What you do in your house is worth as much as if you did it up in heaven for our Lord God. We should accustom ourselves to think of our position and work as sacred and well-pleasing to God, not on account of the position and work, but on account of the word and faith from which the obedience and the work flow. ~ Martin Luther

Friday, September 22, 2017

Welcome to My World





















Why yes, that is a dirty, wet dishrag on her head!


Corynn turns greasy pizza boxes into art.  











I now have two girls baking in the house:  Lord have mercy.


I had a hunkering for Chinese: Asian Chicken in Plum Sauce and Fried Rice













I wonder if, when I am old and gray, I will look back on my dust piles and miss the legos and hairbands and whole plums that fall from little fingers.  Maybe I will be happy to sweep only dust.  Or maybe I'll actually miss daily sweepings like these.



I had been working hard to avoid all of the inferences to autumn I kept hearing/seeing/sensing.  I refused to acknowledge the school bus passing through at 6:50am and I avoided any mention of switching summer clothes for fall ones.  In my particularly grumpy moods, I would inwardly mutter "Keep your pumpkin spice candles, soups and steaming mugs to yourself!" when friends were embracing the crisp autumny air.   At one point, I may have even cursed the leaves that were littering the road.

And then something happened...all of a sudden the wall of thick, obscuring fog in the morning made me linger by the window.  All the zinnias popped open and every single one seemed to be another gorgeous shade of orange.   And sunflowers, in their yellows and burgundies, are particularly good at easing one in.  A generous neighbor took pity on my mouldy, disease-ridden peaches and dropped off a few buckets of peaches and plums.  Have you ever made jam from plums?  The dark, chalky blue skins turn the jam the most GORGEOUS purple red color in some sort of kitchen magic.  And the blush of skinned peaches- you must be dead inside if it doesn't do something to you.  

I'm in....I'm aaallllllll in.   I'vebeen sufficiently wooed.  I've been roasting vegetables and making comfort foods, I've been looking for opportunities to bake instead of turning on the oven when I absolutely MUST.  I am loving the deeper, jeweled colors everywhere...I've even picked up my long abandoned yarn (do I still remember how to crochet and knit?!).  There may even be some pumpkin spice candles flickering in the background.

A few weeks ago, Matt paid his brother to come over with his fancy sawmill and saw up some lumber from trees Matt has been hauling out of our woods.  One particular tree was ginormous!  (The pictures don't really do it justice.)  It was a gorgeous day for it and we now have a bit over 2300 board feet to do who knows what with.   Matt knows.  We'll find out...

We officially started the homeschool year this week and I think we were all ready to just take that first step.  I've been dreading it... because homeschooling can just be HARD.  It can be hard to get everything done in a day that you simply MUST do both on the academic front and in the ordinary 'rumbling bellies must be fed and the bathroom stinks like a stadium urinal' sort of way.  The flower bouquet on the table has been dead and crispy for over a week.   Yesterday, I swept and vacuumed the living room and I honestly felt as if I had just spring cleaned my entire house!   Adding home learning to the mix seemed to daunting a task.

Two things:

1)  All four children are starting out excited, diligent and hard working.   The older two are much better about getting their work done without me badgering them about it (a major complaint in years' past) and the middles are rearing to go.  Granted, a spankin' new year does that to students, but I am enjoying it immensely for how ever long it does last.

2)  Ineke is insane.

She finds a marker and starts drawing in a book while I am trying to explain a math problem to Judah.  I take it away and set the marker in front of me.  Adele' asks me a question.  Ineke somehow found another crayon, marker (or stealthily retrieved the confiscated one)-usually permanent, or other such writing utensil in the time it took me to answe the question and resumes her carnage.  I get all writing utensils that I can find and put them up high on a shelf.  THERE!  So Ineke climbs up on the chair to crawl up on the table to crawl over to Corynn who is studying her grammar and shoves her little face in Corynn's and grins.  Corynn smiles, puts her down from the table saying "Ineke, you can't be on top of the table" and then Ineke walks around the table and does it again.  And again. She thinks she is so hilarious.  I take her to the living room and to her toys and she finds a crayon under the couch.  And then finds a book.

11 comments:

Rozy Lass said...

Plum jam is my absolute favorite! My mother made it from her plums and it was divine. She's gone now and I have no source of free plums. Lucky you! All those food pictures are making my hungry too!

Terri said...

Oh my word, that last photo just cracks me up. What a little character! You are truly blessed, Rebecca. Everything looks wonderful, as usual.

Joel Engelsma said...

Could you post/link to your recipes for plum chicken and fried rice? Looks delicious!

Elisabeth said...

Ineke is literally one of the cutest little girls I've seen.

Unknown said...

Oh boy do you have your hands full with that one! Haha Christina

Amy Marie said...

Aww! I love your writing, dearie! I can just feel the struggle between summer and autumn and then when you embraced it! Your photos, thank you so much. Swoon. Monday is now set after seeing your soul-feast of photos. School has been a bit more crazy for me this year, for SOME? reason, so I get everything you said. <3

jamie said...

your food looks so delicious! do you share them? i must go look!

Angela said...

Oh my goodness that last picture. I remember how annoying my littles were at that stage and now I cry because I couldn't enjoy it then and wish I could go back and do it again.

Rebecca said...

Thanks for your kind words everyone! I love to read your comments, I really do.

Jamie and Heather~ the day I made the plum chicken I was having a major hunkering for chinese but I was also in the middle of plum and peach jam canning so I based the food off of two recipes I had looked at from the morning but tossed this and that in the pots and left that this or that out- and doubled the recipe and tripled the scrambled egg...without writing anything down because...canning!

Here are the two recipes that are loosely based off of the plum chicken and fried rice.

The plum sauce is a canning recipe so it actually makes enough for 7 pints. I used probably half of it for the meal and the other half I froze. And mine wasn't super spicy for some reason my jalapenos weren't crazy hot.

I added a ton of veggies to the fried rice by chopping them in the food processor first. The fried rice looked straight from a Chinese place. Well, since it has been years since I have BEEN to a Chinese place I should say it seems like it would look like it came straight from a Chinese place. ;-)

Asian Plum Sauce:

http://canninggranny.blogspot.com/2016/10/saucy-spicy-asian-plum-dipping-sauce.html

Fried Rice:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/230524/new-years-fried-rice/?internalSource=hub%20recipe&referringContentType=search%20results&clickId=cardslot%2016



Hope said...

Love this post! As a fellow homeschool mom of 5, the youngest being 4 is just slightly easier then your youngest, which is so very cute! Homeschooling with a toddler isn't for the faint of heart! I hear you on the homeschooling and house work and feeding everyone juggle, we are slowly getting going ourselves, my oldest 2 are able to work on their own a lot and that is a huge step! I am a long time reader, but first time for a comment! Sure enjoy your blog and your honesty of life and of course your beautiful pictures! May you have a wonderful homeschool year!

Amanda said...

you had me at the dirt pile! I have every single blessed thing in my dirt piles too:-) Life looks to be happy and full for you all these days. thanking the lord. hugs from Virginia:-)