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Weight loss update

Well, I can't tell you if I've lost any weight because we have no scale, but I can update on how I'm doing with my goals. well...um...as far as eating goes i've done awful. I'm fairly certain that as long as their are cookies, soda and M&Ms in the world I will never be able to eat healthy! Ack! It's frustrating and embarrassing. I've cut down, but still am eating too much junk. Doing better with drinking water. I found a huge cup with a handle that helps with that. Before I was having to use these tiny plastic cups we got at costco and it was hard to drink enough. I started out with drinking tea instead of soda, but it didn't last. I think I need to buy some of the Lipton Naturals tea that I like at the grocery store. I like it as well as soda, but I can't find it around here at any of the convience stores. Exercise. I'm doing good with that! I've worked out everyday and sometimes even twice a day. My TurboJam DVD came in the mail and I love it. I mean, i really, really love it! I've never liked exercise in general before, but this is so much fun and the 20 minutes goes by soooo quickly! There's a 45 minute workout that I want to do, but I have no idea how I would have that much time at once. I have also done much better about not eating after the kids go to bed. I've hit a wall with my knitting and need some help, but I'm working on some sewing projects to keep my hands busy and I've also started going to bed at 9. Doesn't leave a lot of time to snack. Exercise and an earlier bedtime have left me feeling 100 times better! I occasionally have bouts of "the blues" and since I've been sleeping more and exercising I don't just not feel blue, I feel happy and good! I can hear my mother saying "are you getting any exercise?" right now and wish I had listened to her earlier :) My goals for this coming week are to... 1. drink Lipton tea (buy it first!) instead of soda 2. exercise each weekday and hike on Saturday 3. cut down (even more) on the cookies and candy 4. drink more water 5. get in bed at 9 each night

Goals for this week

It's tuesday, but I made these goals on Sunday so I think it's still OK for me to write them down. Crafting Finish Gideon's mei tai. I'm using my own pattern, but you can find a great tutorial here if you want to make one. Make girls matching PJ pants from the cute knit fabric I got 1/2 off at Hancock. Using this tutorial. Find fabric to make girls either a tiered skirt or a circle skirt Homeschool Finish Misty of Chincoteague Read Landon To Fly Start the 3 bible history books I got at the library Make play doh with the girls Read books to Gideon every day Home Vaccuum house Try new beef enchalada recipie

What my mother taught me

It's easy to be critical of our parents. It seems as we come into adulthood we see things through our new "adult" eyes and have a tendency to think about things our parents did wrong. Lately though, I seem to be thinking more about what my mother did right. And I am thankful...so very, very thankful for the example she set for me.

1. She taught me about Jesus. She introduced me to the Savior. My biggest need met right there. If it wasn't for that, who knows what I would believe and be doing now.

2. She taught me (by example) to stay home with my children. This is a decision I will never regret and I am eternally thankful that she modeled this for me!

3. She taught me that divorce is not an option. Marriage isn't easy as we all know. I remember a specific conversation that we had about how people say, "this is just too hard" and quit. For her it was never an option and I'm so very grateful she instilled that in me, also!

And she taught me to work hard (she is the hardest worker I know), she taught me to never, ever lie...not even little white lies, she taught me to hate abortion and to love life, she taught me how to be careful with my money and not waste it, she showed me how not to quit, she taught me to be generous in my giving and to have compassion for the poor, she taught me the supremacy of the scriptures and the importance of daily devotions, she modeled and taught me the importance of healthy eating and regular exercise (i am so thankful for the healthy foundations she gave me!!!), she taught me to not let children watch too much TV or waste their time playing video games, she taught me to read to my children, she taught to me go to church EVERY sunday and well...i know there's so much more that I'm not thinking of right now, but I love you, Mom!! Thank you.

School

Homeschooling in a temporary home is different. I don't have everything I'm used to having around. We don't have every book, game, puzzle, etc. like we do at home. However, I am loving how we are learning right now. I had brought along our MFW curriculum and planned to get back on track with it, but we haven't used it at all! We've used one book, Dinosaurs of Eden, but just to read for some science. Otherwise, we've been using the library. I love it. We're doing lots of read alouds, memorizing scripture, learning hymns and visiting places in the area that are alive with history.

Here's what we've been doing!

Read Alouds
Misty of Chincoteague (we had originally planned to visit Chincoteague Island, but it's farther that we'd thought)
Dangerous Journey (just finished this) It's a wonderful adaptation of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
Capital: Washington D.C. from A to Z (we'll be going up to DC tomorrow)
Casey goes to Washington
Abraham Lincoln
To Fly: The Story of the Wright Brothers (we'll learn more about them at the Air and Space Museum tomorrow)
Lots of different spring picture books for the girls.

Art
Pottery class for the older boys and Thea
Come Look With Me: Exploring Landscape Art with Children (We can't wait to look for some of the paintings in DC!)

Poetry and memorization
A Child's Garden of Verses
We're just about done memorizing Psalm 1. Even Thea can say most of it with some prompting.
Hymns-mostly reviewing, but I need to pick a new one for them to learn

Science
Dinosaurs of Eden, by Ken Hamm
Various Ranger Rick and Zoobooks magazines

P.E.
Walks around town
Being monkeys at the park
Playing at the beach

I have not done a lot of "hands on" things since we've been here. I keep meaning to make play dough with Thea and find some science projects for the boys. Ashton just loves science and I don't do enough of it. However, the layout isn't really conducive to that and I'm having a hard time keeping mareea out of things.

Things we do daily
Math (Singapore and Math U See)
Spelling (Spelling Power
Copywork (From the bible)
Reading aloud to Mama (proverb of the day or beginning reader depending on the child)
Phonics (Explode the Code)

Lunch on the cheap

Story time ended at noon and I had such a hard time resisting the temptation to stop at Fat Fredas as we walked by it on the way home. However, I stayed strong and got to our house empty handed (besides all the books we'd borrowed). So then what? I had no idea what to make. I caught sight of the cans of pinto beans on the counter and decided on been and rice burritos for lunch.

What you need:
Tortillas
Leftover cooked rice
can or 2 of pinto beans
toppings (sour cream, lettuce and shredded cheese)

1.Heat rice and pintos
2. put everything inside a tortilla shell and enjoy

Everyone loved this! I think we'll do it 3 times a week ;-)

Pottery

We seem to keep finding new places in this small town. While on a walk we found a pottery studio that offers classes. I went in on a Saturday and the teacher said she'd be thrilled to have the three boys take a class one morning a week. Today was the first day. Q, Ashton and Landon got to hand build with clay and use the wheel. It was just the three of them...so sort of a semi private lesson. I was so excited for them to learn something new and experience art in a way that I can't do at home with them. They loved it! Quintin told me on the way home that it was going to be so hard to wait to go back until next week. I wish they could go twice a week but it's exactly a cheap hobby! Near the end of the class Thea joined in and did some hand building. Next week she'll stay for a little in the beginning.

Less than a block away we found a thrift store. It was pretty nice considering how small this town is. I was able to find a few very nice shirts for Gid in 12-18 months...Ralph Lauren, Children's place, etc. We also picked up some super cute dresses for the girls to wear to church since mama forgot to pack church clothes for them. Oops!

Note to self...when going to a beach house/furnished rental, assume the knives will be terrible and bring your own. It sounds like a silly thing to bring, but I have been so frustrated trying to cut with the ones here! Cooking in a minature kitchen is hard enough without having crummy knives.

If you're wondering why there are no pictures it's because we can't find the camera cord that we thought we had brought. We'll try to buy one somewhere as I have a ton of pictures on the camera that need to be unloaded!

Books and a funny

The funny...
Ashton - Are you going to put torpedoes on your submarine, Quintin?
quintin- No, because where would I get torpedoes?
Ashton- You can get anything on Amazon.

(The kids watched a Popular Mechanics show about submarine designers and Q is designing one)


The books...
We have a new library and I have found a couple of books that I just love.

Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes by Mem Fox
Love, love this! It's perfect for any mama of a baby (or that's had a baby). I love to read it over and over to the littles. I especially love to read it to Gideon.

Time for Ballet
Fun book that is perfect for my ballet girl, Thea! Just like a preschool ballet class. Mareea and Thea both love it and so do I. The pictures are my favorite. The moms standing around could be the moms from Thea's ballet class. It's perfect.

Weight loss goals

I honestly have never really been on a diet. Well, at least since high school. If you knew me in high school you obviously know that the dieting didn't work out too well. Anywhoo...
Dan and I were watching The Biggest Loser last night and that sort of thing gets him really motivated. I, on the other hand, may have been eating cookies while watching it. So my loving husband told me that he was worried about me. I told him he should be worried about himself if he tried to take my cookies away. This morning I looked back on what had happened and looked at some pictures and decided that I really would like to make some changes. Not necessarily a diet, but healthy changes in my life.
So to start off with I'd like to lose 20 pounds. Ultimately, I'd like to lose 35 or 40, but I"m going to start with 20. My goal is to loose 2 pounds a week for the next 10 weeks. I won't have a chance to weigh myself since we don't have a scale here but in about 10 weeks we will have moved and I will have my scale back. Here are some ideas I have to help me do that!

1. Avoid snacking on junk foods. Mid-morning, mid afternoon and evening are when I fall into this trap. I plan to eat a healthy snack mid morning and mid afternoon with the kids and knit in the evenings instead of eat.

2. Drink more water.

3. Exercise 5-6 times a week. I'm going to do the 2 mile Walk Away the Pounds DVD and 1 "10 minute shape up" each day. On top of this I hope to take a lot of walks with the kids. I have turbojam coming in the mail and will probably do that instead of WATP when it comes.

4. Drink green tea sweetened with honey that I make at home instead of soda or sweet tea that I buy.

5. Pay attention to my portions at lunch and dinner

6. Eat more veggies at lunch and dinner. Fruit hurts my teeth...don't ask.

7. And Pray!! I need to pray for the strength to be able to make these changes and that I will do it as unto the Lord and not unto man.

Did I miss anything?

A good Monday!

After a very rough Friday, we had a wonderful Monday yesterday! It was such a relief to really enjoy my children and focus on them. After talking with Dan, I decided not to go on facebook at all during the day when the children are awake. This helps me to really focus on them and not to see them as a distraction. Facebook was actually the distraction, but I didn't want to admit it! Morning, nap time and after bedtime leave plenty of social time for me...no reason to do it when the kids are awake. After reading a blog post by Brandy, I did some thinking about really listening to my children. The change it made was amazing. I looked at them when they talked to me. I responded to them in a slow and calm matter as opposed to a rushed "i need to be doing other thing" manner. I enjoyed listening to them and being with them. One of the hardest things was to concentrate on being with my children. I have a tendency to think about other things that I should be doing/would like to be doing when I'm playing with my children. Purposing to live "in the moment" with my children is so necessarily! While kicking the ball with Mareea I made sure to encourage her, enjoy the cute looks on her face when she kicked and not think about anything else but playing with her. Does that make sense?

In reading the Mission of Motherhood I was reminded that our children do not need us to be perfect and avoid any problems, what they need is for us to be calm and positive when problems do arise. If I as the mom melt down and get upset, they feel that they've done something wrong and feel badly, but handling things with grace and patience gives them security and comfort. This is certainly not how I naturally deal with issues. If mareea gets a big blob of ketchup on her clothes from knocking her plate on herself, my first reaction is to be frustrated with her, mad at everyone for not remembering to put the tray on her high chair and yell something about how a load of laundry costs a dollar and that stains don't come out in our stupid HE washer. Obviously, this is NOT the way to respond to something that was an accident. Instead, I'm striving to calmly say, "uh oh, let's get you cleaned up" and smile and move on with life.

The challenges of moving, sadness from leaving our friends and a new, smaller living space make being joyful difficult. However, God tells us to "be joyful always" and to "do everything without complaining or arguing" and if I can model these things to my children I pray that they will follow.

More funnies

While watching Chicken Run Mareea scrunches up her face, looks at me disapprovingly and says, "Chickens don't talk! Stop it chickens!"

While visiting George Washinton's birthplace we passed a trash can dressed up with wooden paneled sides. Thea started to touch it and I said, "Don't touch, Thea. It's a trash can!" And Ashton says, "don't touch. That ain't no butter churn".
It DID look like a butter churn, but where my son learned "ain't no" I have NO idea!!!

Ashton asked if he could buy a swiss army knife and stated that he wouldn't point it at anyone and "it would be a different story if it was landon because he would point it at people all the time." Landon replied, "I'd point it at trees sometimes, too!"

Toaster Oven Cookies Tutorial

We don't have a toaster oven in our "normal" home, but here at our beach rental we have no oven, but do have a toaster oven. I did some Internet searching and figured out how to make cookies in it. After doing this, I believe I will have to go buy a toaster oven and will probably never make cookies in the oven again! It is so easy and quick.

Here's how to do it!
1.Make cookie dough. You can either make it from scratch or use a mix.
2. Drop by spoonful the desired amount of cookies on the aluminum foil covered tray (5-8 small cookies fit)
3. set temperature according to package or recipe instructions (no need to preheat!)
4. cook for as long as the package or recipe says to
5. enjoy your cookies!

oh...put the leftover cookie dough in an airtight container in the fridge. Anytime you want some cookies just scoop out as many as you want and do some more toaster oven cooking!
I've also made Grand's biscuits in the toaster oven with great success. No need to heat up the kitchen in the summer or wait for your big oven to preheat!

Expectations

Wow! Today has been quite the day! It started off with the girls waking up WAY too early (well, with thea waking up mareea way too early) and my trying to get them to stay in their beds for awhile. Mareea will, but Thea decided that she needed to come out and "test" me every few minutes to see if I'd let her stay up. I finally made it clear that she was not to get up and she was quite nasty to me! Friday is the one day i've decided that they can watch Super Why on PBS and after her behavior I told her she could not. Landon soon lost his TV by saying "blah!" to me when I asked him to take his dirty clothes to where they belonged. So I had 2 mad and overtired littles by 8 am!
We made it to story time where Ashton told me "no" to my face when I told him to sit down and do the craft. It was age appropriate for him and I thought it would be a good thing for him to do. He finally did it, but I was blown away by his defiance! Back at home I tried to get the kids to get their coats on so we could pick up lunch and they just ran around like crazy in the house and as I looked after them noticed that all their toys were all over the place and not picked up. Ahhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

After lunch we went outside due to the children being crazy and wild inside. I have never seen my 2 little girls cry so much! Literally every 5 minutes they either got hurt and cried or made each other mad and screamed and cried. I'd had it and we came in as they obviously were in dire need of a nap. Trying to get them down for nap is always a challenge due to perfected stalling techniques. I really believe we go 2 steps forward 3 steps back when it comes to getting in bed for nap. When I finally did get them down for nap ashton came and told me he had accidentally pulled down the window treatments in his room. I have no idea how to fix those and pray that Dan can.

We need a routine. I feel out of sorts. My kitchen has no storage for food so everything is just kind of stacked around where it will fit. It makes me feel tired and out of control. Children are the same way. With things stacks and tucked in random places they don't have a sense of security. There always seems to be a mess here because there is no where to put things except against the wall. They are pushing, pushing, pushing me to see what they can get away with in this new place..."since I don't have to hang up my coat anymore maybe i can run in the house here, too!" All of this testing and mess make me so short tempered and I had such a hard time dealing with the constant screaming, crying and running with any sort of kindness and love. Especially since I was exhausted from the constant fight to make Thea stay in bed this morning.
It seems that I as a mother also go 2 steps forward, 3 steps back in my journey to Godliness. I am so thankful for God's grace and forgiveness on a day like today. I am praying that after quiet time we will be able to start fresh. I am also very thankful that today is Friday and we will have Daddy home for the weekend!!!

Funny...

Me-Landon, if you wake Ashton up tomorrow morning you won't be able to watch the TV show.
Landon- (bursts into tears) But it's really hard for me!!
Me-Do you know what self control is?
Landon-I don't want to answer the question!

Ashton out of the blue- When I grow up I'm going to have a store and call it "Ashton's Fashions"

Another day

We went to the library yesterday and I was pleasantly surprised at the selection. It's a very small library, but about 1/2 of it is children's books. There were great non-fiction books and the set up allows all the children to access their level of books and still be where I can see them all. We were very excited to see that they had all 4 of the Story of the World books and Q was thrilled to see the selection of cookbooks and The Dangerous Book for Boys. St. Patrick's Day is coming up and they still had a huge selection of books on that. Normally, there would be no books left for an upcoming holiday. The librarian told us about story time on Friday's and Thea is very excited to try it out.

Last night I read another chapter of The Mission of Motherhood and it really spoke to me. Well, it kind of screamed at me and kicked me in the gut...in a good way. It's helping me to learn that serving my children (not to be confused with spoiling or indulging) is the best use of my time. This is hard for me as I often feel like I "need" to have time to sit on the computer for awhile or sew or just be quiet and alone! What I perceive as an interruption or an inconvenience is actually a chance to train or to show my children love. Much more important than laundry, a perfect house, or "me" time.

Today we had fun trying to make cookies in the toaster oven. It's a new thing and we're still trying to get it right. I used a cookie mix so I would not have to buy a bunch of ingredients, but added too much oil and they were falling apart! I tried again and burned them. Oh well, i had Dan buy several packages because I knew I'd have to try a few times to get it right. We also made edible play dough from honey, peanut butter and powdered milk. This was a lot of fun! The children played with it and then we ate it on graham crackers for lunch. Tomorrow I'm hoping to make regular play doh to have for the girls to play with in the mornings.

Settling in

We've started to get into a little bit of a groove here. Dan started school monday and we're on our own during the day. In some ways things are different...we're in a new house in a new state with new people around us. But in other ways things are just the same. We're all together during the day, learning, playing and eating together. We eat the same sort of things and learn from the same books and try to get outside as much as possible. I have realized how blessed we are to homeschool and have the freedom and consistancy that comes with it. Had the children been in school, we would either have had to switch schools mid year or stay back in Ohio. While we love ohio, it's so important to be together as a family whenever we can.

Yesterday we went on a walk to check things out. We found the library a couple of blocks away and the park one street over. The children found sea glass at the beach and dug with big shells in the sand. The library was not open mondays, but we're excited to go back today and check it out. There was a big display of children's books in the window so that seems promising. I'm a little discouraged with the weather. While it seems like it should be so nice out, it's still cold! The blue sky and sun sure had me fooled until we started our walk and I realized we should have been in winter coats. We survived though...we just had to walk fast and play hard at the park.

I'm starting a new book called The Mission of Motherhood, By Sally Clarkson. A few years ago I started it and loved it, but stoped reading it for whatever reason. Now I'm starting it again and find that I need it much more in this season of my life! She talks a lot about giving our whole heart to our homes...and to being a mother. I love it. In my daily struggles I often feel tempted to want to just escape instead of deal with what's going on around me. This book has really encouraged me to apply myself to mothering instead of just try and survive the day! What we do as mothers is so important. It's worth dedicating our lives to it.

Being in a "beach house" of sorts with minimal toys, clothes and things has certainly been wonderful. I love having less laundry (or at least less clothes in general to deal with, clean up and look at), cleaning up fewer toys and not having to constantly think about organizing, decluttering and aquiring more of the things I think we need. Each time we live like this I am inspired to make our perminant home more simple. Before we left I was able to get rid of a lot, but not nearly enough to make this possible! I think I'm going to make a written plan of how to become more simple in our house in RI. What a joy to not be drowning in "stuff". I think the reason I have time to write this thought out post is that I don't have as much to worry about as I would in our perminant home.

That's about it. It's quiet around here right now. The boys watched America's Next Great Restaurant and are busy with plans for their own restaurant idea and the girls are snoozing. Mr. Gideon has just eaten lunch and is busy with eating his hand. I think I will get everyone up for library fun!!

We are here

We made it to our new, yet temporary home on Friday night after a very long day of driving. Saturday we went to the nearest town ( about an hour away) to shop at the costco and walmart for groceries. $300 later we headed home to take a walk along the beach and enjoy the not-as -cold-as-Cincinnati weather. All that fresh air after a long, cold winter exhausted me! I could hardly stay awake after. This also might have something to do with our house. There are windows all around the house and the sun comes up at 6:30. This means the children are waking up an hour earlier than usual and consequently, so is mama!

Our house is meant to be a beach house for shorter vacations. It is furnished and has 3 bedrooms. We like that the children can keep the same sleeping arrangements that they are used to at home. Q sleeps on the sofa bed in a little nook in the house. He loves having his own little area. The kitchen has a stove with 4 burners, a 1/2 size dishwasher, and NO oven. We knew this before we came and brought along our electric griddle and our crock pot. Our meals will almost all be made in the crock pot, which is not so different from being at home. The only thing I will miss is being able to make bread and cookies! There is a toaster oven, however, and i may try to make cookies in it!

We are within walking distance of the beach, library and a park. I am hoping to take 2 walks a day with the children. Since we are waking up so much earlier this should not be a problem! I also hope it will result in the girls taking a good nap so we can do school in the afternoons with minimal cutie pie interruptions.

I am off to finish up dinner. Tonight we're having chili on hot dogs with onions and cheese! No oven needed for that! I'm hoping to have enough chili left over to have chili over baked potatoes next week.

We're on the move!!

The movers came yesterday and today and got all of our things packed and out. We headed out soon after the movers left to start our journey to the coast. Tonight we're in a hotel and will do the big part of the trip tomorrow. I cried as we left. It was terrible. I hate the thought that we're not going back, that we won't be at our church on Sunday and that some friends I may never see again on this side of heaven. However, I have recently decided to purpose to "choose joy" in life and am trying my best to be joyful in this move. And as I told Dan today, "i'm glad we're sad about leaving...otherwise it would mean we had a bad 3 years here". I wish I could write about how wonderful our friends have been over these last few years, about how much we loved having Daddy home every night and hiking all over beautiful Cincinnati. But I'm not even sure I could put it into words. God blessed us greatly by giving us these years. We grew in our marriage, grew our family and grew some wonderful friends. Now a new chapter of life is about to begin. I am thankful to be with my husband and that we can do it together.