Blessings From Home

New Curriculum, quilt block exchange, and just my usual rambling

Well friends, It did turn out to be a busy weekend indeed. Saturday, we had our nieces all day and since we were needing to get some work done on the rent house, my husband volunteered to stay home and watch the 5 kids while I go work on it, (He was wanting to watch football).Now who got the worse of the two tasks, it was a tie, I think...actually I think I had it worse, because he kept the kids outside playing all day long and I ended up with roaches crawling on me. Yuck! It gives me the heebee jeebees just thinking about it again. I'm still in awe of how filthy that house is.

While I was over there gathering trash and setting off roach fumigators, I noticed my parents car parked at my aunts house, two houses down, (did I mention we live in a fairly small town?) So I took a break and wandered on down there. My aunt is very, very sick with cancer and although I've taken her to the doctor several times, I never ventured into her home, because the nicotine was so heavy in the house, it made me sick. So my parent's told me to come on in and see what they were doing. My other aunt and uncle were also there. It turns out that there house was such a mess. Not as bad as the rent house, but none the less horrible. My uncle didn't have time to clean as he was having to do everything for her, and was needing help, and there was a lot of clutter, so the family all pitched in and helped. We found several mice and what they left behind, but thankfully no roaches.  I cleaned the kitchen and scrubbed layers of nicotine off of everything.  And did some laundry. Needless to say, I was very tired when I got home that night, but so glad that I got some work done on that rent house and helped my family.  I am planning on spending a few hours every Saturday cleaning and helping in any way I can.  The doctors don't expect my aunt to last much longer, and I want to spend some time with her.

Sunday was spent at home. I wanted so much to go to church, but I was so sore and tired, I didn't get out of bed in time. So after I got up, I decided that I would get my house cleaned up. After seeing the mess I cleaned, it makes me want to clean my house as clean as I can get it. We ended up having a huge storm and losing power for a couple of hours, but we were prepared with our oil lamps and ended up having a camp out in the living room, and then of course after we were all sound asleep, the power comes back on...and all the lights that we left on woke us, but we were thankful and soon fast asleep.  

Today was a quiet day at home. We finally got our new school books from Christian Light Publications today. We were so excited! After going through everything, I realized I forgot to order the workbook for language arts, so I guess we'll start that next week. From what I've seen so far, I think we're really going to like this curriculum. I already like it because 1)It's a bible based curriculum, 2)I don't have to spend the money all at once, I can buy a light unit at a time if I want to, 3)I don't have to spend 3-5 hours a week just in prep time for the next week. I also like that it shows children dressed modestly, girls in dresses, etc., and that the scripture used is from a KJV bible. It is a curriculum made by a Mennonite company, and I've seen several women in the books wearing head coverings, but that is fine with me. It still seems to have the strong godly values I wish for my children to have, and the structure we need. I will keep you all updated on how we do with it.

We're off and running with our quilt block exchange.  I am going to start going through my fabric this week and getting it all washed, ironed, and ready to go so I can start cutting squares next week. I am so excited about this, not only making all the quilt blocks for everyone but also in recieving blocks from everyone else, and having the joy of putting them together and quilting them over the holidays.

In other news, I am feeling a lot of stress from what all is going on in my life. I don't think it's too much stuff, really, I just need to get more organized. Right now, I have my husband, my children, homeschooling, my housework, and now, I am cleaning my parent's home for a couple hours once a week and my aunt's house once a week, and ofcourse I want to make time for my own personal Bible studies and devotions.  I want to be able to do all these things, but it's just hard to get it all done when you're not organized. I've tried the tackle it all at once way...that doesn't work. My house is clean for, oh, maybe 2 days, and like Flylady says, you have to have a routine in place to keep it that way. Now I'm not a die hard "fly baby", but I do appreciate some of her techniques and tactics. I also enjoy a lot of what  Candy has to say about homemaking and other things. So I am going to combine the best of both worlds and put them to good use. One thing both of these ladies have in common is their use of Home management binders, or Control journals. Both have the same principals and varying content, but both are there to aide you in taking care of your family and your home. I have the beginnings of a home management binder that I've started and laid aside and am bound and determined to finish it and put it to good use. Over the next week, I'm going to spend a little bit of time working on this, and I will post about what I get done with it. I probably will not be able to share pictures, as my main computer is on the fritz and that's where I always upload my photos. I do think flylady is on the right track with her babysteps, as I seem to always get overwhelmed and give up too quickly when I dive in and try to do it all at once. So we'll see how it goes.

Tomorrow will be a busy day. We'll be starting with our new books tomorrow, doing some laundry and housework, and going over to my mother's to help clean up for a couple of hours. I'd like to do some rearranging in my den/schoolroom because it's getting kind of crowded but that may have to wait for another day. We're supposed to be having cub scouts, but I'm thinking of taking my son out of that because they are not taking control of those boys and the quiet boys who are ready to learn aren't able to because of the boys who are being little toots. I will talk to the den leader about it first and maybe it will be resolved, I hope.

Well, I'm off to bed now. I pray your evening is blessed beyond measure.

Love,

Sara

Greetings

{ 10:18, Monday, October 15, 2007 } { Posted by gardenoflove }

Hello, you have a great blog! I just love it here on this site and I'm trying to make homestead friends so wanna be one?
God Bless,
Megan

Halloween

{ 07:30, Tuesday, October 16, 2007 } { Posted by oldfashionedgirl }

This is meant to be down on your halloween post... my mom felt convicted a couple of years ago that we should change the way we celebrate halloween, or like you said NOT celebrate. I was too little to remember what exactly she decided at first but I remember that we all invited friends over and dressed up and then made dinner for some widows in our area. Since then (about 8 years ago) it has just kind of evolved. We still dressed up (pioneers/rainbow colors, nothing scary) until (I think) last year. Now what we do is to still take dinner to different widows, but a couple of years ago we started performing for them ;) I think that it all started with one of the widows who has a grand piano and doesn't know how to play... now we usually spend about an hour at each place. We also turn off our porch light and close all the blinds and then go to the back of our house and watch a movie when we're finished. I think that you said that your children still wanted to celebrate?? I don't really know how to help that except to make a service or whatever you decide to do SO much funner (is that a word??) than any trick or treating!! I have a lot younger siblings and most of them haven't gone trick or treating like I used to and I think that they really enjoy what we do!! PLUS the widows LOVE us coming and usually give us more treats than we ever got trick or treating! I think that the biggest thing is that THEY need to notice the difference in feelings... for example on Halloween there is a sort of dark feeling but when we fill that with good there is SUCH a difference!!! We have a paper on Halloween that someone gave us that I could email you if you want... I hope that this was helpful!!! Sorry for yakking for so long!!! May the LORD bless you in your efforts!!

Blessings,
Alex