We have an enclosed breezeway between our house and garage, and a second small basement underneath that. It's about 8'x28' with concrete walls and floor and no windows. A great storm shelter!
With my parents and sisters coming to live with us for awhile, I needed to get that cellar basement organized. We pulled everything out (there wasn't much in there) and swept and power washed the floors. Then painted the walls, and painted an epoxy on the floor. The stuff that you sprinkle the paint chips in before it dries, we did this on the garage floor earlier this year and it makes for super easy clean up! That's drying now, and then comes the task of organizing it! Eventually there will be plywood shelves built down there, but dh will get the wood from work so we have to wait until they have some leftovers for us to have. So for now, I just have one plastic shelving unit that will go down there to hold canned goods, and everything else will just be stacked in totes.
I will have some totes with blankets and some toys and games and flashlights, ect for tornado weather. It will be much nicer down there the next time we need to seek shelter! One long wall will be with wide shelves for totes of to-be-grown-into clothes, seasonal decorations, and other things we will save (it should stay dry, there's been no wetness down there in the two years since we built it). Then the short wall for now will be food storage. Hopefully as I stock up on more things and learn to can more things, we can add more shelves on the other short wall for more food storage.
I'd love to see photos of how all of you organize your pantries and storage spaces! I love pantry pictures!!!
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With my parents and sisters moving out here, there are going to be some big temporary changes in our family. They will be staying with us until they find a place to live. So in two weeks our family will grow from five to nine! It will likely be for at least a few months.
Any advice on how to not step on each other's toes would be appreciated! DH works on the road, so he's only home about three days a week over the weekend. We have a finished basement with one bedroom that is dd's. DD will be moving upstairs with one of her brothers. There are three bedrooms upstairs, our, and one each for the boys. I don't know if I should put all three of our kids in one bedroom, and let my sisters have the other. I'm not sure how well that will go over, I'm afraid my kids will keep each other up all night long! My parents will get dd's room downstairs. I could partition off a section of the basement to make a temporary bedroom for one or both of my sisters. Or one sister could sleep with one of my boys, and my dd could sleep with the other of my boys.
Oh, so many things to think about! They will start moving their things here this weekend, and in only two weeks will be living with us!!!
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The Lord has answered the biggest prayer of my family's!!! DH and I and our three children live about 3 hours away from our hometown and all our family. We've been out here for 7 years now, and there is no chance dh will ever move back home. While I've been glad to live here and not have to deal with the issues of his family (which is why we moved) I still miss my family fiercely, and that feeling has only gotten worse since having children. I've felt so bad that my children are missing growing up with grandparents nearby, and they don't have cousins to be close to like I did growing up. It's torn me apart, wanting to be two places at once.
My parents put their house up for sale two years ago, first with the intention of just moving into the country, and later decided they wanted to move out by us. They finally gave up on selling the house though, and decided if it did sell before their contract with the realtor was up, they would just stay in our hometown and rent a house until something in the country came up. DH and I were heartbroken by that decision. Well, two week ago they sold their house. I've been feeling more and more every day that the Lord was telling them to move out here, but didn't want to push the issue with my mom because she was so tense about everything going on. They could not find a place to live. They had at least twenty different places they called on, and for one reason or another, not a single one worked out. Tonight they called and said they've decided to move out here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have two jr. high age sisters, and I'm SO happy my children will grow up close to them now! And I no longer will have to miss everything going on in my sister's lives! The is the biggest and best blessing we could all get!!
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A walk through any store lately sends the children into a tizzy with all the Halloween stuff. DD has been begging to decorate our yard. I have no interest in having a graveyard in our front yard, and while I ADORE fall, I'm not so big on Halloween. I don't want skeletons and gravestones and witches about my home. We don't take the kids trick or treating unless we happen to be at my parent's that weekend, then my little sisters like to take them and we know all the neighbors there. But here we just don't feel right about it. The town used to have a nice free party for the kids, but they haven't done it the past two years. I want to decorate the yard with the kids so they don't feel like they are missing out. I'm not quite sure how to "wean" them off of Halloween, especially since dd's birthday is a few days before and she thinks Halloween is "her" holiday!
We will be going to the pumpkin patch this weekend since dd's patch didn't fare so well this year. There are only two pumpkins (three, but ds picked one little green one). Usually she plants a wonderful patch that yields more than we can make use of and we have some to share, but this year nothing grew. not sure why.
I would love suggestions or photos of how any of you decorate your yards for fall! I have dreams of a beautiful front porch all done up, but alas, we have no front porch. What we do have is a giant front yard with only one tiny tree and one small flower bed- the rest is just grass. So we don't even have the benefit of fall leaves! Not a single one to rake up in a pile and jump into! So any suggestions or photos would be much appreciated!
Happy Fall!!!
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Did any of you see on the national news this morning the story on "luxury" dorm rooms? I was just disgusted. More and more colleges are building these luxury accomodations for students, and kids are starting to look first at what the standard of living is rather than what kind of education they will get when choosing colleges! One college featured has $1900 per month dorm rooms! Granite countertops, fully furnished with $4000 couches! These "dorms" are fancier than most homes I've seen!
What concerns me is that this is the first "real world" experiences some of these kids are having, and after four years living in the lap of luxury, what will they do when they graduate? When they have real bills, and real jobs with real pay? Of course they aren't going to want to lower their standard of living! So out come the credit cards to finance this lifestyle they grew accustomed to! I just sat shaking my head as I watched this story- it's so very sad! What kind of future are we cultivating? When will the thinking that "I deserve this so I'm going to have it" stop?
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For the past week or so, I have been praying that we could find something exciting and not too costly to do to celebrate our daughter's 6th birthday. She wanted so badly to have a birthday party at the Children's Museum, but it's just way out of our price range. She was so disappointed when we told her we just couldn't do it. I love the Children's Museum, and entrance is very reasonable (even more-so because we go on Sundays and it's a dollar off each admission then). But the birthday party packages are outrageous in price.
Today He answered my prayer, in a big way! I got home from our MOPS Open House, and there was a message on the answering machine from a woman at the local tv station, telling my to call her back because she may have good news for me. I had no idea what that was about. I was thinking, boy, I hope they don't want to do a story on my business or something, I don't want any more advertising! I'm taking a year off! Well I called her back and left her a voicemail, and she just returned my call now.
I won a two night stay in a suite, with three days worth of water passes at a beautiful indoor waterpark/resort place, that just happens to be smack dab in the middle of the towns my dad and stepmom, and mom and stepdad and little sisters live in on the other side of the state from us! What a wonderful way to celebrate dd's birthday! We can invite the grandparents to each spend an evening with us there! And it won't cost us anything more than gas money to get there! Money is so tight right now, especially with me making the decision to put my business on the back burner for awhile. So we would have never been able to give our daughter a birthday gift as big and exciting as this!
I'm so thankful for this wonderful answer to my prayer! Sometimes He sure does go all out when pouring out the blessings!!!
I can't wait for dd to get home from school so I can tell her the exciting news!
Now I just have to figure out how to pacify an almost two year old in a hotel for two nights! Yikes!
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As soon as the satellite office opens this morning, I am calling to cancel our service! I've been wanting to do this for a long, long time, with much resistance from dh. But I finally got his blessing! I think he will miss it more than we will, but he's only home usually two or three days a week. That's a short time and a lot of money spent! So today it is gone! I will be stopping by Radio Shack to pick up a set of rabbit ears for the tv, otherwise we won't even get local channels. I still want to be able to watch the news and weather in the morning, and I know he will want to watch tv in the evenings when he's home on the weekends. I'm so excited about this! One less ridiculous bill, my kids won't be glued to a box everytime it's on, I won't have wasted time watching useless shows that just encourage me to want more! It will definitely be a blessing for all of us!
We do subscribe to Netflix, and have a lot of videos for the kids. I don't mind them watching movies though because I can choose what I want them to see. There's a lotta VeggieTales in this house!
Now to see how much of a hassle it is to return the satellite receivers. We had Directv, and I've heard some scary stories about recievers getting "lost" by FedEx (they send you a box to pack the receivers in, and Fed Ex comes to pick it up) and Directv sending you a bill for quite a few hundred dollars. I'm worried about that. We're cancelling early too, so there is a fee that will amount to about $150 (the guy told me we only had a one year contract, but it turns out it was two years, in small light grey print, on the backside of the paper.) But that's still a TON less than what we would have paid out in programming for another year.
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My job... what exactly is my job? For the past almost five years I have operated a wedding cake business from my home. I have a great set up- commercial kitchen so I could be licensed, a consultation room to meet with brides in so they don't have to trek through my house. I love making cakes. But when does a business become a burden? Where do you draw the line between work and family time? Especially when you're working in your home?
The past few weeks have been spent in prayer over this. It's been put on my heart that my first job is to serve the Lord, and then my family. Cake is an "extra". It sure is nice to have the extra money coming in, but at what expense? I'm always tired, I'm always stressed, so many nights my kids are rushed to bed so I can get to work. DH works on the road, and while he's been very supportive of my business, I know it's wearing on him. He gets home and usually has to take care of the kids all day Friday and most of Saturday while I work. That leaves him a day and a half, if he's lucky, to get his things done and relax. My home isn't feeling much like a home these days, what with the piles of unfolded laundry and all the unfinished projects that have taken a back seat. And all it takes is the brightest of lights in my children's eyes when I say "Mommy doesn't have a wedding this weekend". Oh, the squeals of delight and the hugs and kisses that come with those words. No amount of wedding cake money can buy that kind of happiness, I know that much!
God gave me this talent of decorating to be used in it's own time. And I'm beginning to see that He didn't mean for that time to be now. There will come a day when my children are busy with their lives and won't need me as often, at least not physically. Then will be the time to devote to this gift. But right now, my job lies with the family I have been given charge over. It's very hard for me to let go of this, but I know it's the right thing and every single person in my family will benefit from it. I want my kids to look back and say "my mom spent lots of time playing with us, we did fun things together when we were little." Not " my mom made spent hours working on cakes for people we don't even know and we never got to spend enough time with her".
I came to the decision last night that I am taking a year off!
I haven't felt this at peace with myself in a long time! I know this is the right decision, and I know the Lord is smiling upon me right now. There will still be people getting married and needing a cake in a year or two. So for now, I am only going to take the orders that I truely want to do. I have a few weddings on the books for next year that I will keep, but two of them are freebies for family anyway, and I enjoy those. I may take on a few more throughout the year, but only if it's not taking away from my family. Now I just need to wrap up what's on the books for 2007, and claim my family life back again! Whooo Hoooo!!!! Yup, best decision I've made all year!
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Today I tried my hand at making raspberry jam! I think they worked, I guess I'll know for sure tomorrow! What a mess though! But it sure smelled nice in the kitchen. I got a dozen half-pint jars canned, and still had some left over, but no jars. I poured it into containers and put it in the fridge. Does anyone know if ithe leftovers will set up that way? I can't wait to try it out! Now we have jam to last all year and some to give away! I think I'm really liking this canning stuff! Hmmm, what should I try next?
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This is fun Mom!
My two oldest children and I had a fun night last night, making applesauce! This was my first attempt at this, and also at canning. The applesauce was delicious! One was a great bucket holder, catching the sauce as it came out of the mill. The other was the masher, and had fun pushing the apples down the hole while Mom cranked away! It was a great experience for all of us, and we can't wait to make the trip to the orchard next week to get more apples. We only made three and a half quarts, I canned three and we ate one right away. I didn't want to make too much in case I messed it up, but I think we did it right!!
Today we picked up some raspberries, and tonight after the baby goes to bed we'll try our hand at making jam!
I wanted to post pictures, but hubby has the camera on his elk hunting trip right now, so when he gets back I'll take a picture of whatever we manage to can this week!
And the kids are right, this IS fun!
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