rachel's continued ramblings

haven’t done one of these in a while, so i thought i should update what all the kids are up to about now. shane is busy as usual. he still has little use for ‘school’, but tolerates it and for the most part, is doing really well. he’s currently studying south america – countries, climate, landforms, cultures, history, animals, plants, and the like. we are all now completely enlightened with the discovery of the capybara… the world’s largest rodent, which is apparently the size of our 60 pound dog. he and i also just finished reading the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe which he was enthralled with, so we’re excited to start on the next book. he’s still helping susie with her gardens, and recently has helped her with a couple of ‘trillium tours’ and redoing all the pathways throughout her acre of gardens with ‘hog fuel’ AKA cedar mulch. another neighbor, recently tore off his roof and is in the middle of replacing it with a metal roof, so of course, shane spent last weekend (and is p...

they’re here! they’re here! they’re finally here! i’ve been anticipating a package w/ MY name on it and it got here last night! back story: dave has this pillow that he’s had since childhood. a family friend down the street made one for him and each of his brothers. i think i first saw this pillow when visiting his parents’ house before we got married, along with the the ‘matt’ pillow and thought they were the coolest things EVER! i’m thinking the ‘joey’ pillow was already residing w/ joe and mary at the time, because i didn’t see it until we were staying with them some time later. at any rate, the ‘david’ pillow has always had a home in our living room, and i’ve always had in the back of my head that i wanted to make a set of them for our kids. well, mary beat me. a couple weeks ago, she posted, on her blog, pictures of the super-cute pillows she made for HER kids! OH! i was green with envy (and frustration), but alas, i have no sewing machine! grrr. BUT, unbeknownst to me, my husba...

so i took a big risk yesterday, and was miraculously successful. i can only give credit to divine intervention, because normally, when i do this, i fail miserably. i went grocery shopping… without a list… and no meal plan. GASP! somehow or other, having left my list at home (it only had two items on it anyway), i managed to do my shopping, on the fly, with two of my kids in tow, and mentally pulled together a meal plan and bought everything i needed. WOW. so, although we’re halfway through the week, i’ll post my meal plan anyway. on saturday, dave and i were away all day at the christian heritage homeschool conference, and my plan from last week was to make the tater tot casserole that night… with the ground beef that i had forgotten to take out of the freezer that morning… so we wound up having a super healthy meal of mac&cheese w/ hot dogs. AND PEAS! i always feel better if we have a vegetable with it… like it counteracts the crap factor. that, and it’s organic mac&cheese! ok...

blah blah blah… something happened last week. our meal plan kind of blew up. but that’s good news for this week because i can just transfer a lot of what we didn’t eat last week to this week! sunday: burgers; oven fries; carrots (from last week) monday: pancakes; bacon; fruit (from last week) tuesday: chicken caesar salads wednesday: leftover beef stew; sourdough thursday: tater tot casserole (from last week) friday: pizza; green beans saturday: soup; grilled cheese sandwiches so basically, i don’t have to buy anything! well, that’s not true. i had to buy charcoal on sunday so we could grill the burgers. i could have just broiled them, but it was such a nice day it just seemed wrong! and we’re out of milk and coffee (GASP!) so i’ll have to make a costco run. but other than that, i think we’re good! which is awesome, because my grocery budget is kind of shot.

in case you didn’t know, i’m a spontaneous person. most of the time, i complain about this little aspect of my personality, because it’s downside is that i’m a BAD planner. committing to do something more than about an hour in advance has a tendency to give me the willies. i’m a last minute kinda person, like to do things when the pressure’s on. partly, this is because i’m just a bad procrastinator (actually, i think i’m a pretty good procrastinator). papers, for example, were always written at the last minute, the night before they were due – and i always got good grades on them (case in point – i’m good at procrastinating). packing is a slightly different example, but similar. if i’m going on a trip, i CANNOT pack for it until the night before i leave. i can mentally pack prior to that, but actually putting stuff in the suitcase any sooner than that, gives me the heebie jeebies and kind of makes me start to panic. first of all, it’s just a given that most of the clothes i want to tak...

so this post is already anti-climactic because he’s over it! i still don’t know what it was, because he’s certainly not sick w/ anything i can see. but anyway, installment 2 goes like this. saturday morning, he woke up cool. he was relatively happy, played, etc. once again, i was thinking we were in the clear. then sometime, late morning, he came and got me and told me he wanted to snuggle. red flag #1. so we went and cuddled up on the couch. he wound up falling asleep draped across my lap, and as he slept, i could feel him getting warmer and warmer. while he slept, i stuck the thermometer in his armpit and the highest it went was 100.4. so then i’m confused. it’s up. but not that much. do i take him in, or not? i decided to call the nurse advice line at our dr’s office and when they called me back they basically said that since it had been that many days, he should probably be seen. so we got an appointment for early afternoon. i LOVE that about our pediatrician’s office. you can ...

my little guy has been plagued since wednesday, with this crazy fever that just keeps going up and down. my first clue should have been the 5am wake up on wednesday morning, and what sounded like some slight sniffles. layla had an appointment that morning to have her hearing tested, and i had arranged for micah to hang w/ my friend lindsey. he seemed kind of quiet and sleepy when i dropped him off, but i assumed that was due to a combination of being a little sleepy from getting up so early, and being in a strange place. when i came back to get him, just over  an hour later, he was passed out on the floor of the livingroom, in a pile of toy trains. interesting. we took layla to preschool and then came home, at which time, micah asked to watch phineas and ferb. so i turned it on and he lay, comatose, for the next half hour on the pooh couch. it was at this point that it occurred to me to take his temperature (duh!) and at 102.6, i gave up on my slow-poke thermometer and just w...

i have no idea why i didn’t post this yesterday. oh well. monday: french dips; veggies (something happened last week and we never had these, so we did this week!) tuesday: homemade mac&cheese w/ ham; peas wednesday: beef stew; sourdough thursday: tater tot casserole friday: pizza; green beans saturday: burgers; oven fries; veggies sunday: pancakes did the shopping yesterday, and a big thank you to the friendly checker at safeway, who, when my total was $100. 87, allowed me to empty the change compartment of my wallet on the counter, counted out .84 and called it good! all so i didn’t have to break a twenty for 87 cents! so i owe safeway .3!

no, don’t worry, you haven’t stumbled upon the wrong blog. you know, the blog of someone who actually DOES spring cleaning! it’s really me. it’s friday of spring break. and yes, even though we’re homeschoolers, that does mean something. first of all, any of shane’s classes that he takes are off this week, and HE KNOWS when all the vacations and days off are. it’s like he’s got a sixth sense. you know, the ‘anti-school sense’. of course, he’s probably off learning more this week than he does the rest of the year. he’s been working, full days, w/ susie this week, and happy as a clam about it. sometimes i’m tempted to just forego school and let him work with her all day. she is, after all, what’s considered an official master gardener. she has an acre of partially wooded property, on the lake, that she has entirely landscaped with native plants. they spend hours weeding, planting, replanting, labeling, filing, recording, mulching, and otherwise caring for the gardens. and when they’re n...

so i’m late. boo hoo. monday: scrambled eggs w/ leftover ham and cheese; english muffins tuesday: burgers; carrot sticks wednesday: roast beef; potatoes; veggies thursday: chicken of some sort…… friday: pizza; green beans saturday: french dips; salad sunday: waffles; sausage i’ve already done a little bit of shopping, but need to finish up. don’t need much though, because i already have a lot of stuff – ground beef, buns, carrots, roast, potatoes, veggies, hoagie rolls… love costco shopping! just need to pick up some chicken (and whatever i decide to have w/ it), some salad stuff, buttermilk, and sausages. shouldn’t be too bad!

so it’s 9:39pm and we’ve just (sort of) finished our easter celebration. what a wacko day. what a wacko weekend. it does not feel so much like easter. to start, we’re all tired. we had a great little overnight trip south to visit kat and cole, and to celebrate cole’s 40th. kat had a surprise party planned for him. it was totally fun, the kids were just running crazy all day long and having so much fun together, the guys went on some bike rides, etc. etc. we got home last night at around 9, and i had to head straight out to target to get some easter surprises or the kids were going to have empty baskets. yes, that’s waiting til the last minute. i tried to do it yesterday morning, but after spending an hour in walmart and getting everything sorted out and at the checkout, i discovered that my debit card was not in my wallet and i had no way to pay for anything. POO! so i frantically shopped last night, then had to get gas, then had to hit the grocery store. this morning everyone was stil...