One room school house

Welcome to our school room. We spend more time in this room than any other most days. I thought a tour was in order as many of you will not be able to visit me and see it for yourselves.
Our first stop is our storage cabinets full of our craft supplies, learning games and other fun activities. You can see the tables and desk. Rex and Cormac sit at the little table and desk and I am in the middle. Stephen uses the bigger table for his work. Blase usually sits at the kitchen table where I can see him. You will notice our newly installed lighting. We are a thrifty sorta family that uses and reuses anything we can. Who knew a pool light could double as a school light?? Will wonders never cease???

The second picture was taken from the area where the storage cabinets are. It shows the doorway back to the living room. You can see our large collection of children's books on the white bookshelves. The books on the brown shelves are science, literature and religion book sets.

Here is my area. The bookshelf holds my teacher resource books and books I spent too much money on to just let the boys have full access to. It also houses our office supplies down below. The roll top desk was a wonderful birthday present to me from Darren. I LOVE IT! The other desk has been down-graded to storage. The drawers underneath hold the boys' workbooks and notebooks.

Here is a picture of the roll top desk opened up.

This is above the down-grade desk. My Horton Hears a Who poster (From sun in the summer. From rain when it's fall-ish, I'm going to protect them. No matter how small-ish!). You will notice our friends and family pictures from the 2009 Christmas cards. Below that is our saints calendar. I have little saint pictures we place on there daily. It also lists the birthdays and special holidays of the month.

This is our Communion of Saints door. It is next to the calender and pictures. The door leads to the coat room and garage. You will notice Jesus is the Mystical Head of the Church. Below Him are a few examples of the Church Triumphant, including a cross heart for my brother St. Blase, entered heaven June 7, 1984. Under those pictures are the crosses representing the Church Suffering. We have listed a few friends and family who have past on. You will see another cross heart that has my brother Mark's name and death day on it. The bottom is our families listed as the Church Militant. The lightest pink has the names of Darren, myself and our children. The non-family Godparents are also on the lightest pink hearts. They are placed so they are connected to the Godchild's name. The next little bit darker pink hearts are Darren's parents and siblings. The darkest pink hearts of my parents, siblings and grandparents. One the sides of the gold trim you can barely see little pieces of paper. Those are the names of the priests we know, plus their ordination days. Ideally I'd check the door every so often to make sure we are praying for those people listed. It doesn't happen as often as I would like. Sometimes things just get put off and when its in front of you...all the harder to actually remember doing it!!!

No one room school room is complete without the stove. Here is our pellet stove in the corner with one of the white boards above. We have a great view of the back yard and deck from our school windows. We have had a family of deer watch us do our history class and many birds peek in for a lesson or two. Of course some birds tend to hit the window and disrupt our class, but even that is a welcome distraction for us. We love nature and love being so close to it.

Solo

Have you ever imagined what a pilot must feel like on their first solo flight? There must be a bit of fear, tons of excitement and determination to succeed, right? My husband is fishing this weekend with his buddies from work. I'm flying solo with 5 boys.

Fear - CHECK
Excitement - CHECK
Determination to succeed - CHECK CHECK

Even though I have done many week long solo "flights" without Darren, I find myself always a bit hesitant when he leaves. I wonder about the what ifs and the could happens and the AHH OHHH NOOOOOO's that DO happen. In the end its always just fine and I always make it through.

It is good for Darren to get away from us. It helps all of us to have him gone. He relaxes and has a good time, which he deserves more often. I just hope he misses us at some point when the fish aren't biting. It is good for the rest of us too because we can feel the emptiness that comes with Darren being gone. I learn to appreciate Darren's helpfulness and miss his company. That is always good for a wife to realize.

When he returns later in the weekend there will be hugs and kisses from all. Blase will ask if Darren had any luck and Stephen will want to know how many and how big. Cormac will show Darren a trick he learned (hopefully not at the expense of my furniture). Rex will try whatever Cormac does. Brech will run around and scream like the rest of them, trying to be big too. And what about me...I will take a deep breathe, hug my husband, kiss him sweetly, open a beer and head for a nice, LONG, hot bath. My reward for flying solo and succeeding.

Little sis all grown up

I was thinking about my sister Mauri the other day. She is a beautiful woman who will soon be married. I look upon her as an equal in age (maybe not in cooking skills though ha ha), but it wasn't always that way.


This is a picture of us taken in December 1991. She would have been just over a year old and I was almost 13 years old. That is quite an age difference for two sisters to share a room. She was into EVERYTHING. She loved painting with my fingernail polish and getting into my makeup. I had to laugh when she shared a room with our two younger sisters and had the exact same complaints I had against her. Funny how that happens! :-)

Mauri has always been there to help me when I need it. She spent a month with me after Cormac was born and I was battling PPD. When we have visited SD, she was/is willing to help babysit so I can have a night or two away from the boys. She even patiently handled being asked to be a Godmother to Rex and then unasked as we couldn't have her be one after all. She did however get to be Godmother to Brech.

As far as sisters go, Mauri is the best of the best (Bestgens). She is such a sweet person and always full of fun. I still want to think of her as a little girl, so it has been almost hard to think she is getting married. She is still suppose to be that baby I spilled hot chocolate on when she was still very tiny. She should still be 5 years old and claim my boyfriend as her own. She can't possibly be old enough to be married and having her own children!!! Boy am I getting old!

Like I said before - I look upon her as closer to my age. I think she would tell you that comes from me acting younger than I should. There have been many times that people have confused me as the younger sister and her as the responsible, older sister. In many regards - I would venture to guess they are right. ;-)

So little sister, as you prepare for your wedding day...know that I am proud of the woman you have become and the sister you have always been. You are in my thoughts and prayers as you start your own family. May God shower you with many graces as you become Mrs. Sobotka.

Myself and Mauri - all grown up

well, maybe a little grown up

Simple livin'

I have always wanted to live a simpler life. I look at the Amish lifestyle and wonder what it would be like to be that simple. Its hard work no doubt, but it must be rewarding at the same time. I honestly don't think I could ever go quite that simple as that would mean giving up the computer, movies, electricity in general and I'm just not that brave.

There are a few things I do to make it feel more simple around here, and to save money. I'd LOVE to make more homemade bread, but it usually goes to waste as Darren and I are the only ones who would eat it. I need to find a good recipe for easy, small loaves of bread. Darren did buy me a bread stone for Christmas. I suppose that is a hint.

One of the other things I'd love to do is cook healthier from scratch. I can do it and have done it in the past, but the boys are such picky eaters. I have begun to take on a more intense "You eat what I serve or go hungry!" attitude when it comes to meal time. I am slowly phasing out processed foods - slowly is the key word. I may accomplish it when Blase graduates from high school!!!

One thing I do and enjoy doing is sewing my own skirts. I haven't learned or attempted sewing my own shirts, but if ever I find a good pattern I'll give it a try. I do have a wonderful apron pattern I have gotten as far as cutting out the material. That is my next project.

The other thing I enjoy doing is making my own laundry detergent. I can't even remember where I got this recipe, but it was a GREAT website!! I have found that it cleans our clothes very well and is easy to make.

Laundry Detergent Powder
1 bar grated Fels Naptha
1 cup baking soda
1 cup Borax

Mix together, store in an airtight container. Use 1 tablespoon per load, adding to water before clothes.


Do you make your own laundry detergent?? I'd like to know and have your recipe. Send me ideas for living simpler, recipes and of course your favorite "go to" websites. THANKS!!!

Stranger yet

Just when you think I couldn't get any stranger...

I thought I would post something odd about myself. I have lots of strange habits like most people do. I think one of my strangest is that I cannot resist the urge to clean my ears if I see a Q-tip. I will literally clean my ears three or four times a day if I see a Q-tip that many times. In our last house I had to put the Q-tips in the closet so that I won't see them every time I brushed my teeth or washed my hands. Yes I know...strange. What's maybe stranger is that I admit it and have posted it for everyone to see. :-)

Winter in South Dakota

Here are some pictures from Christmas weekend. We had a terrible storm blow snow and cold everywhere. There were 20 of us snowed in at Mom and Dad's. The electricity went out as we were getting ready to go to Midnight Mass. It was great because we each took turns using flashlights to get dressed. Not your typical Christmas Eve. Dad did try to start the generator, but ended up blowing up one TV, one DVD player, one sound system (which they fixed later), the power supply to the Wii, one microwave and the surge protector for the big screen TV. EXCITING!!! The electricity did come on after a bit and all was ok. I think it was a blessing actually because we couldn't use the excuse of watching movies...we had to actually play games and come up with things to do as a family. Good memories!!!

Take note - the ice was formed pointed out instead of down. That was a crazy wind we had!
Mom's clothesline, I think its pretty with the ice covered clothes pins.

The back yard - a winter wonderland of our own.

A close up shot of one of the trees.

This is the drift on the east side of the house. Notice the cat on the side??

The front of the house, facing south, with the deck snowed in to the first landing.

This is the neighbor's barn across the road (south of the house). Its hard to see, but the barn was covered from ground to roof. Notice the road is clear though. The plow came through on Sunday and it took a bit for him to clear out the road just south of the barn. Its always bad there, so we weren't surprised.

Finally done

As of this week I am done with the blood tests for the tubal pregnancy. It took 2 months and blood tests every other week to finally get to 1 (should have been zero) on my HCG hormone level. I am glad to know there is no danger of the piece of the placenta turning into a tumor - ITS GONE!! I am so blessed! God has taken care of me yet again.