Woodstove hooked up and working! :-)

Brief update

The last few weeks have been busy, busy... We have finished the majority of the big stuff on the remodel, leaving lots of small details, like unpacking a few boxes, putting up trim, and hanging wall pictures, etc... It will take a while to finish that stuff, but we'll eventually get it done. In the meantime, we have had lots of visitors and lots of fun. We are working now on getting organized for the next school year, finding a new normal for how to balance our daily lives, and... getting ready for our vacation! We are so looking forward to our week away in the Smoky Mtns.

I have made some updates on the gardens, kid's pages, and my health page, so you can read more there if desired.

Remodel project movie

I am going to attempt to upload a short movie/slideshow of the remodel we've been working on. We have accomplished much! It is not done yet, more details need to be added to make it feel like home, but mostly cosmetic and simple. It feels so good to have it mostly done!

Poll: Which color do you like better?

Okay, help me! Picture these with white trim, white chair rail and light bamboo flooring (and minus the mess of boxes, etc...). Which do you like better? This is in the living room/dining room which are basically one large open room.

What we've been up to...

Huge remodel project! I mentioned tearing up the carpet from the living room, well... that led to new drywall, paint, hearth for the wood stove, tile, along with bamboo floors for the living and dining area and new trim around all walls/doors/windows. So, everything is topsy-turvy here right now! I picked some colors that I loved, but now that they are on the wall, I am not so sure. I am hoping that when we get some chocolate brown furniture, curtains and accents it will all blend together and not be so bold and bright. We are also putting a chair rail between the two colors, probably white but still considering that too. What do you think?

Overdue

An overdue update that is. I realized that it has been a couple weeks since I posted. Lots going on here, I have sat down to try and post several times and it just hasn't happened. Work has been nice and busy, keeping Tom and I both pretty occupied. We have continued to work in the gardens, which are growing very well. The kids are growing and enjoying the nice weather and slower schedule with school. We finished our CAT tests for end of the year assessments and have decided to continue with math and some science unit studies through the summer but at a relaxed pace. We will pick up with TOG year 2 in the fall. Our animals are all doing well, our pet population has grown by 2 this past week. Will has a new lizard - "Style", and Heather has a new fish "Ollie". You can read more about them on their pages or the Four Legged Friends page. Our van was in the shop this week, various items that added up. We decided that this was the last $ we would put into it. We will be adding to our savings toward a used vehicle as we can. Our remodel is slowly but surely shaping up. We have ripped out the carpet and the wall strips and trim from the living room and hallway. We have pretty much decided to put in unfinished red oak flooring and apply a poly coat ourselves (hoping my dad will help). I have narrowed down the paint choices, though no final decisions have been made. We got the hearth frame put together last night and will work on finishing that up so I can tile it and we can start on the walls. I am excited about our plans for the living area and hope it looks like I am imagining it! The summer is shaping up to be a busy one with some visits from family and hopefully a little vacation away for us too. I hope to get on here tomorrow and add some pics of the remodeling work. That's all for now.

Trees, carpets and fences

Our big news this week is that last weekend, Tom ripped up all the carpeting from our living room and hallway. We are now living with a huge mess and plywood floors through almost half the house. It is a good thing we are outdoors much of our days! We are going to be spackling and painting the walls, putting up new trim and hardwood flooring throughout - hooray! It will be wonderful when it is done, but until then things are even more chaotic.

The picture here is of the kids up in their new climbing tree. When we first moved on this property, there were no good climbing trees - they were all tall and skinny with branches way up high from being so close together. Now we have cleared and thinned more and some branches are filling out. This ones branches are low enough, though still a little thin for too much weight. They do have fun though! All three children are in the tree in this picture.

In other news, while Tom was ripping out our carpeting, the kids and I visited my mom. We had to pick up some supplies for Tom in Roanoke which is half way there anyway. It was nice to go relax there and my littlest brother was able to hang out with us both evenings, he can always make me laugh which felt good. :-) Here are some more pics of the kids playing outdoors at my mom and Oscar's. They found a bird's nest and picked lots of wildflowers from the field behind her house.

The gardens are doing well. I found a baby broccoli on one plant a couple days ago and the lettuce from the first planting is about to harvest, I also found a flower on one of the pea plants! It will be great to get some things harvested already. :-) There are more updates and pics on the gardens page. Oh, also pics of the newly completed chicken run!

I think that is about all for this week. Business is going well. We are looking forward to this weekend being a long 3-day break and our 13th anniversary. We don't have any big plans other than enjoying working together here at the house.

Long update

A friend asked for an update, so I am posting what I replied to her as an update here too.

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Not sure where to begin on how we are... I am frankly surprised that God is asking this of me again, LOL!  The office work and phones are keeping me very busy.

The kids seem to be adjusting well.  I am so thankful that we are home, makes it a lot easier!  Heather has started to take over most of the cooking - at least 2 meals a day.  She really enjoys it and it is a big help to me.  She still loves reading and doing her little crafts and projects.  Rose plays with Will much of the time, she is reading more too and has been really enjoying drawing lately and has shown some talent there.  Will is just full of energy and I am so thankful for our land and that I can give him the freedom to run and play and catch critters to his heart's content.  We have had some attitude issues with the additional chores and garden work, but are working through it.

We are doing basic math and grammar and reading books on history as much as we can, but school is definitely slowed down lately.  I decided to give the kids CAT tests this year so I would know what we need to work on next year.  I've never done that, so interested to see how it goes.  My goal is to somehow get 1-on-1 time with each of them, do the testing in the morning and then something fun with them in the afternoon.  Haven't quite figured out the logistics yet though.

I am enjoying the outdoors and the chickens and gardens very much.  All is well so far out there, but so many projects to still be done!  I planted using the square foot gardening method in raised lasagna beds... it's not a huge garden but there are a massive amount of plants in there!  We are all anxious to see how it goes.  The rains have been a blessing and things are growing like crazy.

The house is my downfall right now.  I just cannot keep up, when I am indoors I am at the computer working or on the phone - so things have just fallen apart.  I am planning a yard sale with my sister and friends the first Sat in June (just set yesterday), so hope to really clean out some extra clutter.  We are replacing the carpets in the living room and hallway with laminate and I am so happy to be getting that done!  I am also planning to paint the walls and eventually get new trim.  We will be replacing the 10 year old furniture, which I am very excited about.  Tom and I are going to work together on getting this done gradually, so hopefully I don't go insane with the state of things as a work-in-progress! :-).

My health is definitely suffering from the stress and being so very busy.  I am not making good choices with eating and so have gained back 20lbs :(  I am itchy and tired and bloated and my cycles are getting crazier.  I am sleeping a bit better though, that's a bonus.

God has blessed our efforts with the business.  It has worked out well, better than I could have hoped for. The men that we had to lay off have found good jobs within a couple weeks of us giving them notice and are happy and at the same pay level - amazing!  That has helped Tom feel a lot better and taken away the depression and worry.  We have moved everything out of the shop, painted, cleaned carpets and got our deposit back on the building, the landlords were understanding and kind.  We are using 2 storage sheds as a place to store extra stock and machinery.  I am doing the phones/dispatch/bookkeeping and Tom and 1 other man are running 2 trucks and we are staying busy and enough money is coming in that we are recovering nicely.  We anticipate being caught up on bills by the end of this month and then will start saving for a storage shed at our house where we can put a small office and move the things from the rental sheds into so we don't have that monthly cost.  It is exciting to see things turning and Tom's outlook on things has changed dramatically - as in his expectations and ideas about money and growth have become much more in line with God's.  That is so wonderful and has carried over into our personal finances too.

I had a pretty good Mother's Day.  Tom and the kids took me out for a late dinner Saturday night after we worked outdoors all day.  It was yummy!  Sunday we had church, a fellowship dinner and afternoon service (love that!).  We came home and I took a 3-hour nap which was so nice and obviously much needed.  I meant to have Tom get a pic of me with the kids and forgot, will have to do that soon.  I hope that you all enjoyed your day as well <3

Thank you as always for your prayers and support.

Refreshment

It was very nice to get a break this past weekend and en joy some time with extended family. The kids and I drove down to Georgia and enjoyed camping i n the yard at my brother's for his 30th birthday party. There were 11 adults and 10 children there, we had a nice time catching up and the weather was perfect.

It was good to get a break from the grind here and it has improved my outlook, allowing me to regroup in a sense. We have accomplished quite a bit this week with school, house and gardens. Tom stayed home due to a dentist appt, and he did some housework for me, took care of the animals and put up some new backsplash in our kitchen to surprise me. :-) It is better than the icky walls, and nice to have a fresh look in there. Such a sweet hubby I have!

Things are finally starting to warm up here - this weekend should be perfect for yardwork. I am determined to get the fence around the big gardens so that I can plant them, the beds are all ready to go. Such fun and so invigorating to be accomplishing so much.

A low valley

It's been a hard week.  I was planning to write here on Tuesday but wanted to wait until I was in better spirits... hasn't happened yet.  :(  Nothing horrible happening, I just am overwhelmed and not feeling great and frustrated that I am not taking better care of myself.  I am a hormonal mess right now, blech!

We are getting ready to take a trip down to GA for my brother Ryan's 30th birthday.  It will be good to see everyone again.  I am praying that I feel better physically by the time we leave tomorrow morning and that I am able to relax and leave behind my list of to-do's and enjoy time with family.  Tom is having to stay home for a dentist appt and animal care, I will be taking the kids and car pooling with my sis and her hubby and family.  We leave tomorrow morning.

It's been cloudy and rainy this week, probably hasn't helped with my mood.  I haven't gotten a thing done outside all week, which is frustrating, though I am thankful for the rain.  I will try to get out and walk around the yard at least this afternoon.  I need to trellis the peas and fence the strawberries which shouldn't take long.

I've been working on the house and lots of paperwork and business website updating, all good stuff to get done.

That's all for now, will try to be more cheerful next week!  :-)

New life

Not a lot new to report on this week, I am learning where the new schedule is and is not working. General idea is fine, but need to switch office work to AM hours with school and then get outside, so a bit of re-arranging to do. It is helping me to remember what needs done, and helps to know that if I see that something in particular needs done... there is a day that week I will get to it and I don't have to stress over it. So that is where we are with that.

We have gotten lots done outside, today is too cold to do much so we are staying inside. I don't have much energy when there is no sunshine! I am pleased with all the green beginning to show up around the yard. Everything is budding and sprouting. We need to get the garden fence up soon so that I can put the seedlings in the ground and not fear the deer. Things are really shaping up outside. It is a bit depressing to come inside and see the mess waiting there, but can only do so much - this is a season.

Spring brings all sorts of analogies of new life and fresh starts. I have been having a fairly inactive day (more desk work, phone calls, less power tools and running around)... and looking out my window enjoying the little green things poking up all around has me contemplating much. I was musing today on how often the things that take the most attention and care and are the most "difficult" to grow are the most rewarding. I pray that is synonymous with our life right now. I know that no matter how difficult/slow/weedy/rotten things look to us, God will keep working with us and bring about something beautiful in His eyes. I need to remember this when training and loving our children too, it will be worth it one day! It is humbling to see these little reminders in the world and life God has given us. I am thankful for the new life He gave to me when He gave His Son new life. I seek to live for Him even when I feel like screaming that it's all too much. His strength is sufficient.

Settling in...

Wanted to take some time to update tonight. We had a great visit with my sis Angela and her sweet boys. We really enjoyed it and it helped us to have the extra laughs, extra hugs, and extra hands around during that time. We got almost everything done on my large checklist during the week, and still managed to get out and enjoy ourselves a few evenings.

We are working hard at readjusting to life as it changes. I sat down and made a list of all my duties, divided it into days and tried to make it manageable. I think I have a workable schedule, but we will see how it goes. Hard to plan when there are so many variables in a day. I redid the chore lists also and planned time for school, office, home duties and garden time. It will take some tweaking and flexibility but I felt a bit less overwhelmed getting it on paper. I even divided my blogging into certain days... I have to laugh at myself - such a "list maker"! :-)

Right now, besides the office being moved into the kitchen and all the duties surrounding that, we have 27 baby chickens in the living room, 3 shelves of seedlings under lights in the dining room, and a very energetic puppy demanding love and training running through the house. We are having lots of fun, and going a little more insane each day!

Tonight, Tom and I got the plastic put on the hoop greenhouse that we have been slowly building. We have big plans for the garden, just have to find the time to carry them out now!

The kids are doing well. They have all gotten to a point of realizing that school can be done quickly if they apply themselves and they can have a lot more fun in a day if they just get it done. They have all been spending a lot of time outside lately, Will with his various bugs and critters... Rose running around with the animals... Heather usually with a book. The girls have been building mud cakes lately too which are getting more and more elaborate. I need to get some pics off the camera and post some soon.

Business is staying busy enough to run the two trucks. It has been an answer to prayer. Tom is feeling much better and adjusting well to the changes at work and home. We have been taking turns feeling down and overwhelmed, thankfully not at the same time so that we can support each other.

While Angela was here, my brother Justin and my dad and his family all came up to the shop and helped get some things moved out and into the storage bldgs. My dad then came and painted the front office area for us this week. I will be going up to clean the carpets and then we will hopefully have it all done! The back area has a lot of little things left to clean up and move out but most of the big stuff is done.

I guess that is about it. My brain is turning off for the night. So, that is the Tuesday update for this week! We are thankful for your prayers and for our Father who gives us strength.

Calm in the Storm...

"Then he arose, and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water:
and they ceased, and there was a calm."
Luke 8:24b

I sit here this Sunday morning - home from church due to Rose's fever (though she is feeling much better today) - windows open, I can hear the birds singing and actually hear Rose too... she is out on a stump in the middle of our woods "having nature time" which involves singing with the birds apparently. :-) Things are peaceful at the moment.

It has been a very difficult week for us. Tom made the decision to downscale his business as things had slowed down lots and there was not enough income to support the salaries of all the men and make payments. It was a very hard and emotional decision for him. We have been blessed to have friends working with us and it has been wonderful as we could trust them and work through things, but it also makes it a LOT harder when we have to let them go. Things are strained, Tom is very sad and depressed and feeling like a failure. It is hard to see him like that, and hard to know how to help when he so rarely gets this way. In all honesty, I have NEVER in our almost 16 years of dating/marriage known him to be like this. Please pray for his spirits to be lifted as he worships in church today, that friends and brethren in Christ would give him the support that he needs.

Yesterday, we moved the office to our kitchen. I will be taking over the office work and job dispatching again... yes, along with being a wife and mommy, homeschooling, housework, gardening, and caring for our animals. It will not be easy, but it is the best thing. We will close our office location, but still operate as usual - just with Tom and 1 other tech. It is a lot of change to process at once, but I know God will give us strength.

At this moment, I am waiting for my sweet little sister to arrive. She drove from MN with her 3 little boys to come be a help to me as I readjust. If she can keep the daily things running while I catch up on some big stuff and get into the groove of office work it will be a HUGE help. However, even if she only entertains the children and boosts my spirits, it will be the BEST thing ever! THANK YOU Joe for sending your family in my time of need. We love you all!

We'll see how it all goes... but for today, enjoying the calm in the midst of the storm.

Sick - again? still?

I am home from church this morning - the 3rd Sunday in a row. After dealing with the congestion, sinus pain, coughing, and then bronchitis - now I have strep! I feel fine, which is the wierd part. I am a little worn down and still have a bit of congestion and in the mornings my throat hurts - but otherwise I don't have all the usual strep symptoms - except when I look at my throat, which is really quite nasty. So... home again, this morning by myself so going to go soak in a very hot bath with some peppermint oil while listening to my audio Bible.

Yesterday, I managed to accomplish quite a bit. Tom took the two youngest with him on a trip past Roanoke to get a great deal on chain link fence ($50 for 300'+!) from craigslist. Heather and I stayed home and spent the morning grocery shopping - got some good deals! Then we came home and spent the rest of the day cleaning her room. Hooray! It was disaster zone. I threw out 2 huge black trash bags full of stuff, and put away some things for her to "earn" back. I culled down her clothes and toys tremendously. It feels great to have that done.

We've also been working on the gardens and are excited about our new puppy coming this week.
That's about it for now!

A productive day

Today, I am feeling almost 100% better. :-) I got lots more done. Cleaned up a bit, got the kitchen completely clean before bedtime tonight - hooray! Also made laundry soap, started a batch of kombucha tea, got all our chores done, played out in the snow flurries, got my shopping list and coupons together for tomorrow. I was very excited when I posted a few "wanted" ads on Craig's List and got responses from people willing to do some bartering... for fence material, a shed (will be a chicken house), and a bunny! So, a good day and now I am off to watch a movie with Tom and go to sleep. Hopefully tomorrow will be just as good.

Here are pics of the laundry soap. After setting 24 hours it thickened up and I am impressed with the consistency, I added some lavender so like the smell so far... the price is great! We'll see how it goes when we use it.

Update: I have used the laundry soap for several loads now, and I like it so far... I am still not completely sure, but don't have any complaints at the moment. The price breakdown: Arm & Hammer Wash Booster $3, Borax $3, bar of ivory soap (cheap, believe we got it free on a deal). We used only 1 cup of each and 1 bar of soap... so the boxes we bought will go a long way. It made a huge amount of detergent as you can see! I will update again if we decide we don't like it, but so far so good...

New dining table for us!

This is the new table that Dad and Laura gave to us. It has a corner bench and 4 chairs,

and the benches lift for storage! I am SO excited. We thought we would put it in the kitchen, then once we got it there I didn't like it but LOVE it in the dining room. We took the leaf out of Tom's grandma's table and put it at the end of the kitchen - so lots of seating room here now. :-)

This pic is our kids and our friend's children all eating lunch around it - with plenty of room to spare!

Dishwasher!

It's funny how God works sometimes. Our dishwasher stopped cleaning well and so we decided not to use it for washing dishes, just as a drying rack. That was working quite well and we had a great system of only using what we need and each person washing their own after each meal and assigned a different person to each meal for the "extras". Then this lovely stainless steel dishwasher in much better shape comes in our door for free - so Tom put it in and now the kitchen looks much prettier (matches the black stove better, now when the fridge goes we'll just have to match them!). But, Tom has been so pleased with how we are handling the dishes that we aren't allowed to use this one, except as a drying rack!!! :D Actually, we all like the way things have been running more smoothly at the house and don't mind at all. It's been nice to get a handle on things here. We will run the dishwasher occassionally, but it's put things in perspective and helped me see the beauty of doing jobs in little chunks and not letting them pile up.

Wonderful working weekend

We got SO much work done this weekend. It was wonderful! :D

Sorting closets, vacuuming, dusting, re-arranging, making piles and piles of things for yard sale, listing lots of items on e-bay, others on Amazon. It's great to see the piles of things that will be LEAVING the house soon and creating more order and less clutter. So very exciting!

Tom was home all weekend, so he was able to help us get lots done - it's great to have him around. He may be able to be here Tuesday morning, so I hope for us to be able to price items and start loading them on the box van.

Here is a list of my priorities for this week:

1. Advertise yard sale on Craig's list, La Niche, etc...
2. Sort through Tom's dresser-top and my jewelry for items to sell, throw out trash
3. Sort through our bathroom cabinet
4. Sort through kitchen cabinets for things to get rid of
5. Go through the schoolroom/Heather's room and clear out some things, organize shelves
6. Go through Rose's toys, clothes and books
7. Go through Will's toys, clothes and books
8. Sort through TV cabinet shelves for movies to sell / organize
9. Look through hall closet and bathroom for things we no longer need
10. List books on Amazon
11. Help Heather list T-Tapp DVDs on Amazon or E-bay
12. Price yard sale items

Another great day!

We got a lot done today and the children continued to work more quickly and we had an enjoyable afternoon. We are saving our fresco painting for tomorrow, didn't want to push it and had other things to get done. Tom is working late so we went ahead with dinner and actually ate at a normal time! The children got out their winter clothes this afternoon and the girls have actually done well with sorting through things and finding what would fit, what needed stored longer, and what summer things to put away - hooray! :-)

I am busily putting books up on Amazon to sell right now. (TOGbooksandmore if anyone wants to see). I made spaghetti with spaghetti squash for dinner, it was quite yummy. I also started bread and cooked a whole chicken for deboning and using in several meals. The kitchen is still clean! Last night I worked on clearing off my bedside table, tonight I will do one dresser too. I have also been sorting through things for a yard sale, and have planned our spending for the month of October.

Tomorrow I need to take inventory of the kitchen food supplies and wipe out the upper cabinets. I am going to try to make groceries last another week! We have our regular milk and produce pick up tomorrow, but other than that I think I can creatively make do with what we have.

Oh, check the kid's blogs and homeschool blog for some pics from today!

That's it from here, back to work for me now. Good evening!

A Good Day

The kids and I had a great day today. We've had good days overall lately, but today was great. Tom was home this morning until after lunch and he worked outside, burning wood and mowing - he is working hard to claim the acreage next door for a yard. The breeze was cool and the burning wood smelled great, with a hint of cedar from the saplings being mowed and burned (a shame, but there are so many of them!). It has been around 70 during the day and 50 at night here, perfect for open windows and warm blankets at night, socks and warm drinks in the morning. I love the fall!

Back to our day... we got to work on school on time after breakfast with daddy (rarely happens) and I *think* the children are starting to get the idea that if they work quickly without chatting and goofing off, they will get done in plenty of time for outside play and free time in the afternoons! That is what happened today. :-) Heather finished up by lunchtime and Rose was done by 2pm (she is SO easily distracted, she is the one that dawdles the most). I was able to lay down and listen to a homeschool talk radio show while closing my eyes for about an hour - aaaaahhhh, lovely. The kids ran around outside and then did a replica painting of the Cretan "Toreador Fresco" on paper in preparation for doing it on wet plaster later this week. They had fun with that and really did great jobs!

We then worked together in the kitchen until Tom came home. Rose pretty much single-handedly made dinner. Browned hamburger with seasonings, cooked and mashed potatoes and then threw them together with a can of peas and a can of corn. Will scooped the flesh out of 2 small pumpkins and a spaghetti squash I had cooked this afternoon. I threw the pumpkin together with ingredients for a pie and Heather made the crust all by herself! Yummy!!!

We are making some routine changes and really enjoying our busy days AT HOME. I wake up in the morning and sigh with relief that I don't have to run around anywhere but here that day. We enjoy our Fridays when we go to classes, run our errands and have dinner with friends - but SO enjoy our days at home too!

Today I also got a good bit of housecleaning done. Our dishwasher is not cleaning well anymore, so we finally gave up on it and demoted it to a drying rack. So, our new system is that each person is assigned 1 cup, 1 plate, 1 fork, 1 spoon and they are responsible for hand-washing them at the end of each meal. I do the extras. Ideally, we will not have big pile-ups of dishes this way. I got that organized, washed up all the dishes, did 2 loads of laundry, washed and re-organized counters, swept and vacuumed floors, scrubbed our bathroom, cooked or froze the produce I had sitting out, made 3 meals and a pie - hooray!

I am planning to have a yard sale in a week or two and am working on getting things together for that. I have lots of closets and piles to sort through, hope I can really minimize some of the clutter around here, and make a few dollars.

I am now working on finalizing our new budget, paying bills and making a home-management schedule. Tomorrow I need to start working on a menu and grocery list. We have a church picnic on Saturday, so I need to try to get next week's school planning done on Thursday/Friday.

Goodnight everyone!