Stay Out of the Kitchen!

Since adopting our dog, T-Bone, cooking has become a challenge. He's a tall boy, and can easily reach the counter. We have to cook as if we have a small child in the house again. Everything gets cooked on the back burners, and we can't leave anything out on the counters. It would be nice to block of the kitchen with a baby gate so that he can not enter, but it is not possible because of the layout of the kitchen. Last night I tried blocking the entrance with a chair.

Oh, he did not like being excluded from all of the fun! He walked back and forth, whined a little, and finally laid down and pouted! LOL Here is a picture of him pouting. T-Bone's a smart dog, and it wasn't long before he figured out how to squeeze under the chair and get into the kitchen.

Oh well....c'est la vie! 

(Still In Training)

Home Ec

Caitlyn is taking Home Ec right now. Of course it is not called Home Ec anymore. It's called Family and Consumer Science. This has been a fun class. Caitlyn has gained a new love - baking! So far she has made applesauce muffins, pumpkin pies, minced meat pies, cookies, and banana nut muffins.

Not long ago she made a full breakfast. In the near future she will make lunch and soon after that an entire dinner for our family. Some things are familiar for her, because she has helped me in the kitchen before this class. But she has not had to cook entire meals on her own. This is great experience for her.

She will be hosting a cake reception in a month or so. She will have to make 2 or 3 cakes, write and send out invitations, make punch and coffee, and host the reception. It will be so much fun! I love putting on things like this. I hope she discovers that she enjoys it as much.

Her last event for the semester will be planning, preparing for, and hosting a dinner party. There is a lot of work that goes into a dinner party, but I know she will do a great job!

God is Awesome

Saturday night our electricity went out around 9 pm. I walked out back to see if our neighbors lights were on or not. That is when I looked up and saw something I've never seen before. A halo around the moon! It was so pretty. Of course I grabbed my camera to take a picture.



What causes a halo around the moon, you may ask? Well, I wondered the same thing. I searched for an answer and found this explaination on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_(optical_phenomenon)

Homeschooling

I thought I'd update you on our homeschooling adventure today as well.

Everything is going wonderfully. This week Caitlyn finishes up all of her 11th grade work and begins on her 12th grade work. Her goal is to graduate this year. She is doing a good job. Not only is she working on acedemics, but is also taking piano, voice lessons, and playing her flute in our church orchestra.

She finished health, and has started speech. This works out well, since she will have to speak at her graduation ceremony. Speaking of graduation ceremony, that is what I am working on now. This will be such a different graduation than what my son had. He was in the public school system and attended a rather large school. The ceremony was held in a civic center. Our seats were so far up that we could only see a blob when he walked up to accept his diploma. Cailtyn's graduation will take place at our church. So we will have a front row view of her graduating!

Okay. That is all for now. I will try to update more as we head down the hill toward the end of school and graduation.

Hello again, hello.

Oh wow. I knew that I had not posted here in a long time, but I didn't realize how long it had been. November 9, 2008 was my last post. So much has happened since then. I'll give a brief summary of what has been going on in our little world.

> Our Thanksgiving was a nice, quiet one spent at home with our immediate family. We have so very much to be thankful for. The number one reason being that Jesus is Lord of our lives!

> On November 29th we took a ride to Oklahoma. Before leaving Texas we stopped at an animal shelter and ended up adopting an 8 mo. old hound/lab mix puppy. All 42 pounds of him! Here's a picture of him that day with my daughter:


We named him
T-Bone.

And here he is a 6 weeks later, at 54 pounds.



So now you know why I haven't been here. LOL He's a big dog, but he's still all puppy! His favorite thing to do is tear things up. Homeschooling has been a challenge since he has been with us. Caitlyn and I are constantly having to stop what we are doing to chase T-Bone down when he gets something he's not supposed to have. One day he put his front paws on the kitchen counter top, and grabbed a sharp knife. He proceeded to run through the house, playing "Catch me if you can" with it! That taught us a very valuable lesson...nothing can be left on the counter tops that we don't want him to have. Yesterday he took off with a can of chicken noodle soup. LOL Yes, it has been a mess around here. Thankfully it is getting better and he is learning.

Garage Sales

I love to get up early on a Saturday morning and hit the road in search of treasures. Treasures I might find at a yard sale or garage sale that is. You just never know what you might find. I've found some pretty good bargains at yard sales in the past. Of course, its not always like that. Some days I come home with nothing. But even on those days, I can say that I had a good time shopping!

We have been accumulating "stuff" since we've moved to Texas 2-1/2 years ago. Some of the boxes that we brought from our house in Georgia have never been opened. So, I told the family that it is time that we had a garage sale. Our garage was being taken over by all of this "stuff" and it was time to reclaim the garage! LOL

Yesterday we had our garage sale. It was a beautiful day for it, with temps up to 75 and sun shining so nicely. We were able to meet some neighbors that we had not met. That was nice. There were others that came by that were interesting people to meet as well. Like this little Asian lady, who bought Caitlyn's old lady bug umbrella. She was so excited to find that lady bug umbrella! What a sweet and friendly lady.

Overall, we had a nice day. When the traffic stopped coming and we were to tired to stay out there any longer, we decided to pack it up. What was left over went to Goodwill, other than a few items that we wanted to keep. In the end, I think we all agreed that the money made was not worth the effort that was put into the day. I don't plan to ever have another garage sale. However, I sure hope others do, because I still love going to them!

Cooking with Caitlyn

We started Home Ec this week. Oh the memories flood my mind of when I was in high school taking Home Ec! I enjoyed the class, well, at least for the most part. There were things that I learned in class that I still remember and do today. But for the most part I learned how to cook from my mom.

Caitlyn had a microwave project to do. She had to make Microwave Applesauce Muffins. We had to improvise on a couple of things but it all worked out.

Well, I don't have time to finish this post now, but I promise to come back to it later. I have pictures to add as well.

ttfn.....