Commander and I enjoy Homeschooling boys (Herogian, Hawk and Gluten), raising chickens, ducks, and dogs ( Penny and Casey), eating gluten free, surviving breast cancer, coach track and field, and loving God for every minute that He gives us to cherish our family.

Monday, May 28, 2012

simply simple minded

While returning from a Memorial Day Cookout with friends - Thanks C. and C., Gluten was doing two things at once and asked if I liked how he was multi-tasking.
"You can multi-task here in the car, but you can't multi-task by reading while eating breakfast (during the school year)?"
"That's different," he said. "My mind is simple in the morning."
I looked over at Commander while biting my lower lip. He was also pressing his lips together to styme the giggles.
Gluten continued, "I'm simply not awake enough to multi-task with a book. I prefer to keep it simple." He continued to fiddle with his Ipod and phone at the same time.

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Wishing you a great day ...

I hope Memorial Day comes with great weather for you and your family. It will be nice to be with friends and to remember those who have touched our lives.

  GOD BLESS AMERICA.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Don't worry about it, pray about it.

I've always been the uptight personality, always needing to be in charge and doing it myself. It is sad that it has taken so long for me to finally see this side lessen. Yesterday the dogs, disappeared again. Gate left open from one of the boys mowing - but we all have left the gate open at one time or another.  We figured this out about an hour after the dogs dinner and trip outside. After one 'coast' around the neighborhood ( I'm not driving well, yet with the feet). I felt the overwhelming urge to not worry about it. They are GOD'S creation, and he will take care of them like he did before when they ventured out in March for 2 days. A big difference this time is that I can't go driving all over putting up signs or driving to the different farms. Prayer. I know the boys prayed, they didn't want to go to bed with the dogs not home. I specifically asked for the dogs to come back that night. Herogian, Gluten and Commander are leaving for the weekend to go fishing and camping.
At midnight, we finally headed off to bed. Hawk was the last one to come in from the front yard, yelling for the dogs. I was restless in bed, and tried to focus on praying for the dogs, family, and following days.  I had also stepped wrong, and my right foot felt swollen and painful. I was praying that God would heal my feet.

SIDE TRACK HERE - In 2 Chronicles I had recently read about King ASA 'a good king' who basically didn't trust God in his later life. It stated that he came down with a serious disease of the feet and only relied on the physicians to heal him. He didn't seek God. For a foot disease to be mentioned in the Bible, and I'm reading about this at the time I had foot surgery - really tweeked my thoughts. Had I jumped to the conclusion of surgery too soon?   More later.....

After 1:00 a.m. Hawk came into my room with his flashlight (startling to wake up to) and said he heard the dogs barking outside, he was sure of it.  I told him to go out front and call them, as I hobbled out of bed. We had left the gate open, doggie door open, and the garage door partially up in case they came home. Casey met Hawk at the side of the garage. When Hawk brought Casey into the house, we heard the distinct sound of the doggie door being used and Penny coming up the steps. Hallelujah!!  Prayers were answered. What a blessing.

The dogs were covered in burrs and they stank. A mixer of cow manure and skunk. Gluten and I stayed up for the next 2 hours picking burrs out of fur, trimming, and Gluten gave Casey a bath. The dogs snuggled down between our legs and let us pick at them until they fell asleep.

THey will need another bath today, - bought some skunk shampoo. And that fence gate, I think it is time for a better system, something that swings shut - HARD.

SIDE TRACK TWO - I saw the doctor today. He thought the feet looked well. I still can't walk much or drive for another week. He didn't remove the stitches. He did tell me that the neroma was as large around as a pencil. The nerve couldn't follow the groove between the tendons and had actually curved upon itself.  It sorta jumped out when he cut into the foot and opened the area. He believes that I will definitely see relief with the feet. 'It was the worst he has seen so far'. I bet he tells that to all his patience.
Thanks to C and C Coker for helping me get to the doctors office. You two are wonderful.

Monday, May 21, 2012

To answer some questions

I had a couple of questions posted to me about the boys in scouts.
Gluten started two years ago and Herogian joined last summer. They both are 1st class. Herogian will get his patch tomorrow night. This summer with three weeks of boy scout camps, they will pick up about 15-18 merit badges. Herogian is really stacking his schedule to get the Eagle requirements done. Since he turns sixteen this summer, he has the shortest amount of time to finish before age 18. Gluten has five more years. They both are trying to reach star scout by Christmas. Commander for some unknown (boy thing) reason promised to purchase them a K-bar if they reach this goal. Gluten wants one with a Marine medallion on it. The two have really enjoyed scouts even though it was a rough start trying to figure out how to get merit badges done. But we are learning and I'm really thankful to the fathers that put in the extra time to set all the meetings and campouts up for the guys. THey put in a lot of time. The group also does a lot of fund raisers and community service, which helps on the boys transcripts for school. I've seen the two in scouts build a bond between them. They don't argue and fight as much, they joke with each other more, but also gang up on Hawk faster.  I wish Hawk would join B.S. and become part of their bond, but he goes his seperate way, which now seems to be around track. I'm glad he has found an outlet. He doesn't like the outdoor stuff as much as he thought he would and the gluten intolerance  issue is the chip on his shoulder. He doesn't handle it as well as Gluten.

As for the meat birds. They are huge. They eat like pigs and act like babies. Their large size makes them waddle like pregnant women on short legs stuck out at angles. They cluster away from the other birds and if seperated come running to be picked up and 'saved'. From the egg count a couple of them have already started laying. We might not wait until September to butcher. Need to research whether its five weeks or five months. I'm thinking about doing the ducks, just so the pen won't be such a mess, and we can grow some grass back in the run - I do like hearing them laugh. wahh-wahh-wahh. It just brings on a smile.

We are done with school for the summer. THis is the first summer in a long time that the boys won't be scheduled to work on math or more. They are excited about it. I need the break and time to get ready for next year. This year did not end on a positive. The lack of responsibility in completing work to the best was falling off. I think we called it Spring Fever. Gluten and I spent the day going over history test. I found that by reading the multiple choice questions to him, he answered them better. Things from last semester that he had missed, I read the question and he got it right. He was even wondering why he didn't do that in the first place.

I need to improve our organization. Herogian and Gluten can spread things out across the house. I don't get everything checked when it is finished, and leaving it for a day or two and letting them moved on caused a lot of problems this year.
I'm planning to make my master plan, but have the boys write down each day what they will need to do the following day instead of writing in a weeks worth of work for them. In this way they will have review the work, and know what they are responsible for doing the following day. ANY SUGGESTIONS HERE???
As to where we are going to keep our book crates, or shelf or what it will be, I don't know. To grade their stuff, I have to have the teachers books handy, not off in another room, or I'll never come back from the 'house's black hole'. It sucks me in and I start doing other things.

I thought I'd show you the new garden spot. This is where the trampoline was. The only problem was that the peet moss pods I started the corn in, must have smelled really good to the dogs. The middle of the brown spot did have one foot tall corn in it. There are watermelon plants in the grass around the edges.
 I realized yesterday's post didn't have Hawk. Here he is. 

I'm doing better - just itchy. Hobbling around on the feet hasn't been bad.  Thanks for the prayers.
Have a great summer.

Oh what a weekend ... and pictures for you



We had a doozie of a weekend around here. Two boys away to boy scout camping - they were picked for Order of the Arrow- which I'm told is supposed to be an honor with hard work, little to eat, no talking all day for initiation. Sounds like a lot of cleaning up work needed to be done, and they didn't want to put up with any lip from the boys, so which ones would fall for calling it an honor. Our two did! They loved it! Came home dirty and stinky, left for an Eagle Scout Ceremony, then purchasing more camping gear at Cabela's. I've got to quit letting them take their dad to Cabela's. He is a backpack/ gym bag collector.

Hawk ran a 400 in his first track meet this weekend. He has to run in the 15 year old group since he will be 15 by the end of the year. In the 14 -15 year range you can get a lot of different sized kids. Hawk and one other teammate must have been on the youngest end of the line up. He said there were boys with legs at least a foot longer than his. From the fact that he was ready to throw up at the end of the race, I know he gave it his all. Which was too much, for him to turn around and run the 800. So he came home, pulled out the jump rope, jogged a lap around the neighborhood.... I think he'll stick with it for a while. His practice javelin also arrived so we've enjoyed (last week) going out in the evening to throw. His age also requires him to throw the college weight javelin, so he's working up to it right now.

I had surgery on both feet Friday. I think that part went really well. I'm hobbling around on my heels today. I had the nerves cut between the 3rd and 4th metatarsal into the 4th toe. The nerves were damaged and had swelled to the size of a pencil (says the doctor) so it was easy for him to find the culprit. Hopefully, I'll be able to get back to walking and jogging. I'm hoping for sprinting and jumping, but will wait to see on those.

The excitement for the weekend - as if we didn't have enough, was that I had an allergic reaction to the anesthesia. I turned red and was a bit itchy. Okay, I can deal with that. Spoke to the doctor and took benadryl.  Spent the day on the couch with my feet probbed up. That evening around 8:30 I started getting nauseated, dizzy, and felt like I was going to burn up, but my hands were going cold and tingly. With feet up to the wall, head down with ice pack, I thought I might make it through, but the tingling kept creeping up the arms. We called. no reply. So Commander drove me to the hospital. I prayed for friends, family and for green lights all the way through town. God supplied them. 
They did get me started on cortisone. THe metallic mouth and hunger is already here, which reminds me of chemo days, so I don't enjoy the side effects of cortisone, but it does have it's benefits. 

Gluten turned 13 and Herogian bagged two turkeys with one shot this month. Here are those.

a camping tool. - must have a knife on it and can be strapped to the kid.

Since I have a good reason to laze around. I decided to try a task off of pinterest - crochet a rag rug from old sheets.
Well, it was giving me fits. I first tried oval, rectangle with corners, circle, and now going for the straight run. I must have added too many stitches at curves because thats exactly what it wanted to do in the wrong direction.
When the boys can tell it isn't working and they want to play with it, that's when you start over. I'm just using the three colors. This will be for "my" bathroom down stairs.
Here's what I'm working on.
I also plan to latch hook another rug with old t-shirts for lots of color. I'm thinking Impressionist flower garden style -  .

Hope you have a great week. Thanks for stopping by.

Thursday, May 10, 2012

3 days C. H. and TEENS

C. H. = Clear Headed. No dizziness, no disoriented fainty feeling while driving. I've been pep talking, praying and slapping my legs through some errands, but have not felt the need to pull over. 3 days C.H.  Yeah. The afternoon, evening hours seem to be the worse. I realized, I get too dehydrated during this time if I haven't tanked up in the morning. So, I'm trying to remind myself to drink a quart of water/gatorade before noon. If you mix the grape gatorade with lemonade, or with tang, you can actually make a drink that the color will repel boys. When it looks like sludge, they'll keep their mouths off my water bottle. :-) Never thought I'd be able to gross my boys out.

We are moving into the technicological age. We are going to get the boys cell phones. Oh, bother. We will do the initial purchase as part of their birthday presents for this year. Yeah, two are getting them early. Then they will pay the monthly fee. No data streaming or anthing like that, but we will definitely put Navigator on Herogian's phone. I'm just wondering what kind of hell we are bring on ourselves with getting these things. I think the xbox and other electronics were bad enough. I'll definitely be grounding phones if behaviors or attitudes go out the window.

Have you noticed when a preteen gets close to becoming a teen, they get an attitude? I stepped on one today, big time.
This attitude of "my friends know more than you, and your old fashion and don't know anything" - I slapped that attitude out of the air so fast he had to duck so it wouldn't hit him on the way back into his room. He got the "I've been through this twice with your brothers, and I don't want to do it again, so get rid of the attitude" talk. We will see if he did. He turns thirTEEN on Saturday.

We finished our IOWA Standardized Testing today. Yeehaw. We should finish up our school work next week. I'm looking forward to a break.

Have a great one.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

catch up

Track season is now over for me and the USM jumpers and throwers. They made me proud. We had PR's at the last meet, which is what we were training to do. Most of them didn't meet the standard for conference so coach didn't take them. Our budget is so tight. One female high jumper  and one male who Pole vaulted, threw javelin, and high jumped went to conference as our field eventers. We took nine to conference and came back with 8 scoring points and making all-conference. With only 2 females, they placed nineth out of ten teams. THe seven men placed sixth. We have three still training for longer distance races. They will try one last time this weekend to qualify for nationals. One is going to nationals in the marathon.

The driving is still a problem. I'm really trying to break this vicious circle of worry  panic when I have to drive somewhere, even short trips into town. Some days are good, some days scare the heeby-jeebies out of me. The boys have realized that I start slapping my leg  even when the music isn't playing, or jerking in the seat as I do quick muscle twitches to force blood flow around. I'm going to get tight buns just from driving. Today was a good day, I was definitely hydrated, pulling over for trips to the bathroom - that's a first. I usually give Commander a hard time for drinking Pepsi and having to stop on long trips. The tide has turned.

This July I'll be attending the United States Track and Field Coaching Level 2 clinic. I did Level one years ago. I'm so thankful I don't have to do it again. Somehow they cleared me for it the next level, even though their webpage says it has to be done within a year of doing level 1. Maybe it's a grandfather clause. The classes will be held on the University of Las Vegas Campus. Hoot, hoot. Just wish I could take Commander with me. I don't plan to visit the city, just go to classes,  study and stay put. I'm not getting a car!

THe two boy scouts don't know it yet, (don't say anything) but they were picked for the ORDER OF THE ARROW for the next boy scout campout. What I've heard so far is that they get little to eat, hard work all day, no talking at any time, camping out in the open - no tents, which will be a breeze for our troop members, and then having a ceremony in the evening. And why would you want to be picked for this????

We are doing our IOWA TESTING this week. School is almost done. I'm looking forward to a couple of weeks having the boys help me paint the shed, clean around the house and back yard, and chop wood before they head off to camps.

Surgery on both feet will be next Friday, if you don't mind throwing a prayer up at that time, I'd appreciate it. The boys and Dad will be doing the Boy Scout thing and HAWK will have to help me around the house. Feet propped up or iced for the entire weekend.