The Enginmans Page

Hello again!

LONG TIME NO TYPE OR SEE!

I have bascially forgotten about this blog but something tugged at my heart to start doing it again.My biggest problem is that I am still attending school online to get my bachelors in Education and I can't see to even find the time to do my schoolwork let alone find time to blog.

For those of you who don't know me very well, I am a stay at home mom with three kids, who I homeschool.

Well, How are we doing lately? Here's how, My husband is still in school, this is his last year and will probably be the hardest. He is so busy he doesn't even have time to sleep or eat hardley. I miss having him available to be with us, but I know this too shall pass.

I am trying to keep on task with the kids school and make sure I do some everyday. This in itself is a hard task because some days I just feel like I want to do nothing. The work seems to never end. There is always something to do, dishes, laundry, school, pick up after kids, tend to kids needs, I am one tired mother. Sometimes I feel like I just want them to grow up and let me live my life. I know this sounds bad but does anybody else feel this exausted sometimes?

I love my kids and I know if they were all grown up I would miss them and wish they were little, its just more work than I can sometimes handle. Anybody else feel this way?

One thing I know I have figured out is that if I stick to a routine everyone in the family benifits from this. What I mean by routine is mean is the same meal times, school at the same time, bedtime at the same day, things like this. What I have trouble with is the keeping the routine in place. Sometimes I don't feel like making it happen, I am tired of being the one who always has to make the routine happen everyday. Part of this is because my husband is busy with school, but I need a break sometimes too.

Anyway, I probably sound like I am winning. My three year old is winning right now too, he wants something he can't have. Ughhh!

I hope everyone is having a better day than me.

God Bless to everyone!

Every year, for a long time, we have found caterpillers on our dill. And every year we raise them until they turn into butterflies. They are called black swallowtail butterflies. They often lay their eggs on Dill, parsley or carrot leaves.

( I took these pictures)

You need to look very carefully for there eggs because they are very small. Try to find them as eggs or tiny caterpillars, because if you find them when they are full grown odds are that a hornet has laid eggs on it (meaning when the caterpiller comes out of its cocoon, a hornet will come out instead.) Hopefully you can see the egg. Its that little yellow speck.

(I took this picture)

This is how small the caterpillars will be when they are a few days old. Some will be way smaller. If you cannot find any eggs try to find the caterpillars that are this size . The smaller they are the better chance they have of living. The reason why you want to find them when there small is because, when (and if) a hornet lays their eggs on the caterpillar, it means that when the caterpillars in the cocoon the baby hornet will eat the caterpiller, and you won't get a butter fly.

(I took this picture)

When a caterpillar gets bigger it will be green with yellow. orange spots., and black strips. Its quite a funky caterpillar. Feed they whatever you found them on. we always find ours on dill so thats what we feed them. Put a stick in their jar so when its time for them to make there cocoons they can make them on that. They will shead their skin, and when its time for them to make their cocoon, they will hang from the stick by a few threads. it will probly take them a day or two to make it.

(i didn't take these pictures)

Their cocoons will be green and yellow or sometimes brown. Both usally hatch, although sometimes the brown ones turn black and won't hatch. (sometimes they'll turn black and will hatch to though) Before they hatch their cocoon will turn black with red, yellow and blue dots. Thats because you can see them through their cocoons.

(I took this picture)

When they do hatch, they will be all floppy. bring them outside in a sheltered place, away from wind. they'll sit their for a few hours until their strong enough to fly, them you can watch them fily away. They should hatch around late august to sometime in september, If you catch any good luck, and if you have any questions just ask me! This year we found twelve and at the moment we have 2 cocoons (pictured above) 2 eggs (pictured above) 5  medium sized caterpillers (pictured above) and 3 just hatched ones (too small to show!)

I didn't take this picture. I found it one the web.

Once again if the pictures don't work go to my other blog (www.homeschoolblogger.com/tingrin )

Crazee busy

Ok I wasn't on cause I went to my Nanny's and we stayed over night for 3 days. On the first day ( well we got there tuesday night but) we went to this zoo in/near niagra falls. It was called ZooZ. It was OK but I didn't like the exzibits. They were small and all that was in them was a rock, a tree, a shelter and gravel. All the fences were chained link fence so it was hard to see and take pictures. And it started to rain so we couldn't go in the water park,but I did get to do this cool trampoline thingy! I bought a cute white plushie tiger. Hes soft. ummm when we went home I went swimming in the pool and yea. The next day we went to a huge mall. My nanny gave me 40 $ as an early birthday present. And my auntie gave me 25. I bought a pretty purple skirt at old navy for 10$ a purple top, a lime green top and a pair of white capri's. On the way home I bought a red top at a store, for 5 bucks. We went to chuckie cheese for lunch. I earned 108 tickets from games. Well actually I earned more but I gave some of them to Devin. On the last day we were going to go to the horse race track (which I donnot support) and we got there and I was kinda happy cause It was closed. My nanny was like "i'm sorry your day with the horses is ruinoned. I'm thinking "that just made my day!" so we went shopping instead. the mall had an amusment park inside of it! Really! so we stayed there all day and then came home. on my Lesson I was riding Calypso! Yeah!!! (hes soooo my favorite!) The lesson started out normal. walk trot, walk trot, walk trot, Then callie got excited and started to canter. I just hung on for dear life! ok now to the show! If you don't know on July 16 I entered my first horse show. I entered best groomed and walk trot. The day before the show I went to give patches (my pony for best groomed) a bath. Me and my friend Sarah were going to wash Calypso in the morning (I was riding callie in walk trot) so I bathed patchie and seperated his mane for braiding. the next day I wook up at 5:54 got all my stuff togeather, picked up Sarah, and got out to the barn. We gave Callie a bath, then I braided patches while she did Callie. I got second (out of 4) in best groomed and 4th out of 12! in walk trot (which suprised me because I beat people who have been riding for Years!) anyways it was sooo fun! I can't wait till the next show. Enjoy the pics! P.S. If the Pictures don't work (which they should) its because I copy and pasted them from my other blog cause I was too lazy to do it all over again so if they don't work and you want to see them go to www.homeschoolblogger.com/tingrin

^Bungee trampoline thing at the zoo (thats me way up there!)^

^This is INSIDE a mall!^

^Really it is!^

^cross my heart!^

^This is me and patches^

^Leah and Jack (I'm in the background with Calypso)^

^me and Calypso(Leah and Jack are in the background)^

^Me and Callie (again) ^

beach!

Da da da dadadadada da da da dadadadada da da da dadadadada da da da da da da da dada da da da da dadadadada dada da (Thats like that surfing song)

Hehehe! I didn't get sunburnt!   maybe its just me but I think the red dude moves faster. Anyways we had some real weird adventures. I went to the beach with my friends Leah and Jenna and Leahs mom Carol. On our way to the beach we got a FLAT TIRE!Then we knocked on a door of this house (We were 1 1/2 away from home and a half an hour away from the beach. We were also in the middle of no were!) No one was home so we moved the car into the peoples LOOOOOONNNNNGGGGGG driveway and begain trying to fix the car. Meanwhile the other people we were going with (Kitty, (Johnathan's mom) Johnathan, and their cousin Tim) were way up the road when they noticed we wern't following them anymore, so luckly the relized and drove back for us. About 5 minutes later Tim was trying to change the tire. Then the guy that owned the house came home. He was just about to help us when this other guy sped up and started fixing the tire. Boy was he weird. He started going on about how the night before he'd been pulled outa his car at gun point, and that a whole wack of his stuff was stolen. He also said that his car was trashed (but it wasn't) the only thing wrong was he had no lisence plate. Then he went on about how he was living in his car because his wife was cheating on him, and then he started telling us that a dog bite him because some lady didn't want him to leave so she sicked the dog on him, and he was in jail for 4 months because she said he'd beaten her up.THENNNNN he started talking about how he got pulled over by the police and the police asked him were he got his flashy liscence plate and he said "walmart" then he asked if it was illegal and the police said "yeah but I wanna get one!" meanwhile the guy who owned the house stood between all of us and this guy (which we were glad of because this guy was not right) Then this guy said he was a trucker, but he'd lost his lisence bacause when he was driving this lady pulled out right infront of him and stopped, and he moved her car about this much >                              < THEN he said yeah and my serimonial dagger was stoled too. Not that I do animal sacrifices. and we all looked at each other and yeah. Then he said I'll follow you into southhampton to make sure nothing happens and we were like "Uh no thats ok!" then he left we think he was on drugs or something and yeah, so we were on our way! When we got to the beach we ate lunch and then braved the freezing cold water(it was sooo cold! ) we swam the whole day then ate supper. Jenna noticed that she had a red spot on her leg. she started eating again and then looked at her leg to fin the red part was bubbling up!!!! The bubbling lump got bigger and bigger and bigger. Me and jenna and Leah just stood there watching it until I said "Jenna maybe we should tell Carol" so we did and then Carol said "oh my goodness!Kitty! look at jennas leg!" then everyone was staring at jennas leg. We looked on jennas other leg and there was nothing and about 2 minutes later we checked it again and it was bubbling on that leg too! Finally the bubbling went down. We think it was a reaction to something in the sand. It was weird! So that was our day at the beach!

Hi Peoples!

Hi Peoples!

Its me and I'm not Dead! I've been gone for so long! My goodness! Well I have a good reason for it. Here is what happened.

Ok well first I was really busy with my school/friends/and riding (Which I will tell you more about later) Then the next week we went camping (Which I will tell you about later!) Then my computer got a virus (which I will tell you about later) and now I am telling you all the things I told you I'd tell you!:D

school/friends/and riding

Well I forget alot about what happend with my friends, except we stamped these wraps for our africa study, and we went to the zoo (I have pics!BUT I can't show you them now....tell you about it later!) School was normal you know same old same old. RIDING was AWSOME because I got to be with HORSES and see the goldenwoods SHOW which I will be COMPETING in SOON :) Well ok into more detail. I have ridden Calypso for the past month and I luv him!I am almost ready to canter. Golden woods has a show every month in the summer, and I will hopefully be in the next one!!!!Leah won 7th place in her first show and Jenna won 3rd. Leah was oh }{onEy then pain and she did very good (I also have pictures!)

Camping

We went to Elora Gorge to camp. We were at site 400. It rained on and off trough the first two days but then it was sunny. We went to a ice cream shop called Jenny's place. It reminded me of Whit's End a little bit. I had Triple tornado(my favorite) and twix ice cream. The next day I faced the rapids of Elora Gorge. I found my self crazily going over them on a little bittie rubber tube....now how did that happen??

Yes I guess I started having second thoughs after my Dad said we could go tubing. He rented our tubes,and helmets and life jackets (a graduation present) and then we went down to the river were the first set of wild rapids were. I hopped into my tube and then saw the rapids ahead. I almost said "Get me outa here!" but it was too late because I was being sucked into the the rapids and before I knew it I was covered in a creamy white foam. The rapids wern'y that bad...except when I went down a step part and almost fell outa my tube! The whole ride was about an hour and was truly amazing. You can see Clifs and ridges in the edge of the gorge. There are fish jumping all around you, and little swallows diving at the water, and even Harons and little muskrats.It is sooooo amazing. A whole new was of seeing the gorge.

We did lots of other cool things on our trip (like shopping and swimming and biking and catching frogs)I bought this cool book called hold your horses and it is soooo funny. This is what the first page says

If you don't like horses you can save yourself alot of Money, and broken bones and take up something safe like

dolls, of

r

o

c

k

c

l

i

m

b

i

n

g

or X-treme

s

 p

  o

   r

    t

     s

Its real funny

Virus

Ok well before we went away we got a virus and our memory got pooched so we had to get new memory and that is why my pics and not yet on here because dad needs to put our old pictures up and then put our new pictures on. Anyways I gotta go now!TTYL!~Robyn

P.S I'm goin to the beach tomorrowhope I don't turn into this

Trip to Moab, Utah

I just wanted to post about our recent trip to Moab, Utah. 

I love the beautiful red rock formations, and we found some neat treasures this year.  We found a wonderful hiking trail called "Negro Bill's Canyon" and it is full of wonderful places to paint, sketch, catch crawdads, butterflies, look at the plant life, and the bunnies hopping around in the brush.  The water in this canyon is so out of place with the desert, that you forget where you are.

It was very relaxing, and alot of fun.  We camped at Kane Creek, and roasted hotdogs and smores over the fire.  It was so dark, that you could see all the stars out, and we saw a lot of shooting stars.  It was so much fun, I didn't want to come home.

If you'd like to see pictures of our trip visit my other blog:

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/LadyPoet33/148147/

LadyPoet33

Garden

My garden is set to go in on the 30th.  My dad is getting a patch of his 100 acres ready for my plants.

The farm has been flooded due to spring melting, and we haven't been able to get down there too much.  But it's finally starting to dry out thanks to the dry, hot weather we've been having lately.

I can't wait to sink my teeth into a juicy watermelon or cantaloupe that has been vine ripened.  YUMMM!

We are planning a camping trip over Memorial Day weekend, and looking forward to it.

I hope everyone else is okay!

LadyPoet33

Hello?

Trying to find out if anyone is out there.  I keep posting new entries, and visiting other blog sites and leaving comments, but nobody has left me a comment in a LONG time.

Has everyone been kidnapped by aliens?    LOL

LadyPoet33

Taxi Service

Well, I have two teens with no car....SO...I have officially become the taxi service!  LOL 

My 17yo is saving up for a car, and my 15yo is trying to get a job.  He applies at jobs every day for the last week, but no luck yet.  I think its because he tells them he won't work on the Sabbath day.

So, until my kids make enough money for their own cars, insurance and gas money, I am it!  The price of gas here is $2.80 a gallon.  I put in five dollars, and it's like rubbing my finger on the gas spout and flicking it at the tank.  It's a joke! 

Luckily, my 17yo helps out whenever she can with gas money.

Anyone else being a taxi service?  When does it end?  Do I want it to?

LadyPoet33

hmmmmm

Ok so your probly wondring bout my strange name right? well its kinda two stories in one.First I will tell ya bout my day today,then my riding lessons, my trip to the tack shop, and then the confrence.Ok today I got up,had some raisien bran and babysat my brothers while mom went to say goodbye to her friend Dawn (Dawn and her son Benjamin are visiting from thunder Bay) So yea.That about all thats happend today!YesterdayI went to my riding lesson!It was my first group lesson.I had to tack up all by myself.I'm glad Leah and Jenna were there to help me put the saddle and stuff on!So yeah.I had to check the stirrups and do up my girth by myself too!Once I was riding I was fine.I was on smokey.It was a bit annoying though because smokey likes to "Floss his teeth" on the other horses tail! so I had to try to keep him back.It wasn't easy!My lesson was an hour long this time.It was really fun!I loved it!Ok so now to my trip to the tack shop!Mom did a trade with the lady that owns it so now I have Breeches,half chaps,a helmet,boots and glooves.They made it so much easier  to ride!Ummm ok to the confrence...It was a ittiy bitty boring!It was a homeschool confrence and there were tons of people from all around.For the first two hours we shoped for school books,then I went to a homeschool class thingy,then We did more shopping,then we had another class thingy, then I meet Dawn and I got mom for her.They talked for a while.Then I went to ANOTHER CLASS then we SHOPPED for books then we said by to Dawn and went home :D