June Birthdays and Coffee Drinks

It's been awhile since I posted. I 'm not sure where the summer is going.

The well-planned summer schedule just ain't happenin'.

This parenting thing is harder than it looks.

Anyway...

Between making a few weighted blankets with my helper who was weighing beads.

And having the grand kids over... (we're having a lot of fun)

You know, poor Parker has a meaner grandma than he would probably have if there weren't such young aunties. I find myself saying "no" to the "can we watch something?" question more often than I believe I would if I was just watching the grand kids.

But we would miss productions like the above photo if they had their faces glued to a screen.

I started the summer figuring that I would allow 30 min of screen time per person, per day.

Then I read a book.

Then I changed my mind and said "no".

It's a struggle and the summer is not over yet... Shekinah is reading over my shoulder as I type, hoping I give her a clue how long this ban will last. 

One day they decide that ironing looked like a lot of fun.

"Please mom, we want to iron all the laundry"

Uh-huh, that lasted about 30 minutes.

But there were some nicely pressed "smalls".

When your sister bribes you into helping hang up the laundry, 

ya make sure your hair doesn't fall into your eyes.

Coffee drinks are a hit, that is unless I add chia seeds.

I boiled a cup of water, added 3 heaping teaspoons of instant coffee,

threw in a handful of chocolate chips and stirred that mixture till chips were melted.

Cool off that syrup

Put 3 cups of ice in your blender

3 Tablespoons sugar

1 cup of milk

add most of the syrup--you can adjust to your taste.

Blend

pour in cups and top with whipped cream.

and "twalla" (Shekinah's translation) you have coffee drink.

You can use decaf coffee,"healthier" sugar, and other kinds of milk to make this better for you.

Way back in April we attended a quilt show and the girls were given some fabric, 

Faith made a cosmetics bag with hers. She was very happy how it turned out.

I still need to work with Shekinah on her sewing skills ...it's on the list.

She really doesn't think she needs to wait on me though.

Here is her start of a quilt. 

It's good there are two sewing machines in this sewing room.

Then she had a birthday! Grandma decided to share a trick that her sisters played on her on HER 70th birthday...Ten $1 bills taped to toilet paper and rolled up.

Birthdays are best if you can snag dad to play Uno before breakfast.

And shopping and Pizza Hut for lunch.

Shekinah decided that Faith can come with her.

Faith returned the favor on her birthday, ten days later.

We ate at McDonald's but somehow I didn't take a picture.

Guess what we are hearing about these days?

Umbrellas are great fun when shared with friends.

5K, Mother's Day, Baby Showers

Last Saturday there was a 5K in town, the proceeds benefited our local fire company and ambulance. I wasn't ambitious enough to run in a 5K but I figured I could participate by handing out water at the half-way spot. I convinced the girls to come with me.

We were in position a bit early so we wandered around in a very old grave yard- some of the dates were in the 1700's. Shekinah noticed an odd thing

"Mom, why did they bury them if they were just "at rest"?

S:  One lady said "Thank you sweetheart" I felt like saying, "You're welcome sweetie."

We visited grandma High and  tried on some clothes from the great-grandma era.

I don't have any Mother's Day pictures of my children--some of them didn't get the memo that they should pose happily for that kind of thing. 

I did get a surprise via Fed Ex on Saturday...the lilies came the whole way from CA in a box.

The coffee drinks, chocolate and black licorice were from hubby--he knows me well.

The flowers took all week to open.

Hope and I went for a quick field trip before school is over.

We actually both had gift cards so we had the best kind of field trip--free!

Friday evening we held a baby shower for Ben and Jana...I managed a picture of the cake!

Thanks to Pinterest, yes I did make it.

Then Saturday, another Mother's Day gift arrived! Tea and biscuits the whole way from UK.

I intend to sit down with an Agatha Christie mystery and a cuppa.

There probably won't be a picture.

The 50 ducks that I ordered for decoration at the baby shower came in 

handy when we baby-sat the grands Sat. night.

Scattering them far and wide was great fun.

Getting Older, Supper Table Conversations, and QOTD

When this one has a birthday, so do I.

Guess who was more thrilled?

She had to wait a few days to go take her permit questions.

She passed, of course she did. We found the handy dandy permit app 

and are keeping track of each minute of driving.

Then it was my turn to have a birthday. Since Hope upgraded her camera, I get to pose sometimes.

The other night I made a supper that not everyone enjoyed (the youngest two). So some of the older children were imparting their vast wisdom.

"When I have children I will make them eat their food."

Me. "Oh, how will you do that?"

The conversation went from there. Ideas ranged from "no dessert" to "making them sit there till they eat it"  to "no, if you do that you'll get a kid like me"

What pray tell would be wrong with that?

Then we branched off to "what if you don't agree with what your spouse decrees to your non-eating child?"

I'll just say this...a lot more is caught than taught  and we will be closely examining the hair styles of prospective spouses....that's all I'm allowed to say.

I saw a teddy bear tea party the other day.

Birthdays make you feel older without your husband helping you out. My hubby stayed home on my birthday and while I was getting the kids off to school I placed my glasses on the table while putting a hot compress on my eye ( I have a sty). After the compress cooled I wanted my glasses back, as I'm at least half-blind without them. I looked around in my mole-like fashion and just couldn't see them.

I enlisted Zeke and dad in the search and there were some helpful remarks about

getting forgetful in my advancing years.

I was very sure I remembered cleaning them while in the bathroom so I knew I'd brought them down from our bedroom. Hubby decided to double-check, cause you know, my age.

After awhile he came down  WITH MY GLASSES! and a half-smirk on his face.

He had absent-mindedly picked up my glasses and put them in his pocket and then picked up HIS glasses and put them on his face.  Hmph! 

This is not what you want to see when you are driving down a back road in the fog.

It was a row of Amish on scooters with no reflective tapes or lights.

(I was at a stop sign)

Tis the season for grilled pizza!

QOTD: Shekinah was busy eating yogurt with a knife. I asked her why she is using a knife.
           Matter-of-factly she replied, "Because I don't have a spoon." 
Zeke wanting to add to the conversation stated , "It says 'keep refrigerated' on your yogurt."
 Sh, blithely knifing her yogurt, answered, "But there is no room for me in the refrigerator."

Pain with No Name

This weekend I missed the Empowered to Connect seminar,but I was seeing quotes all over FB-land. This got me to thinking about pain and what we do with it and to avoid it.

It it interesting how we are made. When I was pregnant with my first child, I had premature labor around 24 weeks. I didn't know what I was feeling. I didn't even know enough to fear the sensation and what it might mean to my unborn child. Later when I was close to delivering our third I knew exactly what I was feeling, I had a name for my pains and I sort of knew what to expect. These days when those sensations called heat flashes hit me, I have to tell myself that this feeling has a name and if I don't panic it subsides again. These "normal" feelings are very similar to the cold sweat just before a fainting episode. I fear fainting because it is not "normal" and it is evidence that something is not okay for me.

Well enough about my physical ailments, I was really thinking about heart pain-- no not heart attacks but the emotional pains that we have. We go to great lengths to avoid getting hurt that way, though sometimes we are way to young to identify our pain.  We just know something is wrong. If a child stores the pain of abandonment, abuse or neglect inside his heart and does not realize that it is the source of his pain, but only knows to avoid anything that comes close to those feelings. He may grow up knowing that certain feelings bring up subconscious warning flags. "Don't go there."  "Don't love that person, it it too scary."  On the surface the warnings really don't make sense, but it is easier to simply avoid trusting,or loving so that his heart- his inner self- stays safe.
This lack of trust easily goes into our spiritual lives, trusting God is a huge risk, if you don't really believe you are lovable. Really why would anyone so big, good, and powerful really care about someone so small, bad and really not very lovable all around.

If a feeling can be identified ---go back to my physical ailments---that cold sweat ( heat flashes are associated with cold sweat? yeah a cold sweat is one that you get suddenly, as in "a sweat that is not caused by heat or exertion") is also the same feeling that precedes fainting, low blood sugar, or a heart attack...or a simple, old heat flash. If I can name my reason for my feeling, I can relax and realize this isn't dangerous. I think the same could be said for any number of physical pains...if you can name it, you can tame it.

"Name it to tame it" is a catch phrase that  Dan Siegel uses to teach parents to help their children name a feeling. It is amazing how many feelings come out looking like anger. Anger is very helpful, it chases people away, it makes you feel powerful, and you can go off in a snit and not talk things through. If however, you look at anger and realize it is something like grief, fear, or anxiety then things get messy. Then you have to look at what you are grieving, what you fear, and what is causing your anxiety or do you?
Can't you just say " You scared me, I thought you were going to ________."  There it is named and now it looks smaller.
How about?   "I am sad, I didn't get to hold you when you were a little one." Oh, so sadness on someone's face looks very much like anger?

I realize there is a flip side to this. Sometimes you have a "gut feeling" that something isn't right. How to know?


QOTD: The other day I was explaining the phrase "didn't say squat" to Shekinah. I said it simply means "didn't say anything". She gave me this side-wise look and said, "You mean in Dutch?"

Quilt Shows and Little Girls

So on Friday after I taught a CPR class and met hubby for a lunch date and picked up the younger girls at school, we picked up Grandma to go to a quilt show.

Now Shekinah was sure she didn't want to miss this.

She really didn't know what it was. After we visited the first few vendors her feet were very tired.

They were even more tired when I told her that we probably could not buy anything. 

Tho' it looked like a yard sale they certainly weren't yard sale prices.

Then one of the stands had a drawing for a sewing machine and they told all of us to enter. They also had a little mug on the table with caramels. "Sure please take one!" the lady said....

A few booths later she was "patiently" waiting while Grandma watched a stand holder explain the intricacies of stained glass window quilting and a neighboring stand holder handed out some Tootsie Rolls.  Suddenly this quilt show wasn't quite so boooring!

As we walked into another room, a man at another stand (another rarity, not many men go to quilt shows) saw Faith and Shekinah and asked if they are sewing yet? They answered with shrugs and nods. "Well you go over here and each select a fat quarter for free. Here put it in this bag." The stand had about a 1000 fat quarters. For those of you that don't quilt...a fat quarter is a piece of fabric that is 1/2 a yard long and 21" wide.  The choosing was fun and of course mom had to buy a coordinating piece for each of their selections because we are going to make zippered pencil pouches!

Then my little group walked out to yet another stand and they were selling quilt magazines. My little second-grader could not see the magazines so she looked around and noticed a cute pen in the man's pocket. "I like your pen,"she told him. He paused a bit when he noticed her unique hand formation and bless his heart if he didn't simply pull out his pen and show her how it was a stylus on one end and a screen cleaner on the other....then he gave it to her!

It was high time to get out of there! She stopped at one more stand and found a mug with starlight mints, but the lady said she can't have one because they were "adult only"....BUT she had something in her box. After a bit of digging she came out with some gummy candy packs.

Not sure what I learned from all that, but...it was fun.

Those cards that Shekinah is stitching were a great snowy day project.

I simply drew a picture and poked holes with a needle every 1/4". I then had them stitch around the design. 

History is repeating itself here...reading the newspaper while holding a little boy.

Sharing the last drips of someone's coffee drink.

Ahh spring...

13" of it.

Kitchen Reveal

Ok I had to go back a piece to get a "before" photo.

Those wooded cabinets were/are decent quality especially the doors. They have been in this house since we built it in 1986. The flooring of the cupboards needs to be replaced.

The paint color looks a bit greenish on this photo, the one below is more accurate.

I really love the "tiles" They were my husband's invention.

We didn't think the "stick-up" tiles seemed high enough quality for what we were 

going to need to pay.
And real tiles were just too expensive and scary to install. So after some brainstorming he came up with a tile made from 3/8" MDF (medium density fiber). He machined an edge to simulate tile. Then painted each one by hand with the best  glossy kitchen and bath paint we could afford. We were going to apply a non-yellowing clear gloss, but it gave- you guessed it- a yellowish tint to the light gray paint.

I need to put up my knife rack so I can get rid of the purple container I'm using now, and get a new paper towel holder.

Oh and the kitchen counter is Typhoon Ice from Home Depot. It was a pre-fab counter, came in three pieces. We were very happy with the ease of installation. The corner comes pre-mitered and you get special bolts to pull the corners together. The miter wasn't cut as straight as we could have wished, but in the scheme of things I don'  think it is noticeable. Cutting the hole for the sink bowls was a bit nerve wracking but a sharp blade on the jig saw made for  good results.

I really like that there is no seam between the counter and the short little backsplash. Our old one cracked and warped there and looked awful...that is why we decided to go with the prefab counter instead of painting the old one.

We ordered a 10' right miter and a 6' left miter and a 4' rectangle countertop and our cost was about $300. I don't know if it will last another 30 years...but probably I don't care.

The one thing that needs changed is the light fixture. One globe is broken and of course finding a match is almost impossible. Replacing all eight of them costs almost as much as putting up new fixtures.

Kitchen Update, Snow Days and Book Club

I need to clean off the kitchen sink and take good pictures. 

The "tiles" are in! We just need to paint the range hood and maybe paint the kitchen chairs.

Tho' it might be easier to buy new chairs.

I just won't take pictures of them.

Nothing like a new project. I decided to do a ministry-type project.

Economy weighted blankets - I don't give many fabric choices- saves my running around all over the place. I will probably do a limited number, but after crunching the numbers for tax time I think

quilts really don't have a very high hourly wage.

Caught Shekinah manning her vegetable stand- not sure 

why she needed a mask.

Then someone had an 18th birthday....that is 17 + 1  as we did not have an "8"

candle. Shekinah thinks we'd better take care of that before June.

We did the hibachi grill thing for supper again.

If you ever want an interesting art project. Have your child draw an animal...imaginary or no.

Then allow them to dig in your scrap box and select the fabrics. 

And see what you come up with.

He was wearing sun glasses then...

Zeke helped her decide that it needs eyes.

This is the project that was tabled until a later date.

I'm thinking that if you are going to make a crazy quilt, you should make it for yourself

or for someone you love.

It is very hard to make color decisions for a person

who simply "wants a crazy quilt". 

She has changed her mind a number of times in the past two years.

I kept pushing the order to the back of the line.

This is the best pattern selection she has come up with but still....

The photo copy she sent is not in actual color...so here we go...

She supposedly is going to do her own embroidery. 

This will give her something to start on, I might never hear from her again!

I like this kind of snow day.

Well behaved snow...it only lays on the grass and very little on the driveway.

Since it is a snow day. Someone decided that playing zoo is lots of fun.

Tho the monkeys are housed in the bathroom and you need a zookeep to open the door for you.

Lest you think our house is just humming along like a top.

I joined a book discussion group

for this book.

QOTD:Shekinah:" I know what I want to be! A teacher, because then I can look at the answers."