The Adventures of the Reese's Pieces Gang

I love Wisconsin weather! The public schools decided to close down for today last night because the blizzard was supposed to be horrible. This morning here is it clear with some wind still, not bad for Wisconsin though. South of us they are still being hammered with snow and high winds, but we will have a pleasant snow day with everyone home.

I'm going to let the home schoolers have a day off too. They have been working really hard lately. Our move last May caused us to end school early and thus not get as much accomplished as I wanted for the year. We finished last years stuff by Christmas and now we are pushing to complete an entire grade in 5 months. The kids are working hard and are doing well. I think for the older children going through the material faster is keeping it fresh in their heads which is making it easier to remember the facts. They complain a lot because they are doing school for 6-8 hours a day (like normal school kids). This time schedule seems strenuous to them since we usually only have to work 4-6 hours a day to get school done. It will be nice to be totally back on track by the end of May. The fast paced way we are moving through the subjects requires a lot more work on my end too. Keeping up with the grading and testing occupies most of my day. So..... a snow day is welcome!!

I'm going to bake cookies with Philip, he is star student this week in his first grade class at school and wants to take a treat to share with his friends. Then we will do some much needed cleaning.

Happy Winter Wonderland to those of you enjoying this Blizzard too!!

School has begun again. The three littles started at New Holstein Elementary last week and overall had a very good week. Thomas, who is in grade 2, is adjusting well to being in the classroom again and is excited to try ridding the bus this week. We have his IEP (Individualized Education Plan) meeting on Tuesday at school to outline the areas that we will target this year with his behaviors, therapy (speech & Occupational Therapy) and education at school. Philip is in kindergarten and having a great time! Nathan and I went to his class for a shortened day on Thursday, then on Friday he went by himself and rode the bus home. He loved it!! He will be getting evaluated for speech which will allow him to receive speech therapy soon.

The older kids and I took the first week to get used to our new spelling program. We are using Spelling Power which allows each child to be at their own level, while progressing as quickly as they master the current word list. They are all doing great and are really enjoying it! We also did their math testing so I could verify which level each child is at while getting a good picture of their strength and weaknesses in Math. We ended the week by hanging a bulletin board, white board and classroom clock. The kids also wrote a Journal entry about their first week of school. This next week we will add a couple more subjects for each child, depending on what curriculum's have arrived by then. We are still waiting for all our school materials to arrive.

This year they each have their own crates to hold their school materials, and they have their own "space". Elizabeth uses the table, Caleb the school desk, and Sam, the old computer desk. They really like having their own "desks" this year! Within the next couple weeks we will start them on Piano too. I want them each to have a foundation in music and piano is the best way to attain that. Once they each have a good understanding of music theory and the treble and base clef notes then we will look at getting them each an additional instrument to learn.

This year's schooling will be a lot more structured than last year and I am enjoying the change. The kids seem to be really liking having a guided lesson for each subject too. We are using Alpha Omega Life Packs for science, history, and language arts this year. I'm sure it will be another year of learning what works and what doesn't!

We spent this past week getting back into a "normal" routine. The week before was so busy with Sunny's departure, Elizabeth's birthday, and the Youth Group activity that our week was just CRAZY! This week we focused on getting back into a good school routine and enjoyed stopping by the library to refresh our supply of books and audio learning cd's. We have a great library only 10 miles from our house. The head of the children's dept loves home schooling families and it shows. She is very helpful and loves working with kids!! We checked out a cd on Squanto that is produced by Focus on the Family. It is excellent, I would highly recommend that you try to borrow or buy it for your family if you have children.

Phil finished up the chicken room all but the laying boxes. For now we put some crates filled with straw up on top of their tall feeder lid. Our new hens will hopefully start laying eggs any day.... we anxiously await the day when we no longer need to buy eggs from the store or others.

Phil also made a stall in the barn for the goats so we could get them out of their summer area and into a place where it is much warmer. He plans on building them a larger winter stall in the middle of the barn but the one he finished was already partially started and easier to complete. Plus it leads to the outside which he can fence in with some electric fencing to allow the goats to have some free choice grazing on the "warmer" days.

Pinky and Stinky have been reduced to the upper left hand corner of their pasture area and are enjoying more feed these days while we fatten them up for butchering and wintering. Phil will be working on a stall for Pinky over these next couple of weeks so that when we haul off Stinky for butchering we will be able to move her into her winter stall.

Our first Youth activity was the evening of Elizabeth's birthday Party. Our activity for the night was entitled "chicken run"! We divided the youth and our boys into two teams which had to catch all the roosters (18) and put them into the chicken tractors for fattening before we butcher them. Would you believe I forgot to take pictures!!! It was quite fun watching the girls, Pastor Steve, Phil, Caleb & Sam chasing the roosters. We enjoyed a toasty campfire which we used for hot dogs and s'mores. The girls also practiced for their Bible quizzing in which they tied for First Place this past weekend at our regional Youth Meeting. Elizabeth was very nervous about the quizzing but did manage to answer one question to help her team gain their victory.

The boys and I spent Saturday getting the garden ready for its wintery rest. We pulled up the trellises, ripped out all the dead plants, buried the strawberry plants under straw, and started the process of spreading a thin layer of straw over the entire garden. Our soil is solid clay. I hope that by adding the straw and rabbit manure it will start the process of getting the soil more peat like and workable. I will do a shallow 3 inch tilling of the straw this week after I sprinkle on some lime. Next fall I will have some nicely composted goat, pig, and chicken poop to spread throughout the garden, that will be just lovely!! :-) We will also be picking rocks in the new garden plot and ripping up any weeds that Stinky & Pinky decided not to eat this summer. My last garden project for this year will be to transplant some raspberry plants from a friend into the new garden plot. We are still enjoying lettuce, spinach, leeks, celery, and brussels sprouts but that will probably come to an end soon since the temperatures are dropping and I don't have these foods in winter boxes.

The only other new event in our lives is that I am a piano teacher again! I was approached by a family in our church and asked to teach their three daughters. I was planning on teaching Elizabeth this year and decided it would be fun to get back to teaching a couple other students. It has challenged me to get back to the piano, and I now spend many days wishing I had a piano here at the house to practice. Since we don't have a piano I teach at our church and practice at our church. I hope that this week Eliza and I will be able to start practicing 4-5 days a week at the church. Thankfully our church is only 10 minutes away, but it is more convenient to practice when the boys can stay here, so Phil and I are trying to figure out when we can work piano practice into our daily schedule.

Well, that concludes the latest info on the Reese's Pieces gang.... enjoy a week filled with God's beautiful creation during this wonderful fall season!

Autumn has finally arrived to New Holstein Wisconsin! The days are cooler, the crops slowing down and/or being harvested, the tree's turning their beautiful warm colors, and the smell of wood burning stoves fill the air. I apologize for my lack of blogging this past month. I've been a bit overwhelmed with everything from my blod clot to school, preserving, and trying to develop a good daily schedule with the children.

So here is a quick run down on what we have been doing:
1. Home schooling -- Our school year is going great so far. The kids are enjoying the routine and I am enjoying seeing them be successful while having fun learning. We are doing a very intensive health unit right now where the kids are learning the importance of a clean room, clean bathroom, and hand cleanliness (especially after being outside holding chickens and petting goats).

2. Gardening -- We are still canning tomatoes and freezing zucchini. Usually only 1 day a week is consumed with preserving the garden produce. We are enjoying our fall lettuce bed and have tried a couple yummy Butternut Squash! Soon I will be harvesting some brussels sprouts and the sweet potatoes. We will also be working on the new 84 X 84 garden plot that Stinky and Pinky have been weeding, fertilizing, and picking rocks in.

3. Health -- I met with my doctor today and he is sending me to a podiatrist for my foot. He is wondering if my blod clot may have been a result of the injury to my foot. I still have many times where I experience a lot of pain in my foot, so we are going to try to find out what it wrong with my foot. I see my family doctor again the beginning of December at which time I will probably be able to go off the blood thinner. I have his permission to start walking for exercise to help the blood flow as well as to hopefully help my Blood pressure to go down.

4. Animals -- The goose is getting fat, the ducks are almost ready to be butchered, Stinky is looking more pork choppish, and I butchered our first chicken last week! Yep, you read correctly, I, Me who HATES blood & guts butchered a chicken! One of our roosters got hit by a car but was still warm. I was determined to NOT miss out on the meat so I quickly put a pot of water on to boil, and got a knife while Sam was tying it up by the feet to the tree, and slit the throat (after about 7 tries, and a run into the house for a large serving fork to hold the head still). I am afraid that after digging out the guts and going through an anatomy session with the kids pointing out the various organs, I simply couldn't handle separating out all the gizzards for cooking later. We ate the bird for dinner even though he was still quite small. Phil butchered another one that evening that had been attacked by Sunny and had a injured leg. After eating these two small birds we've decided they need another month or so and need to be confined so they can put on a bit of weight.

5. Family -- We were so blessed to have Mom & Dad Reese with us for about 10 days while I was on couch potato rest. We also had a fun surprise visit from Phil's Uncle Jack and his wife Auntie Jane. They came all the way from Colorado to bring us yards and yards of material and a beautiful electronic sewing machine. I'm so excited!! I've had 3 other machines given to me and none of them worked. This machine is oiled adjusted and ready for action. The first two things on our winter sewing project list are winter jammies for everyone and window coverings for each of the rooms. I hope that I'll be able to remember what to do after not sewing for 13 years. Elizabeth really wants to learn to sew and I'm sure she will have a talent for it!

6. Church -- We love our little church! I got to attend a ladies sleepover with a few other ladies from the church. It was so much fun getting to know the ladies that were at the sleep over. We had fun chatting, eating, and playing games. Samuel has one of the lead roles in our Christmas program this year. He plays the role of a little boy who is ALWAYS eating, while going on an adventure with another little boy as they seek to help a needy family in their community. Sam is learning his lines and is very excited about it.

That's about it for now! I'll try not to have such a huge gap in my blogs this month.

I wrote this blog on Friday but was having problems with the internet connection so it didn't post. So read it as if it was written on Friday.

This mornings blood work shows that I'm at 2.1 so I did not have to get a Lovanex shot today!! My tummy is so relieved and so am I! The hospital said that I should get a break from daily blood work and shots at least until we get the results of the blood work on Monday. Thank you for praying!!

My doctors appointment yesterday was also encouraging. Our new family doctor said that sometime between 3-6 months we will stop the oral medication. Then after a couple months they will run a test to see if I have a clotting disorder. If I do not they will not "require" me to stay on thinners. I explained to the doctor that I wanted off the thinners as soon as it was safe. I also talked with him about my desire to continue to loose weight through proper diet and exercise rather than being put back on BP medicines and he agreed that my plan was a reasonable one. I see the doctor again in a month and will still be monitored Mon - Fri by the Anti Coagulation clinic until they feel my levels are at a point when I can spread the testing to 1 time a week then eventually 1 time a month.

I'm using my resting time to read everything I can about raising the animals we have and the proper harvest and storage of our garden veggies. We registered at our local library yesterday and took the opportunity to check out more books on farming and in particular raising goats.

Periodically we have been blessed by a friend bringing over a meal. That is a huge help since Phil is trying to work, manage our unruly animals, and keep up with the house. Last night a friend who also practices the Nourishing Traditions way of eating brought over a WONDERFUL Lamb Coconut Curry stew. It was so good, the kids practically licked their bowls!! Thomas wouldn't eat the meat since it was "green". It is often very discouraging dealing with his sensory issues along with his food allergies. But such is life!!

The kids are enjoying their first research/reading/science unit: GOATS! They are reading about how to care for goats while we are developing a charting system to keep track of when they are in heat (so we can breed them), how much feed they are getting, how much milk they are giving, what minerals & supplements they are on (this will happen when they are closer to kidding), and eventually when they are due to kid. It is really amazing how much graphing, charting, and math skills are used in raising healthy animals.

I'm really excited about starting the kids nutrition unit. The older three children will be learning how to prepare about 10 healthy lunch meals. Once they are comfortable making these dishes they will be on a rotation system of having to plan a week of lunch meals. They will be learning how to make nourishing soups, stews, sandwiches, salads, and whole grain pasta dishes.

Time to check the weather and pick a day sometime over the next couple of weeks when we can harvest our potatoes! Phil and Elizabeth are going to be making Cultured Salsa today too. That should be interesting! :-) Phil whipped up a batch of his first soaked whole grain pizza crust this morning too! What a guy!!

It has been a while since I've posted. We have been enjoying beautiful weather as summer winds to a close. Friday through Tuesday we were able to enjoy a wonderful visit with Phil's parents. The visit was short but was such a nice change to our days. The fellowship was sweet and the kids enjoyed some great grandparent time!

Philip

Our garden continues to kick out produce and we try to figure out what to do with it! :-) So far we've canned 14 quarts of applesauce from the tree in our yard, zucchini relish, zucchini pickles, squash pickles, and bread & butter pickles. We also made up 5 bags of zucchini crisp filling for the freezer, I'll let you know if it works just as well as apple crisp/pie stored in the freezer. The tomatoes are starting to ripen a bit faster. I'm anxious to try some tomato sauce and my canning recipe calls for 45 pounds of tomatoes. Today I brought in 12 pounds. Maybe by the middle of next week I'll have enough to try my first batch of tomato sauce. I canned my first two quarts of diced tomatoes this past weekend.

Today we harvested our first two spaghetti squash. It looks like I'll have a ton of pickling cucumbers ready next week. most are about as big as my pinky right now, so by next week they should be a nice size.

The vine bore has finally killed my last two pumpkin plants and is starting to move to my butternut squash. This makes me very sad!!! I have a ton of butternut squash forming so hopefully they won't progress fast enough to ruin the entire crop. I dream of having enough butternut squash to last the winter but we'll have to see if the bore destroys those dreams as he has my dreams of pumpkin pie, pumpkin bread, and pumpkin soup made right in the pumpkin.

We have some watermelons that are about the size of a basket ball. I hope that it stays warm for a few more weeks so they can finish growing.

We lost about 8 of our cauliflower heads to the heat of the sun. I didn't know until too late that you have to keep the cauliflower covered while the flowerettes are forming. The pigs are enjoying the bitter cauliflower. We have 8 plants left that have just started to form their cauliflower heads so I tied the leaves up around them today hoping that we will be able to harvest some nice cauliflower in a couple weeks.

Our fall lettuce, spinach, pea and bean plants are starting to grow. The fall broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage haven't sprouted yet. It has been so hot and dry! We are watering the garden so that each section gets watered at least every other day, but it might not be enough to get the plants to start. We will just wait and see.

We are gearing up for school. Our school supplies have been purchased. I was given free English/language arts books for the older three, math for the older two, and science & social studies/history for all the kids. I found some great math books for Thomas. We are working on his blends in phonics and will be starting to do a review of his sight words next week. While shopping the other day I found the perfect kindergarten work book for Philip! Elizabeth and Caleb are reading books like crazy lately which is fun! Phil is reading the kids The Hobbit for literature. I am working on lesson plans for the month of September. I yet have to purchase the spelling books for the older three and Thomas's reading curriculum but other than that we have everything needed to start our school year! I'm excited about our character study that we will be doing called Proverbs for People by Rick & Marilyn Boyer. The first lesson is exactly what we need right now, Slothful vs. Diligence. The kids still have not adjusted to the needs of our farmette country life. It amazes me how lazy we are allowing our kids to be raised and I always thought my kids weren't that bad until moving here. The typical American child is EXTREMELY lazy and selfish. Yes I realize we all struggle with laziness and selfishness. BUT, that isn't how it should be. Somehow my generation and this next one (I believe) are missing the discipline gene that our WWII grandparents had. Phil and I pray that with lots of patience and consistency that we will have a changed heart and that we will be able to help to shape young men and a young women that will have great work ethics.

What a title hey?

Snow: Yes that is right it is snowing again in Wisconsin tonight. They are anticipating 4-8 inches for our area so tomorrow may be another snow day. Our school has already used up all their snow days so I'm sure they will try to just delay school if it is at all possible. I just went upstairs to check out the weather and we already have 1" and it is coming down quite nicely.

School: Home schooling with Samuel is going well. Most days we cruise right through Math, English, and Reading. Science & Social Studies are the fun subjects as we are working on starting our plants for the garden and reading whatever interests us for Social Studies. My biggest concern for Sam right now is his reading & math. He is reading better, but not as well as a fourth grader should be reading, and he really does not like reading. He is enjoying the time that I spend reading to him each day, and I hope he will start to see how much fun reading is! For health we are working on eating healthier, drinking more water, and trying to get to a healthy body weight. We've studied the digestive system and are studying various aspects of health & nutrition. The other kids are doing well still in the Public School. Elizabeth was very excited to get a B+ in science, which was actually the highest grade on her report card. I'm looking forward to next year and being able to help Elizabeth feel more confident with her academics. Caleb is doing good but once again I feel he is not doing as well as he cold. He is very smart, yet gets so excited about things that he is easily distracted. For those of you who have see the movie, "Over the Hedge" Caleb is a little Hammy! His energy level matches Hammy to a "T"! :-) Thomas is doing GREAT work in kindergarten which is so exciting to see him participating at a close to normal level with the other children. Philip loves pre-k and I think will be a great Kindergarten student next year when we home school. He seems to be growing like a weed and is at one of those stages where he is ALWAYS hungry! Nathan, our soon to be 3 year old is enjoying playing out in the mud, trying to learn to ride his tricycle and playing with his puppy (Sunny) and "doddy" (Bandit).

Sprouting: Yes, my pepper plants have finally started to sprout. All my tomato varieties have sprouted but some are doing better than others. It is fun watching the little green shoots come up each day now! Thomas is very excited about the plants. When I told him they were tomatoes and not flowers he said, "But I don't like Tomatoes!" So I explained to him that we were going to use the tomatoes to make his katsup. He eats EVERYTHING with katsup! It is fun watching him as he tries to figure out whether or not these tomato plants are really a good thing. :-)

Stuff: We are hoping to nail down the house in New Holstein soon, however we are not sure when our moving date will be since the current tenants don't really know when they are moving out yet. We are reminded once again that God is in control and we have to wait on His timing. He is orchestrating these events and will allow all the dates to work out according to His plan! For now, I'm working on packing and trying to think through the process of how to organize it all to make it as simple and streamlined as possible for getting settled once we are in the new house. Pray that WEAP will be able to find new therapists for Thomas. We have a tentative start date for the week of June 16 to have Thomas's new initial workshop training session with the team in New Holstein. Thomas is very excited about his new house and is telling me every day that he wants to "go home". And on days like these where we are busy with Dentist appointments, homework, and life in general and missing daddy.... I echo his request to "go home". I'm looking forward to our family being together every day, but until then I look to God to give me the strength and grace to single parent while Phil is away.

I'll end this post with one more "S" word...... Sleep........ Good Night!

It has been a while since I have posted. We've had a lot of sickness in the house while trying to get into a good school routine with Sam. School with Samuel has been going very well. We have gotten over the honeymoon which led to a few days of stress and have now settled into a routine that is going really well. I figure if I'm getting too stressed... it isn't working. So we've tweeked a few things and now have a system that allows Sam to get the basics done successfully and in a reasonable amount of time while having fun!! I'm thankful for the many
godly families out there with 10+ kids who have gone before me and have left websites, books, and suggestions along the way to help those of us who are squandering at their first attempts to homeschool.

I've been busy in my free time researching food, food storage, gardening, and livestock. Phil will FINALLY see the farm house we are hoping to rent next week we HOPE! He spoke with the landlord and they are still planning on renting it out and it may be available as early as May 1st! YEAH!! That will give Phil time to do some painting and get the garden going nicely! :-)

Currently we are waiting for our organic seeds to arrive so that Sam and I can get some of them started indoors as part of our science and math "fun" work!

The books I'm reading right now include: Parenting from the Heart by Marilyn Boyer, Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon, and Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.

If you want to really find out about the food you are eating and why you may want to start having your own garden or at the very least buy local organically raised produce you'll want to read Animal Vegetable Miracle. If you want to explore the possibility that the five basic food groups might not be all there is to a healthy diet and know more about fats, milk, vitamins, minerals, carbs, proteins, etc, then you'll want to read Nourishing Traditions. WOW!! My eye's have been opened and my quest for a kitchen filled with good nutrition is becoming a passion as well as a fun learning experience. I've been reminded of many of the things I studied about health and nutrition 8 yrs ago and encouraged to do what I can to make healthy food choices for my family. And... I'm not talking about following the 5 basic food groups!!! I'll post more about what I'm learning and the changes we are making in other posts.

For now, I'm off to read for a few minutes before settling down to bed.

Next year will be our first year of homeschooling the entire crew of children! I tried homeschooling Sam and Elizabeth when I was pregnant with Nathan but it wasn't a very good year. I was on bed rest 6 of the 9 months making it a challenging year for school. The past two years the kids have been in public school. We are blessed that we have a good public school here in Pembine. However, we do not like the challenges of peer pressure and the constant world-view that is being fed to our kids 8 hours a day. Also, I am seeing more and more each year that each of my children have different learning styles and abilities which are not being met in the traditional classroom setting. So, next year will be the start of our home schooling journey.

I'm doing a classical approach to learning which will include a hodge podge of curriculum's and learning styles. I thought I had chosen all my curriculum's but was still struggling with wanting to have a relaxed, FUN learning experience for the kids. Today I found a site called edhelper.com. It offers lessons for every topic imaginable. I'm sure that the science is very evolution based, so will not be using it unless I find worksheets that have actual scientific facts instead of evolution theories. I really like the options for worksheets this site offers and am thinking about using it for a lot of our subjects so I can pick and choose what we will do based on the strengths and weaknesses of each child. I think it might give me more flexibility than purchasing a specific curriculum then find that it is too advanced or not advanced enough for the child I chose it for. Anyway, it is $39.98 for a year's subscription which includes an entire section for Special Ed Students! If your a home school mom check it out! It might be a great resource for your family education program!

I'm also really excited about doing the children's history and science as a group. We will be using Story of the World and starting with Ancient Times next year. The older children will have extra reading and assignments whereas the younger children have simple worksheets/coloring pages to do. It is designed for teaching children at all ages which I like. It is one of the few history programs out there possibly the only one that truly goes chronologically. Most history textbooks focus primarily on US history.

For science we are going to do a lot of fun things applicable to what we are doing on the "farm" and in the garden, as well as studying animals by using the book: The Complete Zoo Adventure. My kids really enjoy listening to Jonathan Park Adventure stories. There are 5 different audio packs of stories you can get and each one comes with a study guide that is AMAZING!!! We will be learning about a lot more than dinosaurs, which is the main theme of the Jonathan Park Adventure stories. There are a lot of other scientific truths about human and animal make-up and all with a great Biblical perspective. If you've not heard of this audio series visit JonathanPark.com and listen to one of their stories. You can purchase them from that site or through CBD.

If your a home schooling mom or were a home schooler and have some suggestions I'd love to hear your ideas, leave me a comment!