The Papon Family

NASCAR

2012-02-18T20:55:00.000-06:00

In honor of today being the first NASCAR race of the season I'm sharing K-man's new project he started. He loves NASCAR!

My mom loves to quilt and she always starts the kids on new projects when she visits. Both of the older girls each made smaller quilts which they were able to finish. K-man decided he wanted to make a NASCAR quilt for his bed. He designed the layout, picked out the fabrics and quilted the rows together.

I was able to use my Cricut cutter to cut out the numbers and flags to add on top. I love that we were able to combine two of my favorite hobbies.

We decided to send the top home with Nana Kristi to quilt since she has a long arm machine quilting business.

We had some extra fabric so I decided to make a pillowcase to match his quilt. I love the flames svg file I found online for free. I still need to quilt around the pieces to hold them down and sew the edges, but I think K-man is going to love this.

Curly Hair

2012-02-17T21:28:00.000-06:00

K-sis usually has stick straight hair just like her mommy.
She likes to have it curly too.

Nana and Papa Cook Visit

2012-02-11T22:23:00.004-06:00

When Nana and Papa come up North to visit we get busy trying to cram as much fun as possible into one week. They arrived on Friday and we've done more things than I can count. I did manage to snap some pictures of our activities.

K-baby received a new quilt from Nana for her bed.

All the kids loved getting books and Valentine candy.

On Fridays we've been attending Swim and Gym for homeschoolers at the YMCA in town. There have been about 25-30 kids at each session so far. K-man and K-girl have been loving it and it's only $35/family. You can't find too many activities that are so reasonable to participate in.

K-girl and K-man practicing their swimming.

K-girl sporting her new swim shirt I bought her to help keep her warmer. She still got cold, but she swam for most of the time. I may have to find her some long shorts too.

Thanks to Uncle Kenny and Aunt Staci, the boys enjoyed a rousing game of Catan. K-man also talked Nana and I into play Bibleopoly.

All my kids love to quilt so we squeezed in some time to make a few new creations in between all our activities.

K-sis made her first ever quilt top.

K-sis helping Nana sew.

A quick trip to the bowling alley. K-man beat me, but he did have gutter bumpers. I may have to switch over to the kids lane next time.

K-girl, Nana and Mommy working out.

K-girl made a cute, little doll blanket. She still wants to sew some buttons and yo-yos on it so I don't have a finished project picture.

K-girl opening an early birthday present!

Whew! Two days down and a week more to go. The kids have been dropping into bed each night. We're hoping that the weather will warm up some so we can play outside too. We don't really have enough snow to do any snow activities, but it's always nice to be outdoors.

Some Days We Homeschool By the Book

2012-02-08T21:46:00.001-06:00

Some days we play hard and have lots of fun. We take field trips, participate in homeschool group activities, or even visit friends. No worries about our socialization in this house.

Other days we do LOTS of book work.

I know I have a tendency to post only the "fun" things that we do, so this is my chance to share all the hard work my kids do each week.

My kids are really hard workers!

When I get phone calls from grandparents or friends during the day I always feel bad when I say that we only finished "some" of our work, but after looking at all I require my children to do, I don't feel so quite so bad if we don't get it all done every single day.

K-man's stack of "self work"

These are the subjects that he can do mostly by himself every day. He comes to me if he has questions, but he is really good at working his way through his pile by himself.

K-girl's pile of "self work"

For a first grader she works really hard and does a lot of work each day. She does need the motivation of me sitting close to keep her on task or moving on to the next subject. I listen to her read aloud a LOT during the course of the day.

Besides their self work each kid usually does 3-4 other things with me. These are all the extra curriculum books that I use to work with the kids. We don't do these things everyday, but I usually read or teach out of 3-4 of these books most days of the week. I read a lot of information about science (this year we are doing ecosystems) and history (countries and cultures).
Last year we had a detailed schedule that I loved and it worked really well for us. K-baby was still taking naps so having a schedule around her awake and sleep times kept us on task.

This year I'm trying a different approach since K-baby no longer naps everyday and is with us trying to "do school" along with K-sis. I made a checklist using Excel for each subject I know the kids can work through "mostly" on their own. These are for most of the basic things that I really need them to be working on.

K-man's weekly checklist.

When we get started for the day they usually look at their checklist and start working on whatever subject they want. This gives them some freedom to choose what they want to do and in what order. Having a list allows them to start downstairs without me if I'm still coming hair, cleaning the kitchen or serving breakfast to the little girls. During the day the check list gives them an idea of direction if I'm not available to help them at the exact moment.

The checklist also allows me to work with the little kids and keep them out of trouble and I know the big kids are still working without me directing them 100% of the time. I also file these lists at the end of the week to create a record of all the work they've completed throughout the year. (That is a huge bonus in my book, because I haven't been very consistent on record keeping in the past) I still have to push for a few subjects to be completed at the end of the day that they tend to leave for last or try to skip.

K-girl's checklist.

Notice she doesn't have every subject filled out every day.

Across the top of the chart are the days of the week. Down the side of the chart are the subjects that they need to complete. Sometimes they just use check marks, but I try to have them write in page numbers so I can see how much they are accomplishing. An additional perk that I have found is that my perfectionist child (can you guess which one???) loves to have all the spots in his checklist filled out. The other one doesn't care and would love to leave many of them blank. :)

Each of my older two kids have 11 different subjects to fill in. I think they like that each subject is broken up into small bits so they can work for a while and then have the satisfaction of crossing something off.

K-man's checklist includes:

Devotions

Bible

AWANA

Reading

Spelling

Writing

Handwriting

Math

Rosetta Stone Spanish

Art

K-girl's checklist includes:

Devotions/AWANA

Bible

Reading Aloud

Spelling

Math

Handwriting

Explode the Code

Hooked on Phonics

Art

Writing

Brain Fun

Whew!!! And don't get me wrong, remember at the top when I said that we don't usually do ALL of this everyday. We are not the perfect family and some days I bribe the kids to do 2-3 things and then they play for a while before we do a few more. We also take days off to do Swim and Gym, Gymnastics, Co-op, play dates, 4-H, Prairie Wetland field trips and of course lots of trips to the library. I'm not super mom, but having my kids keep a checklist has helped us stay on task this year.

We Didn't Do Any School Work Today!

2012-02-07T19:47:00.004-06:00

Instead we...

had two teeth pulled on top...

had three teeth pulled from the bottom...

had a temporary crown glued back in (sorry no picture of me)...

went to homeschool 4-H and learned about Panama (the kids thought it was so cool that one of our homeschool friends was adopted from Panama and she shared a box of special items)...

homemade pizza and ice skating at the indoor arena with our friends the Fronnings (our kitchen WILL fit 12 kids and 2 moms).

Then we ended our day with learning a little about this special man. Do you recognize him???

Mark Twain came to the History Museum to give a talk about his life. K-man thought the story he told about giving the pet cat his medicine was pretty funny. The kids also liked the one when Mark put snakes in his mother's work basket. Hopefully, they didn't get any ideas to try at home. :) I was so proud of my 4 kiddos who sat with a room mostly full of adults to learn about a part of American history.

It may not look like school, but I think we may have learned some lessons today.

Ice Fishing

2012-02-05T23:47:00.001-06:00

We've lived up North for 8 years now (It will be 9 years in May). Wow, that's a lot of time!

We took the afternoon off from home improvement and other things to attend a fishing derby at a local lake. This is the same lake where we swim at the beach in the summer. Currently the ice is about 18 inches thick, which is good because there were LOTS of people, buildings and vehicles out on the lake today. I may never be able to feel comfortable standing in the middle of a lake.

The family on the ice.

A picture of the shore line with the trees covered in beautiful frost. This picture only shows a small amount of the people on the lake today.

The kids loved to use this ice scoop to keep the holes clear of ice. Thanks Larsons for letting our kids borrow this!

K-baby spent the most time of all the kids holding a pole.

Any fish yet???

We didn't catch any fish today, but we sure enjoyed our chance to talk with three other couples from our church who we fished by. Ice fishing is a social sport. We did see one other person actually catch a fish. We also saw two other families as we drove out. It was definitely a popular place to be today.

Just Can't Stop Reading!

2012-02-04T09:04:00.002-06:00

Reading at breakfast. That's my boy!

A Week of Hand Washing

2012-01-30T12:27:00.000-06:00

Last week was an unusual week for us at the Papon household. We had one kid sick with a fever, two different kids puking, a runny nose, sore throat and sinus problems. K-man was the only one that made it through the week unscathed. All the kids illnesses were short lived and thankfully they are all feeling 100% again. Needless to say, we had a LOT of handwashing last week and the kids and I are going to clean all the surfaces with water and vinegar this week.

We've been busy doing school too. The kids were excited when we did a little bit of reorganization in the classroom. (pictures coming later) I'm hoping this will help my older two get through their work quicker, with less chatting and checking out each other's work. We also went through some school work files. I'm always amazed when we look back over their work from the beginning of the year at how far they've come in such a short period of time. K-girl is really coming along in her reading and has even been reading some 2nd grade reading books.

Our winter weather had finally arrived and the kids are having lots of fun shoveling the driveway (and the yard) to make snow jumps, forts and mazes. Last year we had already had a couple of blizzards by this time and were buried in snow, so the 4-6 inches that we have on the ground has been just enough to play in. The temperatures haven't been so bad this winter either, we've been enjoying many days of highs in the 30s. Last year it seemed that many of our days were highs in the negatives and it was
to cold to play outside.

Sled jump and snow angels in the front yard. They scooped half of our yard to get this snow pile.

K-girl sitting on top of the fort the kids built in the backyard. They had fun building a tunnel and even got Abby to crawl through it.

Football in the snow with daddy and some neighbor kids.

More snow fun in the front yard. It's funny to look out and see everyone else's pretty yards which look like the snow just fell. I don't think there is a single spot in our yard that the kids or the dog haven't trampled or played on.

K-man built some domino creations.

The neighbor girl had a pool party and of course my kids were in the hot tub most of the time.

Shawn, K-sis and K-baby sledding. Thank God for Daddy who loves to pull, pull and pull the sleds!

We even managed to go ice skating, Shawn did the taxes and some 529 funds for the kids and I helped our small group host a marriage seminar at church (we were in charge of all the food for about 120 people).

In My Seat

2012-01-24T18:53:00.001-06:00

This past week, Steven Scheibner came to speak at our church. He was the pilot who was scheduled to fly the airplane that flew into the first World Trade Center. He has an amazing testimony which you can watch on you tube. The video is about 15 minutes long and is worth watching. It was made by his son (a homeschooler) who just graduated from Bob Jones University. His testimony really puts our lives in to perspective. Life is short. Are we really living for God?

One of the local television stations came by to cover the story. This short clip tells about his story and you can see Shawn, Kaylee and I. We don't watch the news very often because we are usually busy keeping up with 4 kids, but after Shawn went to work on Monday, all his co-workers said they saw the story and we looked it up on the Internet.

We bought his new book, In My Seat for Shawn's dad, but I have a feeling Shawn and I are going to have to read it before we give him a copy. I'm so grateful for the Naz Church and for the oppertunity to learn more about God's amazing love each week.

In other noteworthy news, my dad was also in the news this past week. My father, Tom Cook announced his retirement and his story was covered in The Hutchinson News. You can follow the link and read his story too. I'm thankful that my dad had such an amazing impact on not only my life, but also the lives of many other people through his work. We're hoping that my parents will enjoy their retirement and maybe even drive their R.V our direction every once in a while.

Patience

2012-01-22T17:07:00.002-06:00

I'm sure Shawn could work a lot faster without help, but I'm so grateful for a husband who allows our children to learn along side him in everything he does. I'm sure their future spouses will be grateful too.

K-man sanding the walls.

K-man and Daddy working on drywall putty.

Even K-sis helped mud the lower nails on the walls.

K-girl adding some mud.

I also know we will all appreciate our new bathroom too, since we all worked on it together.

K-girl loves AWANA

2012-01-20T20:30:00.001-06:00

K-girl has been so excited about learning verses this year. I'm so proud of the hard work she puts in practicing during the week.

Grand Forks, ND

2012-01-15T19:27:00.003-06:00

Last weekend we had to travel up to Grand Forks, ND because Shawn had some gift cards burning a whole in his pocket. Cabelas was having a really good special on some goose decoys that Shawn has had his eye on for quite some time. After a long time wandering the isles with the kids at Cabelas, Shawn checked out with everything he needed, then we took the kids to the Canad Inn Water park.

The kids had a blast at the water park showing off all the new swimming skills they've learned this winter. Shawn even talked the admissions person in to giving us our tickets for $10/person instead of the original price of $17/person. CRAZY! The big kids enjoyed all the different slides and K-sis and K-baby stuck pretty close to mommy.

K-baby, K-man and K-girl (all on the left) getting ready to try out a slide.

K-sis, my cautious girl who didn't like any of the slides.

K-baby and Mom waiting to go on one of the big slides. She LOVED it!

It's a homemade Christmas

2012-01-14T09:38:00.000-06:00

I love giving and receiving homemade gifts. This Christmas we managed to work in quite a few fun ideas and the kids had such fun coming up with ideas that they could do. The hardest part was not sharing the ideas on the blog before we gave the presents.

The kids started making their first presents before Thanksgiving. They had lots of fun using up some of our extra Scrabble letters to make Christmas tree ornaments and coasters.

All the K-kids crafting away!

I snuck in some spelling practice. (Shhhh! Don't tell.)

K-girl made a bunch of cute bookmarks for everyone she knew. She had a great time using my sewing machine. She loves crafting! (a girl after my own heart) She also practiced using a needle to sew on the buttons.

This wasn't a gift, but it was a craft I did recently so I'm including it. :) I've had this ugly clear plastic organizer sitting in my closet since we moved from Wisconsin three years ago. I recently discovered Mod Podge and had to try it out with a project.

Before:

After:

Now I just have to figure out where I want to hang it.

These are some jars that I made for gifts. I decoupaged the lids and cut vinyl with my Cricut for the glass. I thought they turned out really cute and were perfect for holding the sewing/craft labels that I made to go in them. (I didn't get a picture of that craft, sorry.)

Nana Yvette gave K-girl some fabric for Christmas and of course she had to use it RIGHT AWAY. Nana is so creative and made up a pattern for a cute bag to hold K-girl's Bible and AWANA book. I thought it turned out fantastic.

The kids were busy crafting over vacation too. They made this ginger bread barn at Nana Yvette's house. It turned out so cute!

Yvette and I had to stop in at the quilt store in Kiowa. She always carries such cute quilting fabric and many other types of fabric too. I found this cute scarf idea on Pinterest and had to try it out. I had tons of fun getting in some sewing time with Yvette and it only took us an hour to whip these together.

One of my favorite projects was using my Cricut cutter to make my mom a sign for her long-arm quilting business. It was my first BIG project using vinyl and it turned out great.

Somehow I found a few minutes to slip into Hobby Lobby without the kids and found some cute brown jersey knit fabric to make this cute scarf. Yet another Pinterest idea and so easy too.

I also made some coasters for my mother and some for me too. Somehow our old sandstone ones have all been dropped and broken so we didn't have any coasters at home. I love these and it was so easy. I just used Mod Podge, cheap tiles from Hobby Lobby, scrapbook paper and pictures.

These are the ones I made for my mom. Aren't they cute?

Everyone got an Initial/Name frame this year. My friend Heather and I came up with this idea when we last got together (way too long ago.). These were fun to make with vinyl using my Cricut.

My mom and dad got the kids a Kindle Fire for Christmas so we HAD to sew a cute cover to protect it. My mom and I made this together and I love how it turned out.

outside cover:

My sister-in-law also spent some time crafting this fall because I got a great stash of homemade gifts from her too. She gave me homemade vanilla extract, lip balm, skin scrub and bath salts. I can say that we both a have a LOVE for Pinterest this year!

This post just gets me excited for all the crafting possiblities for the coming year.

Ready for bed?

2012-01-13T06:00:00.000-06:00

Moments Like These...

2012-01-12T12:12:00.000-06:00

...warm my heart.

AWANA

2012-01-11T15:41:00.000-06:00

We are doing AWANAs again this year for our Wednesday night activity. I love that we can all be involved together as a family.

Our crew

K-baby is in Puggles. She doesn't have verses that she has to learn at home yet, but she loves going to the nursery to learn about all that God has created.

K-sis is in her final year of Cubbies and she is so proud of her vest and saying her verse each week.

K-girl is loving Sparks this year and is moving quickly through her book. It always amazes me how much they can memorize (and remember for longer that a week). Her favorite school activity (beside art) is to copy her verses on paper for handwriting. I love to hear her say Psalm 23.

K-man is in his first year of Truth and Training. This is a huge jump up from Sparks and I love how it pushes to the kids to learn long passages, memorize multiple verses and also reviews their older verses. He (and the rest of us) are really learning a lot about God this year. His favorite thing to say this year is all the books of the Bible from Gensis to Revelations.

K-sis showing off one of her favorite verse. Her Cubbie verses aren't usually this long, but I think she's heard it enough from her older siblings that she learned it pretty fast. If you see her, ask her what Matthew 2:10 is.

Pantry Challenge Needed!

2012-01-09T16:38:00.001-06:00

I am in desperate need of doing a pantry challenge. We have been blessed with wonderful crops from our CSA, Bluebird Gardens. My freezers, fridges and cabinets are full! After I spend so much time putting all this food away for winter I tend to hoard it. Now that it is January, I'm realizing that I need to make a more concerted effort to use up our supplies so we have room this spring for new veggies.

Our kitchen at this house may be small but, it feels like we have our own appliance store downstairs in our laundry room. We have our washer and dryer, a fridge and 2 freezers.

When we moved from Waupun, WI to here we brought our almost new fridge with us because we weren't sure if our new house would have one. It did, so know we have two. When we moved from MO to WI we didn't bring any of our appliances and we really regretted that, especially since our house in WI came with a fridge from the 1940s. Most of the time we haven't had it on, but as our food stash from summer gardening has increased we've now been using it full time.

A few years after we were married we bought a little chest freezer which we have keep pretty full through the years. I was really grateful for this freezer when I discovered the world of freezer cooking. My family has eaten many nutritious meals that I've stalked in the freezer.

Last year my parents decided to get rid of their stand-up freezer and so we gladly accepted it. YEAH, free freezer! I love being able to see stuff on the shelves. It is so much easier to access, so I put lots of things that I need to find in this one.

I know we probably pay quite a bit in electricity, but I love knowing where my food came from and all the harvest events at Bluebird Gardens are considered a free bonus. Free food = Stock up!

Sooo....here are my pictures of our food stash. (I also have a snack cabinet and a rice/noodles/baking good cabinet that I didn't take a picture of) I feel like these are the before pictures of a home improvement project. Hopefully in a few months these freezers will be empty and ready to be filled with fresh food. I'm also hoping to see if I can lower my food bill for a few months too.

Upstairs Freezer. I don't really like these side-by-side kind, but it can hold lots of veggie bags.

Our stand-up freezer downstairs. It's stuffed with chickens, beef and more veggies.

Our chest freezer full of duck, geese and LOTS of veggies.

I usually use our old fridge for freezer meals so I can get to them easily. Right now it's full of milk, broth, cream of soup and a few meals.

The fridge downstairs holds all my flour, oats, sugar, extra milk and Shawn's Dr. Pepper.

This last picture is our upstairs pantry. The two middle shelves are stuffed full of food. I know I have at least 16 quarts of green beans in there. We have TONS of pickles and tomato sauce too (and I know I have more jars downstairs in our storage room.)

Man that is a lot of food. I'm glad that God has blessed our family this year. I shared lots of our veggies with friends as they came by the house and gave jars of canned stuff for Christmas.

I've been checking out allrecipes.com for good recipes to use up our stash. If you are interested in learning more about this type of challenge check out GoodCheapEats for more ideas and other moms who are doing the same thing.

K-girl looses her 1st tooth!

2012-01-01T18:05:00.000-06:00

K-girl lost her first tooth while we were at Nana and Papa's house.

And guess what??? The tooth fairy pays more when you loose a tooth at Nana and Papa's house. ;)

Happy 3rd Birthday K-baby

2011-12-22T17:18:00.001-06:00

It's hard to believe that my little baby is already 3 years old. Time flies by! Just yesterday I was holding her in my arms at the hospital. She is such a joy and brings a smile to our faces each day with all her ornery antics.

Being dedicated at church.

My little ray of sunshine is 5 today!

2011-12-05T06:00:00.000-06:00

My beautiful, joyous third child is turning 5 today. I'm having a hard time believing that!

She always has a smile on her face and skip in her step. She loves being a little and a big sister. We love her to pieces and can't imagine our lives without her. She is constantly talking about kindergarten. (next year already, I know!) She is my fashionista and always has on something sparkly, pink or dressy. And she LOVES Jesus!

I know that a picture says a 1,000 words, but I can never narrow it down to just a few. These are some of my favorite pictures from this year.

We are spending her special day doing "K-sis school", baking cupcakes, opening presents and having a bowling party!

First Snow!

2011-12-03T08:06:00.001-06:00

Last year we had 12 inches of snow on Thanksgiving Day. It has been very hard for the kids to wait until December 1st for our first snow to arrive. When they woke up on Tuesday and looked out the window they were pretty excited. It only snowed about 1/2 an inch, but they insisted that the driveway needed scooped.

K-baby

K-girl

K-man

almost done

We had to have a little fun too. K-sis provided the first snow angel of the year.

I'm very thankful for all my hard workers!

Enjoying The Real Reason For The Season

2011-12-01T21:29:00.001-06:00

Once every three years our church puts on a reenactment of the nativity story. This year was the first year for us to attend this event. We were blessed enough to be one of the families that served as the Inn Keeper's family. The kids had a blast serving all the visitors to our inn and I can't wait to see their eyes as they get to live out the nativity story on Saturday when we walk through.

Our Bethlehem family

The Inn Keeper's Children

Visiting the well to get some free water. All the shops of the marketplace are in the background. The kids are so excited to get their sheckels (lima beans) to buy things at the shops.

The kids had a fabulous time. When the visitors came to our inn they would get to serve them lamb, nuts, dried fruit, water and goat's milk. I don't think I've ever had lamb before, but we all thought it was wonderful. Shawn had a few lines that he had to memorize and he did a great job too! K-baby and K-sis helped for the first hour and then our wonderful neighbor came to pick them up. K-girl and K-man stayed and helped for the entire three hour shift. We all got tired by the end, but the kids did great and didn't complain at all.

Decorating Using Silhouettes

2011-11-19T19:39:00.001-06:00

I am NOT an interior decorator. I've never been good at buying things to put on the walls or shelves. My style is pretty much just using what I already have on hand and hanging pictures to cover holes that are already on the wall.

When we moved into our new house the previous owner had painted all the rooms and I loved most of them. I love this two tone blue that she used in the bathroom, it wasn't white or tan so it was better than what I would have chosen. Above our toilet in the kids' bathroom were two huge holes that they must have used to hang a shelf. So what did I do??

I hung a quilt I already had on the holes that were already there. I didn't even need Shawn to put new holes in the wall. :)

Two years later, I finally decided to do something different to make this area look a little better. After buying this brown shelf at Good Will for $2 and seeing a silhouette idea on Pinterest I knew what I wanted to do.

I really wanted to do a silhouette of each of the k-kids. I started by trying to trace their heads using a dark room and a light shining their shadow on the wall. This produced three huge head tracings and one child that was crying. I didn't really want the silhouettes to be so big so I went back on-line to get other ideas on how to do it. One page suggested taking pictures of the kids' profile. I took their pictures, printed them out on draft and then cut them out. I used the cutout to trace their profile on card stock that I had chosen from my stash. This worked MUCH better.

K-girl's profile picture.

I ended up using a can of white spray paint that I had on hand to paint some old wooden frames and the shelf. I need to buy/find some cute decor items to add to the shelf, but for right now we using a vase of shells from Nana Yvette and a candle from Aunt Theresa.

I thought the end result was great! I really wanted to do the pictures two above and two below, but I needed to cover the old holes and this was the layout that worked the best. Shawn was a wonderful husband and hung all the stuff while I gave the girls their baths.

Not bad for a $2 project!

Blog Post Share: By Whose Standard?

2011-11-13T22:59:00.000-06:00

I love to read other mom's blogs. I love knowing that there are other moms struggling, loving and doing the same things that I'm doing. Laura from Heavenly Homemakers seems like a very down to Earth gal I would love to be friends with. I love her post By Whose Standard? and think it is a good read for everyone.

A Fantastic Idea

2011-11-13T16:07:00.001-06:00

One of my homeschooling friends had a fantastic idea this fall. Instead of having friend parties for all three of her boys, she threw a family Operation Christmas Child Party. I loved this idea! The kids had a fantastic idea, my friend doesn't have tons of cheap toys crowding her house and we did some good for children who REALLY need basic supplies. We also love activities where our whole family can be involved. In this busy day and age quality, whole family time can be hard to come by. I may have to see if I can come up with something similar for my oldest two for their birthdays in March.

K-man taking a turn at the paper bag pinata. We may have to do this next week during our study of Mexico.

K-sis enjoying decorate your own Rice Crispy treat!

The kids packing their boxes with all the supplies that everyone brought to share!

K-girl showing off the box that K-baby and her packed.

K-baby adding candy to her box. Or maybe trying to talk daddy in to taking some of it home. ;)

Happy Veteran's Day

2011-11-11T22:53:00.001-06:00

As we spent this Veteran's Day together, we spent time reflecting on how thankful we are for all those people who were willing to fight for our freedoms.

THANK YOU to all the veterans out there for your service and sacrifice!

Traveling the World

2011-11-11T22:38:00.001-06:00

The kids were pretty excited last week when we finished our study of the U.S and they finally got their passports. Our first stop for school this year is Mexico!

Is School Really This Tough?

2011-11-07T16:07:00.000-06:00

As I homeschool my kids I try to think of all the things that I need to prepare them for...but I'm not quite sure what K-girl thought we'd be doing today.

At least she was prepared for anything tough coming her way today.

All I Want For Christmas

2011-11-02T11:22:00.002-05:00

Is my two front teeth!

He lost a tooth!

2011-10-31T21:11:00.001-05:00

K-man finally lost his 4th tooth and a 5th barely hanging on.

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T21:07:00.003-05:00

Cooler Weather and School

2011-10-27T21:39:00.000-05:00

My favorite thing about the start of cooler weather is that we have more time to homeschool. We always try to start the school year early because we take lots of breaks to visit family or have family visit us. I also find it's always hard to keep the kids indoors when the weather is so nice so we take breaks quite often. I'm glad that I have the freedom to send my kids outside after doing a few subjects when it's beautiful outdoors, because I know when it turns colder we'll have plenty of time to catch up. This week it's been cooler and we've been putting in some full days of school.

We're using My Father's World again this year and loving it. We are doing Countries and Cultures with K-man and 1st grade with K-girl. K-man's starting with the US and Canada is next week. The kids can hardly wait to get their passports next week. I'm having K-man do all the assignments and the girls get to do all the "fun" things.

Working on a puzzle together.

All done! I got this puzzle at a PE convention I went to in Boston with my mom. I lost one of the states while I was teaching middle school in Missouri, but the kids still love putting this puzzle together.

K-sis is sooooo excited that she is learning to read. She's got all her at words down P-A-T. She's using some scrabble letters I got from my mom that she used in her P.E. class before she retired.

All four K's at the table. The little girls are playing with dry erase markers, K-man is doing language arts and K-girl is doing some site word work.

Working hard!

We love FOSS!

2011-10-23T10:39:00.000-05:00

Anyone who knows my family well, knows that growing up we lived at the pool. My brother and I used to spend all afternoon at the pool each summer when we lived in NE and my mom taught swim lessons for the Red Cross. When we moved to KS we took lessons every summer, then taught lessons and worked as life guards during the summers.

You may also know that I'm pretty frugal and I hate to spend money on something that I know I can do myself. SO...knowing that I am quite capable of teaching kids to swim I really wanted to teach my own kids. Just think $40/kid for a week of lessons and I have 4 kids. $$$$$ Well, after we moved to MN, I signed K-man and K-girl up for lessons that first summer. Group lessons went okay, but I hated to spend $80 and watch a high school kid start lessons five minutes late and end five minutes early. The kids also spend most of the time clinging to the wall while they waited their turn, which left me frustrated. This meant that for two summers we didn't do any swim lessons besides having Nana Kristi teaching them one or two days when we swam in KS.

This fall my father offered to pay for lessons for our oldest three kiddos. I spent some time researching options and after I had two friends tell me about FOSS swim lessons and how wonderful they were, I knew we had to try them out. They are more expensive than lessons at the YMCA, but SO WORTH IT!

The lessons were held at the Athletic Republic training center in town. They have a small endless swim pool that has wonderful, heated water just perfect for kids. Each kid had an individual lessons for 4- 30 min. sessions. I was amazed at how she had my middle girls putting their faces in the water after just a few minutes.

K-girl showing off her back float.

K-girl

K-sis back floating while giving a rubber duck a ride on her forehead. She is very insecure in the water so to watch her relax on her back was amazing!

K-sis using her "monkey cheeks" while kicking. The instructor had the kids puff out their cheeks like monkeys so they wouldn't inhale water through their noses while swimming.

K-man was floating on his own by the end of the first lesson.

K-man practicing his rhythmic breathing and arm strokes.

K-baby had to get in on the action too! It was still warm this week so this was how she dressed to get to swim lessons. You gotta love those ruby red slippers.

K-baby kicking in the water.

K-baby practicing her kicking while sitting on the island (foam board). She loved making the ducks race through the water with her kicks.

Thank you Papa Tom and Nana Kristi for providing swim lessons for the kids!!! We are definitely going to have the kids do more lessons before summer arrives.

K-man's First Duck

2011-10-22T12:45:00.000-05:00

K-man shot his first duck this morning with Shawn. Boy was daddy proud!!!

K-man with his Coot and Shawn with a hen Mallard.

showing off the wing

K-man posing with his Coot and his new youth model 410 that Papa Bruce bought him for duck hunting. This kid now has his own arsenal of three guns.

It would have been even better if they'd been able to take Abby, but she just got two stitches in her chest yesterday and can't swim in the water for 10 days. This was her third visit to the vet in the past two weeks. Hopefully, she will be healthy for the rest of the winter because they were starting to give us a frequent visitor's discount at the vet office.

Nana and Papa Cook (part 2)

2011-10-22T08:20:00.002-05:00

We always manage to squeeze in lots of fun activities while my parents are visiting. I remembered to bring my camera to most of the things we did, but I didn't manage to get any pictures of bowling. The kids had a blast and I'm pretty sure some of them even beat me.

On Saturday after we went to the Apple open house at Meadow Farm Foods (and had tons of free yummy food samples) we drove up to Detroit Lakes. While up there we visited some camp sites my parents might stay at next summer. We also managed to stop at two different parks along the lake. It was cold, but beautiful.

Park along the lake at Pelican Rapids.

There were hundreds of Coots swimming right by the edge of the lake.

I love my parents!

Don't forget we picked produce on Sunday! My mom helped me wash all the onions and get them in the freezer. I gave LOTS of the produce away to friends, but I still have some more to process.

On Monday morning we had a field trip to the Prairie Wetlands with the WATCH homeschool group that we are involved in. We had enough kids for three groups so Papa Tom and I went with the little two girls and Nana went with the older two K-kids in the middle group.

Papa Tom, K-sis and K-baby listening to Theresa tell us what colors we might see on our adventure. I was amazed that we were able to find pink, purple and red this late in the year.

Watching the Canada Geese fly right over our heads and land in one of the ponds.

When we walked over the floating bridge we stopped to see what we could find in the water. We saw some Duck Shrimp and a Boatman bug in the water.

The kids also took parts of some cattail and blew the seeds in the wind. The kids were covered in cattail fluff and smiling from ear to ear.

K-sis with her milkweed seed.

Papa and K-baby walking on the trail. You can see the Prairie Wetland facilities in the background. They have some amazing buildings here.

K-sis hugging a tree. The kids were also looking for things that were smooth and rough.

While looking for all the different colors on our walk the group to a break to hide in the tall prairie grass.

I found them!

K-sis had a blast.

Looking down an animal hole that we found on the trail. Theresa was kind enough to remind the kids that we don't stick hands down any holes.

We had a great time. I don't think Nana took her camera so I didn't get any pictures of the big kids. They spent their time looking for invertebrates. After our field trip finished up we rushed over to Viking Cafe to meet Shawn for lunch and have some delicious meatballs. Then went on to swim lessons for the big three kids which will have to be another post by itself.

We even managed to squeeze in many games of marbles, Battleship, Connect Four, Candy Land and some puzzles. I think K-man was the marbles champion, he kept beating everyone he played.

I am so thankful that God gave Shawn and I both loving parents who are willing to travel long distances to come and visit us! I love that they can stay for a week at a time (maybe more after they retire??) and spoil our kids!

Enjoying Nana and Papa Time

2011-10-21T17:59:00.001-05:00

My parents were finally able to travel up North to visit us. After driving for 12 hours my parents arrive at about 1 o'clock in the morning on Thursday. The kids were so excited on Thursday morning when they woke up Nana and Papa were both waiting for them!

Nana had to give out presents right away. She gave each of the kids a new tennis racquets. Of course we had to go and use them right away so we went to Broadway Park to try them out.

Nana and the K-kids with their new racquet's.

Papa, K-girl, K-man and Nana playing doubles. K-man was really good!

K-sis loved pushing the ball on the ground with her racquet.

K-baby talked Papa into going over to the park.

We are so thankful for this beautiful smile!

Papa and K-sis trying out the merry-go-round.

K-girl

Nana Kristi

K-baby trying out the duck.

The whole crew at the park. You gotta love it when they won't smile cause it's too sunny.

K-baby is always trying out the dangerous parts of the park. She's got to keep up with all her siblings.

K-baby and Nana Kristi

Trying out their new racquets with Nana in the backyard with our badminton net.

On Saturday our health food store had an open house to celebrate MN apples. On our way to the store we stopped off to take a short hike at a local park.

Hiking with Nana and Papa.

Showing Nana and Papa the "secret" swim area. It was pretty windy that day so we finally had to break out the winter gear.

Nana Kristi

hiking on the trail

K-man showing off his NASCAR gear. I think he'll be set for Halloween this year thanks to Papa Tom.

We love it when our parents get the chance to come up and spend some time playing with us. One of the benefits of living so far away from grandparents is that we get some great quality time when they visit for a week at a time. Nothings better than spending a whole week having fun with Nana and Papa!

I have more pictures but decided to split them into two posts.

Last Harvest of 2011

2011-10-16T21:59:00.001-05:00

Our last box from Bluebird Gardens arrived on Tuesday and contained all this wonderful produce. We enjoyed 19 of our 20 boxes this summer and shared one with friends while we were on vacation. The kids and I were both excited to see a bag of brussel sprouts.

Since the farm is done delivering their weekly CSA boxes they did a free gleaning harvest event where any member could come and pick what was left. We made a huge haul!!! I'm hoping most of this will fit in our freezers and I'm giving a bunch of it away.

Our haul from the final harvest event.

I got my mom and Shawn to pick with me. It was REALLY windy so the big kids helped pick some onions and then all the k-kids went home with Papa to get warmed up. THANKS, Papa Tom for watching the kids while we finished picking all this wonderful produce.

We came home with:
2- 5 gallon buckets of onions and leeks
4 bags and 1-5 gallon bucket of spinach
1 milk crate of lettuce
1 bag of tomatoes
2 bags of cabbage (15-20 heads)
1 -5 gallon bucket of kale
15-20 pumpkin pie pumpkins
10 spaghetti squash
1 acorn squash
4 large carving pumpkins
1 bag of small decorative pumpkins
1 large bag of radishes
1 -5 gallon bucket kohlrabi
5 cups brussel sprouts

Thank you Bluebird Gardens for the wonderful year!!! We will be eating great all winter long!

90 Days through the Bible, not quite

2011-10-08T21:27:00.001-05:00

Well, today was the official end of reading through the Bible in 90 Days sponsored by Mom's Toolbox. I really wish I could say I made it all the way through, but I didn't. I did make it to day 54. I managed to make it from Genesis all the way through Isaiah.

Even though I didn't make to the end, I loved that I was able to make it more than halfway through the Bible. Using Mom's Toolbox I was matched up with a wonderful support group of other ladies reading through the Bible with me. I enjoyed the support I got from my weekly check-ins and it was motivating to keep reading because I knew I would be reporting my progress each Monday.

My favorite part of doing this program was learning that I could spend a good amount of time each morning (45 min. to 1 hour) reading the Bible and spending quality time with God. I loved the "big picture" of reading through the books so quickly and seeing how they related.

I kept up with the schedule from the 90 Days during the week as long as I got up before my kids woke up. It does time a long time commitment to complete the assigned. The toughest time for me was on the weekends when I really wanted to sleep in.

I was only running a few days behind when we travelled to KS for a 10 day vacation. When we got there it seemed life got in the way and I didn't make getting in my Bible time a priority. I didn't get any days done while on vacation. When we returned from vacation I managed to work in a few more days, but I pretty much gave up.

I'm thinking about signing up for the Bible in 90 Days again the next time Mom's Toolbox starts a group. I loved the motivation it gave me to spend time in God's word. Hopefully, I can make my morning Bible time a more consistent habit. I know I'm a better mom when I can spend some quite time with God in the morning. I would highly recommend this program to anyone who is interested in making it all the way through the Bible.

Veggies are good for breakfast

2011-10-07T19:34:00.000-05:00

I know I've been on a veggie kick lately. With fall right around the corner I'm almost done preserving all the veggies we've gotten from our CSA and our small backyard garden.

We've been trying to eat more veggies and adding them to our breakfast is super easy. My kids love scrambled eggs so adding in precut veggies is just the way to start our day off on the right foot.

Veggie scrambled eggs.

green peppers, carrots, mushrooms, celery, potatoes and onions

I love to cut up extra veggies and keep them handy in my freezer for using in any meal. I blanch them by boiling in hot water for a few minutes and then putting them in ice water for the same amount of time. Next, I flash freeze them on a cookie sheet then put them in ziploc bags. This allows the veggies to be frozen without being in a big ice hunk. I love to reach in my freezer and simply pull out a handful of whatever ingredient I need for soup, a casserole or scrambled eggs. This is also a great way to use up veggies you buy for a certain recipe and then don't need the rest.

We had one last CSA ticket to use up this week and I choose to use it for 1/2 a share of carrots and a 1/2 share of potatoes. Last year we got 4 buckets of potatoes for one ticket and it was a LOT of work to freeze them all. I still have a few gallon bags left from last year so I split this last ticket up. I also picked up a 1/2 bucket of free tomatoes.

Carrots, Melons and Rutabagas!

2011-10-05T14:48:00.000-05:00

Do you remember when we came home with all this stuff a week ago??

Well the chicken were easy and went right in the freezer (thanks hon) and the pumpkins went on the front step. I've canned, baked and frozen all the tomatoes and we've eaten or shared many of our watermelons and cantaloupes.

The next thing that I decided to tackle was our 7 gallons of carrots.

Dirty carrots straight from the farm.

These are 3 (of the 4) reasons that I was able to get my carrots done so quickly. My kids are crazy and wanted to help me so I had them wash, cut and peel for me. Don't worry I didn't let K-baby have a knife, but she loved to wash carrots or watch what everyone else was doing.

Ta-Da this is what the carrots looked like after we were done slicing them. I forgot to take a picture before I used half of the top right bowl. I did end up shredding the 9x19 pan of carrots, but I'm thinking I may freeze some whole carrots next time. These were the ends that I had left-over after when I was using my Papered Chef cutter. I learned to leave quite a lot on the end after a few bloody injuries to my fingers.

Carrots ready to be frozen on cookie sheets.

Yeah! Frozen carrots packaged for the freezer. I didn't take time to measure out cups, but I did get 6 FULL gallon bags and 4 quart bags of carrots. I love being able to pull out what I need all winter to go in soups, casseroles or omelets.

We ran out of carrots last winter and we still have one farm event ticket left so I may use that last one to get more carrots. I was thinking about using it to get some squash, but I'm not sure if we would use it up. We'll see how much energy I can muster, because I still have a few melons left to use and a big 5 gallon bucket of rutabagas left to use.

Sometimes things don't go our way.

2011-10-04T21:55:00.000-05:00

This is my beautiful cowgirl and Nana's horse Blackie. She is drawn to everything and anything horse. This picture was taken at Shawn's Parent's house this fall the day after she took a few couple of tough falls. Check out my Mother-in-law's blog to read more about K-girl's rough day.

We were blessed that nothing bad happened that day! Believe me, we know how a simple trip to story time at the library or even a trip to the science museum can turn in to a trip to the emergency room.

Hunting and Hiking

2011-10-03T22:16:00.000-05:00

So you know I've been busy in the kitchen, but you may have be wondering what the rest of my family has been doing.

I've been bribing my kids with cooking chores to get their school work done.

kid: I want to cut carrots.

me: If you do 2 school subjects then you can help me.

kid: Yeah! Can I wash the carrots.

another kid: I want to cut.

me: Yes.

I did have 7 gallons of carrots to peel, wash and slice today so any help I could get was greatly appreciated. I'm so thankful that my kids love to help out in the kitchen.

Shawn has been busy too. It's duck season, so he's been busy bringing home meat to feed his family this winter. ;) I think he has made it 6 days so far this year. I know he stayed up late every night when we got back from KS to refinish his duck boat and get it ready for the season. He managed to go hunting on Friday, Saturday and Sunday this past weekend. He's having a blast and I'm glad that the dog is exhausted for the rest of the day.

4 ducks and 1 goose.

K-man was excited to get his first hunting license. Shawn's hoping to take him this weekend.

3 Wood Ducks.

Our weather this fall has been beautiful so we've been trying to get out of the house as much as we can. We were hoping to take a day hiking trip to Maplewood State Park this weekend but K-man wasn't feeling well. We delayed our trip and took a short evening trip on Monday night instead. We stopped by Subway and then headed out to the park to have a picnic and hike. The leaves are beautiful right now and K-sis summed it all up when she said, "Mom, God is so wonderful that he can make leaves that change colors."

Picnic at Maplewood State Park.

K-sis found a pretty tree and wanted me to take her picture with the leaves.

I love this one even though it's blurry. This park is only 35-40 minutes from our house and it is just beautiful!

We love leaves!

This makes putting aside the things that I feel have to be done, worth it.

Most of the family by the lake shore.

Science- cool tree roots exposed on the beach.

Throwing rocks with daddy.

One fellow hiker offered to take a family picture. I love all the different colors in the background.

At the top of the look-out. That little narrow strip in the background is the road we drove on to get to the park. You could see 360 degrees in all directions from this lookout. God is AMAZING!

15 Gallons of Tomatoes!

2011-10-01T22:01:00.002-05:00

Have you ever wondered what to do with 15 gallons of tomatoes???

First you have to load up on Chi Tea Latte. I think I drank half of mine before my helper consumed the rest.

Then you have your helper wash the tomatoes. This only lasted for about 15 minutes before I encouraged her to go play with her sisters so I could clean up the water on the floor.

I then spent LOTS of time (like hours) cutting tomatoes in halves and quarters.

On to the baking! Last year I canned all my tomatoes, but this year one of the ladies in my homeschooling group posted a wonderful recipes for baking the tomatoes in the oven to freeze. I decided since I was going to make my kitchen hot I might as well cook on the stove and in the oven at the same time. Here is my first batch of tomatoes reducing in the pot for canning and a cookie sheet full of tomatoes ready to go in the oven.

Oven roasted tomatoes drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper. I cooked them for 2 hours, blended them and then froze them in 2 cup portions.

Last time I did this recipe I only put in 2 cookie sheets in my oven, but this time I got smart and used my cookie cooling racks so I could stack 2 additional cookie sheets. Using this method, twice the tomatoes went through with each batch!

Poor Shawn had to clean the stove after I finished cooking. It's his job and he loves our smooth top stove. Don't feel too bad for him though, because I did the rest of the dishes and there were lots. I only boiled my various pots over a few times. I learned NOT to add 4 blenders full of tomatoes to my pot or it would over flow and make a huge mess.

Ummm...I think I over-boiled my pot. This was what the pot looked like after 4 rounds of tomatoes. I'm soaking this baby all night long and hoping that the dish fairy comes tonight.

I'm a messy cook! This doesn't include the two-three loads I did while I was washing my canning jars. I cooked all day so I didn't think this was too bad. My floor really needs mopped after today, but I think I'll wait a few more days until I can finish the rest of my produce.

15 gallons of tomatoes turned in to all this beautiful food! Yep, my dirty dishes are still on the counter.

I ended up with 40 cups of oven roasted tomatoes drizzled in olive oil. My house smells soooo good. Thanks Gretchen for sharing this recipe!

10 quarts and 6 pints of plain tomato sauce.

2 meals of spaghetti sauce (one that we ate tonight for supper) and a bowl full of diced tomatoes that I'm going to use for salsa tomorrow. I ran out of energy after supper and chose to go for a run instead. I also gave my wonderful neighbors a bunch of produce since they are always watching our house for us when we are on vacation.

Tomorrow: salsa, carrots and fruit Popsicles.

Don't worry, I'm not super woman because my house is a total disaster and my girls spent hours playing at the neighbors and wondering in and out of our house while I cooked.

Fall Harvest

2011-09-30T20:28:00.002-05:00

Can you guess what I'll be doing this weekend?

Washing, peeling, cutting, dicing, baking, blending, freezing and eating.

I'm so excited with our fall harvest pick from Bluebird Gardens. Each week we get a huge box of yummy veggies and we also get to go to the farm for 8 special pick days where we can pick a large amount of veggies to preserve for winter. We've already froze and canned lots of peas, green beans, broccoli, cucumbers, corn and tomatoes.

Today we came away with:

15 gallons of tomatoes

5 gallons of rutabagas

8 gallons carrots

4 pumpkins

10 watermelons

10 cantaloupes

and a 1/2 share of frozen chickens

They had excess of the rutabagas, watermelons and cantaloupes were all free! We're going to be eating good all winter. Feel free to come and play with me tomorrow. ;)

Peace Treaty Pagent

2011-09-29T22:21:00.003-05:00

Shawn's parents live about 30 minutes from Medicine Lodge, KS. Medicine Lodge is the location of an important Peace Treaty signed by the Native Americans and the U.S. government. Every few years the city of only 2,000 people puts on a huge pageant showing the history of how our country was settled. The stage was God's red hills in a beautiful valley.

I can say it was so AWESOME to see history come alive before our very eyes. They had 100's of horses and people involved in the pageant. This program fit in perfectly with the US history that we studies as part of our homeschool last year.

Our family was joined by Shawn's parents, my parents, Shawn's Aunt Jo and Eric's family. The kids all did good in the heat even though they started late.

Nana Yvette with all the K-kids standing in front of a tee-pee.

The K-kids standing by the cannon that was shot during the program. The men working the cannon had some really great stories to tell.

K-baby, Shawn, K-sis and K-man standing by the trapper's wagon that was used in the original 1927 Peace Treaty Pageant.

Kelton using some binoculars to view the action.

K-man and Konner trying to keep cool. Konner did a great job and sat in his shaded stroller spot for 3 hours.

K-sis up close and personal with one of the "Indians." They had real Native Americans, but we didn't get any close up shots with the kids.

The Native Americans signing the Peace Treaty.

A cattle drive.

The Native Americans waiting to attack the wagon trail.

It was so cool to see the wagon trains all lined up. I can just imagine how lines of 100's of wagons would have looked passing through the KS prairie. K-sis said next time she was going to bring her prairie bonnet and dress.

The Calvary chasing away the Indians attacking the wagon train.

I'm so glad that we have made the decision to homeschool so we had the opportunity to travel to see this historical event! My kids will remember this part of American history for a long time to come.

Horsing Around at the Papon's House

2011-09-28T21:47:00.003-05:00

We had a super busy five days at Nana Yvette and Papa Bruce's house. The kids love visiting the farm! They had a great time doing chores and keeping Nana and Papa busy.

K-girl and Nana heading to the barn to do chores. I LOVE the new quilt square that Nana painted on the barn. I may have to buy a barn so I can have one too!

K-girl throwing hay to Cheyenne.

Feeding Nana's donkey Frankie.

K-girl helping dad check out Papa's prairie. You can see the shop and trees by the house in the background.

K-man is definitely Papa's shadow when ever he visits the farm. He helped Papa plant, mow and move dirt with the tractor.

The girl's helping Papa plant some wheat at the farm.

K-man loading the planter with seed. This boy would LOVE to live on a farm someday.

K-man, Bruce and Shawn shooting blue rocks. K-man even hit one with his new gun!

Papa watching all the kids in the sandbox. He didn't even lose anyone!

K-baby and cousin Katie loved playing together.

K-girl trying out the new kid sized saddle Nana picked up at the State Fair. She really wanted it to be pink, but Nana didn't think the boys would like that so she got a cute one with black on it.

K-baby and K-girl helping Nana brush Cheyenne. These two girls spent most of their time at the farm riding or bugging Nana to ride more. :)

K-girl aka Cowgirl

She loves Cheyenne, even though she got dumped off 2 times this trip. We're glad that Papa bought some fence panels to make a safe corral for riding in.

K-baby loves riding too!

and kissing....

and petting....

and even waiting with Papa for a turn is fun.

K-sis took a short turn riding, but she spent most of her time eating apples off of Nana's apple tree and playing in the sandbox.

K-baby riding with Nana.

Cousin Katie taking her turn.

K-girl

I know that cousins Kelton and Konner were around too, but I didn't get any good pictures to post with this blog post. I know I have some cute ones from the Peace Treaty though, so I'll post those when I get a chance.

Playing at the Cook's House

2011-09-26T21:13:00.000-05:00

I love my mom, she's a "do-er" which means if we aren't "doing" things we aren't having fun! So in the five days we visited my parents in Kansas we spent two days at the State Fair, one day having a family reunion AND all these activities at the farm. Warning: LOTS of pictures to follow!

K-sis bakes squirrel corn and bird seed in the play house.

K-girl riding the trike and trailer hauling supplies to her cousins.

We went to the YMCA for open swim and had the pool all to ourselves. The kids had a great time swimming around with their cousins!

K-man had a "blast" with his new guns that Papa Tom gave him. My Grandpa Bo passed away earlier this year and he gave my dad two guns. Papa decided to gift these guns to K-man. He got a 410 and 22. The 410 was a gun that K-man's great-great grandpa had when he was alive. What a fun legacy to pass along! Thanks to Papa Tom for making this boy smile from ear to ear. I'm sure he'll be asking when he can shoot again!

K-man showing off a can he shot. The guns are still a bit heavy, but he has a great eye! He can shoot at cans from 20 yards with no problem even shooting better than his dad sometimes. His highlight of the vacation was shooting a blue rockin the air on his third try ever! I couldn't believe it and I'm sure he's already better than me.

Shawn, K-man and Papa Tom out by the shed shooting cans.

Tether ball with Nana and K-girl

A quick attempt at a family picture.

K-man enjoying a tractor ride with Papa. I'm sure he'll be driving by himself before we know it.

K-sis posing in my parent's back field.

K-sis cooking with Nana.

K-girl posing at the Dillon Nature Center.

My dad is the director of Recreation for the USD 308 area in Hutchinson, KS. They've been working on a new nature play park at the Dillon Nature Center. This is the first time that our kids have gotten to play at the new park and it was a hit! What else could a kid want besides sand, water, dirt and sticks?? The landscaping was beautiful and my kids did not want to leave!

The kids playing in the GIANT sandbox area while daddy works the pump to fill up the river.

Another family picture with my parents. They had a beautiful gazebo and so many different places for photo opportunities.

Shawn and K-baby building in the fort and sticks area. I'm thinking my parents may have to have an area like this at their house. They had a tarp, sticks and some log slices that this kids could create with.

My parent's version of a sandbox. Room for everyone!

All the cousins playing in the sandbox.

The K-kids touring the farm in Papa's trucks. We worn these things out and had to recharge them many times!

I'm so thankful to my parents for putting up with us for 5 days. We travel with LOTS of stuff and take up LOTS of room. We had a wonderful time and can't wait for my parents to come up North to visit us in a few weeks. I don't think we could have fit another activity in to our trip.

Mini Family Reunion

2011-09-20T08:34:00.000-05:00

On Sunday my mom planned a little mini family reunion and we were so excited to see most of our family from both sides! We only had a few family members who couldn't make it and they live multiple states away so we'll excuse them this time.

My mom and dad rented out the Elmdale Community Center and the kids all had a blast running around. I can say that my kids slept well that night! We had racquetball, volleyball, marshmallow golf, ride on toys, gymnastics mats, a playground, yummy food and LOTS of space to run around. Thanks mom for taking the time to plan this event!!

Shawn and the little kids playing in the racquetball court.

Konner playing with a ball. He wasn't walking last time we saw him so we were excited to see him running around.

K-girl showing off her gymnastics.

Shawn's family supervising some of the littles.

All the kids were glad that we had ride on toys to play with. Thanks Aunt Staci.

Watching the kids play in the gym.

Creating a cool obstacle course.

K-man, Shawn and cousin Kelton.

Konner, K-girl and Cousin A.

All the cousins from both sides plus one- second cousin.

Chatting outside while watching the kids play.

Konner and K-girl playing while Nana watches.

This was a popular feature at the playground.

Aunt Staci helping K-sis with some marshmallow golf.

Candy (my sister-in-law Staci's mom) and cousin A.

Cousin Katie Beth showing off her marshmallow golf skills.

Somehow a few people managed to avoid my camera! I know I had 3 uncles and another cousin who didn't make the blog.

A BIG thank you to everyone who drove hours to see us!! We had lots of family who travelled 3-4 hours to play for the day! Hopefully we will be able to see everyone again soon. If anyone wonders up to MN please stop by and enjoy some free food and lodging at the Papon house. We would love to see you!

2011-09-19T23:43:00.001-05:00

Shawn and I haven't been to the Kansas State Fair since before we had kids. I think the kids managed to do everything the fair had to offer! We did lots of rides, ate lots of fun fair food, walked through many exhibits and enjoyed the whole fair experience. We had a fabulous time with my parents, my brother's family, Shawn's mom and his brother.

K-baby, my mom and K-sis

K-man and K-sis milking a cow.

K-baby and K-girl trying out riding double on a horse saddle.

The whole clan learning about how to clean cotton.

K-girl with her two cousins.

All the K-kids with their cousin. My kids loved the Western comedy show!

K-sis feeding a zebra while K-man watches. My parents love about 4 miles from Hedricks animal farm which provides all the animals for the petting zoo at the fair. It's fun to see all these unique animals.

K-baby rides a pony while Shawn watches. I think she's ready to ride horses at Nana's house next week.

K-man working on a virtual excavator.

Shawn playing golf with an excavator.

K-man played in the NASCAR exhibit 6 different times. This was probably his favorite spot!

All the K-kids boating a the lake on the fair grounds.

I even braved my fear of heights to try out the zip line and had a blast! That's me in the green shirt.

Shawn's mom, my parents and the kids enjoying some free ice cream. YUM!

K-man, K-girl and Shawn enjoying the giant yellow slide. The kids (except K-sis) could have done this slide ALL DAY LONG!!

K-baby catching a quick nap at the fair.

mmm....sugar....thanks Nana!

K-girl and K-man riding the dragon roller coaster! It was fun to see them try some of the crazier rides for younger kids.

Yvette, Eric and Shawn at the Third Day Concert! Thanks Yvette! We had a blast and the music was awesome. I wish it hadn't been misting, but we survived.

Getting ready to watch the pig races.

Riding the train.

I think they're having fun don't you??

K-baby wasn't tall enough to ride the small slide by herself so daddy volunteered to take her down. She loved it!

Shawn and K-man braving the tornado spinner!

Virtual kayaking with Nana.

K-baby and K-sis LOVED the big yellow slide. K-baby wouldn't allow me to help her up the steps in any way. I was scared, but she was ready to go again!

YEP, I think we did it all! I can't wait until next year, I'm hoping that we can all make it to the MN State Fair.

Tomatoes!!!

2011-09-13T14:26:00.000-05:00

We finally got our tomatoes from Bluebird Gardens! I wish I would have remembered to take a picture of Shawn's dad Bruce because he helped me pick the 10 gallons of tomatoes.

WOW! This is me (Carrie) I know we don't see me very often AND even from the front side. ;)

The sink of tomatoes. I only ate a few while I was canning, cooking and washing. mmmm...garden fresh tomatoes with some salt on top.

I spent all day Sunday canning tomato sauce, salsa and roasting some tomatoes to freeze. I wish we could have gotten more!

Out of our 10 gallons we made:

7 quarts of tomato sauce

7 pints of salsa

10 cups of roasted tomatoes frozen

A bunch flew home to KS with Shawn's parents.

We also planted six tomato plants in our garden this year. Three of them did awesome and we got gobs of tomatoes from them. One of them only produced two tomatoes and the kids ate all the cherry tomatoes off the plant before they made it inside. We won't have enough sauce to last us through the winter, but we have a good start. I also managed to make a lot of salsa and sauce from our tomatoes, but I'm not sure how many jars we ended up with.

The middle two K-kids are gone, so K-man and K-baby are getting plenty of quality snuggle time in.

My Hubby

2011-09-09T18:14:00.003-05:00

I'm so blessed to have such a wonderful man in my life. My husband works hard each day, but also takes time to have fun with his family. I love him so much!

Duck Banding and Butterfly Tagging

2011-09-08T16:37:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago we were able to attend a wonderful day full of activities at the Prairie Wetland Learning Center. The Learning Center is with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Shawn's boss is also in charge of this facility. Sometime during special events Shawn gets to help volunteer with running some of the booths. We love seeing Shawn at work and we are so glad that he LOVES what he does.

Our first stop for the day was Wood Duck banding. It was so cool to watch the kids launch the ducks in the air after they banded their leg.

Wood Ducks in the swimming trap. Somehow they could swim in but not out.

Shawn and the kids looking on while the PWLC staff explained the differences in the duck they caught.

Shawn showing all the kids a wood duck and how to tell if it was a male/female and a juvenile/adult.

Shawn putting a leg band on a duck.

K-girl's duck

Mommy and K-baby getting ready to launch our duck.

The kids thought releasing the duck was the best thing in the world. I will definitely remember their smiles and giggles for hears to come.

After the duck banding we watched a spectacular play put on by local kids. The buffaloes coming over the the hill. They looked so real and the music they had during the play really was cool.

The kids also had a chance to tag Monarch butterflies. Here they are with their nets.

Shawn putting a small, circle sticker on the wing of a butterfly that K-man caught.

K-man with his Monarch

K-sis getting ready to release her butterfly.

Making butterfly crafts.

K-baby thought releasing butterflies was pretty awesome.

K-girl releasing her Viceroy butterfly. (I'm sure the spelling is wrong)

I'm glad that we have such amazing facilities to learn about nature in our community!

MN State Fair

2011-09-02T18:47:00.001-05:00

We are so blessed to have two wonderful sets of grandparents who dote on our children. We also have an "adopted" set of grandparents who are willing to fill the gap felt by living so far away from our family in Kansas.

Last week Sue and Al Doering offered to take our oldest two children to the MN State Fair all day. We've never been to the MN State Fair but we've heard fantastic things about it and our kids love to spend time with the Doerings. I'm so thankful for this couple who are living out Christ's love for us in real life! We attend such a fantastic church filled with people who love each other.

Al and Sue Doering with K-man and K-girl before they boarded the charter bus to travel to the State Fair.

Of course they had to start off the day with a nutritious breakfast! mmmmm....donuts.

K-man

K-girl and Sue

Boarding the bus to head to the fair. I'm thinking they were pretty excited!

K-girl doing to reading along the way.

Al and Sue took lots of pictures of the kids throughout the day so they could show us how much fun they had. K-girl's first stop had to be the horse barn!

K-girl and Al

K-girl looking at the horses. She was excited that one of the ladies even let her go in the pen and pet her horse.

Lunch?? Ice cream!

I think they had cotton candy too, but I didn't see a picture of that.

Quilts! The kids were getting ideas for what they wanted to make for our county fair next year.

Watching the parade.

Exploring the booths. They came home with bags of goodies to show us.

A crazy guy.

I'm sure my kids will be talking about this for a long time to come. Thank you Al and Sue for taking your time to reach out to our little family!

Our Weekly Box

2011-08-31T22:16:00.001-05:00

I haven't been posting our veggie boxes this summer as often as I did last year. We've still been getting our box of veggies from Bluebird Gardens every Tuesday and we love it! The highlight for the past month has been the 2 dozen ears of corn and 5-6 tomatoes we get each week.

I've been busy making salsa and tomato sauce with all the tomatoes from our garden and the ones we've been getting from Bluebird Garden. I can't wait until we get to pick two- five gallon buckets of tomatoes next week.

I was so excited when the UPS man pulled up and delivered this box of FREE stuff that I got from a post listed on the Money Saving Mom blog. Yeah for free stuff, especially healthy food!

I'm Blessed

2011-08-29T18:29:00.000-05:00

Please check out other moms who have been blessed on Gretchen's blog He Sows, She Sews and link up if you've been blessed this week.

I'm blessed to have a wonderful mom who is talented enough to sew my girls beautiful outfits! She also loves K-man enough not to sew him a cute K shirt and instead got him a Kansas City Chiefs jersey.

K-baby, K-sis, K-girl and K-man

Sundberg Apiary

2011-08-28T20:31:00.001-05:00

I'm so thankful that we have an active homeschool group in our town. The kids and I recently went on a trip to the Sundberg Apiary (a bee farm). I can't believe that this amazing place is just 2 miles up the road from our house. We learned quite a lot about bees and the kids are looking forward to checking out some bee books this week at the library.

There were about 50-60 people on this field trip.

Not the best picture, I guess they thought it was a little sunny out.

This was the processing room for the honey. It was really cool to see how they extracted the honey from the combs. They have 6,000 hives around our area and even take their bees South for the winter on a semi truck.

A view of all the honey dripping down on to the conveyor belt.

another view

Each of us got to stick one finger in the honey! mmmmmm....good!

My crew standing next to a 700 pound barrel of honey.

K-girl standing next to a few of their empty bee boxes.

After we toured the honey factory we got to visit their antique car building. They had around 20 antique cars. Most of them were from the 1910-1920s. Way cool!

We ended our day with a quick lunch play date with some friends!

Football Video

2011-08-21T21:27:00.001-05:00

K-man was excited about his second football practice because they told him that they would get to tackle real people. Me, not so excited. They did match the kids up by size for this first practice so he didn't get hurt by someone twice his size. He's still enjoying every minute and makes Shawn practice with him in the backyard when ever they have a free minute.

K-man is #14.

K-man blazes by his tackler. He's on the ground closest to the screen.

K-man gets his man. He's on the ground on behind the coach.

K-man running the first play they taught this season, a right dive.

School Pictures

2011-08-17T13:11:00.000-05:00

I took our school pictures while we were taking a nature hike at Hoot Lake this morning.

K-man my 3rd grader

K-girl my 1st grader

K-sis my preschooler

K-baby my little busy girly, girl.

The Class Picture

First Day of Football Practice

2011-08-17T06:00:00.002-05:00

Fergus Falls Gold Team #14

Can you guess which one??

Count 4 over from the right.

He's the one on the right. He thought tackling was awesome.

K-man was so excited for today's practice. He had a great time and his coaches were both very knowledgeable. I'm sure we will see him running around with a football every where he goes tomorrow.

We'll see what he thinks after they start practicing live tackling on Thursday. ;)

The Bible in 90 Days

2011-08-16T14:51:00.001-05:00

WARNING! Bible Usage Can Be Habit Forming. Regular reading can cause loss of anxiety and fear; decreased appetite for lying, cheating, stealing, hating, anger, jealousy, and envy. Symptoms include but are not limited to: increased sense of love, joy, peace, compassion and contentment. Use as often as needed; however, if symptoms persist, praise the Lord!

I started doing the Bible in 90 Days program through Mom's Toolbox in July. So far I'm loving the experience. The Mom's Toolbox matches you up with an accountability group of other moms to help you keep going. I love checking in each week with Mary (who happens to live very close to where I used to live in WI) and seeing how all the other moms are doing. No one is nagging me to get my Bible reading done, but it's nice to know that other moms are out their trying to read through the same parts of the bible and struggling with the same life moments that I am.

I've been keeping up fairly week during the week days, but the weekends have been giving me trouble. I may have to start setting my alarm to get up and get my reading done before the rest of the family wakes up. I've been trying to get up with Shawn during the week days and finish my reading before the kids get up. This gives me about an hour to finish my reading. Right now, I'm about 2 days behind, but I'm sure I can catch up soon. Day 37 done! I'm almost half way!

My favorite thing about doing this program is that it is helping me to do my quite time in the morning. I LOVE quite time! I'm also loving that I'm reading big chucks all at once which is helping me to put together some of the different stories within the whole big "God Story." I'm so thankful for other moms/Christians who have stepped forward to use their skills God gave them to support others!

My Life's Not Perfect

2011-08-14T22:56:00.030-05:00

I wish that every thing in my life was perfect, but it's not. I'm trying to find blessings in the small things in life. One of my homeschooling friends is hosting an I'm Blessed post link-up each Monday and I'm participating this week.

Did you know that by the end of some days I eagerly hand my cranky kids off to my husband and lock myself in the bathroom for a nice long bath and a little peace and quite? I may or may not be heard saying "I'm tired of YOUR kids!" I'm blessed that I get to spend each day with my kids.

Being at home with my kids puts my house in a state of constant disaster, but I love being at home with my kids. God has blessed me with 4 little helpers who love to help out around the house (sometimes bribery has to be used). If you come by please don't look to closely at my kitchen floor.

I'm always behind in my devotions reading, but I'm blessed to have the freedom to read my Bible when ever and where ever I choose.

There always seems to be things at the store that I really want to buy that aren't in our budget. I'm blessed by a wonderful husband who is willing and able to support our family on one income and provide for our families needs.

We live really far from our families and don't get to see them very often. I'm blessed that our families are willing to travel long distances to see us and that we have been able to "adopt" friends as part of our extended family.

I'm not the best wife, mom, friend or sister in the world. I often do or say the wrong thing. I always feel that I have lots of room for improvement, but I'm truly blessed that I worship a God who loves me just the way that I am.

I think it's all in a matter of perspective on how we look at our lives.
Is it all drudgery?
I can see my blessings in disguise.

Thanks Gretchen for coming up with this wonderful idea and sharing it with others.

Updated Horse Wall

2011-08-14T14:57:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I worked on adding a horse outline to K-girl's room while she was at the rodeo with Daddy. She was so excited when she got home and saw it. The beautiful tan paint I had picked out looked orange on the wall so I went to the store and got a tube of chocolate brown. I think this looks MUCH better! And you can even see it in the pictures now.

K-girl- my little cowgirl!

K-girl's Cowgirl Room

2011-08-13T21:08:00.000-05:00

I've been working hard on K-girl's room in my spare time. We finally had a weekend at home so I followed Shawn around and had him fix things that were broken, hang things on the walls and move big furniture around some. K-girl is so excited about her room. She moved in to her own room sometime around March and I didn't really take any before pictures I liked besides this one as we were getting ready to paint and remove wallpaper.

Before- ugly pink border

I'm so excited with the results! K-girl is enjoying an antique desk that she got from Papa Bruce's mom. Nana Yvette bought her the chair and we spray painted it white. K-girl and daddy made the shelves for all her treasures. We also found the iron horse sculpture at the craft show down town. The only think we have left to work on in this corner of the room is building a bookcase where the white plastic drawers are sitting. I've added this to Shawn's extensive to-do list and I'm sure it will get done sometime soon.

Bigger view of K-girl's room. I got the curtains at Walmart and they really darken the room in the evenings and mornings which is great since it is light until after 10:30 in the summer here.

This is currently housing K-girl's books, horse toys and a few other treasures. Shawn and I made this toy holder together when we lived in WI. We are planning on moving this to a different room and adding a white dresser when we find one we like in our price range or when Shawn builds one. Yvette made K-girl a beautiful horse quilt that she loves on her wall. Shawn is also planning on making some hat hooks for K-girl out of some horse shoes from his parents house next time we visit KS.

I knew that I wanted to do a horse on K-girl's biggest wall and that finally happened today. I emailed Yvette a clip art picture that I liked and she enlarged it with her artistic skills on butcher paper and then gave me her cutout that she made. All that I had to do was trace around the outside with pencil and then follow the lines.

It's hard to see the horse outline painted on the wall in this picture, but it shows up really well in her room. I didn't want it to stick out too much so I picked a light tan (which looks more peach on the wall). I may go and get some chocolate brown paint and go over it again so it matches the curtains. I'm waiting for Nana to come and add in a few details. I can follow lines, but I'm definitely not an artist. Nana Kristi made K-girl the cute cow boot quilt on her bed and helped her make a matching pillow. She is using the bed that my parents bought me when I was in elementary school. I did take the brass knobs off and paint them with a brushed nickel spray paint.

Interior decorating is NOT one of my talents. I've never been good at it so I was pleasantly suprised that everything pulled together as well as it did. I'm always trying to balance out using things that we've been given and treasure with things that we can afford to buy. I'm grateful that we have wonderful parents who are willing to pass on wonderful furniture to us that holds a meaningful story. I'm also thankful to Shawn's mom and my mom for their willingness to spend time making things for my kids.

I'm sure my cowgirl is going to be happy for many years to come. I know I have two cousins who would be totally jealous of this horse themed room (that's you Anne and Katie Beth) ;) I'm sure she would love for you to come and visit anytime. She may even let you play with her horses!

Football???

2011-08-10T18:22:00.003-05:00

K-man is getting excited because this fall he is going to be playing tackle football! I'm sure he's going to have fun!

He starts next Tuesday with 2 practices a week and games on Saturday.

Trying to look tough! I told him football players weren't supposed to smile, but that just made him grin even bigger.

I Can Almost Taste The Salsa and Corn!

2011-08-10T17:35:00.000-05:00

The day before we were suposed to leave for our IA trip I got the email that the corn pick was starting. Mark, the owner of Bluebird Gardens mentioned that the corn goes really fast and I didn't want to miss out so I left the 3 girls at the neighbors and took K-man with me to pick our share of corn. It only took us about 20 minutes to pick 10 dozen ears of corn! The longer part of the process is shucking, cutting it off the cob and freezing it all in baggies.

A few of my favorite Cornhuskers!! There were 2 more, but they were too busy playing to take a picture.

The boy Cornhuskers!

The girl Huskers (Notice that I get free labor from the neighbor's kids?? Who knew chores could be so much fun?)

We started school last week too, so K-man and K-girl were working on some of their work while I cut the corn off the cob.

Daddy and K-baby picking the last of the raspberries. I don't think any came in the house. K-baby LOVES raspberries and I think it's wonderful to be able to say go pick some berries from the bush if you are hungry. :) The 2 bushes on either side of them are some of our tomato plants.

K-man showing off our sunflower!

A few of the tomatoes from one of our bushes. It looks like it's going to be a good crop this year. I'm hoping to make salsa, tomato sauce and some spagetti sauce.

One of our other plants. We planted 6 tomato plants total and I wish We'd planted more. Our pepper plants look beautiful too, but there aren't any peppers on them yet. I don't think we get enough sun in our shady backyard for them so we probably won't plant those next year.

Now I just have to find some good salsa and spagetti recipes to can for this winter. YUMMY!!

Visiting More Friends, Missouri Addition

2011-08-09T08:00:00.003-05:00

Another busy weekend in the life of the Papons! It's been 8 years since we moved from Columbia, MO to WI and then on to MN. I love Facebook since it has really given us a chance to keep in touch with some of our friends who we had to leave behind.

This past weekend we were able to meet up with some of our MO friends who we attended Small Group Church with. It amazes me that we only had K-man and he was 3 months old when we moved. Some of our friends cute little kiddos are now beautiful teenagers and growing boys! A big thanks to our friend Heidi for organizing this reunion. We definitely would love to do this again!

Our first stop on our trip down was to Walnut Grove, MN. Does that sound familiar?? Well if you watched Little House On The Prairie you know that is one of the places that Laura Ingalls Wilder lived. My whole family loves the Little House On The Prairie books and we love listening to them on CD when we travel. The kids were super excited to be visiting the actual place where one of her books took place. It was funny to listen to K-man talking about different parts of the book that he remembered.

Runny up the path on the far side of Plum Creek.

Posing before the hole where their dugout used to be. I can't imagine having to live like that. We also learned some great information from the signs that wasn't in her books.

The old dugout location.

Mom and K-girl walking along the table top land from Laura's book.

The kids standing on the rock that Laura and her sister Mary stood on while playing along the creek. How Cool!!!

We also got to visit a Laura Ingalls Wilder museum. It was a wonderful museum and had lots of different little buildings to walk through.

Posing in front of the Little House set mural on the wall. We will definitely have to look in to getting some Little House episodes.

Shawn and K-girl posing at the museum in front of the prairie. All the buildings in the background were part of the museum.

K-sis by some prairie flowers that Daddy pointed out to her.

The kids with Shawn down by Plum Creek.

K-girl trying out a washboard. I'm very thankful for my washing machine!!!

The exploration room, trying out some hands-on toys.

Visiting a dugout. I don't think there is room for all our stuff!

The dugout from the outside.

Visiting the one room school house. Look at that smart looking class of kids. ;)

We napped on the go!

When we arrived at the Christian Camp near Dayton, IA we had a fabulous weekend with a few of our Missouri E-Free friends. We were busy from morning to night and I wish we could have had more time together. Maybe next year we will have a few more families attend who weren't able to make it this year.

Some of the kids playing kickball.

The really cool play set which my kids loved!

K-baby loved the twisty side!

We played miniature golf. I'm not sure who won, but we had lots of fun.

They had a fabulous pool which we spend hours in!

K-girl and one of the boys that now lives in IA. The Kisers used to live our our route home when we lived in WI, but since we moved we havent' seen them. It was nice to be able to see them again and our kids loved chasing each other around.

Paddle boating and canoeing with Dad.

K-baby loved the lake. She pretended she was an alligator and crawled around at the edge happy as can be.

The bigger kids enjoyed making rivers and wetlands in the mud shore. The boy on the right was a cute little Kindergartner when we left MO and now he is a fun, loving, boy scout. The kids loved wrestling with him.

The men enjoying some time to chat.

We weren't ruffing it. We had a wonderful facility with bathrooms, showers, separate rooms for each family and a kitchen to cook our food.

Canoeing with Dad. The little lake was beautiful and the kids had a blast with all the activities they could do.

The kids found some time to play catch with dad.

Learning to build a boy scout fire.

SMORES!!!

K-girl taking a turn being the pitcher for her kickball team.

More SMORES!

We came home tired and happy and we are looking forward to seeing these wonderful friends again. If you get up to the MN area we would love to have you spend some time with us!

EAA and a Trip Back to WI

2011-08-08T21:58:00.002-05:00

We've been busy traveling to visit all our "old" friends. A few weekends ago we traveled back to WI to meet up with Shawn's parents at the EAA (experimental aircraft association) show and also to spend some time with my best friend's family. My pictures are in reverse order (again), but it still makes sense.

The kids had TONS of fun with Nana and Papa at the EAA. It was a little hot, but we had lots of water ($3.50/ bottle) and yummy treats.

K-girl learning to wire an airplane. Maybe she'll be an A&P like Uncle Eric.

The Sea Plane base. This was our first time to visit this part of EAA and it was a wonderful spot. The kids loved watching the float planes take off and we had some wonderful shade to enjoy our lunch in.

We borrowed some shade from an airplane to watch the show. I don't think anyone got burnt.

Papa and K-girl posing in front of Papa's redone WWII aircraft. He won an award for the best L-2 aircraft at the show. I can't believe that he was able to teach himself to totally redue this whole airplane.

K-girl

She loved the airplanes, but it was a little loud on the front lines.

She wanted to wave at every plane that flew over. Maybe she'll be a pilot like Papa??

K-sis enjoying Papa's L2 back seat.

Snuggle time with Nana.

We even managed to squeeze in a visit with some friends at Pizza Ranch. We had a great time watching the kids run around and play games while we had a few minutes to catch up with each other.

All the kids.

The adults.

K-man even got the chance to meet up with one of his friends that had moved to CO and was back visiting.

We watched A (middle) play some great soccer.

Heather is such a great friend. I'm so glad that we can still plan to get together even though we live so far away. Heather and I had a great time watching the kids play and also crafting together.

It was a busy 4 days and we were exhausted when we got home, but I'm glad that we took the time to go back "home" again.

Green Beans are Done!

2011-07-25T19:06:00.001-05:00

Stocking up our veggies for winter is keeping me busy! That and the fact that we had VBS all week and a 50th wedding celebration party to attend this weekend. I must be getting used to picking, canning and freezing because I didn't even think to take any pictures of us picking the beans or doing anything else.

We ended up with 16 quart sized bags in the freezer, 14 pint jars canned and 24 quart jars canned. This was more than last year so hopefully we won't run out of green beans.

All the cans.

My chest freezer. I just turned it back on and the green beans were the first thing to go in. I'm ready to see this freezer full for winter. My stand-up freezer that my parents gave us is already full of peas, broccoli and some of the things we have left from last year.

In a Pickle and New Paint

2011-07-21T16:46:00.000-05:00

On Thursday, before I found out I'd be picking a ton of produce to preserve all week, I started working on K-girl's wallpaper. When we moved into the house it had this "girlfriend" border, which I don't like and K-girl didn't like either. So in between freezing broccoli and pickling all my cucumbers I found time to finish removing wallpaper and paint.

I forgot to take a picture before I moved all her stuff around so her room is messy (but that isn't too different from normal).

Look a picture of me. At least the lamp is blocking most of my backside. Every mom loves to have pictures of their backside posted on the web. ;) I've decided that I really dislike wallpaper.

Just a few of the cucumbers getting washed up.

How many did we pick???? Next year I don't think we will pick this many or I will find someone else who wants some ahead of time.

Some of my bread and butter pickles.

I'm sure as a mom I could get lots more done on my list each day if I didn't have quite so much help, but oh how my kids love to help! I would hate to discourage them from helping now when they want to spend time doing "work" things with me now. I know the time may come when they may not be as eager to help out with chores and such. K-girl did the painting on the bottom half of her room all the way around as high as she could reach. She did a fantastic job and didn't spill any paint (I wish I could say the same about me).

K-girl helped me pick the color and it matches her cowgirl quilt on her bed. The color is a bit brighter than I originally thought, but I think we will let this color grow on us for a few weeks and then paint a darker shade if we don't like it. I don't think it will look quite so bright once we get some things up on the walls and Nana Yvette and I have a project in the works for one of her walls. I'm so excited and can't wait to see K-girl's face when she sees the finished project.

more pickles...these ones are dill

We ended up with:

28 pints and 7 quarts of bread and butter pickles

10 pints and 10 quarts of dill pickles

I don't think I want to see another cucumber for a month! The canning directions said they had to sit and absorb the flavor for 4-6 weeks anyways.

K-girl's bed and quilt in her room. I still haven't got the old curtains back up yet.

And of course we got more veggies on Tuesday. I love that we get so much variety and my kids love trying all the new things (most of the time anyways). I love the feeling that my kids and hubby are getting nutritious food each week and we are preserving food to last us all winter long. But I do hope that the green bean pick isn't this weekend...I need a break!