A gorgeous...and very productive day!

Ah! Nothing like a bit of spring fever. We had a really nice day today. The weather was perfect! It was probably close to 70 degrees and we had a beautiful blue clear sky. It was a day for walking, hanging out the laundry (which I do everyday anyway :O) ), prepping the boat for spring and summer fun, riding the 4wheelers...
discing up the garden... fine-tuning it with the tiller...
(This was no easy task because the chickens were out running around at the time. They really enjoyed scratching around in that dirt!)
But because we almost lost a few chickens in a "tiller accident" we put them up! (These chickens have no fear!!)
What did we plant so early, you ask? We put out our cabbage and onions. This year we planted 3 different types of onions...Georgia Sweet, yellow, and purple. (And yes, you'll notice from the picture below that our garden rows are not perfectly straight. :O) We always "let" the kids help and since we've had kids, we've not had straight rows. But that's ok. The food is always just as good.)
We ate supper after we finished all the garden work, then laid down on the picnic table by the pond in the dark watching the stars and listening to the frogs croaking. :O) That's my idea of a good day. :O) Hope you and yours had just as nice a day as we had!

Spring is near!

Today was a beautiful, slightly-chilly-but-not-cold-day. One of the items on our to-do-list was to plant some fruit trees. We planted 2 semi-dwarf Bartlett pear trees and 2 semi-dwarf yellow delicious apple trees. Now if the fruit would just hurry!! :O)

Snowy days

We woke up to a few inches of snow yesterday morning. Believe it or not, the kids talked me into taking a "snow day". So, all day long, we did no school work at all. It really was too cold for anybody to go outside and play in the snow for any length of time. The high was 22, but it was windy, which made it seem alot colder! Sorry the picture didn't turn out very light or bright but it was taken early in the morning.

Apart from the snow day off of school, things are running along quite smoothly. It's business as usual here....that involves lots of reading....

and lots of research....

and lots of hard work, in general....

This is a fairly busy time of the school year. Achievement tests are coming right up, then Jacob will be taking the ACT in early June. Hard to believe he'll be a senior next year! I'm always careful when keeping track of our school records. As far as Jacob's high school credits are concerned, we're right on target and he should have a fairly easy year next year. We've been discussing our college options. Right now, he seems to be leaning towards taking business courses. We might even try some online courses this summer.

Hope all is well wherever you are. I'll be posting again soon!!

We're still here!

We're still here...and see, there's proof in the picture above! Haven't updated in a while...our camera has been acting crazy and I've been having trouble downloading pictures. (I'm trying to convince Matt it's time to buy a new camera) :O)
Anyway, all is well here and hope life is good wherever you are! Nothing really much new to report. School is still going great. There have been a few bumps in the road (namely MATH) but we seem to be overcoming those little hurdles. We're currently working on Day 126 of the school year...leaving us 54 remaining days to complete the year. Woohoo!! We should be done, Lord willing, no later than mid-May (depends on how much time we take for spring break).
Concerning farm news, we're still cow-less and goat-less. But we've been getting rain and we're hoping for a good spring so that we can re-populate these empty, lonely hills again with cows! I think that even the chickens are recovering from the drought...they're starting to lay again! Yippee! It's hard to beat farm fresh eggs!
So anyway, that's a brief update on us. I'll be posting more when I get my new camera. :O)

Rockets...and new suits

Catchy title, huh? :O) Read on, and you'll understand.
Katie got a model rocket last week, so she and her Dad (mostly Dad) spent alot of time putting it together and getting it all set up.

They chose a place to set it up where it surely wouldn't land in a tree. There were no trees close enough. (whatever) Katie was all excited....I've never seen one of these things blast off....I tried to get a picture of take-off but it was too fast. It was gone before I knew it! Plus...it's hard to take a picture when you're squealing and running in the opposite direction. (The dogs did NOT like this....Diamond ended up in the doghouse pouting) So where did it land, you ask? In a tree. It nestled in one of the tallest trees on one of the tallest hills on our property. I never would have believed it would have gone so far so fast! Matt ended up having to cut the tree down to get the rocket. Oh well...it was a huge oak...it'll make good firewood. :O)
Ok, so there's the rocket part of the title. Now onto the new suit. Just thought I'd post a picture of Jacob in his new suit. Ain't he slick? :O)

Winter is definitely here!

Yesterday was Day One of our 2nd semester and what a good school day we had! The kids always fall right back in sequence no matter how long our break has been, and I am one thankful mama!
And brrrr! It's cold here! Yesterdays high was 23 degrees! I never ever never wear shoes in the house (don't even wear them often outside!), much less socks, but yesterday was definitely sock day! We spent most of the day huddled around the woodstove! I have 3 birdfeeders outside my living room window (near the woodstove) so we watched the birds alot yesterday. :) They ate like there was no tomorrow! It's funny how, over the past several years, we've been able to recognize a few birds that come here year after year. For instance, there's a little chickadee with a cowlick on the back of his hear, whom I have affectionately dubbed "Cowlick." There's another little bird that always has a baldspot on his head. :) Then there is a really (and I do mean really) chubby goldfinch named Eglon...named for that...um, shall we say "fat" king in the Bible. :) Anyway, they're fun to watch...even if I'm the only one who really enjoys that pasttime.
Matthew 6:25-26 ¶Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?

We're off to a new year!

2008 is up and running now and we wish you a Happy New Year! We'll begin our 2nd semester of homeschool tomorrow. I think the hardest part will be just getting the kids out of bed in the morning. We've been sleeping in during our vacation, and sometimes it's hard to get adjusted to waking up early. But once they get out of bed, I am confident hoping things will go smoothly.

Thought I'd post a picture of one of the gifts Katie got for Christmas. It's a neat little kit where you make a mold of the human skeleton, let it harden, remove it from the mold, then put it together with magnets or just glue it on a background. The kit includes many different colors of paint, but who wants a red skeleton?? She really enjoyed doing this. Gotta love those educational games! :O)