Kitchen Surprise

My husband surprised me this weekend by painting the cupboards while I was away at a women's retreat. 

I'll try to get some better pictures later. And put together some before and afters. He painted the tile and upper cabinets white and it is so much crisper and cleaner looking.

 The kitchen lower walls and lower cabinets are all purple. We aren't set on the shade of purple. I think it should be a little darker and more plum. 

But it looks so much better!! I have more words to say about that and the retreat, but my kids are crying. 

Spring is on the way

These little flowers made me happy. 

They are saying that warmer weather is coming.

Birthday cake and a cheerful giver

I've made four new recipes from my Cook's Country magazine.  I'll share some of them (like the pork tacos that we had for dinner tonight). But just look at this cake that came in my newest edition.   I know what I am making for my birthday!  Too bad I have to wait another three and a half months...

Also, Memes is feeling so much better after three weeks of a cold and 5 days of pneumonia. He almost back to normal (aka he slept through the night for the first time in like two weeks)!! He's a ham. 

Today Martin gave me $1.49 to help pay for groceries and to pay me for "making him such good food". He only had $7 to his name. He tells me he is going to give Jared some money for fixing things around the house and making him a play closet. His generosity is putting me to shame. I think there is a lesson here in trusting our Heavenly Father for everything and giving cheerfully. 

2018 - Book 8

I don't agree with everything in this book, however, I do think it would helpful if people read this book. I plan to read more on the subject including one about housing policies in the 1970s that made it hard for black people to buy houses in the suburbs.  I heard the author interviewed and he was talking about how contractors were hired to build neighborhoods as long as they promised to sell all the houses to white people.   

Coming from an all white background, I find it helpful to read books like this. I hope to read books about several other cultures this year too. There are things that we don't even realize that we think or believe until someone points it out. Living in a more mixed part of the city helped me work through some of my stereotypes. And working in an English-as-a-Second language program has helped me with others.  But I have plenty more to work through.  

We all have more to learn about each other.  In the days of social media, when it is easy to just hear ideas that agree with our own, books like this are even more important.   I understand people make choices, but I also can see where a system is in place to make it harder for people to succeed. I don't know how to fix the system. I don't know what my place it.  It made me sad. 

This is a collection of essays.  Some of them were more excellently written then others.  I have never read a more well footnoted book. Each essay had 50-100 footnotes. I could follow each one and study any aspect of what they were discussing in this book. I was amazed by the thoroughness.  

I found the chapters on the history of racism the most educational.  Humans are terrible.  We all are lost and miserable without Jesus.  The way that politicians find ways to hide racism in policies was interesting and horrible.  The essay on Implicit Bias was also interesting (as was this test: Take this Test for Fun -- click on the Race Test ). I scored "not a notable difference" between white and dark skin associations. P.S. It is easier to take on a phone.  They ask you more questions on a computer. 

One of my goals for reading this year is to read about things that make me uncomfortable and things that are from a different perspective than mine. I find it helps me understand people more and makes me more compassionate. More than anything it makes me realize how none of us have it all together and know everything. We all come into this world with a set of biases.  Without Jesus we are big messes (even with Jesus we are still big messes, but we can repent of our messes and seek to live with each other in an understanding way). 

This book made me uncomfortable.  It made me think. It made me grateful for a Savior that loves us all and wants us to in-turn love our neighbor as ourselves.  I don't know what that looks like, but I want to work on it more.  

Pages: 315

I fixed some pants

Taking an after shot of a moving baby is tough. 

Also, of this picture, in the words of Warbs, "oh no, Charlie Brown's head is broken!"

These are some of my favorite baby double-lined pants. They are so warm. All the boys have worn them. Memes wears them to bed quite often, over his regular pajamas for extra warmth.  They are from Gap and were a hand-me-down. After, three plus kids the knees started to get holes on the outer layer. But everything else is perfectly still fine with them. No problem! I cut out patches for the knees and stitched them together in about 10 minutes. I left the edges raw and zip-zagged the middle to hold it down. 

The favorite pants live another day!

Reading is the best

I love these three! 

And I love that they love books. 

Play closet under the stairs

Here it finally is - the post about the closet under the stairs. 

Isn't it so much fun? 

Don't you just want to take a book and go read in there?

The boys have spent countless hours in there so far. The baby even loves being in there.  We ended up taking off the door and hanging up curtains to give it a more finished look. 

So far it has been a kitchen of a restaurant, a bakery, an army fortress, a reading nook, fire truck, and much more. 

Here is how it looks from down the hallway. 

Here is before the curtains, but you can see the table a bit better. 

This is before the rug was put in and the holes from the door filled in in the frame.  

That floor tiles was so yuck. 

Here it is with the first coats of paint. 

All my workers helped assemble the tabletop.

Before. 

After. 

Before.

After without curtains and before we moved the light (we moved the light to the wall next to the table - you can see it in some of the finished picture above)

So let's talk cost:
Curtains - free (from old house)
Shelves - free (from old house)
Paint - free (left over from other rooms)
Pillows - free (from old play closet)
Light fixture - free (bought it for our chicken coop and never used it)
Wire - free already had it
Lighting mount, plate, and wall anchors - $9 at Lowes
Twinkle Lights - $0.90 at Christmas Clearence
Rugs - $10 for carpet squares at Ollies
Wood for Table Top - $15
Wood Trim - free (left over from house projects)

So fewer than $40 (and a weekend of work) for a new clubhouse for the boys! It will be used for many many years.

Thanks to my handy husband for all his help on this fun project.

2018 Book 7

I found this in my parent's homeschooling collection of books right after I asked about dealing with a child that is different then me. 

It is a good starting point for understanding all of the many many learning methods and combinations of such. In some ways, it helped that I don't fit into any categories and am a blend because it shows me that my children probably are blends too. But that makes it also more difficult to figure them out. 

I look forward to reading some more child personality and learning types books. I know what I'll be checking the library for next trip. 

Can you tell I'm in love with the library right now? 

Pages: 162

Finished: January 18, 2018

What We Ate

Monday:
Poppyseed Chicken
Broccoli
Sweet Potatoes

Tuesday:
Chicken Enchilladas
Cheese
Sour Cream
Guac

Wednesday:
Cajun Corn Chowder
Cheddar Biscuits

Thursday:
Leftovers

Friday:
Out at friends

Saturday:
Lunch:
Grilled Cheese
Trader Joe's Tomato and Roasted Red Pepper Soup
Apples

Dinner:
Calzones (from the freezer, half a batch from last time I made them)
Tomato Sauce
Apples

Sunday:
Lasagna
Salads
Rustic Rolls

Books abandoned

The one on the left was written more like blog posts and it was repetitive. They could have used a good editor and formatter. 

The book on the Tsars sounded promising. Unfortunately I didn't realize that it is only about the last 16 months of Nicholas's life. I was looking for something with a bit more history of the Russian revolution and the Tsars. I want more of an overview. This is an in depth study. 

Back we go to the library soon. All those books I put on hold... My notifications are not on and they are now off hold. :( 

2018 Book 6

We are on a bit of a Nate the Great kick. Perhaps I should make pancakes to eat while we read them. 

I read enough of children's books to tally many many 1000s of pages, but they are short. Even if they have 50 pages, as in, Go, Dog Go, can you really count it as a page is it is only one word on each page?  

But I am starting to read longer books out loud. I still wouldn't count these in my book total as one a piece. But I think 5 or 6 of them might count. I won't post all the short readers that we go through. However, I'll credit myself a few here and there. 

Today we read three Nate the Greats and A Flat Stanley along with other various children's books. This afternoon we will probably read more. They are all set on the coffee table, lined up and waiting for me... 

Pages: 48, 62, 48, 65, 48. 

(Are all later Nate the Greats 48 pages?)

Total: 271 pages

Six things

1. It is cold, but we went outside, ran around, road bikes, and dug holes yesterday

2. I realized that UNC is still the national champion, but won't be come April. So, I pulled out my hat and am wearing it around. A hat does wonders for a messy head of hair. 

3. We are feeding a cat for a neighbor. It makes me never want to have a cat. The boys are asking for a dog. Maybe we'll compromise with some chickens.

4. The closet under the stairs is finished. I'll try to post pictures tomorrow. 

5. The original Mr. Baby is turning 5 this week. Bring out all the tissues. 

6. The boys and I found these slippers for $2 at Target on clearance. They've never seen the movies, but their aunt shows them the video "shorts" and they have fallen in love with them. 

2018 Book 5

This didn't quite live up to my expectations, but I finished it.  It was interesting in some parts. I found myself skimming some of the chapters (like how people in prison smuggle things into the prison and how drug runners smuggle drugs -- no thanks).  

Her stories of visiting all the specialists in these fields are strangely amusing, probably out of some weird curiosity about who-in-the-world-would-study-some-of-this-stuff?  Did you know that each person has a bite pattern almost as different as your fingerprint? Did you know that saliva is a good stain remover and germ killer (and mostly you get sick from rubbing your eyes and nose)? Did you know that chewing your food excessively can make you eat more? Did you know that they used to cut out the colon and throw it away when doing autopsies (so it wasn't well studied)?

The last chapter on "digestive tract bacteria transplants" (I'll call it that to spare you your lunch) to c.diff. patients is something I have read about in other scientific magazines recently and I think it is fascinating. So while that chapter has a serious ick factor, it was also interesting. 

This book is definitely not for the squeamish.  The alimentary canal is gross.  It is also amazing how it works and what it can do. Her humor is borderline "potty humor" in a couple places, but it is a book about the alimentary canal... so, I gave her a pass on those. 

Pages 327