Happenings

Just a few pictures, busy here doing school and painting the dining room. Curtiss stripped the wallpaper down and did a great job. That was a big help. It's neat to come into a season of not just having lots of little children. I still have that but now along with a young adult I have older preteens who are eager to learn how to do things and like to help out. Sometimes they lose interest quicker than I'd like :)

So we have an orphan kitten. The girls are bottle feeding it and it's name is Bartrum. I'm not sure what's going to happen with it but we are at our animal max in this house. Kaley is hoping to find it a home. He's a sweetie.




Here is our birthday boy, having his first oreo cookie. We had a drive on saturday, we often picnic in the van when we do that and oreos are a must.

The rest of these picts are from the farmers market. Kaley is doing an article for the paper so we have been having extra visits for interviews and pictures. This is a taste of fall in NC.





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So my goal this week, other than painting the dining room, is to post about our school life and what that looks like. How Charlotte Mason has influenced me and how we do a Charlotte Mason method as a large family. Hmmm, if I can get it down it'll be interesting!

Blessings

The Lost Blog

Iron weed
vernnonia noveborocensis



It's been forever since I have used this blog. It's hard to get to in this season of life. Max is a busy walking boy, school has started, Kaley is interning at our local paper and gone from home four afternoons a week. Some days I don't sit down except to eat and sometimes not even then! Thankfully I have a nursing baby, so I am forced to sit and slow down every so often through the day.

Our school year is fabulous. We are studying exciting things like Botony, Abraham Lincoln's World, Dickens, and Bullfinches Mythology. I can't believe that one is a favorite around here. I think I am having as much fun as the children are. I miss having Kaley as a part of it all but she is staying plugged in by helping me with Maura. They are doing great together and reading things like Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories, Peter Pan, Parables From Nature, The Blue Fairy Book and Paddle To The Sea. Love those!



Kaley is making such a life of her own! It seems so strange to have an "adult" child. She's my best friend and sidekick extraordinaire and where ever we go and what ever we are doing we have a blast doing it. I miss her during the day but am so happy that she is finding all these neat things to do in life. Working at the paper is teaching her a lot about the world and herself and what she wants out of life. She plans to try out at the community theater in January, I'm sure that will be exciting. So different than me! I am relational but not at all brave and intrepid like her. I admire that. It is touching to see her use the wings I hope we have given her. She is full of dreams and excitement that life has brought her in the last few months.



Oh, I can't believe Max is one tomorrow!! A year ago I was so sad and challenged. I thought he would never be born. Actually a year ago this moment I was in early labor and was excited and thought I'd be holding my baby by night time. Little did I know it would be my longest and most challenging labor. Not so much painful as unending and dysfunctional. But we waited on the Lord, waited on Max and he came but not until more than 24hrs later. It's hard to be born when your arms are all tied up! But babies are so smart, he eventually got turned enough to come. He is such a joy! So happy and sweet. In love with all his siblings, I love seeing that since I didn't grow up with any of mine. They dote on him as well.





Mark is busy at school, it's going well for him. He enjoys it a lot and I am glad for that. He is so good with those guys and I know he makes a difference in their lives.

Well, I hope to add some pictures and get back to this blog more often. I don't even know who looks at it, that's the weird thing about an open blog. I know my family does, that's who I started it for. I enjoy a few blogs myself, I have thought of changing the intent of this one, or creating a new one devoted to Charlotte Mason eduction in a large family. I don't know... First I think I just need to get into the habit of blogging again. And then I wonder of the value of what I have to say, you know? I'm not a good writer and do I really have anything to share that would uplift or encourage anyone? I'm just better in person, I think.

One of the things we are doing this school year is saving fridays for nature study and field trips. (Always the two are one with us!) So we spent last friday up in Hendersonville, NC. We go every year to an orchard for apples with some sweet friends.


Then we were off to the Carl Sandburg house. I have been wanting to make it up there for years! It was so lovely, I can't believe we waited. It's only about an hour from home, the grounds are free and the tour of the house very reasonable.



What I found so interesting there was not only was Carl Sandburgs writing an emphasis but his wife's passion for her prize winning goats. His was very proud of her and she won many awards for her milkers.



The kids loved seeing the goats, still being milked there.




We had a great time there and sweet time with our friends. On the way out, we found this fellow:



I haven't identified him yet. Isn't he grand?!

Blessings

Just For Kaley

Isn't it pretty?! Hope you can see them ok, my camera isn't as good as yours.







Have lots of fun. Smell Maddie's head for me, kiss her soft cheeks and tell her I will meet her soon!

Long Absence

It has certainly been awhile. Life is busy, babies making blogging very hard, facebook cheapens me in a way. It makes it quick and easy to keep up with others but not putting any thought to it.

I just attended the 6th annual Childlight USA Charlotte Mason Conference. It was so wonderful and encouraging, as usual. It inspired me to plan our best school year ever. We have been homeschooling with the Charlotte Mason method since Kaley was 5 years old. She lived in Victorian England and died before WWII. Her method lives on and is rooted in great truths. This explains it well. http://amblesideonline.org/CM/20Principles.html

Here's a great quote from Charlotte, a huge part of the philosophy of education.

"Education is a life; that life is sustained on ideas. Ideas are of spiritual origin, and God has made us that we get them chiefly as we convey them to one another, whether by word of mouth, written page, Scripture word, musical symphony; but we must sustain a child's inner life with ideas as we sustain his body with food."

And this:

"One of our presumptuous sins in this connection is that we venture to offer opinions to children (and to older persons) instead of ideas. We believe that an opinion expresses thought and therefore embodies an idea."

And she quotes John Stuart Mill:

"What the poor, as well as the rich, require is not to be taught other people's opinions, but to be induced and enabled to think for themselves."

Isn't that great?! I have had the joy of seeing my daughter finish her high schools years of education. She is never done learning, she knows how to get at anything she wants and continues to grow and learn so much. It is thrilling for me to watch her, she stands on my shoulders.

One last Charlotte quote:

"All I have said is meant to enforce the fact that much and varied humane reading, as well as human thought expressed in the forms of art is, not a luxury, a tit-bit, to be given to children now and then, but their very bread of life, which they must have in abundant portions and at regular periods."

I am planning quite a feast to set before the children this school year. And a good summer of relaxed reading and nature study. And lots of swimming and blackberry picking!

So these pictures are mainly for my sister in NY who never gets to see my gardens. They are no where near as beautiful as hers, but I am quite excited about my two tone bee balm this year.

Here is my mammoth sunflowers. They just reseed every year now, I have to pull them and I can't stand it. They attract so many goldfinches. You can see how big they are, Curtiss is hiding in there and they just started blooming. I do have a veggie garden in there somewhere :)


My lovely bee balm. This is my fragrant herb garden. Bee balm, lavender, rosemary, lemon balm, peppermint and chamomile. Also thrown in are purple cone flowers and volunteer black eyed susans.


The Lavender.


The bee balm that is two colors??


I'll try to keep up better, posting pictures etc.

Blessings to all!

Snow Day/A Gracie Post

Snow again! Five to six inches this time. Grace wanted a project to do. She decided a quilt for her baby, Sarah. So she dug into our scraps and designed one all on her own. I helped with the cutting, we decided on 2.5in blocks and she started playing with them and laying them out.




I realized afterwards, she had made nine patch blocks.





Grace did all the sewing and piecing. She also decided to put in sashing.





I did the free motion quilting.





This was the back.

And here it is, binding all done! We made it in two days. Way to go team!!


blessings

Holidays

This is a LONG post of pics, since it's been so long since I've been able to update my blog. Life has been very busy, as usual, and time flies. It's so cold here right now, I am not enjoying winter, I never do. So looking back on pictures is cheering. Now I am looking forward to spring, my favorite time of year.

The beginning of December found us kicking off our holiday season in our annual reenactment at the Backcountry Farm in the Scheile Museum. It was a very cold day, so Max and I didn't stay dressed out for long. But here is the cabin looking festive.



Maura, staying warm in her cape.


The beautiful food the ladies there made, all the reenactors ate them after the public left.


Curtiss, Ben, Grace, David and Maura, singing Christmas hymns.


Kaley and Josiah, helping to hand out candles for the candlelight service.


Josiah was entranced with the lanterns.


Max, trying to stay warm.




This is Max and I on some random day before Christmas. He is so happy and getting so big. He weighs 18lbs already! He is one of our happiest babies. Always a smile and it doesn't take much to cheer him up if he is unhappy. We all adore him. Josiah love him so much, never a day of jealousy.


Christmas cookies were awkward and difficult this year. We never did get it together. I always had guilt at the sugar and carbs that were laying around. Maura can't have wheat so here she is trying her hand at gluten free cookies. Unfortunately, they aren't sugar free and are high on the glycemic index. So they wreaked havoc on her blood sugars. I am not sure what we will do next year.





She sure had fun. Maybe next year we will do the cinnamon cut outs for decorations-you don't eat those but still have the cutout fun.


We got snow!! Lots for us, the kids loved it. Actually, writing this 4 weeks later, we still have patches of snow on the ground. Unusual for this area of NC.


Kaley, still being a kid-yea!


Curtiss and the dirty snow man he and the kids built.


Our next excitement was a visit from my sister Melody and family. We don't get to each others houses but maybe once or twice a year so it was a treat! We all had a great time. My mom also was here so it was a real houseful. Melody is my birth sister so it is especially special that we know one another and get on so well. We have all been in touch for 12 1/2 years now and it's cool to look back and see how we have all grown.

Melody holding Max, sweet.


COUSINS!


Max


Four generations of women in our family. My grandmother, Lauretta; my Mom, Audrey, Melody and I and Kaley.


These are all my moms grandchildren in one place, wow! Left to right, back to front: Jon Paul 9, Grace 9, Charlie 12, Max 3m, Kaley 17, Joseph 6, Maura 5, Benjamin 7, Josiah 2, David 7, Robert 9, Curtiss 11, Sarah 7. You can see 2000 and 2002 were big years for grandkids for my mom and pop!


We sped on from there to Christmas day. Mark and I beat the kids up! (not literally)



My beautiful girls, I think this is Christmas eve.


Our tradition is stockings first and everyone gets a Christmas mug.


David


Me getting my surprise gift, an ipod!


Curtiss and Grace playing with their new camera.


The spread at mom and dads.


The outlaw Josie Wales.


A fairy that stopped by.


Snow on the ground still.



After Christmas my sister April and brother Randy came down. Here is my gorgeous nephew Jaden with Kaley



Oh, he is so cute. We had fun sitting around talking and nursing our babies.


I have more pics of family to follow, some of my other nephew Jack and the kids. I'll have to get them downloaded soon. For now, it's back to the sounds going on behind me near the wood stove as I type in the cold office. Back to dinner and a cup of coffee.

blessings