More of Spring

This video was the very first day of spring & it just keeps getting busier out here. Happily, God has providentially granted us rain almost every other day so we don't have to spend too much time watering the gardens. Victor has a little "guerrila garden" up the hill w/ his special low-acid Mr. Stripey tomatoes & cukes he wants for pickles. It's up on the mountain somewhere secret. I found some potatoes sprouting up from last year & he asked for one. I handed it over & he tucked it in his black Tonka truck w/ shovel & disappeared.



Mike& I are having a "potato-off". I'm trying them in a tire tower & he's built a potato tower out of old shipping crates. We've used these crates for everything.



Who will grow the most? I found spouts coming up in the garden that I missed last harvest & he bought some from Lowes. Stay tuned...



We have at least one rat in the hayloft. I've actually seen it while up there & occasionally we find dead babies in the goat run that V & C like to feed to the chickens. Sometimes it feels like Lord of the Flies around here. In preparation for the goatlings birth Mike gave the goat shed a thorough mucking & found it! He blocked it in w/ cinderblocks & shot I won't say how many times. His trophy that the chickens wouldn't touch:



There's another one at least, I can hear it squeaking in the mornings when I'm doing chicken chores. Mike was getting water & saw a tail disappear over the roof. I saw a ratty whiskery pink nose peeking from the side of the slab in the chicken shed. These rats put me in mind of Garth Williams drawings of Templeton after he'd gorged himself. Salt & Pepper mindlessly leads her 10 babies (1 died) in there & I just know 1 will get taken out by the rat.



Here is Annie, still not having babies. I've just about decided she isn't pregnant. But wait!



Victor & Charlotte have taken them!



No, I found them this morning. Annie looked gaunt & there was a big spread of birth slime on the floor which I tossed w/ the rake & strawed over. It was quiet though so just thought she had lost a freaky mucous plug but there were the 2 little bucklings, one stuck under a pallet. They were shivering & it was fairly cool & overcast so I brought them in for an hour or so until the sun came out. Annie was starving so I took her to the front & fed her a goodly chunk of grain, alfalfa & a box of raisens. Unhappily through my negligence the white goat got a bath.



I had been running back & forth all morning misplacing things trying to figure out how to promote bonding while not dying of chill & running off of 2 cups of coffee w/out breakfast. Mike was at school. Victor was so good about holding the brown goat until his legs & the goat fell asleep so I said he might lay him on the towel in the tub & leave him. I was finishing up clothes & Miranda came out & proudly announced that she had "I shompoo baby doat!" Mike (who was back from school & making us breakfast) exchanged a look & went to see little white goat was covered w/ pink conditioner. I gave it a very warm rinse off in the laundry sink which as a detachable nozzle w/ shower option. He seemed to like it. But whatever special bonding smell that was on him got washed off. Annie shows fairly strong signs of rejecting him. She milks great & I'm getting enough to put in a bottle to feed him so we'll see if he makes it or not. We think it's funny how they're ears are half Nubian half La Mancha.





Well, it's a long day & I'm beat. It looks like we've got unexpected midnight feedings to do. We're thankful for all of the new life, & wisdom we've been given in the first short weeks of the season. Oh yeah, I also made my first batch of saurkraut. I followed Joannes directions implicitly so go check out her blog & pictures on how to make it if you'd like to. I used the rubber handle of a hammer to pound w/.

A Poison Prednisone Adventure!

There has to be a very good reason for me to take drugs; I'll hardly even take a Tylenol unless Mike pushes it on me, so I thought it would be a fun blog post to document my journey through prednisone. No, I've not got asthma, cancer, arthritis or whatever it is that doctors prescribe prednisone for. It's worse: poison ivy. No, totally not worse than those things, I recant that, but maddening just the same.

I'm fairly allergic to poison ivy. While clearing brush my senior year of high school for some ag conservation class I contracted a pretty serious case that lasted for a month & necessitated a shot. I got a bad case last year, but nothing that couldn't be treated at home. This year went beyond what I could treat at home. It started w/ the baby chicks.

Aren't they cute? All innocent balls of fluff & sweetness. They're nearly fully feathered now. I was moving their nursery box & all 5+ mommy escaped. So I spent an hour or so chasing them & braving her pecks wherein I fell down the slope behind the goat shed. Apparently into poison. On the doctor's advice, (herself an animal husbander sp?) I've since picketed the goats out there but I don't know if they ate it all. That was Wed. I did wash my hands, it's a family rule. In from the property, you wash your hands. I did neglect my arms until shower time, because hey, I'm not a surgeon. That was Wed.

Thurs. a small patch of bumps appeared on my inner left elbow as I was working outside. I knew myself to be dehydrated (I live off of coffee) so I chalked it up to heat rash & promised myself a glass of water in the house. The heat rash continued...

Friday I had a full blown rash on both arms, decidedly NOT a heat rash.I began to treat w/ the clear anti-itch calamine spin off because I do think it feels better & I will NOT be pink unless necessary. I am relentlessly itchy.

Saturday I am still itchy, but now a delightful new dimension presents itself & the crust on my upper arms commences to oozing after a scratch.

"So don 't scratch." you say. I have to scratch. I can't not scratch. I am looking up herbal remedies to stop the itching on google & nothing works.

Sun. I wear a long sleeve shirt to church but the ooze comes through & I fancy I see some horrified looks during the sermon. I am now sleeping w/ Miranda's diapers wrapped & tied over both oozing itchy arms & changing them once or twice whenever the wetness wakes me up. Nice, yes?

Monday I swim at Wilson's creek, hoping all of the minerals in the water will help dry me out. If you're not a local you won't understand. I itch, ooze & apply the clear calamine. Because of the never ending ooze & yellow crusted diapers (we cloth diaper) I am looking up burn care because that's what it looks like to me. I contemplate calling my sister because she is a home health nurse who deals w/ a lot of bandage changing because my arm looks like this. I guess I'm doing the dishes in this picture, Victor is my very obliging photographer.

Tues. I itch & ooze some more, applying more of my lessening calamine supply.

Wed. I itch & ooze & here is something unforeseen. Edema. I figure there is nothing I can do at home for that; I can't bend my arm enough to buckle a bra or do my hair w/ no sign of it getting less. The worst part was I can't hold Miranda. Left is my carrying arm. You will observe on my right side that I am naturally very vein-y & they were all but swallowed up on my left side. So I cave & call a doctor who sees me w/in the hour.

She, unlike the secretary & nurse managed to not look horrified though her eyes did get big. 2 other nurses (actually a student & retiree, so I get the gamut) said it was the worse case of poison ivy they'd ever seen. She writes me a scrip for 3 weeks of prednisone & my odyssey into Pharmacopoeia begins.

April Critters

It has been a BUSY week here. We've got extra family in which means more suppers, outings, visiting & just more back & forth than is generally usual. V & C are having such a good time w/ their grandma & uncle; I get lonely & miss them, but she's only here for another week before we haveto go back to normal. They've been staying over there twice a week or so, the librarian & store clerks are thinking I've ax murdered them or something, they've not been in town much at all these 6 weeks last. Mike & I are planning an Off Off-Grid experiment in the next week or so for spring break. He asked me if I would rather dig a root cellar or flip the breaker? I'm trying to persuade him to do both; w/ the switch flipped it's unlikely that we'll be spending as much time as we do on the internet. He countered that he would really enjoy a shower after 2 or 3 days of digging which I can completely understand. I do plan on helping though & was thinking that maybe we could go swim in the lake or creek afterwards. The lake is at a park w/ grills so we could cook there. I don't know, just thinking out loud. I'll try & record it in long hand & post the highlights. Cooking full time outside is a daunting idea for me, simplification in everything. Less clothing changes, less side dishes, more planning ahead. I think we're just going to sink a cooler into our stream for cold stuff. Our whole front yard & fire pit is fenced in & doing anything will mean doing it w/ curious goats trying to help...but really badly. Which brings me to our newest blessings... Sam. I don't have picture loaded or even taken yet in some cases but Sam is our 6 month old Labrador Retriever. (Did you know Labs originate from Newfoundland & not Labrador?) Sam is trained to fetch & sit though he needs some practice. He is a very sweet puppy w/ loads of energy & very affectionate. He keeps the goats on their toes (actually the culvert) as he likes to run & though he was a beautiful dog, since he discovered the stream on the 3rd day he's a pretty muddy mess & needs a brushing often. The front is starting to resemble a rodeo ground. Buck was somewhat useful the other day. She came in & settled down deliberately in front of the woodstove, but not on the tile to stay cool as she ususally does. She stared at the stove, not twitchy or concerned but definitly not moving either, Miranda bear crawling & Charlotte running didn't send her under the bed. After about 2 hours it was unsettling me & I told Mike she was sick or something. He thought to amuse her & opened the stove door & she was in the stove as fast as Tom Tildrum. He gabbed her fur & an Eastern Bluebird flew out right in his face freaking him out. This is the very same bird that the great state of Missouri has claimed, though I'm not sure why. Mo. is smack dab in the middle of the country. He flew around all crazy & got himself wedged between the kitchen window screen & glass. I ran out to get the ladder as the window is a good 12' high & the screens are only removeable from the outside. He chirped furiously as he made his escape to some neighboring tree. We also received 2 chickens but they flew out of the carrier before we even had them & took off up the mountain. I chased them for a good 45 min. on the 70 degree slope covered w/ loggers detritus trying to flush them out of the laurel but to no avail. They slept out the first night. I finally caught the hen the next day; she was roosting on the goats fence & I got her cornered inside. It's true what is said concerning chickens hanging upside down by their feet, it does hypnotize them. Does that sound weird? I started to type "It's true what they say about chickens, etc." but who is "they"? So I made it more awkward in order to be proper; I dislike what "they" say whenever they've not been identified. The rooster is still out there crowing up the mountain somewhere, if he doesn't come down tomorrow we're going on a chicken hunt if some critter hasn't gotten to him yet. We had a fairly strong storm w/ tornado warnings & everything pass through. Ice cube size hail but we were out at one of those family suppers. I had planted 5 fruit bushes not 3 hours before we left I'm curious to go out & inspect them but it's dark time & still lightning-y. Church tomorrow; we've spent the last year going through 1st Timothy, verse by verse. A 5 or 6 weeks series on marriage is going on & we're enjoying it immensly. Mike is going to give out our copy of Surviving Off Off-Grid to the pastor, he enjoys having his worldview challenged & arguing. I've read it twice & we plan on buying as we are able on April 15th.

Spring Update

We've been sick this last week, but thankfully only on the gloomy blah days. It is wonderful to be healthy & working in the warm sunshine. I'm a day behind on everything this week but nothing has gone up in flames, so we're good.

Mike has started reading Surviving Off Off-Grid & we're having some serious conversations in fun. Training days for instance. We'd like to flip the breaker switch for a couple of days & see what we encounter & put a system in place to deal w/ it. We were thinking of putting a system for water in front of our culvert but while mucking out the goat shed I realized that there's probably a lot of run off that could potentially be harmful. I started to bring it up but he finished my sentence before it was out so we hope to find a different solution.

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Mike has put up a new shed & turned the old shed into our new woodshed. He's anxious to get one hilly area cut & split so we can bulldoze it flat & plant a bit of pasture or orchard. Maybe chickens could run there too? We'd like to make a chicken tractor & find out. It's kind of like a lean-to & he's packed it full.

Here's the back view...

And I thought his closure very cleverly contrived. The shells don't snag the bungee cords like nails do.

We are actively searching for a billy goat. Annie is so big & getting more muscle-y looking every week. Abigail was a runt & though she is bigger I think we're going to hold off on breeding her until next year.

We had dentist appointments yesterday. Victors 6 year molars are poking through though he's just 5 & none of his front teeth are loose. The dentist was a goodly portion of our tax return & the cheapest one around. I think he specializes in pulling teeth. The guy in the room next to us was getting a tooth pulled. A rough looking couple in the waiting room were also there for teeth pulling. My sister in law had had an abscess & needed teeth pulled, she referred him to us.

This was the oldest dentist I've ever seen, easily 70. He worked fast & mercilessly & our teeth lightened several shades under his care. He used a very old dental unit & as I listened to the receptionist type I realized I was hearing the clacking of type-writer keys. He very satisfactorily told us that we would all have teeth in our heads for a very long time, barring accidents & that we weren't plaque traps. Hooray!

Oddments

We've been very blessed by our church this last weekend, all of the men came out w/ their chainsaws & helped us clear up some of the mess the loggers left. It was the first time that most of them had been here & we were able to offer free firewood & dirt bike trails to some. We had good fellowship & were really blessed by the body of Christ in action. We had a giant burn pile that kept going all night until God's next blessing...

So far, we've received about 1 & 1/2" of rain, the first in nearly 4 weeks. My fall garden & the fruit trees have been struggling but the forecast is to continue on until Tues. I hope so. It finally got out of the 90's today & is starting to feel like Fall. We live where there is something called "Leafers", a pestilence (say the locals & the Weather channel) that is due in a couple of weeks, clogging the roads so city people can look at trees. Poor city people, I can't feel too smug, wasn't I there last year? No, it was the year before. There but for Grace, etc.

The baby weight is gone & I'm down to my pre-pregnancy numbers of 140. Cheers! (That might be off, I still had Charlotte's baby weight at 145 when I conceived Miranda.) Unhappily, fewer numbers do not equal my clothes fitting; to celebrate I moved my skirt buttons to the very possible ends of their respective tabs. Boo, hiss. I can only take this to mean I burned off all of my under utilized muscle instead of fat storage. I might get it back, I'm certainly not puny. Hauling babies, baskets of wet clothes, buckets of water (the handle broke today :( ) & my new favorite, splitting the wood might put some muscle back on me. I've got the biggest build in my family. Wait, pictures! This is myself, mom & my younger sister. Aren't we fine?

I'm terrible w/ pictures, I didn't get any until the day they left. I need to take a new one of the living room, we've rearranged the furniture & mom brought some things that make it look so homey. Looking at pictures, check out my sisters children, we stacked them w/ mine & decided that they look less like cousins & more like siblings. Our helpers...



Our blondies...

And our babies. There is 7 months between them.

My baby is a vampire, I've not seen this teething order before. Check out her fangs!

Mom also brought a milk crate of books I used to have, like 15 of those Great Illustrated Classics. Victor loves those, we check them out at the library whenever we find one, but I think we've exhausted their supply. Victor asked to read "Swiss Family Robinsonhood" so we've started that. Every time Mike walks by us I am reading a part about the family killing another animal so now we're reading "The Swiss Family Murderson."

And lastly we ran out of jelly this week. Not something to normally blog about, but Victor will eat PB&J every day for lunch if I let him. I usually do let him too, it's easy to balance out & he simply would not believe me. He burst into tears, bargained, threatened fasting, acts of disobedience, canceling our date night & the list goes on for 10 stormy minutes, but no jelly appeared. I was grieved to see this rebellion in him until he quieted down & calmly & forcefully w/ his finger pointed at me w/ this ultimatum, "Mommy if you don't give me peanut butter & jelly to eat, I will throw 3 unkind cats at you & they will scratch your arm!"

Oh how I wanted not to laugh & to be sadder at his rebellion! But I was done for, I've never had unkind cats thrown at me much less 3 of them. He got yogurt & Graham crackers instead.

A Visit

My mom, sister & nieces drove over from Mo. to spend a week w/ us, what a FULL week. I loved seeing them but we were out of the house so much, I was getting to miss my house. I didn't get to the goat pen once, poor goaty's. (That is what Charlotte calls them in her sweet little voice: "Good morning goaty girls!") Not really, Mike handled it all week which made me very glad that I had handled it all the week before as he was starting school. We don't really have a schedule, it's just whoever gets to it. I generally do it late mornings & he during some random cigarette break.

But we had so much fun! The cousins tired each other out, Victor slept in until 9 one day, I think for the first time in his life. Mom & I did a wine tasting, which I've never done, but enjoyed. I think Miranda is the only one who didn't enjoy the visit as much. She did enjoy all of the extra chickens to look at, but I don't think I picked her up except to nurse her. Also we were out of the house so much she was constantly in a disposable diaper & we're battling a rash. Also She grew 4 teeth in the last week w/ 4 more surfacing. On the whole she is such a happy teether. I'm hoping to catch a picture of it but she has vampire fangs, top canines & the bottom 2 front. The next bottom 2 are pushing through & her top gum is slightly bulgy so I need to try for it quick.

We are finally getting some rain tonight, praise God, it's been nearly 2 weeks. My vehicle is filthy. I hope to have pictures later but I didn't catch any until the last day. I'm hoping to try for 2 posts this week, stay tuned.

Adventures in Potty Training

Have you ever seen a flustered mother w/ oddly dressed children in public & asked yourself "What was she thinking?"

That was me on Mon. After sitting very nicely in an office for 3 hours it was time for us to go & man, were their spirits up! Charlotte was crying for water so we stopped off at the library first for the water fountain, AC & stories. She has been doing SO good w/ wearing panties out & about. She made her water on a public toilet for the first time, the usual kind w/ a split seat. I held her on there & she did her business on 2 separate occasions. I was so proud! After loading up w/ books, we went to the park to eat some sandwiches I had packed & run off steam.

There aren't any municipal pools around here, but there is a water feature w/ different fountains that are sensor motivated. After nibbling on the food & 2 seconds of swinging they spotted a solid little 4 year old running through the fountains in naught but his red briefs. Bowing to the inevitable, I let them run through after some hesitation on their part. Soon 2 little girls in swimsuits came by. My 2 were fully clothed, but I keep extra emergency hiking clothes in a rucksack w/ spare shoes in case we get stranded. Miranda was sleeping on me through most of this. Charlotte came up to me about 30 min. later saying "Pee". This usually means that she has already peed, but she was already soaked from playing in the fountains.

I walked her to the bathroom & saw that it was too late, so I figured it was time to go. I had no towel, only a heavy baby blanket. Good so far. Then I hit a wall. I had neglected to replace Charlotte's clothes; I had used them last week during the hoof trimming when she had muddied herself in the goat pen. She's soaking wet so she can't be in her car seat. I figure I can cover her w/ a light receiving blanket & she can ride home naked, though that wouldn't be comfortable for her in her car seat, or I can dress her like I used to do my Barbies when there was only a piece of fabric. I am big on blankets, but a receiving blanket is not quite big enough to tie on her growing frame securely. I would normally fasten it w/ barrettes or hairpins but I've not got any. I could secure it w/ earrings, but unusual for me, I'm not wearing them, only a pin instead. A pin, how thick am I? Jubilation!

I fashioned this toga, put another receiving blanket under her seat to act as an in
case diaper while Victor got dressed in the back of the van (he has too much dignity & modesty to get dressed at the picnic shelter like the other little boy did)declaring he didn't need shoes & we headed off.

We were tired still thirsty & they were hungry as they had only nibbled at their sandwiches. It had been 5 hours out of the house & well on the way to Quiet Time. At least Miranda was zonked out by the sun.

Turning onto the road that leads out of town Charlotte starts up again w/ her angelic smile & killer 1 word.
"Pee."
"Charlotte, did you pee pee in the van?"
"Pee."
"Did you already pee or do you need to pee?"
"Pee car."
"No! Do NOT pee in the car! Did you pee in the car?"
"Pee car."
"If you did not pee, hold it!"

Going about in public w/ 3 children, 1 in a toga is not what I had anticipated for today, but that is the spice of motherhood I guess. I made a quick turn into the Food Lion parking lot where I could get out & check her seat. It was dry!
"Good girl for holding your pee pee Charlotte, do you need to pee?
"Need pee!"
Sigh. I grab a buggy/cart, place Miranda's seat on the front startling her & crying, Victor tries to jump on the rear to hitch hike in his socks & Charlotte wants to hold my hand. I make them switch & try very calmly (but quickly) to explain to Victor why he needs to wear shoes, forget the tying & you must walk, you are a big boy, this is a race against Charlotte's bladder.

He is upset but follows me w/ trailing laces & flapping toungue, Charlotte holding onto the back & (please don't notice), at the angle she's bent back from, her bare butt cheek is exposed from her flapping toga. Everyone who works at Food Lion knows all of our names (I love small towns), but I'm hoping they don't notice that I have no intent to shop or buy & am only using the cart for speed. Thankfully, their bathroom is on the right hand side of the store in the back instead of catty corner the entrance. I did pass 2 other customers, but smiled so forcefully, I didn't see their eyes cut away to her outfit.

The bathroom is no good. It is completely done in some kind of polished stone but I like the handicap stall because it has it's own sink & is plenty big enough for 4 people. Charlotte ran to the air dryer happily exclaiming "Sanitizer!" & it came on automatically. I think it's meant for a carwash application, it easily had 2000 watts & was very LOUD in that little stone room. But not as loud as Charlotte's & then Miranda's shrieks. Poor babies, I have to unstrap Miranda to calm her down, put her down so I can lift Charlotte onto the toilet & coax her to do her business. But she has no business to do! At all.

I run through various possible punishments, but none would make the connection in her head for putting us all through this; she didn't actually do anything & I know they don't mind an affront to my dignity. So, tying Victor's shoes, we leave past a whole new slew of customers & waving checkers, Charlotte's toga waving at them just as gaily. We've since had great success in just taking her little toilet w/ us & having her use it when we're done.

Oddments

We've had some wicked thunderstorms these last 2 days. Even as my age advances I haven't outgrown my fear of thunderstorms. I remember riding my bike home from somewhere one night in the middle of a stormy Aug. w/ lightning bolts seeming to be hurled all around me, head low & pedaling as fast as I possibly could down Cemetary Rd. to escape God's just wrath. I seem to remember more storms in Mo. than anywhere Va.

Victor is on a science fiction kick. We've been reading the unabridged The Invisible Man for a read aloud but then I saw one of those Great Illustrated Classics of The Time Machine at the library so we read that in 3 days. I searched on the internet for the movie & found the 1960 version on youtube. I used to watch that waaay back when TNT had monstervision on Fri. nights. He is very impressed w/ the Morlocks & has a fairly good grasp of the whole thing; he went into detail telling daddy all about it when he got home. Invisible Man not so much, a great many big words, words I need to look up for myself. Still he wants to finish it.

I'd like to find more of those Great illustrated Classics, I must have had at least 20 of them when I was younger. They were so good I went & read most of them unabridged starting around 12. That was a mistake. There is no more self punishing novel than Moby Dick or anything by Jules Verne for that matter. I ought to read them again to see if my perspective has changed; I hugely enjoyed Treasure Island a few months ago, but Mike just finished it the other day & for him it was self-punishing to read it.

I'm still not in a school routine as I would like. I really want him to want to learn & his disinterest drives me wild. His writing, when I persuade him to do anything resembling the act, is alot more steady than it was before. He only recognizes 1/2 of his letters but I console myself that he knows their sounds & can string them together into a word. "Letter beads on a word necklace." He liked that idea & the look of delight on his face when he gets a word is beautiful. But he doesn't want to, just army games & war all day long, unless we're reading.

Speaking of we took our first family trip to the library which was fun. Mike got a book called Weird Carolinas & our heads are full of places to road trip. There are some out there things too, really just weird. Ripley's helped to write the book. But the best part was we got to switch off & I got to see the adult section. The children's room is downstairs so that's where we're at. My head is full of ideas; entymology is our predominant subject for outside but the field guide is not to be taken from the library. Bummer.

Random Bits

What a fun week we've had! I got most of the windows clean. I've still got 2 bedrooms & the inside of our bathroom to do. My windows are high too, taller than our 12' ladder on the outside, so that was an almost daring adventure. I like cleaning windows because it's a good excuse to buy the Iwanna's. Everything under the sun in the area for sale. In Newport News it was called The Trading Post.

Before I figured out how to get the inside top panes off I was breaking my arm turning sideways to get the inside between the panes(double panes w/ the width of the sill between)swearing I would get a squeegee by the time fall came around. Then they just came off & I could clean it comfortably in 3 min. as opposed to an agonizing 10.

And it's like crystal! I fully expect some birds to meet their ends w/ my clean windows. I had one do that on the sliding deck door at our old house. BAM! Flew into the door & snapped its neck. I think it's wrong to feel pride that a creature met its demise due to my sparkling clean windows, but I did. It was also a good opportunity to let Victor see death first hand in a non-scary way. Anyways I generally hate cleaning windows & expect to relegate them to the normal 6 month interval.

I attended a baby shower on Sat., but instead of playing all those stupid cutesy games we went around the room & everyone prayed for something specific for the baby. It was nice & very sensical, I really enjoyed it.

Victor got a wicked rugburn on Wed. I was so thankful it was nothing worse. He was racing his smallest Tonka truck around at full speed & one end ramped up on my sewing machine pedal & he somehow flipped over it & scraped his face hard along the carpet from forehead to nostril. His rugburn wasn't showing up so bad at first & he was bleeding from the inside of his nose; I was sure he had broken it. He's really been basking in all of the attention it has garnered him.





,

It's not as bad on the computer as it looks in real life. We've got a salve w/ an olive oil, beeswax base, wheat germ & something else. It works great on burns & diabetic bedsores though I've never tested it on the latter. Herbal Mender it's called.

We had a family over for lunch today after church, it was fun. We had no tv to distract us & spent some time getting to know one another a bit more. Their son is a month older than Charlotte. Victor was such a good host sharing his toys & showing him things & I was very pleased because the boy was younger. He's not been such a good host when his guests are older & thinks it's ok to just randomly jump on them, attack them & try to start fights just to play. There was no quiet time today but still they did really good.

My niece has been staying w/ us this weekend, she's been really great playing w/ the children & teaching them fun outside bat & ball type games. She's 17 & we've been having lots of girl talk. I in no way, shape or form miss being 17. But it's fun being reminded & it doesn't seem so long ago.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun!

A rainy Fri. in progress & I'm looking around at all I have to do & thinking of the importance of men. Why? Well this week my men have left to visit Grandma & attend a wedding in Fl. for a week. They took my motivation to cook & clean too, lol.




Charlotte & I have been baking cookies, blowing off dandelion heads, reading stories & big time focusing on potty training. Even w/ the step stool she can't climb onto the toilet w/out help, so I got her a little $5.00 potty, all one piece that she really likes. I wish I'd had it for Victor, he had a $20.00 "Royal Potty" that would make music whenever it sensed a deposit. It gradually became haunted, singing it's triumphal songs at all hours even after we turned it off. It would sing out on the deck & eventually we just trashed it.




Charlotte had hers in her bedroom at first, then she desired the privacy of her closet & finally in my bathroom. She empties it into the toilet very nearly always w/out mishap. Her reward is 1 chocolate chip. She's stopped telling me when she has to pee & instead yells "Shockit schip!" That's my cue to drop what I'm doing & escort her, sometimes reading a Farm Story if the deposit is solid. That will garner 3 or 4 chocolate chips. A small price to pay, in my mind.


I don't like bribery but her motivation had retreated so far as to be nearly gone after Miranda was born & all of our visitors had left. She would yell "Like it!" vehemently, which is her backwards barbaric way of saying,"I don't like it." I don't know if she's a lazy speaker or what; I'm inclined to think so. She said very nicely this morning "Pancakes please ma'am." w/out my asking or having to prompt. Manners always seem to be there when it's something they want.


I was worried how Victor would do; this is his first overnight away from home & a road trip besides. By all accounts he's having a great time. Sigh. I know he'll be more grown up when he returns. But for now it's time for girl fun!

Hillbilly Housewife Helped Me Yet Again

Every Wed. we get together w/ my brother in law's family & we girls will cook something up for supper. This week is waffles. (Breakfast for supper is never wrong!)
But alas! What is this? A dab of syrup enough only for a cornbread muffin? It won't work. Yes, there's jelly, preserves, honey & sugars of various sorts, but I really prefer syrup w/ waffles.
There's no way I'm driving back to town today for only syrup so I turn to my favorite frugal internet lady, Susanne at Hillbilly Housewife, http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/.

A lady named Lisa posted this & it tastes pretty good. I mixed the dregs of the leftover syrup w/ plain yogurt for my brother in law as that's his forte' & after rinsing the bottle out in lava hot water refilled it w/ the new stuff. It filled all 24 oz. (syrup standard?) w/ a bit left over.
Lisa says..


"I like to make this syrup because it has few ingredients, easy to make, and tastes great. It is thinner than commercial syrup but at least I can read the entire ingredient list and know what is in it."

You will need:
1 1/2 C. brown sugar
1 1/2 C. water
1/2 C. white sugar
3/4 C. light corn syrup
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. maple flavoring (optional)

Combine sugars, water, and corn syrup in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat. Boil for approximately 7-9 minutes to thicken slightly.
Remove from heat and stir in salt, vanilla, and maple flavoring if using. Cool completely before pouring into bottle or jar. Does not need to be refrigerated.

*Note* I have never used the maple flavoring in this syrup and it still tastes “maple” enough for my family.

I concur.

March Madness

Goodness, but we're busy. Daylight Savings has sent us awry; we are just getting to where we're supposed to be this week instead of everyone sleeping until 8:30. Miranda is a night owl, but once she's down it's for the night.

Our garden for the year is underway:

We've got strawberries, garlic, lettuce, onions & carrots in so far. Our land has almost no topsoil, so Mike ordered a dumptruck of mixed fill dirt & fine mulch. They came in 2 separate unmixed trips leaving us to do it by hand the old fashioned way. We're very grateful to have it; I think our land grows mostly rocks.

Our schooling is a bit off & of a practical nature. For instance, w/ the carseats/ booster, Victor got bumped to the back. Well after 2 weeks of climbing to the back to buckle him we had a pretty long lesson just on buckling himself in. Lots of that. Learning to wipe himself w/out a checkup, staying focused long enough to give himself a bath, etc. He is distracted terribly easily & really needs someone to guide him back to the task almost constantly. Not being rebellious, just interested in everything. Here's a more fun lesson on changing the oil.



Diapers are something else I didn't expect to be quite so overwhelming. Every child is in cloth diapers & each has their own system. Miranda is in the wraps & flatfolds. Charlotte is in the training panties w/ a diaper liner for added absorbency, & Victor is in them only at night (yay!), w/ a prefold & my homemade flannel diaper folded into some larger underwear. I wake him up to pee as I go to bed & sometimes w/ that he'll be dry all night like last night. More often than not it isn't so & he's still asleep even standing in front of the toilet waking only when he's climbing the ladder on the return trip. He sleeps very hard.

Miranda is a month old & filling out. She's a very serious baby. Mike & I have heard her laugh & seen her smile but she only does those as she sleeps. I got a backback Snugli for her off of ebay so I can have 2 hands free for food prep. She vastly prefers it to the Hotsling & so does my back. I used it yesterday as we went to the flea market (high entertainment here, 3 whole counties turn out every weekend), Mike said he heard some complimentery comments about it. We got 2 peach trees, a plum & cherry. I need to get our apple seedlings back, the family has been waching them for us as we moved. Probably we'll be cutting down some not not so useful trees up front, there's a weird gnarly nut tree & a willow by the stream that can go.

Here's Miranda at about 2 weeks.



She had terribly long nails at birth. I tried to cut them twice & twice I nicked her, so it was mitten hands for the first 2 weeks until the nails would let me get under them. I've got more to say but nary a moment to say it.

Jan. Adventures

These have been such happy busy days, made all the more interesting by the trials & setbacks that have come up. To sum up the first half of the month:

Our midwife will be unable to attend our birth, (I'm about 34 weeks or so) so we're looking into a better hospital w/ nurse midwives on staff a bit further away. This is a very male dominated area in regards to female specific health care & I want nothing to do w/ that. The new clinic is very accommodating.

I was robbed for a day at Aldi's. My billfold fell out of my pocket after I paid for my purchases & a gentleman behind me turned it in. I know this because I saw the security tape. This was on one of those 20 degree windy days when we were finishing our shopping into nap time having passed lunch by. Victor & Charlotte were better than I hoped as I unpacked, searched & repacked the groceries several times out in the wind & unharnessed all of the carts in two's & three's (the chained quarter carts) thinking perhaps it was wedged in the seat top. No avail. The cashier hadn't seen it the first I asked her, the second time I asked her no one had turned it in. I was in a panic, we've taken a 70% loss of income w/ retirement. I didn't know how I could face Mike w/out the debit card or remaining cash & especially w/out my military dependent ID. There's no place to get a replacement around here & it doubles as an insurance card. The wonderful manager took me into the back to check the security cameras & we watched it all on tape. The gentleman handed it off to the cashier as it was the the proper thing to do & she put it on the counter. The manager sent me home & said he would watch to see if anyone took it off of the counter. I borrowed the store phone & called Mike to cancel the bank card. He was predictably unhappy. After feeding the children & laying Charlotte down the manager called to see if I could come to the store as they had it!

I did & was welcomed by the police, manager & district manager. Apparently the employee (Jennifer Crump, 27 yrs old, beware of her!) had palmed my billfold & got nervous when they kept looking & threw it in the trash. It probably helped that I called Mike & had him cancel the card right in front of her. They had discovered that not only was she guilty of petty theft in my case, but had been pilfering money from the store for a long time too. The police escorted me to the magistrates to file a complaint & Aldi's (I love you Aldi's; where but you can I feed a family of 4 for $60.00 a week?) comped my fuel in the form of $10.00 off my next grocery bill & gave me a free gallon of milk besides. Anyway, nothing was missing & I had a very rare opportunity of being in town w/out children so instead of going to the library by myself (what I really wanted; what does the adult section look like I wonder?) I went to the bank to see if I could still keep my card. No, they had cancelled it promptly which I really enjoyed knowing. The banker very speedily hooked me up w/ a temporary card & said my new one would come in the mail. All in all it was a happy report to take home.

Mike started school this week & his first day away the house sort of fell apart. The toilet clogged & I had eggs boiling on the stove. I realized that if Iwas going to the hospital I should pack a bag. I had no idea what to bring, only that the list in What to Expect When You're Expecting was entirely too long. So I got lost on the internet looking things up & let Victor pick out coming home outfits for the baby. We were in my bathroom packing toiletry thing when I kept hearing these weird pops & saw the cat come streaking around the corner. I figured she had done something & started to check it out when the smell hit me. Had I cooked something?

I totally forgot about making eggs. The memory had to be searched for, it was weird. Is this what they call mommy brain? I've heard of (& experience) absentmindedness all of the time, but this was a whole different level. Egg was everywhere. 5 half eggs burned to the bottom of a very dry pan & exploded egg on all of my condiments, coffeepot, vent hood, cabinets, floor, etc. It was very cold outside, but the windows had to be opened to get that smell out. I opened them & started some hot chocolate on another burner & the smell increased. I played musical burners, but I guess egg &/or egg water had gotten down into all of them. Victor & Charlotte very nicely ate their lunch while chanting "Eggy, eggy, eggy!" I can't explain it, they have some kind of Eggy game they play that involves running.

Today (the 15th) was Victor's birthday & though we didn't have the party he was expecting, he thoroughly enjoyed the day. I think he thought he was getting a party because he attended his cousins birthday last spring & it left an impression. He & daddy went squirrel hunting & I guess Mike did some kind of land nav w/ him which he excelled at. They chopped wood for a fire that night & as they did their outside things Charlotte & I made a peanutbutter cake. It was very gooey in the middle, like a melted Reeses Peanut Butter Cup.

Disclaimer: I have permission to mention this.
I had cookies in the oven after that. I used a different recipe & figured that that accounted for the extra crispiness, I just couldn't bake them gooey how I like them. The bread followed suit, very brown & done on top but when I flipped it out of the pans it wasn't cooked through at all! I flipped the loaves on their backs & asked Mike to watch it while I ran to the store. He assented so I left. However, he had to unexpectedly run to the bathroom & being a responsible man turned off the oven first. Right as he realized that we were out of toilet paper in our bathroom he was assaulted by a burning smell from the kitchen & was forced to make a mad dash across the house to the other bathroom for the toilet paper to take care of himself before rescuing my loaves which had gone up in flames. He had accidently turned it to broil instead of off. They are right next to each other. He sawed off what he could, a raccoon or possum has been eating the burnt pieces at night. I've been drying out the rest & making bread crumbs & croutons out of the remainders.

We did a thorough investigation after that & realized that the bottom heating element had completely melted through & burned in half; praise God that our house has been spared & all we've had to put up w/ are crispy goods & skillet meals! We like skillets, it just took some rearranging of my menu for the week. Today (the 25th, I never finish a post when I start) we got a new element & I could bake again. I had my first appointment at the new clinic today too, they operate out of a magnet hospital w/ a very low c-section rate which is very reassurring.

We've had alot to be thankful for this month so far; I've got more to say but will try to get another update in this moth.

New Year's & Victor's First Church Service

2010 & no more holidays at last! We didn't do too much for New Year's, I baked alot. The children napped until 5 & they stayed up until 9:30 on the eve. Victor thought that was the coolest, Mike had a fire outside w/ his friend & brother & Victor stayed out for quite a bit w/ the men. He shot his snowman (or the last remaining ball) & was very pleased w/ himself. We had home-made pizza for supper on the china. I bought a lemon & made a lemon chiffon pie, & lemon glazed butter cake. I love lemon deserts! They were for our breakfast. I also made a breakfast casserole during their long nap so it was ready to pop in the oven when we woke up. My letting them stay up late plan didn't work out, they were up at 7:30 w/out my having set their alarm. Excepting Mike, the rest of us stayed up to watch Zombie Land. I'm not a zombie movie fan, but they were more of a back drop to the story, it was mostly funny. We went out to shoot guns at midnight & immediately crashed. Ha, we're old.

Everyone ravaged my breakfast which does me good to see, & then went out for an FTX (field training exercise). They had scenarios & targets & 1 guy would set them up in different places for different missions, etc. They came in soaked & cold, silly men. Mike's friend is a Marine sniper (he is an ex-Marine but I write it like that because once a Marine always a Marine, right?) from the first Gulf War & I made fun of them for missing the service. He's really helped us out alot, running fence & helping us set posts. They had more coffee, the rest of the desserts & watched Zombie Land again, since Mike had missed it. It was fun!

Victor has been fascinated w/ all of the churches around here, there are alot everywhere. Most of them have steeples, so they're conspicuous. So I promised to to take him to one some Sun. I found a Mennonite church a town over & figured they wouldn't look askance at my head-covering, but I could not find the place. I wanted to try again next week, but he was so disappointed, I figured we would head to the little white 1 room country church right up the road from our house. They're Baptist & it's on our way home.

The parking lot was packed. It's a small lot to begin w/ but I was struck w/ how very nice alot of the cars were. Newer & very clean. We could hear the singing from the outside which excited Victor to no end. "Mommy, it's a usical church!" He always leaves the m off for whatever reason. We walked in from the tiny vestibule & found all of the black people. It was a bit of a shock, as we've been black deprived. I would say a good 50% of our old neighborhood & town was black w/ a good sprinkling of Korean. This place is pretty homogeneous. In order, I think it is predominantly white, Hispanic, black & Cherokee.

It was a very small church, very full up. It was not like the black church I attended back in Mo. w/ my dad. There the men wore purple & teal suits & the women all in hats. It was very intimate there, the preacher assigned us readings from the Bible & we had a discussion & review at the end. There were no flashy clothes here, but lots of shouting which reminded me of my Pentacostal upbringing. Everyone was very friendly in this church & made us feel welcome. They lined the songs which Victor had never heard of but we enjoyed. Then the sermon started.

I confess, I was disappointed in the sermon. The Bible wasn't opened & it was mostly a prosperity pep rally, which surprised me. I mean this was a tiny church, not more than 12 wooden pews. I hadn't wanted to take Victor to a big church because I hadn't wanted him to hear that God is nothing more than a name it & claim it wishing fairy. I expected more old time religion from its whitewashed facade. A bummer all in all, but it was nice to get out & meet people.

Mike is going crazy in the house & at times begs me to get out for my own good. He never realized that my leaving the house once a week for groceries or library books was just once a week, period. And all in 1 morning so we can be back in time for lunch & Charlotte's nap. That is how I would use up only 1/2 a tank of gas once a month in Va. We left early today because I had an extra store to squeeze in, the Wal-Mart. I've only been there once before so we had to look around a bit to find what we were looking for. From there to the library w/ dinosaurs as our objective & on to Aldi's from there. More later!

Snow Edition

We've been pretty snowbound these last 2 weeks. Though we can now leave, our drive is still iced over, though I'm hoping tomorrow we'll see the last of it for awhile. The van got completely stuck at one time & was unusable for 2 or 3 days. I get very nervous driving on ice. I have been thanking God many times for that giant truck of Mike's.
Mike said he's not seen a snow like what we got several weeks ago since he was in Bosnia, but he was driving a tank there. Apparently after driving a tank you will never be afraid of driving anything any where again. All of my driving experience took place on the far edge of Va. where snow is generally a laughable thing. Now I must learn to master a steep ice coated driveway w/ a creek on either side.
At any rate, his behemoth truck has enabled us to do many many things that would have been impossible. He even towed a guy from Charlotte to town whose car just couldn't make the hill. He was able to meet a friend for breakfast the next day to help him out w/ something & I guess I-40 looked like a post apocalyptic nightmare. Anyway, here we are.




I think I may have finally figured out pictures & how to cut & paste. I didn't realize what HTML was, but now I can put things up in order that I couldn't figure out before. More pictures!


Bowing trees that have since been slain...


Buried cars...


This is the back view. The metal shed couldn't take the weight & its roof collapsed.


Trying to figure out how this is a toy from God.


NOT happy. The snow came up to her hips once she left the tire tracks. Poor Charlotte has been housebound longer than anybody. I've never seen her so excited to go to the grocery store a week later.


This is what they prefer. Victor had stayed out longer w/ Daddy to shovel out the trucks & clean off the stairs & when Charlotte was down for her nap Mike tried to shoot down the shed & supplied us w/ an expression for this snow peasant.



We've been very thankful to God for keeping the lights on. We do have provision for kerosene & battery lanterns & the house is wonderfully bright w/ the snow's reflection, but we're not in a position to prepare ourselves as well as we would like. Our only backup for heat is a kerosene heater & kerosene isn't cheap around here. We do plan on getting a wood stove when their prices come down in spring or summer. We need a lot of sunlight being taken up by the trees right now.

Back in Internet Land

Ahhh, information at my fingertips. I've forgotten all of the words I wanted to look up, the odd things I was curious about, the information I needed to get. I feel bad for Mike, he got us a Verizon account because of it's reliability, but the house we have been blessed w/ & lived in for the last 3 weeks is in the dreaded dead zone. No phone, internet or tv, which we didn't have anyways. He did buy a small tv/dvd player so we wouldn't have to keep adjusting the laptop for movies. He would make a commo run twice a day to the top of the hill to get any messages. He's getting pretty skinny w/ all of the hiking he's been doing.
The children have been nuts since we moved in. In the RV they lived outside a big portion of the day. Now our kitchen has the same amount of living space as the entire RV. The useless adjoining dining room (useless as a dining room) plus the kitchen is all of the living space I think we need for whenever we can build a cabin up high. Probably not for years though. Anyways the house is so big they seem to have forgotten about outside. There is still no furniture & they're only using one of the bedrooms so they've got nearly 3 big empty rooms to play in. I think our household goods will be here around the 3rd, it depends on Ft. Bragg. It will be good to have a real mattress, vacuum & pots to cook in again.
Our house is wonderful, but on closer inspection it wasn't as clean as we'd thought. The previous owners were smokers & there are weird drips on everything, like way up high near the ceiling. Soda drops? I don't know. The light fixtures in the bathroom were dripping mud down after a hot shower, I guess they'd never been dusted.
Mike's new enemy is the ladybug. He has to vacuum them at the end of everyday or he goes mad. Really, they tend to stick to the windows & lights, so it's not hard to find them. They start moving around sluggishly in the afternoons. We don't have a garden set out (high on my list of things to do, it just involves clearing out lots of trees) but they are supposed to be wonderful for eating things like aphids & other pests.
Yesterday we were blessed again w/ the selling of our RV. It goes to a lady who is living on her family's land in a house built in the 1840's but is so far beyond repair, only 1 room is habitable. I hope she will be equally blessed w/ it. So now we can pay our plumbing bill!
There was a record rainfall here last week that caused the kitchen sink to back up & finally not drain at all. I was doing my dishes the old way in the dishpan & throwing out the water on the driveway. I was enjoying it too, the deer are out after supper & the splash of my water would scare them away. We did what we could w/ our snake & Mike crawled under the house & fiddled around until he decided he was about to break something, so he had me drive out to call a plumber. I was surprised w/ what w/ all of the manufactured homes out here how few plumbers are willing to work on them. The sink pipe had no slant & ran parallel to the house over the beams & emptied...somewhere. The plumber just cut off that line & rerouted it to the main drain to go right into the leach field. I'm glad we use natural cleaning products!
However, they couldn't give us an estimate & just said that they would bill us. That was last week.There is a definite difference here in how time works. AT&T took 3 weeks to install. The banks, real estate, mortgage company & all drivers are also slower minded. Minded is not the right word, but many priorities (such as getting paid) do not seem as urgent, & everyone is so much friendlier during whatever transaction is being processed. I find it to be a good tradeoff, especially as we have no particular hours to keep.
We've been keeping regular school hours since we've moved into the house though, they have a 1/2 hour of play after their room chores are done & then we start lessons about 9:00, 9:30-11:00. I switched their wake up time to around 7:00 at daylight savings, but I still wake them up. At 11:00 I push us all outside to play. They're favorite game is running to the top of the hill & then down again screaming. Generally the mail has come by then.
It may or may not be a work hour when our goods are delivered. For me yes, maybe after lunch for them. I've not got even a spade to work w/ & I could use the pickax & shovel for digging. I'd like to try double dug beds this time, but nearly none of the land is flat excepting the leach field. We plan to tear apart one of the dilapidated sheds & convert it to a chicken house for our first livestock endeavor this spring. Mike got some goat slaughter/ butchering practice in already w/ the lady who sires out her billy to my brother in law. The guy who used to live here says coyotes are no problem here like they are for my brother-in-law, but there are a couple of mountain lions in the area. I wish I had never seen those shows on Animal Planet, I'm not sure if I would rather meet that or a bear.
I guess that's enough for now. I'll try to post once a week & tell of our adventures. So much time has passed I'm sure I've forgotten things, but I trust everyone is good & I'm glad to have been catching up on your blogs too.

Vanessa

Good October Things

DV, this will be our last week in the camper. VA had turned our low (I thought) loan down, citing "not enough residual income"so phooey on them. BB&T has supplied us w/ what we lacked for the short term & we really think we can pay it off in 5 years. That's our main goal anyways. Everyone had planned on closing sometime this week, but now it's looking like next Mon. or Tues. Then... we can move in! Mike has 2 interested parties in the RV & we've paid up for another month, so we'll clean it out & show it off here where it's all set up.

Today has been chill & rainy w/ every one hanging out inside. I washed every one of Charlotte's diapers as we'd been out the last few days; it was a bigger than usual wash day as Victor's pullups can't hold all that's in his bladder at night. I don't know what to do, I cut off all of his liquids at 6:30 & make him relieve himself right before 8:00 bed. He's doing another growth spurt & I suspect he has the bladder capacity of a 5 or 6 year old; pullups just aren't built for it. Charlotte didn't sleep well last night so she had a long nap to make up for it. Victor & I took the opportunity to go the Food Lion.

I rotate between Bi-Lo, Ingalls & Food Lion. I like them all! We don't get the shopper/ VIP cards because they remain store property, & all of your purchases are tracked & stored. Sound paranoid? Maybe, but if we have friends staying w/ us, it's no one else's business. How do they tell? Your toilet paper purchases. http://www.nocards.org/ & also http://www.spychips.com/ Anyway, everyone is so nice here, 9 times out of 10 the checker's will swipe their own cards for you.

We're far south enough that a shopping cart is called a buggy instead. That cracks me up, but not nearly as much as Victor's new accent. He has some friends & I don't know if they made fun of him or commented or what, but he's picked up on the fact that he sounds different & he's taking great pains to hide his Va. roots. "No Charlotte, put it in the trayash right nayow! Get in the vayan!" We tease him for it a bit, but I expect we'll pick some of it up in the next 15 years or so.

Mike received a bow from a friend & he spent the morning getting acquainted w/ it under the awning. I guess he did good, he missed 4 out of 30 shots & his sights were on upside down. He's anxious to begin hunting, but as we're not yet residents a license is not feasible for this year. These RV guys are crazy, they went out hunting bear w/ bows, but all they did was get their truck stuck.

Yesterday was a beautiful day & we kidnapped my niece Amanda & went for a walk on the Greenway, right along the Catawba river. It was (is) a very pretty walk, not terribly far from where we hope to get the land.Victor walked almost a mile & 1/2, he did very good. I carried him the last 2/10ths uphill, he was so tired. At least until he saw the playground at the end, then he forgot all about his muscles hurting. Charlotte walked a goodly ways herself, but we had the stroller for when she played out. We all played while Mike walked another mile back to get the van & pick up lunch for us.

I finally got in contact w/ a midwife today, but as midwifery laws are so much stricter here, that's all I'm going to say about it. I'm happy to have a contact though.

Good Things

We have been busy & having fun. Cid was here last July & fell in love w/ 8 & 1/2 acres right outside of town. The realtor who happened to be there at the time told him to not bother, it was already under contract. BUT, he went by there again & it is now new, improved & on the market so he had taken us to look at it.
I could see he was excited for us to look at it, so being silly & spying an old lipgloss that had fallen out of my grocery/ restaurant catch-all purse, I put it on & made flirty eyes at him. He rolled his eyes but started laughing when Victor asked in his very serious little boy voice, "Mommy, why do you want other men to look at you?" My sweet little man, you are wise beyond your years. I wiped it off, apologized for being silly & put it in the trash bag. There was unmistakable relief on his face & a big smile as I put on my usual chapstick instead. How thin a thread their security can hang! I was sorry, to have made him worry so. I do think that that was the last of my make-up too, if it isn't the other stuff is all too old to be healthy to wear anyway.
Anyway, we got there before the realtor & so got to walk the property w/out him & it's almost perfect. I actually don't know of any faults yet, but I've only seen it once. It's kind of in a valley, the acreage going up a timbered mountain. Not very thickly timbered though, easily cleared w/ several trails running through it. A road has already been cut in, & though it needs work going further up & there are several sites suitable for building. I think it is Grandfather & Tablerock Mountains you get good views from at the top.
The house itself is a doublewide from 98' & is fairly huge, 1600 sq ft. It's been landscaped, recarpeted & painted & has a well. I saw some newer looking T-posts out in the woods from an old clothesline, there is no dryer or dishwasher & I'm glad, the dishwasher made me lazy. Now that a house is a real prospect, Cid is enthusiastic over the idea of another homebirth, which makes me glad. I know he didn't want to rent a cabin & he'd mentioned the hospital once or twice as a maybe. He's been trying so hard to find us a nest, I love him.
There's also a well up by the road, a dilapidated shed & a year round branch that comes down the mountain & cuts through the front yard. Cid is making his usual defensive position decisions & we've been talking about when to get what animals & put them where. There's only one spot for a garden for now, as only the front 1/2 acre is cleared, so we'll keep our first garden very basic.
But the best part is that that after offering, counter offering & counter-counter offering, they've accepted our bid & we are able to put 1/2 of the cash down up front; we've been preapproved & our mortgage is so low the payments can easily be doubled & probably paid off in 5 years, barring something horrible happening. He plans on going back to school for fun & extra income like I did & all kinds of castles in the air are floating over our fire pit. The inspection is scheduled for Wed. Praise God!
School-wise we've not done so well. We went to the library & some homeschool information was posted there, but not for the region we're moving to. I did get a pamphlet on the NC homeschool association. It was easily the worst library day I've ever had. It's a small town intimate library, w/ the librarians seeming to know everyone (we had just missed story time) & noticing the new people (us). The children's section is downstairs & very nice. Victor had decided ahead of time that he wanted to read about Eskimo's, Australia & goats. That's how we do the library, it makes it easier to get in & out & leaves time to read some stories while we're there too. He always has a random combination of subjects.
We were there, reading stories, collecting his books & WHAM! A terrible odor assaulted me from the next aisle. It could only be from Charlotte who loves the library & was running & playing peekaboo through the gaps. I had to chase her down, & right when I caught her she unlatched her disposable diaper tab (how did she get by that?) & stepped right into whatever had been fermenting in her little tummy. My changing pad was in the next aisle over & I used my loudest inside library voice to get Victor to assist me as I furiously unbuckled her shoes & smeary socks. I was between the front desk librarian & a re-shelving librarian. I could feel their eyes.
This was an etiquette crisis. There was no way I could take Charlotte, who was flipped over my knee w/ her sludgy bottom waving, squealing in joy at this new naked game upstairs past the other patrons to the front desk to get the restroom key. But, it is completely inappropriate to change a toddler (my opinion) in a public aisle of anything. I did have to break w/ my opinion on this one. There was no way to hide the diaper. Smelling as it did I just could not leave it in the regular trashcan.
Charlotte was now barefoot, so I had to carry her, the diaper, changing mat & Victor's books upstairs. He very gamely volunteered himself to carry her shoes. When we got to the front desk to get a library card & check out we were told that it was impossible as we had no permanent address. No one likes a gypsy, even today. Victor was kind of in shock; he wasn't sure how to handle it. The library has always had open arms for him. He opened his mouth & loud & slow started sobbing "But I want to read about Eskimo's! I want to check out books!"
We'd created enough of a scene so we left, but all the way home it was the same chorus, "I want to check out b-o-o-o-o-ks!" Except for 1/2 way there then he started asking me did I swallow the baby to get it in my tummy? Well how did it get in there? How did God get it in there? And then more "I want to read!", so I was kind of saved.
We are doing an alphabet caterpillar right now, I write the letters out for him & he colors them, cuts them out & pastes them to a paper plate. Then he'll look for the letter in several books & point them out to me & we go over the sound & think up all the words we can that start w/ that letter. When he colored the face for the caterpillar, he made a cyclops, but recognizing his mistake he drew another eye, though it was on top of the first like a flounder. Easily, it is the creepiest caterpillar I've ever seen.
Charlotte is reading to herself the books she knows, it is so cute. She'll babble & match up the actions & sounds I say w/ the right page. She can say, "pretty, kitty, book, ball, bacon, mama, daddy, maynya (naked), piggy, shoe & others I can't remember. She has 3 teeth cutting through but is very sweet on the whole, unlike w/ the rest of her mouth. She sleeps poorly though.
Victor himself has had a fever on & off again the last couple of days. I've had both of them sleeping in Charlotte's bunk Irish style, w/ a head on either end to keep warm on the colder nights & stack the blankets. They both sleep better & don't argue or kick like I expected they would. God is so good & we've been blessed us w/ so much; it's very humbling looking at it all.

Boring Alert: RV Schedule

It has been nothing but busy here. You would think that living in dramatically smaller quarters would mean less cleaning, but I have found the opposite to be true. We need to shop more often for less quantities due to lack of storage as well. Our routine goes something like this:

12:30-6:00- Charlotte wakes up ravenous needing to eat NOW. We lay back down together if it's after 4:00.
8:00- Everyone is awake, though only the children & I are about. It's averaging about 55-60 degrees in the camper during the AM. Cid stays in bed because there is no room to maneuver w/ 2 adults moving around. I get them dressed & make them breakfast. Charlotte is like a hobbit & this is her second breakfast. We do our chapter of Proverbs or Bible story while they eat. When they're done they do their chores. Victor feeds Buck while I water her, then he runs the Swivel Sweeper (Great for RV's! Charlotte broke it, but it fixed easy w/ 100mph tape.) over the floors & I do the dishes. Charlotte gets a rag to wipe the benches & cabinets. She also likes to stand on the couch & wave the scrubby brush over everything I've rinsed.
9ish- The children & I go to the Washhouse to start laundry while Cid makes breakfast & leaves for bank/property business if he's not gone already. Laundry is an every other to 3 day chore. Diapers are every other day; diaper days are longer because I wash them by hand in the laundry sink. It's not a full washer load & I'm not paying 1.50 for a half empty washer. If sheets have been soiled that's different. Non diaper & wash days are turning into library story & shopping days.
11:00- We're eating lunch & the windows are open!
11:30- More wiping & Swiveling, maybe a deeper cleaning on my part. This is the first time all 4 of us have had to share a bathroom & it needs a swish & swipe.
12:00- This could be collecting the laundry, doing our read aloud, a craft, a walk, playing on the swings, looking at a property, maybe checking my email? Afternoons are pretty open.
1:30-2:00 Charlotte has her nap & Victor gets a snack. I'm trying to get him to do some school, but he's usually tired. Tired, but not sleepy, I have plans for this later, but not in the camper. Sometimes he'll take the trash out or collect firewood w/ daddy. He likes to tell me rambling stories about crazy stuff, sometimes he does fall asleep & I can get the laundry folded & put away.
4:00- Charlotte gets a snack & she &Victor play together; I get to clean between refereeing & prepping for supper. Close the windows.
5:00- I'm cooking (or we're eating out!) & Cid is home telling me what all he found out during the day.
5:30-6:30- Victor often will take longer than this to eat if you let him. He has so many thoughts & observances to share his food is always cold & unappetizing by the time he gets to it. Sometimes a dessert bribe will motivate him, but more often it goes to the fridge for Charlotte's midnight snack.
6:30- Supper clean up & the usual tidying up chores. It's starting to get chilly by about 4:30, so everyone is more anxious to get inside. They play or read to each other for an hour unless it's bath night.
7:00- Baths or shower.
7:30-Teeth washed, stories & prayers.
8:00- Lights out. I generally either shower, finish dishes or prep the coffee pot in no particular order. Or I'll do all of that at 9 & sit w/ Cid for an hour so we can talk outside by the fire.
10:00- I'm done!

This is general, we might have gone to look at a property, shot guns w/ the family, or something.
Other news is forthcoming, but I'm 1/2 an hour past my bed & as yet unshowered. I'll try to post something tomorrow, hopefully shorter.