Hey All,

It has taken me a long time to update, but It has been busy here.  Us four kids are involed in a play (the Golden Goose) and I (Hannah) am involved in show choir.  We took a trip to Minnesota for four days, and we had a blast seeing all of our friends.  We are going to TX in two weeks to visit friends.  This summer, we got a trampoline!  Here are some pictures:

We have been having a blast with it!!

I guess thats all for now, hopfully we'll have more updates soon!!

We had a blast visiting our cousins and grandparents this August!  We did alot, and had a blast.  Here are a few pictures of the trip:

We spent a lot of time swimming!!

Natalie finally got into the ocean!!  (You can read all about it in my last post)

Grant and his cousin went parasailing

And Last but not least, my mom went to a cooking class taught by Robert Irvine on the Food Network, and got a picture with him.

Every year that we come to the ocean to visit my grandparents, my sister Natalie, has never gone in the ocean because her excama would hurt in the salt water.  This year, she went into the ocean and loved it!!  She said it didnt hurt anymore.  It has helped her lots.  Thank the lord!!!

I will try and get some pictures on here soon!!

Here is a quiz for you.  These two guys are:

1)  Completely unrelated - live in different states and only recently met

2)  Twin brothers - separated at a young age and recently reunited via Facebook

3)  Second cousins on their mothers' sides

4)  Half brothers - the brother on the left is 5 years older

As of tomorrow, we should have a new, finished roof over our heads.  Our friend came from the Twin Cities to serve as foreman and chief hard worker, but many others pitched in to make it a success, and we are extremely grateful.  Here's a great shot of a couple young workers:

These dudes worked hard and earned a trip to Noah's Ark in the Dells, which we visited today.  (No photos, however.  Didn't want to wreck the camera... just our skin, which we rotisseried to a lovely shade of scarlet).

Hannah got to open an early birthday present last night, while her friend was here for a visit.  However, she didn't get it.   I got her a pair of pierced birthstone earrings. She had been asking for pierced ears for awhile, but I had told her she has to wait until she was 27.  Thus the look of confusion on her face as she examined the new earrings.

I thought for sure she'd get it right away, like "Wow, mom's going to let me get my ears pierced!!"  No such luck.  She was acting all polite, like she really liked the gift, but she honestly thought she had to wait till she was 27 to wear them!   She and her smiling friend are going to get their ears pierced together, tomorrow.

Happy 9th Birthday to the baby of the family!  (Zach.)  Have a great birthday Zach!

 This May, I got to go to my good friend Gracie's house in Minnesota.  While I was there, Molly (Gracie's sister) had a birthday.  She invited a few of her friends to come to a tea party.  We had lots of fun.  We went to the library,  the park, and a lot more!  Here are a few pictures I took in Minnesota:

Happy June everyone!  Finally, nice weather!  :D

Happy mothers day everyone!  I hope you are enjoying this great holiday, and I hope that all moms get some beauty rest (Zach and Natalie call it "beauty rest.)

More exciting updates to come soon.  :-) 

It has come to our attention by several of the very few people who read this boring blog, that it hasn't been updated in awhile.  So, without further ado, I (mom) am about to enter my last entry.  The chore of blogging will now go to Hannah, who loves to write anyway.  Hopefully you can expect to see more frequent posting in the future.

Where did we leave off?  The birth of kittens?  Ok, that was two months ago.  Since then, the kids have participated in two plays.  The first was Charlotte's Web, which they, along with a cast of about 25 other kids, spent months preparing for.

Here are a few action shots of the kids (Zach as Uncle the Pig, Natalie as Narrator, Hannah as Mrs. Arable, Grant as Mr. Zuckerman):

In April, our 4H club competed in the Dodge County Music and Drama Festival.  Our play, "Whose Throne Is It, Anyway?" took first place.  With that honor comes the opportunity to perform it at the State Fair this summer.  Here's our fun-loving Renaissance cast:

Our homeschool group expounded on that idea and planned a Medieval Feast.  We had a dinner, medieval music, chess tournaments, and each family made a family banner.  Our medieval menu included:

Roast Chicken, Pottage, Honeyed Carrots, Tossed Greens, Sweet and Savory Tarts, Dried Fruits, Homemade Bread, and Medieval Gingerbread.

At the end of April, we took a visit to see Grandpa and Grandma in Arizona.  We kept very busy the whole week, visiting such places as the Biosphere 2, Old Tucson, Mexico, the Pima Air and Space Museum, and Mt. Lemmon.  Not to mention spending many fun hours playing word games and cribbage.  Here is a group shot on top of the mountain:

We arrived home from Arizona in time to attend our annual home schooling conference, at which we had a Little Red Hen booth.  Mom and dad both wished to attend Friday night seminars, so we left our 8-year-old salesman of the family in charge.  He got high compliments from the exibitor next to us.  The kid could sell a ketchup popsicle to a woman wearing white gloves!

Enough blogging.  Time for mom to go and work in the garden!

We have had a lot going in the last week.  Friday we had a home school science lab.  Grant demonstrated a vinegar and baking soda reaction that blew up a balloon and changed the water color.  We came home from that just in time to see our new kittens being born.  Three of 'em.  Want one?

Then we had company over the weekend.  My nephew and niece and their three children came for a visit.  Their oldest, who is six, participated in the state Mites Hockey tournament nearby.  Man, those little kids can skate!  We had such a nice visit, and now my kids have new pen pals.

The play that the kids are (Charlotte's Web) in is drawing near.  We are in charge of makeup; here are a few of our practice runs.

I made a quilt top recently and sent it to my sister, who quilted it for me using her long arm.  I finally got it bound and am enjoying it profusely!

Another project we are working on is our upcoming 4H drama festival.  I wrote a goofy skit on the Tudors, based on the Renaissance/Reformation era we are studying.  Yesterday I worked on a Henry VIII costume.  More photos will be forthcoming as this play develops!

We have a fun new activity that we have begun, based on the Food Network show, "Chopped."  We are calling it the Mystery Dinner Challenge.

One of the kids will compile four ingredients and give them to me.  I have to use all four in the dish that I come up with.  Last night, Hannah gave me a bone-in leg of lamb (she had thawed it without my knowlege) , frozen corn, dried parsley, and a grapefruit. 

Woohoo, a challenge!  I made a leg of lamb roast witth a corn, spinach, and onion stuffing and a pomegranate grapefruit reduction glaze.  (I used the lamb bone and the dried parsley to make the stock reduction).   It turned out great!   More challenges to follow!

Last Tuesday afternoon I received a message that my dad was in the hospital after having a heart attack.  So I cleared my calender and flew to Arizona, and not a moment too soon.  He had open heart surgery the next day (quintuple bypass), but I was able to talk to him the night before.  Thankfully, he came through the surgery well and was even able to go home four days later.  It was a close one.  If you are reading this, dad, we are still praying for you as you finish recovering.  Here is dad the morning before surgery with his wife, his sister, and his brother-in-law.

Oh, and by the way, here are a couple views from dad's house, which is halfway up a mountain and overlooking the valley.   We are taking the kids there in April for a visit; we can't wait!

The kids are getting ready for their play in March.  We only have four more rehearsals until tech week.  It's hard to imagine at this point that it will all come together, but it always does.  I forgot my camera the other day when they wore their costumes, so pix will have to wait until the dress rehearsal.

Our church did a Read-a-thon on Valentines Day evening.  What a joy it was to see children engrossed in books!  Every 20 minutes or so, there would be a break in the action for a game or door prize drawing.  It was also an opportunity for parents to bring their kids by and go have a Valentine's date.  I thought I took pictures, but you will have to use your imagination.

We really like the show "Chopped" on Food Network.  The premise is that these chefs are given a basket of four unusual ingredients (for example:  dessert course - dried prunes, cream cheese, animal crackers, and one other thing that I don't remember; red wine maybe) and have to make a dish with it in 30 minutes.   They can use other ingredients too, but have to incorporate the main four.

So tonight I was downstairs working in my commercial kitchen, when Grant came down with a basket and gave me a challenge for dinner.  Anticipating that I would see something like marshmallows and asparagus, I was chagrined to discover ground beef, dried basil, tomato paste, and spaghetti noodles.  Wow, let me go out on a limb here!  Of course he wanted me to make spaghetti, but keeping with the spirit of the show, I made smoked cheese spagetti with spinach and mushrooms, topped with tomato-basil meatballs.  Grant told me that I had been chopped (eliminated).

The groundhog saw his shadow today, so it means six more weeks of winter.  (If he doesn't see his shadow, it means a month and a half more of winter).

My childhood tradition, started by my mom, was to eat Cracker Jacks and drink Dr. Pepper, while singing a song she wrote.  I don't remember the words, but my older sisters probably do (something about being little bickering groundhogs with cabin fever).  So, we began our own tradition today.  We made Alton Brown's recipe for Slacker Jack (tastes like the real thing but without the prize) and we all drank lattes.  Even the 8-year-old.  There was much rejoicing among the children, whose exposure to coffee is limited.  Lunch today was a complete sugar fest!  (Diabetic dad's out of town this week).

The cake you see above is the remnants of Grant's Superbowl cake from yesterday.  Here is a shot of it before it was demolished:

All the boys in the family were quite delighted with the results of Superbowl 43.  I was rooting for the Cardinals, and it is a well-known fact that anyone I ever cheer for loses (it's one of the symptoms of being a Vikings fan).  So they thanked me for cheering on the Cardinals, thus ensuring the Steeler win.

Last Friday Hannah had a few friends over and we had a cooking class on making meat sauce.  This was part of her 4H foods project.

Today Canada and a few other countries celebrate Boxing Day.  I never knew what that was; I only saw it on calenders and assumed it was the day that people boxed up their Christmas gifts that were laying all over the house.  Apparently there is a little more to it.

I sent out an electronic Christmas greeting yesterday, and it has come to my attention that some people could not open the MS Word attachment that I sent.  So I am re-posting my Christmas greeting here.

December 25, 2008

Merry Christmas!

I sit at my computer today, on this day when the world celebrates the birth of the King of Kings, to send you warm greetings on a day that is -2 degrees here in Wisconsin.

I didn’t get a chance to write and send out a letter, so I am resorting to cyber space.  However, the money saved in postage and printing will be donated to our local church’s compassion fund (a fund which gives assistance to people who need it here in town).

We close out the year 2008 with some wonderful memories of this year.  We enjoyed our first full year at the homestead, filled with such projects as gardening and raising meat and egg chickens.  Our first flock of egg layers got eaten by various Horicon Marsh wildlife, most notably a neighborhood dog.  After much trial and error, we now have the layers and their male counterparts secured in an area that needs to be enlarged this spring!  The remaining meat birds are nestled into their cold winter habitat, aka the freezer, awaiting the opportunity to become a culinary concoction.  Raising sheep was on the list for the year, but we never got their fence up.  Hopefully next year…  I already have them named:  Mitten and Mutton.

We are still having a ball homeschooling, and mom is learning a lot!   The older kids are in the middle of studying the Renaissance and Reformation, while the younger two are in 19^th century American History.  Grant and Zach played baseball in our new town, and Grant was allowed to participate in the local middle school football program.  Grant also had a blast attending a 5-day Air Academy camp in OshKosh, as well as the air show in July.  Hannah has been working hard on piano and voice lessons.  And Natalie, well, we have been concentrating on getting her well from her eczema.  And she is doing quite well right now, and feels more up to doing her favorite activites, like drawing and studying medieval weapons.  All four kids are gearing up for a homeschool production of “Charlotte’s Web,” to be performed March 20-21 in Fond du Lac. 

We started 4H this past year and the kids are doing such projects as clothing, folk arts, drawing, photography, clowning, theater arts, aerospace, and cats.  Cats??  Yep, a stray tiger cat adopted us last spring – don’t feed it, kids!  Too late. She will never go away.  But her name is Go Away anyway (mom is an optimist).  Go-Go is heavy with kittens and will pop soon.  Any takers??  She had an earlier batch this summer, but alas, the aforementioned Horicon Marsh Wildlife took their toll on the entire litter.  After this batch, she will be rendered unable to reproduce.

Another highlight of the year has been getting to know our new church family better.  We really enjoy the fellowship, and most importantly, the mission of the church to teach people about Jesus.  Mom sang with the praise team and joined the library team.  Dad just joined the set-up and take-down team, and the kids have been attending Awana on Wednesday nights.  Last night, instead of having a Christmas service, we got do DO Christmas service by going caroling and bringing treats and Christmas cheer to two local nursing facilities.

Mom tried her hand at school pictures again this year, and below are the results.  It’s quite amazing what you can do with Photoshop! 

In closing, wherever this day finds you, may you be blessed by the love of God, who sent us the precious gift of his Son.

We were snowed in this week on Monday and Tuesday; how nice not to have to go anywhere!  I spent much of the time quilting, making gifts (wall hangings) for my two retail customers.  I can post the pix here, since I know they don't visit my blog.  My, this is an addicting pastime!

My turkey stock from Thanksgiving (which I had set on the deck to cool) was completely buried under the snow.  Oh well, at least it's frozen!  It's the marshmallow-looking bump in the picture:

The kids spent hours playing with their Keva planks, building cities, roads, and structures. 

We had a great Thanksgiving this year.  Our friends who always visit were here, and the day after Thanksgiving, we had a gathering of four families.  Each family has a daughter (ages 11-14) who is a penpal to the others.  Several of the girls (and moms and dads too) met for the first time.  We had a very enjoyable visit!  I would post a photo, but the camera with my Thanksgiving pictures on it has gone AWOL.  It serves me right for snapping a photo of an Amish guy when he wasn't looking.     

It has come to my attention that I have not been giving my blog any attention.  So, here is a brief update of our lives since September 5 (at least what I can remember).

In early Sept, Grandpa Bob and Grandma Patty came to visit.  They stayed for a week, and Grandpa got to see Grant play in a football game.  Zach and Grandpa began a cribbage rivalry.

It has been Field Trip City this fall!!  Here are several of the places we went.

Zach, Hannah, and I took a trip to Pepin for Laura Ingalls Wilder Days.  We didn't even bring a tent; we just camped in the van.  It rained most of the weekend and it was pretty miserable.  Hannah entered her final Laura contest; next year she will be too old and we can stay home (heh heh heh).

We attended our 3rd annual Heritage Lab in Minnesota, put on for school groups by a nature center.  This year the theme was American Indians. 

Locally, one of our homeschool dads is a civil war buff and had a little reenactment for our homeschool group.  Here are the kids, getting ready to walk in formation:

Another field trip we did with this group was to visit a local pumpkin farm.  They have so much more than pumpkins - they have go carts, a mining shaft, a slide, a haystack to climb, a petting farm, and even more.  It was chilly out, but we all had fun (and came home with 4 enormous pumpkins).

4H has begun for the year, and our little club that was new last year has grown from 5 to 9 families.  We operated a food stand at a local festival in early October, and did all our fundraising for the year.  Aren't you glad?  We won't be hounding you for donations!!  We attended an old time gathering at the county fairgrounds, with lots of artisans on hand.  Here is Natalie, practicing her axe throw.

Our final "Field Trip" of the fall was a visit to grandparents in Hilton Head Island, SC.   We had a great time, visiting and spending time on the beach.  One of the kids' favorite things to do on the beach is hunt for shark's teeth.  I don't get the attraction of such an activity, but they came home with enough teeth to string for garland around the Christmas tree.  Ok, I am kidding but they sure have a lot of them. 

We took a day trip to Savannah to have lunch at Paula Deen's restaurant, The Lady and Sons.  We also toured the Hilton Head Island Museum, and went mini-golfing.

While there, mom got to teach grandpa how to make homemade soap.  Here he is, cutting his first batch of soap into bars:

Back at home, Hannah came screaming into the house one day, insisting there was a rattlesnake outside.  Since we had only seen garter snakes before, I went and took a look.  Here is the little guy that was curled up next to our garage.  A little bit of research on the net identified him (or her) as a harmless little milk snake.  He was little, probably not even 10 inches long.

Finally, here are the kids' school pictures (taken by mom with a cheesy little camera and made to look decent on Photoshop), all put together into one composite:

Looking at my posting pattern, you can probably expect the next update sometime in January. 

Our friends came for a visit over Labor Day weekend, and boy did we get a lot done!  An Amish tour, complete with the purchase of 10 flats of strawberries!  We came home that evening and had a "strawberry work frolic" with all 12 of us helping!

We also butchered a few chickens, wired the hen house with electric, tiled the bathroom floor, and a few other odds and ends.  Time flew and before you knew it, it was time for them to go home.  We all went through withdrawals after they left.

Football season is upon us, and Grant is playing with a nearby middle school; his first time with an organized team.  Here he is before his first game ever.  He's the little blond guy, right next to the guy who is twice his size.  Ya gotta love eighth grade!

I returned Saturday from a trip to New York City, where I was privileged to be able to work at a church conference. 

While there, I received a blessing that was totally unexpected.  I flew in Tuesday afternoon and didn't need to report to work until Wednesday afternoon, so I thought I'd go see a friend who just landed a small part as part of the company in a Broadway musical (Hairspray).  I bought a single ticket, and Ticketmaster put me in the 2nd row from the stage, front and center!  I was literally four feet from the stage and got spit on by the actors when they did their lines from there.

I was sitting there before the show, minding my own business and reading the program, when out fell a small piece of paper that said that the part of Link Larkin would be played that night by Curt Hansen (who happens to be my friend)!  It was a stunning show, and Curt did such a great job!  To think, I was in three musicals with this talented young man back when he was in middle and high school!  He only found out at 4:30 that afternoon that he was to play the lead that night (he is an understudy for it).  What a wonderful surprise!

After the show, I got to go backstage and meet up with Curt.  What a huge blessing all this was!  I still haven't recovered!  Isn't he a little cutie?

Other highlights of the trip included visiting Chelsea Market, where the offices of Food Network are located (see picture below), having dinner at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill (well ok, not dinner - too expensive - but appetizers and dessert), and walking across the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan at midnight.  I made a new friend, Maria (hi Maria, if you are reading this - you are a dear!!!) and got to know my wonderful work partner Mary better, too.  Maria showed Mary and me all over the city, and we were very grateful to her!

This was the view from our hotel, the Bentley (located next to the East River next to the Queensboro Bridge): 

This is day camp in New York City.  Huge groups of kids in matching T-shirts, visiting a candy shop:

The people at Trinity Baptist were so wonderful!  I really enjoyed working with them and hope to visit for a service the next time I am in NY and reconnect with them.

Oh, one more thing.  I was in NY the day that Brett Favre was welcomed to the New York Jets, on 08/08/08.  For most people, not a big deal.  It's a slightly bigger deal to me because I live in Wisconsin and recently decided to root for the Packers (in addition to my Vikings).

So now it's back to reality.  Back to crowing roosters, chirping birds, and meowing cats.  Our cat had kittens earlier this summer, and they have all died.  One from natural causes, three from a racoon that got into our garage, and one from a neighbor dog.  This living in the country takes some getting used to.  We got 13 new Aracauna hens to replace the ones that previously acted as dog bait, and two have died.  One from natural causes, and the other was yesterday at the hands of a neighbor dog. 

Today we have to finish our 4H fair projects.  They are due tomorrow!! I better get moving!  Nothing like waiting until the last minute.....

We just got back last night from a week's vacation in Minnesota.  We actually got to stay in mom's childhood home, which is now a lakeside rental property.  What a beautiful place!  And why in heaven's name didn't I appreciate it when I was young??  I just wanted to be in town with my friends, not surrounded by God's creation on a gorgeous lake.  We had some dear friends stay with us for most of the week, and then my younger sister and her family joined us for the last two nights.

Here are some of us, relaxing in the lakeside hot tub (installed by the current owner):

Hannah's friend Gracie was baptized in the lake by her dad, on the very day (July 1) that Hannah was baptized the year before.  It was very special!

My irrational childhood fear of snapping turtles haunted me.  I never saw a snapper as a kid, but there was a huge one this time under the neighbor's boat lift.  I only swam once after seeing that, and only after making Grant dive into the water first to scare all the snappers away.  But we did have a lot of fun with the canoes and kayaks:

No trip home in the summer is complete without a jump off the Phelps Mill bridge.  Only Grant and mom were brave enough this year.  The water was running strong and did I mention there is a dam about 20 feet away?  So you have to jump in and then swim like crazy to reach the shore.

The kids caught a bunch of fish, some of which I actually cleaned and made into fish stock.  There wasn't enough there to filet them.  Dad had to help hold 'em down because those little buggers were strong and one almost got away.

One of the highlights of the vacation was the annual family 4th of July Croquet tournament.  This was the 29th year we have celebrated this event.  The previous year's winner gets to pick the theme, and this year's theme was Cowboys and Indians.  Grandma Patty is the winner for this year's tournament, and she has until New Year's Eve to pick next year's theme and the site.  One requirement is that the winner always gets thrown into a body of water.  Since we played on land that had no lakes, a large round cow tank was filled, and Grandma Patty carefully and gingerly stepped into the water so she wouldn't get thrown in.  Here is Jessica, last year's winner, handing over the traveling trophy.

And finally, when we left last week for vacation, we left behind our very pregnant feline, Go Away.  We thought she'd have the kittens while we were gone, but she had the common courtesy to wait until we were home.  This afternoon, we discovered three baby kittens, born today.  Then a few hours later, Go Away surprised us by popping out a couple more.  Here are the first three:

Friends (and husbands) have been hounding me to update my blog.  Hey, I've been busy.  So, here goes:

First of all, a tribute to my dear friend Kathy, who unexpectedly went home to be with the Lord this past week.  She was only in her 30s, and leaves behind her husband and two children, ages 10 and 14.  She was a sweet spirit whose gentleness and kindness will not soon be forgotten.  She served her family with her whole being, and she loved her Lord above all.  Although we are terribly sad and will miss her so badly, she is now walking in the presence of Jesus!  The seizures which plagued her for so long are history.  Goodbye Kathy!  I love you and I'll see you on the other side someday.

(dries tears)

My sisters and I (all seven of us) flew out to Maryland over Memorial Day weekend to celebrate our mom's 75th birthday.  We had a wonderful time!  Here is a group shot of Toots and the girls:

She enjoyed the weekend so much that she has requested that we make this an annual event.  We agreed, except we thought that it would be wise to choose an earlier weekend.  Toots lives just on the other side of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, and the Memorial weekend traffic there is horrendous.  Add to that the Naval Academy graduation and you have the makings of a travel nightmare.

While I was gone, the kids told me I was in the local newspaper.  I was showing our laying hens to a daycare (a few months ago!  Must have been a slow news day!)  I didn't have the heart to call the paper or the daycare and tell them that all 13 of our laying hens got eaten by a dog.

We had to create a more secure place for our new meat birds (that were living in a large box in the basement for two weeks), so dad and Grant built this moveable chicken tractor.

The dog that ate our previous hens has been coming back every morning, desperate for a tasty poultry meal.  Today dad followed the dog home (to find out where he lived) and let the owner know that "Gunnar" has been tearing up our yard and will be the victim of Animal Control if he comes again.  Gunnar has been thwarted day after day due to the weight of the chicken house, but here is a shot of his destruction:

Oh, another thing that has kept us VERY busy is the advent of baseball season.   Apparently in the new township we moved to, this is the HIGHLIGHT of the year.  We signed both boys up, so our lives are very full with practices, games, and tournaments.  Here is Zach, batting for the first time:

Here is Grant's team, after taking first place in their recent tournament:

Grant was accepted to the EAA Air Academy camp in Oshkosh, so we have also been busy getting ready for that.  He gets to be away from home for 5 days, living in dorms with other 12 and 13-year olds.

Oh, one last thing.  It's confession time!  We finally broke down and ordered DirecTV so that I could watch the new season of my favorite show, The Next Food Network Star.  It's a competition, a la American Idol (which I have never watched but now I get why people are sucked in)...  Go Kelsey!!  Or Shane!   I was rooting for Aaron until he dropped an OMG bomb (my pet peeve).