Evening Routine

Our evenings go by so quickly. I try to get home from work by 4 pm, but it's usually around 5. Once I'm home, the first thing to tackle is dinner. While dinner is cooking, I tidy up the kitchen and the house. The kids play outside if the weather is nice. Sean is almost always home before me, so when I get home he is working on the outside chores. This involves feeding and watering the animals and milking. When milking is done, he brings the bucket to me to strain and cool the milk. I can usually count on him being inside and ready for dinner around 6 pm. After dinner, homework begins. Sage has math, spelling, reading, or writing every night. Solomon has to read and practice his spelling words. Then if it is bath night, they hit the tub. If not, we might have time for a game like Go Fish, LEGO's, etc. Then it's almost 8 pm and it's time to brush teeth and go to bed!

After everyone is in bed, if I'm not too tired, I use the computer to read blogs and blog myself!

Tonight our routine was changed a little by Sage's insistence on taking a walk. So we walked around the pond as a family and 2 of the little puppies followed us! We noticed mice trails that were uncovered with the melting snow, muskrat tracks on the pond, and a nice moon. Sean and I chatted about the summer homestead plans.

I feel so lucky to be healthy, happy, and surrounded by love. It's a good life.

Sweet Things

In honor of Valentines Day, some sweet things I've seen lately.

1. Sean painted Sage's toes tonight. Complete with little toenail applique stickers in the shape of butterflies and flowers. Two coats of clear top coat. Awesome. All the while she was beading a bracelet for one of Sean's friends. It had his name on the bracelet in beads.

2. Solomon asking me for a back scratch and saying ohhh... ahhh.... lower mom.... yeah... over to the side.... the kid loves having his back scratched. He MUST be growing because he can't get enough sleep and he ate 3 whole veggie burgers (no bun) noodles and sauce for dinner. This is AFTER a crap load of Valentines Day candy.

3. The puppies. OMG they are amazing. Blue killed an opossum tonight and they were checking the dead thing out. But that's not so cute. The little black one LOVES Sage. I'm serious. It looks at her and follows her and you can just tell that it is in love with her.

4. My good friend Jordan who came to visit me yesterday. He was planning on getting a puppy for his friend but realized that the puppies weren't exactly apartment sized dogs. I was so happy to see him.

5. Sean brought me a cool wooden beaded necklace and earrings from Costa Rica. And some bath soap and honey from one of the local coffee farmers he met. I dig international presents. :)

6. A thought I had. Dad used to buy my sister and me a little red heart shaped box of chocolates for Valentines Day. That was always so special to me. I guess I thought it was weird for a dad to get his daughters a gift on Valentines day but now it's like the sweetest thing ever. And tonight when Sean was painting Sage's nails, I saw how much he loved her when he looked at her.

7. Dove dark chocolate and cherry swirl individually wrapped hearts. YUM!

What happens when the kids watch too many Westerns.

The kids watched Lonesome Dove (it's SOOOO long) and Pale Rider. Thus, Solomon and Sage are obsessed with it. They poured cranberry juice in glasses and toasted each other and called it whiskey. It was so funny. They like to take on the persona of the cowboys and cowgirls in the movie, so they call each other Gus or Captain. Solomon got into the skewers- to him they became Indian arrows. He stuck them in everything. So now I have holes in the fabric of the ottoman. But hey, it's just stuff. Our furniture is pretty raggedy anyway!!

Puppy Love, I can't get enough

It was only a 2 day work week for me this week, as we had snow days Tuesday-Thursday. Nevertheless, today sure felt like a well earned Friday. Sean leaves for Costa Rica on Sunday, and the kids and I will take him to the airport bright and early that morning. Yesterday, Sean go stuck down the road as he was coming home. We finally got our road plowed today and got mail for the first time in 3 days yesterday. Anyway, I'm SOOOOO not looking forward to milking the cow and tending to the other outdoor chores in the COLD COLD weather. I am so ready for Spring.

My angel, and dear sweet helper.

Puppy loving, trying to get some love from Napoleon

He's not real into that.

Check out that chubby puppy!

Snow Day Activity: Part 1

Not much going on today. This morning I ventured out to the local BP station to grab some batteries for our wireless indoor/outdoor thermometer. The roads were fine, but it was early. Little by little, more snow piled up. The kids played well together today--they played pirates, Lego stuff, and lots more of their make believe games. Sol convinced me to draw a beard on his face and Sean drew a patch on his eye.

We moved the new puppies into the back porch and moved the goats to a better shelter for the cold day ahead. The kids played outside, Sean and I cleaned out part of the loafing shed (he calls it the loafing shed because the mule likes to hang out in there) to make room for the goats, and I put together my seed order for this summer. It is almost exclusively from Baker Creek . They have a beautiful seed catalog that has great descriptions of the plants.

Here is a pic of the kids venturing outside. I took this

from inside the house...
Hope everyone is staying warm!

Puppy Pics and Sean's new scythe

The puppies will be 4 weeks old tomorrow and they are already eating solid food. They are fuzzy little zipping and growling balls of fun. We moved them out to the doghouse outside about a week ago and when you walk around the corner of the house and they hear you coming they pile out of the house and waddle toward you! It's so cute.

Sage took a couple of these photos, she is enjoying toting around the camera and I like looking at the pictures she took.

Sean received his custom made scythe from here and he is really fond of it. He was using it out by the pond dam today.

That's about all that is happening around these parts!! Looks like more snow this week. boo!

Handmade from Me! A giveaway..

This year one of my goals is to learn how to sew and make more handmade items for the house. I really want to make some table runners. I love the ones I see at the Family Center in Harrisonville, but they are expensive. They can't be that hard to make..... right?? I'd also like to make place mats and napkins for the table. So, in the spirit of giving, I will pass along the gift by giving away 3 handmade things to the first 3 people who comment on this post. I got this idea from a lovely and creative blogger here.

I just hope I have at least 3 people read this post....