One day, as we were innocently watching some tv, a nasty smell started wafting into our noses.  My hubby said it smelled like death.  All I knew was that it stunk.  For about a week we searched the house for the smell.  My hubby actually went down to the basement and cleaned and still didn't find the smell.  Finally, I turned the couch over because I was convinced there was a dead mouse in the couch.  I smelled all over the couch, didn't find the source, but then, out of a strange hunch, I smelled the outlet.  There it was!  The outlet stunk!  That's when I remembered about a month previous to that, we were sitting in the frontroom and heard scratching in the walls.  UGH!  There was a dead mouse somewhere in our walls!  What were we supposed to do?  My hubby wanted to start tearing apart the walls - which I couldn't really blame him since the smell was just awful.  We tried to wait it out for a little while.  We were hoping it would go away.  No such luck.  Finally, hubby started surgery on our house.  Thankfully, the other side of the wall that the smell was coming from was the basement stairs.  So we didn't have to rip apart a wall that could actually be seen. 

And this is some of what hubby found:

Creepy.  Obviously, this isn't the first time this had happened.  Unfortunatly, he still didn't find the source of the smell.  And we are still living with it. It is definitly not as strong as before, but it's still there.  I need to write a book about everything you need to know about before you move to the country. 

I don't have much to say today, but I will post a couple of pics.  I already had these up on photobucket and since it takes about 20 min to upload photos, I might as well use them.

We made maple leaf cut out cookies.  I think it was on recipezaar.com.  The kids always enjoy making cut out cookies and I don't, but I let them do it once or twice a year because I remember how much fun it was as a kid.  Now that I am the grown up, I have to deal with rolling the dough - which is my least favorite part - and of course, the clean up.  Lots of little sprinkles all over...  yuck. 

B was walking around with a bandana, so I turned him into a pirate.  He was a pirate with a sullen attitude.  He likes drama.    But isn't he adorable?

My next post will be a little more exciting.  Or creepy....

This is a picture of the chicks at about a week old.

Aren't they cute?  They didn't stay cute for long.  They grew fast, and soon we needed to move then into their big chick coop. 

Here is D inside the chicken tractor, which was their "nursery", catching the chicks and passing them out. 

And N moving the chicks to their new home.

They have so much more room now.  You see how they've gotten ugly?  Some of them look like hawks. 

Our neighbors gave us four chickens about a month ago - two hens and two roosters.  Two days ago, we found an egg from one of the hens.  And a little over a week ago, Mrs. Duck started laying.  That is very exciting news around here.  Our four hens do not produce enough eggs to feed this family.  Now that we have two more birds contributing, that will help a lot. 

And that wraps up this edition of Fowl News. 

Last week, Wednesday, we headed to the post office to pick up our chicks!  We ordered 27 Americana chicks, and we received one extra.  Americana chickens lay tinted blue, green eggs.  They also go broody, so in a year or so, we should get our own baby chicks.  It sure beats trying to incubate eggs!  That was fun, but a pain, and not very successful. 

I just love all the different colors they are. 

So far, 3 chicks have died.  We expected it, but it was still sad.  Especially knowing that I paid money for the dead chickens now rotting in my garden. 

Speaking of sadness, we had to put down two of our ducks.  We think the guineas were picking on the ducks, which caused open wounds.  Since it was warm and the flies were out like crazy, they laid eggs in the wounds and, well.... you can imagine the horror that ensued.  When we found them, they were really bad off.  The vet said it would cost over $200 minimum per duck and it could take up to 6 months to nurse them back to health.  So we chose to put them down for $13.  We were really upset, but we still have two ducks, one male and one female, so we are hoping for some baby ducks come spring. 

This morning we woke up to a blanket of fog.  That wasn't completely out of the ordinary, but what sparked our interest was all of the spider webs that we could see.  The wet air had put drops of dew all over the webs around the house.  And being "fall", there were a LOT of webs. 

We started out investigating our front porch. 

But soon the kids were running around the yard finding webs.

We found lots of teeny tiny webs in the grass about 1 inch in diameter.  We also found some bigger webs in the trees and on this sunflower in our garden. 

I found a really good example of a funnel web.

On the way back from the house, I noticed our bushes. 

Can you believe all those webs?  And you can see the fog in the background.

After breakfast, we set up bug bombs and went to Walmart while all of our indoor spiders died. 

When we got home, I read to the kids about spiders from the Handbook of Nature Study.  Tomorrow, we will begin our spider unit study that has been sitting around for a few years, waiting to be used. 

And since we are on the subject of spiders, here is one we found the other night.

And his web which was about 5 feet tall. 

Today we started back to school!  I forgot how much work it is!  Thankfully my mom is here to help out with some of the lessons.  She was entertaining the little ones while I worked with the big ones.  I am terrible at being prepared.  But part of the problem is, I don't know how to prepare.  I like to wing it.  But I know things would run smoother if I was prepared.  How do you people do it?  How do you school some kids and keep the other kids busy at the same time?  How do you keep them sitting quietly?  Things actually went rather well today, despite my pleas for help.  :-)  It's just that right now in my life I am desperate for organization and schedules, but I am so awful at it! 

This year, I bought Teaching Textbooks for D.  I still love Saxon math, but with the other kids schooling to do, I needed something easier on me.  I actually just ordered it today, so I will have to let you know how it goes.  But it is CD Roms and it actually teaches the lesson, has him do practice problems, lesson problems, and most importantly to me, it checks his work.  He tried the sample lesson online and is really excited about it.  He will also finish up his Learning Language Arts through Literature book that I got for him in January.  I really like that book.  When he finishes, I will get him the next book. 

N is moving on into Saxon 3.  It's the last Saxon that I will be doing with him.  Next year, he becomes independent.  He is so happy to be doing school again.  It's awesome.  I am still using First Language Lessons since it is for 1st and 2ND grade.  We like it and I plan on using it for the other kids as well. 

For science we are going to start out with our nature journals.  When the weather turns nasty, we will move on to a volcano/earthquake lapbook.  After that, I have Christian Kids Explore Chemistry that I will hopefully use this year.  (We never got to it last year) 

We are putting off our Story of the World for right now to do A Child's Geography:  Explore the Holy Land.  I did a couple lessons last year, and then I realized it was May and the school year was almost over, so I saved it until this year.  When we finish that, we will continue Story of the World Volume II. 

They will still have copywork, reading, and writing. 

Princess C and Toddler B will be starting Saxon 1.  Mostly Princess C, but Toddler B will be sitting in on the lessons and learning with her.  C will also be practicing writing.  She has hit the point where she wants to do things neatly and carefully, so that helps.  B is just a nut.  Today, we were doing lesson 1, and I was trying to get him to repeat the date and the year and other things.  He would shout out goofy answers like, "2000 and mama!"  or "Tuesmama!"  Oy.  This should be fun.  And since we are speaking of fun, C and B are doing a shape book of some sort.  It is filled with songs and rhymes with a few worksheets thrown in.  They know there shapes, but the worksheets have them tracing shapes and letters.  I am also going to go through the alphabet with them, and have them memorize a scripture for each letter.  We will be using Psalty's song to help them memorize them.  C will be learning to read this year using Abeka's reading and Bob books. 

I have the book, Drawing with Children that I would like to fit in somehow.  We used it once or twice last year and the kids really enjoyed it.  But it's so hard for me to fit in the regular need-to-do things, that it's practically impossible to fit in optional, fun things.  So, we will see how it goes. 

I think that about sums it up.  What are you using?

Just when I vow to be consistent with my blogging, my computer breaks.  I have had such computer problems, it's ridiculous.  N was holding Lil' L when her foot got caught on the power cord of my laptop.  He walked away and, BOOM, down went the laptop.  There were three things wrong with it.  Dell only fixed one problem.  We have been trying for weeks to get the other problems solved.  Nobody knows what could be wrong with it.  The only answer they have is to reboot the entire thing.  So we had to go buy an external hard drive - which took us awhile since our "big city" is not so close.  Now we have to talk to Dell again.  My desk top computer has been broken for awhile.  While we were at Best Buy, we picked up a new fan for it, got it working, but then couldn't install the internet on it.  Of course.  And the next day it broke again anyway.  My mom was in CA visiting my brother, so since she wasn't going to be using her computer, she let my sister borrow it.  So normally I have three computers in my house, and yet I was not able to use any of them.  Very, very frustrating.  Thankfully, my mom is home, and so is her computer.  Phew.  So that's my story.  I have pictures to post and updates to share, but for now, I need to clean my house.  I have a weekend full of company.  Shockingly. 

I am looking forward to reading what everone is doing this school year!

If you were a fly on our wall, you might hear something like this:

N:  We are not allowed to say the "S" word. 

D:  What about the "D" word.  We aren't allowed to say that, either. 

N:  The "D" word?  What's that... Oh, I know.  What about the "F" word?  Mom does NOT like the "F" word. 

At that point, I'm like, what in the world?????

Then I decode their words.  S = stupid, D = dumb, and F = fart.  Those are the worst words my kids know. 

This morning, B came down wearing overalls looking all cute and everything.  Princess C comes over to me and says, "I want to wear oreos." 

My SIL informed me the other day that we only have 6 more weeks until school starts.  SAY WHAT?!?!  That's it?!  Didn't summer just start?  Isn't it still June?  D still hasn't finished last year's math.  I havn't bought next year's math.  I will be homeschooling three/four kids next year!  AHHH!!!!   I say three/four because I plan on including B in on C's schooling as much as I can.  If I can keep them on the same page as far as schooling, life will be so much easier in the long run.  I can't imagine either one of them being ready to sit and learn, so I think I'm going to have to get creative with them.  I don't do creative.  I wish I did creative.  But, I just don't.  Oh, and I just realized there will be a new baby to deal with come Febuary.  Wow, that sounded bad.  But what I meant was, crying and pooping and nursing to try and keep up with therefore school will most likely come to a halt.  Yikes, I hadn't thought of that.  More creativity.  I'm in trouble.  Lil' L was born in May, so we ended the school year early.  B was born in Dec, so we had an extended Christmas break, Princess C was born in August, and really back then, I was only schooling one child, so that wasn't even a big deal.  This is the first baby I'll have to try and work school around. 

If I'm talking in circles, I'm sorry.  I just now thought of all that. 

All summer, N has been working on a snake notebook.  He has been researching things like what is the fastest snakes and most poisonous snakes.  He has drawn pictures and written things about what he drew.  He has printed out pictures and written things about that as well.  He has done all of this on his own.  I showed him what books to look in, and Hubby looked a few things up on the internet for him.  I am quite proud of him.  He is the type of kid that loves collecting things.  So to have a collection of books and pencils and what not to carry around with him makes him happy.  He was just carrying around the stack of things, but then he found an empty container, so he has that filled up and he carries the container around with him.  Right now, he is reading over a book trying to find some cool information to write about.  He probably has about 20 pages in his notebook. 

I love that he is learning and loving it. 

I think I lost all of my readers.  Hopefully I will get some new ones. 

Life has been crazy busy.  Summers are usually like that.  We finished off baseball season.  That only lasted about 2 months so it wasn't as bad as by our old house.  Speaking of old house, yesterday marked our 1 year anniversary of being in our new house. 

So on to the news, right?  We are expecting baby number 6 Jan 31.  We are all excited and happy about it.  I have been feeling TIRED!  Only slightly nauseous.  Just very, very tired.  I don't remember being this tired with my other pregnancies.  But that's OK, because with my other ones, I was insanely sick.  I am actually enjoying this pregnancy so far. 

D turned 11 a few days ago.  He is getting old so quickly.  He is also maturing into such a helpful young man.  He takes care of the animals almost completely by himself.  He feeds them and waters them, lets them out and puts them away.  He is always willing to help and do whatever I ask usually without complaint.  Unless it's school work... that's another story. 

Hopefully I'll get back in the habit of blogging.  I miss it.  I am 10 weeks now, so hopefully in a few weeks I won't be so dead tired. 

Out here in [Ba] Boony Land, we have to find our own source of entertainment.  Especially on days that the internet isn't working and the satellite TV is out.  One of our games is "Is that our Van?"  When someone goes to town, we all gather around the kitchen window and stare down the road.  When we see a car in the distance - which can be a good mile and a half away - we guess if that is our van or not.  It's harder than you think.  But, we don't leave the house much, so that doesn't keep us very occupied. 

The other game we play is "Guess when the wind will change."  (I know, you are thinking what losers we are right about now.)  Yesterday the wind was outrageously strong.  I looked outside and saw the neighbor flying by on a bicycle.  The wind was SSW at 24 mph.  One of my south facing windows has plastic on it.  The plastic was so bubbled out, I thought it was going to pop.  The other south facing windows had a wonderful wind coming straight through them.  Anyway, every time I went upstairs, I noticed my plastic, and I would check it to make sure it was still sealed nice and tight.  So, the wind was supposed to change direction sometime during the night.  On my way up to bed, I noticed the plastic was no longer bubbled, but it was sucked to the window.  I excitedly ran to my mom's room and said, "The wind changed!"  (Hey, remember people, no internet, no TV!)  My mom was excited, too.  She said the wind changed at 11:18.  The wind had suddenly died down for a few minutes, and then picked back up again, now going west.  I checked my west facing window, and now that plastic was a nice huge bubble. 

We also get great pleasure in watching the birds.  We haven't had many birds here.  We had lots of goldfinches, but that was about it.  Now, we have a quite a few woodpeckers, a cardinal couple, lots of juncos, and some sparrows.  We have the occasional flock of starlings and every now and then some crows.  Today, the sparrows were actually on the bird feeder.  We had that bird feeder up since we moved in and the only birds we ever saw on it was a purple finch couple for a few days.  At our old house, we had to refill that thing every day.  The birds hand around underneath it - even the chickens hang around under it.  But today, there were actually birds on it.  I'm so excited. 

So, does country life sound exciting?  You want to join us out here in [Ba] Boony land? 

My Toddler B is no longer a toddler.  Today he is 3.  I went into his room this morning and asked him where my 2 year old was.  He said, "In sissy's room."  So then I asked him who he was and he said, "I'm an angel!" 

He is really excited to be 3.  But he is really digging the whole present thing.  On Friday, my mil, sil, and sil's 5 kids came over to celebrate B's and N's birthday (which is the 24th).  So B got to open presents then.  He keeps asking if they are coming back over today to give him more.  He talked to Hubby on the phone last night and Hubby said he would be coming home for his birthday and B asked, "Are you going to bring me a present?" 

Happy Birthday my baby boy!!  I hope 3 is a good year for you!

On another birthday note.  My blog just turned 3.  Happy birthday to me! 

TLC PREMIERES "SIX FOR THE ROAD" ON OCTOBER 29, 2008

Two-part special follows family of six as they explore America in a RV

Los Angeles, CA One year ago today October 15, 2007 one unique six-member family moved out of their 3,400 square foot house into a 340 square foot RV and set out for an adventure that continues today. Capturing their time adjusting to life on the road as they crisscross the United States, TLC will air the limited-run special SIX FOR THE ROAD over two Wednesday nights October 29 and November 5 at 10 PM ET/PT.

Having now traveled more than 31,000 miles, the family comprised of parents Vern & Kati, daughters Auvi (14) and Zoe (12), and sons Kelby (10) and Conner (7), along with three dogs balances homeschooling, running an internet business, navigating the RV culture, and exploring America. Can they adjust to life as modern nomads, or will the limited privacy and increasing cost of gas drive them back to a more conventional lifestyle?

SIX FOR THE ROAD is produced for TLC by Figure 8 Films.

Check out their website HERE.