Whew!  What a week or two. My mother was in town last week and I think we were out every day travelling around Colorado.  Saw some awesome places – between the rain lol!  The prairie has recieved so much rain in recent weeks we actually are growing mushrooms! That latter part was a boon to us since we are smack dab in the middle of a plant unit. Everything is suddenly green for which we are eternally grateful.

We moved the last chick into the coop this week much to her chagrin. She really had no idea what a chicken was, having never seen one. She has bonded with Alannah and does indeed hop on her shoulder like Jen’s sister.  She spent her first night in the coop huddled in a corner only coming out to leap on Alannah when she checked in on her.

Speaking of chickens, Bleu Cheese the rooster has met his maker. : /  He was a beautiful bird by all accounts but he got it into his bird brain to attack the baby.  Can’t have that. So that was the end of him unfortunately. 

My first baby boy turned 20 last week moving us into our third decade of parenting ; o  Of course you now know what a youthful bride I was thanks to dh’s post lolol! I still can’t believe he did that.  But yes, we had our anniversary last week also and thank you for the lovely wishes!  Colin was born the same day the next year.  He is in the thick of prep to leave for Arizona next month. Hopefully his mother can pull herself together by then. How DO people manage that whole thing??  Be prepared for a long sobby note afterwards. : (

One quick link – my friend Genevieve sent the Little City Kids Lesson Plans page to me this week.  What a treasure trove!  They sell Montessori supplies but also have a day program I believe.  They have recently uploaded a couple months worth of daily plans. They are unit studies essentially with Montessori work woven into each day.  They are a great resource if you have multiple aged students.  If you only have younger kids they may be of mixed value. I intend to use them though not as written exactly.  Of course I don’t use ANYthing as written lol!  My impression is that you may not be able to get to a hands on art project each day though these beg to be fit into the schedule some time during the week. Also, the finger plays and action work are very appropriate for little people.  The history and science lessons are sometimes written above their level.  Perfect for a varied age group, less so for strictly preschoolers.  But do take a look and see if they work for you!  I love the layout of the plans and think the template would be very adaptable and useful for homeschool planning. Thanks Gen!

Will leave you with a few pics from the past week of the Cripple Creek Gold mine district, the Renaissance Fest (a bit more Goth than Renaissance : o   )  and the kids’ new caterpiller.  Or maybe I won’t. My computer is on the blink and upload seems to be stuck now too.  It is making a noise similar to the one my son’s car makes.  Considering the computer doesnt have a muffler I am guessing that is a bad sign….. 

To my dear wife

Memories are forever…

Imperfect 4-inch underwear squares

Pay phone marriage proposals

UW-Milwaukee one day, Germany the next

Autobahn hospital drives with no muffler

Fast deliveries

Child #1 on Anniversary #1

Life between boxes – 14 houses in 18 years

9lb, 10oz baby boy

Goodbyes at the airport…Joyful hugs 4 to 6 months later

Missing baby Brendan’s birth

Arguments over unfolded maps

Unexpected home delivery–you should have listened to me

Dad’s 21 gun salute—you holding my hand

Flooded house, emergent surgeries, car accidents, 3^rd trimester pregnancies, broken down cars – all by yourself

Seeing your smiling face… Marathon finishes, College diplomas, Military promotions, Retirement day, Every day when I come home from work

Goat “assisted” deliveries

Baking in the hot sun during wheelchair track meets

Search for the infamous septic tank

Moira’s coffee burn

I’yi and Aushaus (so, how do you actually spell that?)

Tennis racquet’s do in fact make a mighty fine weapon

The constant sound of a piano

Broken down Suburban’s at 3pm on the 3^rd of July in the middle of Nebraska

Our 1^st girl

Neighborhood kids in our yard, even when we’re not home

RV camping

Russelsheim, Dayton, San Antonio, Layton, Newport News, Colorado Springs

Nutrisystem

Honey Do’s

My dream truck – too easy!

Checkerboard manicured yards and flowers

2am ceiling collapse

Star Wars and lightsabers

Hoover, Blue, Charlie, Chelsea, Lucy, Satch, Emma, Angel, Ruby, Wally – need I say more?

2 male neighbors with swimming pool

Lizards on the wall

Nightly rosaries

Eating baked chicken at Whole Foods

Palmer Lake reservoir

Flintwood Ridge – our 1^st house

B&B’s

Annual Turkey Dance

Happy Anniversary Hon.  I love you so much!  Allen

You meet some of the most incredible women online! And if you’re lucky you get to meet them in person too.  I ran into Michelle Quigley http://www.family-centered.com/  in Denver this month and was able to have a lovely dinner with her. I also have one of her planners in my hands now. Wow!  These are truly beautiful and I am excited about putting it to work this school year. I needed the bigger spaces to write in. My little bk isn’t doing the job.  And now I will have these inspiring illustrations to boot!

Dani and I have been on the same little Catholic homeschool email list for a lot of years now. She is mom to four boys who have somehow gotten WAY too big. She is an incredible digital artist. You can ck out her work here: http://www.dani3d.com/blog/

Rebecca is new online friend who shares my passion for gentle parenting.  In fact, she has devoted a whole blog just to the littlest people and those who love them.  Check it out!   http://www.agypsycaravan.typepad.com/babylove/ 

Gotta get started with school so my list will have to pause for now.  I hope to get my links updated shortly!

I don’t have a lot of words today. It’s been a long week and we are all tapped out around here. I thought instead I would share with you some of the things that made me smile this week.

Sixteen Candles      Asher turned sixteen this week.  I can hardly believe it. Guess I say that every birthday. My mind rushes back to Dayton, Ohio. It was a long painful labor and I would physically completely break down for the next two years. But this was one sweet baby. Through it all he was my reason to keep trying to get better. Now he is thoughtful young man, devoted to his music and literature. He still has this happy-go-lucky nature and makes everyone around him smile. His name means ‘happy and blessed’ and we feel we have been both since the day we got him! Happy birthday sweetie!

My Left Foot  This is one of those silly pics that moms out there have to be able to appreciate. Kieran came running in wanting his shoes on so he could catch up to everyone. He asked if he had them set up right and I said, no, you have the wrong feet. You need to switch the feet. So…… he did <g>

The Grass Really IS Greener over the Septic Tank hence we are taking the goats over to feast for a little bit everyday.  You can see how big the doe kids are getting.

This pic is blurry because the kittens wouldn’t hold still and I can’t tell you how much THAT makes me smile this week. They are transitioning well to the goat’s milk and cat food.  Or so we thought. One morning this week we awakened to find the little guy on the right barely moving nor able to even hold his head up. We figured he was not long for this world. We filled him up with the eye dropper and then had to go fix the fence because the neighbor’s horse had jumped it. by the time we finished and got back to him he was alert and walking if wobbly. He seems fine now after a day of dropper feeding.  Apparently they aren’t quite able to sustain themselves from the bowl just yet.

Nature Notebk  the girls were observant enough to notice this tiny gopher in his hole.  I wasn’t sure if the camera would catch him, but here he is.  These little buggers dot the Colorado countryside in summertime. Frankly we don’t always find them adorable – like when they are burrowing through the pasture.  I couldn’t resist that little face though. Something about little live things that always get to me.

Enough Said …some pictures say it all. Water. It’s a wonderful thing. We don’t have all the kinks worked out yet but for now it’s on. What a blessing. We are so abundantly blessed in this age we often don’t even stop to realize it until something we take for granted is no longer there. However, running water is something Our Lord and most of His children have done without for most of time.  We are so fortunate!

Smile …a ‘just because I am a camera happy mom’ picture.  This shot of Kieran in the grass just makes smile. A lot. <g>  Hope you all had a great week!  God bless : )

……what are…. "things that break when your husband is away."  You also get a Jeopardy point if you answered, "Things that keep you from blogging." <g>   Historically electronics, plumbing, and children tend to act up when dad is gone.  Not sure why but its right up there with death and taxes as a sure thing. 

Most of the above are back in working order now and we are looking forward to Allen’s arrival tonight.  I hope to update the site with some great new things afterwards.  Til then I leave you with a pic of the Ranch Foreman directing traffic. ; ) 

God bless!  Kim

So the series is over.  Did you watch?   The only word that comes to mind is embarassing.  I was truly embarassed for the women on the show, not because their ‘potential’ was not realized, not because they were not granted 21st century ‘respect’. I was embarassed because they made ninnies of themselves.  Their incessant chatter about women’s rights could not hide the fact that they were not pulling their weight.  Worse than that was the ranch wife’s systematic humiliation of her husband and the subsequent demise of the ranch project. 

The whole fiasco was summed up by the historians’ assessment at the end.  Mrs. Cooke had the opportunity to *attain greatness* but instead she *quietly undermined* her husband’s efforts and the interpersonal relations among ranch staff.  Wow!  There is lots of fodder for reflection there. I have been thinking about this since the show ended.  What kind of wife am I?  I do believe her choices are those available to all women.  We can attain a singular greatness as mothers and wives.  We can shape and mold our families and our words can strengthen those around us or devastate them.  No small responsibility there!  But it wasn’t PBS’s idea.  Scripture said it first:

Proverbs 14

1 The wise woman builds her house,
       but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down.

My hope is that this example will stay with me and I will guard my words, which have a tendency to fly before given sufficient thought. : p 

Kim

I had big plans to make my own planner after seeing the ones on Two Peas last winter.  Time and energy escaped me after the holidays, however, so I settled for altering a premade purse-planner.  I suppose I should add here that it was the collective opinion of those who live with me that it was a REALLY good idea to have all my stuff attached to me lol!  Short of a planner tattooed to the back of my hand this was a good option. My problem with this good option was that premade planners are so darn corporate and impersonal looking. If it’s not pretty I tend to just not look at it. (Don’t even get me started on running families like corporation….)   Hence the alteration.

Altering was a snap.  I removed the divider pages and made small collages with my scrapbooking scraps.  Then I hole-punched them and replaced in the planner.  They are pretty now <g>.  Unfortunately the stock filler pages aren’t so next yr I may take the plunge and do the whole she-bang.