A type of homeschooling?

Only in my house would this happen. This morning after breakfast I tell chick #1 to go and take a shower so that we can do our errands. After I finished getting Chick #4 dressed down to the shoes, I begin to look for the ever famous Chick #3. I have to brush out her hair and make sure that she actually has socks on her feet. Low and behold I find her in the bathroom and she holding the children's encyclopedia for Chick#1 so that she can learn about plants while she is in the shower. What! Now reading books is all well and good but I must draw the line at trying to read books in the shower. Another thing I am pondering is the fact that Chick #3 is an accomplice in this. Is she Chick#1's lady in waiting? It is just so funny to witness the things that these little Chicks do.

More visitors

Mark, Gina and John came for a clinic appt. with John's doctors in our area. I was more than excited to have them stay here at the Hen house for a few days. The chicks were all very excited to play with John again and visit with this kind family. They will be back in a few weeks for more appointment so we will be together once again. John kept the table entertained during breakfast by hiding under the table cloth or place mat. As soon as he got the chicks laughing he would ham it up a little more. Last night we had a little looper gathering with 8 adults and 16 children at Diane's house, 14 of the kids were 11 or under. As you can imagine there was a lot of activity in the house. Diane took picture and I might get to post a few of them later on.

A Week With Parents

My Mom and Dad came to spend the week with us over Thanksgiving. It is always so wonderful to have family staying at our house. The house just seems warmer and I love preparing food for more people. While they were here, we went to a pancake feed to help a seminary in Russia.
This was an ultimate pancake feed with fruit topping and whipped cream. My father is the man with the beard in the red and my mother is sitting next to him in the blue. You may also recognize the red headed pastor from some of the Higher Things conferences. He goes over to Russia and teaches in the seminary every few years.

My Dad was busy working on some questions for a lay leadership course he is taking. Little chick #4 wanted to do work on a laptop just like his PaPa.

NaNa, the Chicks and I went for a lovely walk on Monday. The weather was beautiful with a high of about 73. It is not often that one can go for a walk in November without a coat on. We are shown here walking on our local bike trail. I simply love these trails and have seen them change all year long.

Then on Thanksgiving we had a lovely dinner! It was very wonderful to have such good company and good food again! On Thanksgiving Eve I had to miss church because Chick #3 was felling a bit under the weather. She felt so bad that she could not go to church with every one else, but after I explained to her that we did not want anyone at church to get sick too she seemed to understand. I held her and talked to her while we watched a movie. Then I read a few bible stories to her while she rested.

Later that night we made a gingerbread house. My mom had never made one before and she and PaPa had a lot of fun decorating it with the four little chicks.

During the week there was one unwelcome guest at our house. A pesky little stomach bug made the round from chick to chick. My Mother was a great help and did a lot of my laundry from the week. I washed my fair share of sheets this week too. I think that it is now gone through all of the chicks and is over. I am feeling a little under the weather today but it is not anything that I can not live with. Chick #1 was the last to fight with the bug and today she is back to her old self. She helped clean a lot of the house by wiping things down with disinfectant wipes. Those sure do come in handy when you are cleaning bathrooms a few times a day. Hopeful tomorrow all will be well in the Hen house again.

Ahhhh!

I have found myself, this afternoon in a completely quiet house. This happens to me every now and then. If I were to put a number on it I would have to say maybe 6 or 8 times a year. The Rooster had to run and errand this afternoon and took the older three chicks with him. I am home the the littlest chick who is taken a much needed nap. At times when I am here alone (almost) I wonder what my life will be like when these little chicks have flown away. Will my days still be spent at home making a nice place for The Rooster and me? Will I maybe find a job outside the home? Will all of my little chicks stay close by and I will be baking cookies from them to munch on. Meanwhile I will enjoy my little bit of solitude and then vacuum the house. After all, my parents are coming to visit for of whole week this evening. It will be a wonderful week.

Italy, here I come baby

I like the boots plus the food would not be to bad either.

Your Inner European is Italian!

Passionate and colorful. You show the world what culture really is.

Who's Your Inner European?

It's all good

Nothing can be better than an evening filled with good company and good food. A fellow MartinLooper came to my neck of the woods for some shopping with her Mother. She wanted to know if I wanted to meet her and visit for a while. I, of course, jump at the chance to get out of the house and spend some times with friends. So I sprang to action and called fellow loopers and planned an evening. Diane, a good friend came along and then we drove to pick up Gina and John. Diane and I had never been to the Cheesecake Factory. So we suggested it as a meeting place. Wow! The restaurant was amazing! The decor was breathtaking and food was divine. It took our group of ladies quite a while to decide what to order. We giggled and laughed while reading through the menu. Finally, the orders were placed and lively conversation ensued while we waited for the meal. John was all smiles the whole time and kept everyone entertained. When the food was brought out to our table we gasped at the enormous size of the plates and portions. I really believe that my salad could have fed a third world country. OK, I may be exaggerating but it really was a huge plate of salad. I ate about a third of it and then enjoyed the rest for lunch today. Her I am with the gigantic salad!

John is one of the most patient little three year old boys I have ever seen. He sat so well during our two hours visit. Here he is with Gina lovely plate of pasta.

After a while he did want to move around a little so the little guy sat between Gina and me. I have spent a lot of time with him over the past month but usually the Chicks are playing with him while Gina and I talk. I did not get into the act of playing with him so often. Last night he really was teasing me. He wanted to sword fight with the butter knifes and I had to defend myself. Then he would giggle and carry on. He wanted me to tickle him with my long hair then he would pretend to cut it with his butter knife. Tiger, his semi famous stuffed toy, had to get in on the act too. I made a Kleenex cape for him and he flew over the table. I tryed to get John to eat one of the little madarin oranges that were in my salad. But he thought it was more fun to squish them up and try to feed them to Tiger.
We could not go the The Cheesecake Factory with out ordering cheese cake could we. The menu of cheesecakes was just as overwhelming to me as the entree menu. After we finally ordered and the cakes were brought out, John knew just what to go for. The whipped cream! It was good to seem him enjoy it. Notice his round little cheeks? We can only pray that they will become rounder with time. Gina just called me after lunch today and told me that they are going home today. This is a time of rejoicing and sadness. I am so glad that John is now strong enough to return home but I will miss getting to see my new found friend. John will have to be coming back up to the hospital here is a few weeks and Gina, Mark and John will be staying at The Hen House. It will be good to see her again. During that visit we will be having another Looper close by so there will be more laughter with Wendy and her lost boys.

When it rains it pours

Just ask my husband and he will tell you that it is true. It never fails, that if one thing break in our house there will soon be another thing to follow it. Lets go back to last Saturday. My trusty kitchen aid mixer was kneading my bread dough and I walked away to check on one of the little chicks. Suddenly, The Rooster came up to me and told me that he turned off my mixer because it stopped. WHAT? I was trying to wrap my chicken brain around what he was telling me. How does a mixer just stop? Maybe he was trying to say that he turned it off? I always set my timer to beep when the mixer has kneaded the dough for the right amount of time. It usually takes about 6 min. for the dough to turn out right. I asked The Rooster, "You mean that you turned it off, right?" "No", he said. "It shut off so I turned the switch off". Now my mind was racing, could my mixer be broken? Oh the horror, I use this thing all of the time. It was the The Roosters idea to buy me this heavy duty mixer after I kept burning up hand held ones. The model we bought was a reconditioned model because we could have never afforded to but a 6 quart mixer any other way. The Rooster and I established that, yes, the mix was broke. I then look at my husband with pleading eyes. "Dear", I say, "You are able to repair presses that are as big as our house, surly you can fix this little mixer." The Rooster then took apart my mixer, that I am secretly in love with, and figured out that the motor is going bad. Good! We just need to get a motor. Well that statement is easier typed than done. Now the Internet is a wonderful thing and after much surfing and a phone call to acquire and differ part number, he was able to locate a company that sells the motors for these mixers. Mean while, in the hen house, that left me to do manual labor.

Poor Poor mixer!
Notice the bulging muscles from kneaded dough for 6 minutes. Just joking! Let me tell you that those women of the past must have had wrists and elbows of steel. Mine began to hurt after only a few minutes.

The vacuum then decided that it would try to copy the mixer buy busting a plastic piece that holds that tubes together that are used with the beater brush. Duck tape temporarily fixed that break down so I could vacuum the filth and live with the way the floor looked. Hopefully, both of these parts will find their way through the postal system and end up on my door step soon.

cooking and baking and chopping

Yesterday I had a busy day at home. In the morning while chick #3 was at dance lessons I took the older chicks out for nice bike ride. The weather was a little cool and Chick #2 and I really enjoyed the ride. Chick #1 is not a girl up for challenges so she did not have as much fun as we did. But at least we made it home safe. Then I was to spend the rest of my day in the kitchen. I had to make a potato salad for our soup supper at church. Then I finished up the bread that I had soaked the day before. I made green chili for lunch and garlic chicken for supper. The green chili was an accidental dish that I was forced into making because we did not have any canned tomatoes. That is really a bummer when you have your heart set on something and then a key ingredient is missing. I recalled that I had heard you can make green chili using green tomatoes, so I gave that a try. After I perfect the recipe a little I might blog about that and then you can try it. We all agreed that it was good enough and everyone liked it. I then decided to freeze some of our many green tomatoes. If you read this blog often you remember that this is not a good year for tomatoes here. This is me whining about it.

Here are some of the green tomatoes that Chick #1 went and picked for me. I figured I should try them in something because there are just so many of them. I know that the Ugly duckling has been snacking on them because I have found them laying around in the yard.

Chick #3 helped with the washing and the taking off the tops. She talked for the tomatoes the whole time she helped me.

Then I did the chopping.

They look pretty don't they.

Then the little guys were stuffed in bags. Chick #3 thought that this looked liked the best part and, of course, the best job. She had to try her hand at this too. But the tomatoes got a little to excited in the ride they had in the spoon from the bowl to the bag. Every time she would have about five pieces end up on the floor and just could not figure out why. I figure that I now have enough for three batches of green chili. The next time I make some I will share that adventure with you.