, when I wasn't using it, where was I going to put it? I wasn't about to leave it out in the open for someone to take.

While I was working on getting everyone's skates on, Dan took Natalie out on the ice (she had her skates on first). She was petrified and cried every time Dan tried to put her on the ice. Eventually we found the little walkers made from PVC pipe for kids to use to learn to skate. I pushed her around with that for about ten minutes and then she didn't want my help at all. She wanted to do it on her own. Even when she fell she told me she didn't need my help. Pretty soon she was zipping around the ice rink having an absolute blast. She'd even skate up to Ellie and tell her that she needed to race her.

Darin did pretty well too. All of the kids managed to snag one of the walkers (there aren't nearly enough there and some were being used by kids who obviously didn't need them) for awhile and that really helped. Kara had the hardest time learning to skate which surprised me since she seems to be the most athletic.

But being at the Rec Center just reiterated that homeschooling is a good choice for us. Some girls can be so mean!! Once when Kara stepped off the ice and Dan was holding her walker, Natalie fell so he leaned over to pick her up and this girl snatched Kara's walker almost right out of his hands! And there were other instances of disrespect that I saw. It made me very thankful for the sweetness of my own children. And I'm not saying that all homeschooled children are well-behaved or that all public school children are rotten. There just seems to be a greater incidence of disrespectful and mean children in the public school.

All in all we had a great time and have decided that we need to go back soon. Several times throughout the rest of the day Natalie would tell me how much fun she had ice skating.

Ellie's new job

Last year Ellie went to camp with her friend O at Ironwood Springs Christian Ranch and loved it. After she got home last year we told her that she wouldn't be able to go every year since it is rather expensive. Well this year O is going to camp again so Ellie, of course, wants to go too. Instead of going to the overnight camp, she is going to the day camp that focuses on horses. O loves horses. Ellie wants to go too but knows that I'm not forking over the dough for her to go. She's got to make the money herself. She has thought of selling friendship bracelets to the neighbors, shoveling their driveways (I vetoed that one since she hasn't yet proven herself on our driveway), and doing extra chores around the house.

She'd pretty much given up hope that she would be able to raise enough money to go until Dan came up with a great idea!! Dan asked me what things around the house I'd most like help with, and I told him washing the dishes and doing laundry. So we proposed to Ellie that we would pay her to wash all of the non-dishwasher dishes and do all the laundry (including folding and putting away) until mid-July when the camp is. She will get paid $10 per week if she does these chores with a good attitude, does them to my specifications and doesn't let her schoolwork suffer.

When we told her what our plan was, we told her that she needed to think about it overnight as it was a big commitment and we didn't want her to take it lightly. And she would still need to come up with some of the money on her own.

At first when Dan brought up the idea that we pay her for doing chores, I wasn't too keen on it. I didn't really like giving up $40 a month to give to her, but I quickly saw the value of not having to do the dishes or the laundry--my two least favorite chores.

The next morning Ellie said that she wanted to accept the challenge and promptly went and folded three loads of laundry that still needed to be folded from the previous week. (Have I mentioned how much I hate laundry?)

This is only the first week and time will tell if she follows through all the way to the end. But so far it is working out well. Her schoolwork hasn't suffered and she's been doing it with a good attitude. She's actually been quite cute. She will frequently ask me to come look at whatever she has washed or folded to make sure that she is doing it right. "I just don't want it to come out of my pay, Mom (if she doesn't do it right)," she often says.

The big adjustment will be when I have to go back to doing those chores. I just may have to try to hire her again!!

Poem by Ellie

Ellie brought me this poem last night that she wrote--completely unprompted!! I thought it was cute so I thought I'd share it with you.

Oasters
I like to ride on roller coasters
I don't like to buy toasters and coasters
I really don't like big, big boasters
I hang lots of pictures, comics and posters.

Waiting for spring

It is almost the end of February and winter will still be around for quite awhile yet. In fact, they are predicting six inches of snow on Thursday. But we are all ready for winter to be over--even Dan who commented that maybe we should move to Phoenix (not that he'd be liking that decision in the middle of the summer there)!! Several times a week I'll hear Dan or one of the kids wonder out loud how long it will be until we can sit outside in our screened-in porch. In the summertime, we practically live out there.

This week we got a Jung Seed catalog in the mail which only heightened our desire for summer to be here. Ellie and Kara have been looking through it and asked me if they could plant something this summer. I have a small garden plot that doesn't have great soil (I have attempted to amend the soil to no avail) and has never done well with tomatoes and green peppers so I told the girls they could plant the garden this year. They have to buy the seeds and plants, water and weed it and harvest what they plant. So yesterday afternoon they looked a little more closely at the catalog and picked out what they wanted to plant. Ellie decided to plant pickling cucumbers (she wants to make pickles), mesclun mix and a row of flowers. Kara is going to plant carrots, peas and a row of flowers.




Here they are adding up the cost of the seeds:

Dilly Bean Potato Soup

When menu planning for this month I found a great-looking and inexpensive soup recipe in Simply in Season. I was a little skeptical about how the soup would taste as I've never made a soup that combines potatoes and beans. But I figured it was cheap and I've not been disappointed in anything from this cookbook so far so I'd give it a try. And it gave me the opportunity to use my new pan (a Le Creuset knock-off). I was not disappointed. It was delicious!! Even Darin (who thinks he's picky) loved it and had seconds. It is just as good warmed up the next day.

Dilly Bean Potato Soup

3/4 cups chopped celery

3 carrots, shredded

1-2 cloves garlic, minced

In large pot saute in 1 tablespoon olive oil.

6 cups chicken or vegetable broth

4-5 large potatoes, peeled and diced

salt to taste

Add and simmer until potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes. Mash some of the potatoes.

4 1/2 cups cooked Great Northern beans (I used dried that I had cooked the night before)

1 T dried dill weed

Add to soup.

3/4 cup plain yogurt or sour cream

1 1/2 T flour

1/2 tsp pepper

Combine and stir into soup. Cook and stir until sour cream has been mixed in and heated.

Serve with fresh bread.