10/22/2009 Rice Krispies Sculpting

These are mine...




The cat Meeks is very curious...he jumped right in to the tub with Leia...



This is Cinnamon-Toast faced Luke every morning. He bites right into the center of his toast every time - leaving his trademark 'cinnamon smile'. Can't forget this one. : )

10/19/2009 Snail Invasion

The kids were outside and suddenly found about 30-40 snails randomly spaced all over the patio. Very weird. I have never seen these before. If they were crushed they smelled like stinky garlic. "This stink my hands!" - As Gina put it... : )





Luke had a freak bee sting as well...

10/18/2009 Green Lemonade

This is Green Lemonade. I sometimes drink this for breakfast or throughout the day. Though weird - it is good! It is! I want to be healthy and slim and I am glad I found this recipe. I am also introducing it to Leia. I'll work on the others later. I'm just glad Jane, Mary, Luke and Leia drink Spinach Smoothie almost every day!

Green Lemonade

One head Romaine Lettuce
5-6 leaves Kale or few large handfuls of spinach
one lemon
2 sweet apples (I like Honeycrisp)
1" piece of fresh ginger

Run through your juicer.

From The Raw Food Detox - by Natalia Rose


Spinach Smoothie

One cup frozen cherries
One cup frozen apricots or peaches
One frozen banana (or not frozen)
One cup liquid (water, berry juice, POM, etc..)
4 Tbs. Flax seed
5 handfuls of spinach (fill the rest of the blender)

Process on High in a high powered blender like Vita-Mix.
Substitute any fruits in smoothie!

Out for our walk.

10/13/2009 The Sickness

So here are the sick kiddos. Yes - they are sucking on bottles. It was kinda a fun trick to get them to drink fluids. Luke got the croup. Trav took him to the emergency room in the morning. He was having such a hard time breathing - such a horrible sound - gasping and getting very little - kinda grey lips...we weren't sure if it was the swine flu or what. But it was the croup. Jane and Mary got it too and Gina got only a slight variation about a week later. Leia also got a little sick. She had a stuffin' muffin' (as I call it) for a long time. Absolutely miserable to nurse. But...all recovered and I am now that much more wiser in self treating illnesses. All we had to do was take Luke outside in the cold air to open his airway and alternate with a steamy bathroom visit.
No vomiting. So that was a blessing!

"Mom! Take my picture!"
Gina with her famous Apple Toast. Daddy's homemade bread with organic apple butter.

10/10/2009 The Kill

So here is the deer Trav got...or it's head anyway.




He didnt keep the head....Oh...but he did saw off it's skull cap and kept just the horns. Yup. Right to the brain.




I literally had all my bowls filled to the brim with venison. I tried not to help...but the kitchen is MY workspace! I can't just sit back and do nothing. All this 'death meat' was all such a stark contrast to all the 'living food' I try to surround my family with....Ugh.
This is Trav washing all the meat. Yes. We rinsed all of it in the sink.



Trav and his cousin Evan slicing steaks and jerky pieces.

I must say though...that Trav has made a lot of deer jerky out of the meat and it is good...I am glad he knows how to do all this just in case we have to live off the deer walking across the front lawn one day!

Vegan and Stuffed

This is my typical lunch every day. I can barely fit it all on dinner plate. So... I am striving for a vegan diet with no processed foods or sugar. Easier said than done and I am far from perfection in any given week...but I do pretty darn good if I say so myself!
Not that anyone looks at my blog...but I am posting this to show that I eat a TON and am very full and in no way am depriving my self of needed nutrients or calories. This is Romaine with red peppers, tomato, cauliflower, green onion, green pepper, 2 tbs light Thousand Island Dressing and my spicy beans on top. I have no idea how it fits into my stomach actually.

Happy Birthday to Leia today!

You are 5 months old today! I love you so much. You are growing so fast and are a very physically and mentally strong baby. Your sweetness is a blessing to me and our family. I love to snuzz your neck and squoosh your cheeks and smell your head and your feet (gross but so true and I don't care-they are too cute not to nibble on!) You have the cutest squeals and giggles. You like to kick your foot on the floor when relaxing and to hold your toes and give them a taste! You are a very messy eater and love to grab the spoon and suck your messy fingers full of food. You are an active spirit just stuck in this baby body for sure...you cannot be left alone too long and you have wanted to sit up since you were born! You rolled over at 6 weeks and now you are up on all fours rocking just ready to crawl! I will miss you my dear when you are no longer my sweet smelling package of a baby. I love to feed you and snug you and take you with me. You are not a bother to me. You are my good friend and I hope I can always be a good friend to you...I love you Leilerson san seet little stinker scoot'n boots. Bootie Scoot and Scootin Boots. You love to boot your scoot~I love you Bootie Scoot. Mom.

My little Scooter

10-8-2009 A Full Day

So today we started off by finally giving Gina her first hair cut...well trim. I cant believe I haven't done this yet...

Before...and after!

Now not so rat-so!

I am loving teaching my kids in homeschool! It's not just academics (heaven forbid...) Jane made her own sandwich complete with toothpick and olive for herself...

And shared with Lukie! Such a nice sister!

Mary learned how to cook oatmeal for her lunch today...

Everyone had some...using baby spoons of coarse because Mom had no clean spoons and didn't feel like washing any - and its just more fun to eat oatmeal with a baby spoon!

THEN....we cooked the minestrone soup for dinner together!

Note to self: Do Not Open Cans of Tomato Sauce With Baby In Arms.

Poor Gina! Colonel the Horse bit her finger when she was giving him a horse treat! It left a pretty good little bite mark on her finger. Travis said she screamed pretty good when it happened...

But after some ice cream she recovered.

This past week I canned15 or so quarts of apple-pie filling. So I put together an apple pie for a treat tonight. This picture is to show that my kids are crazy and only ate ice cream and would not touch or did not like the pie. It was good I swear! It tastes like apple pie! Apples and sugar! Very typical around here though. My kids will eat 5 raw apples a day each - but they wont touch them if they have sugar all over them....And I'm upset by this? Hmm....

9-24-2009 Leia's First Food

Today we went visiting Roxy's house. We made some homemade spaghetti sauce all day.
Here Leia tried her first solid food - bananas and avocado mixed. Yum!

Well..maybe not so yum....

9-23-2009

Leia likes her new tub...

Today we had our first chapter in Science on 'Insects'. We sat on the lawn to have the lesson...and would you believe....just after the lesson Mary finds a praying mantis on the fence! Six legs, exoskeleton, camouflage, compound and simple eyes...Thank you Mr or Mrs. Mantis for contributing to the lesson!

Luke doing his homework - gluing beans to his letter 'B'.

"Dot...Dot...not alot" Learning to do glue.

Beware - My Blog Is A Diary!

Today I slept in and forgot to take Lukie to preschool. So I took the kids to the library and they had story time and made paper hats with sequins and such. Then we went to Walmart and got various non-essentials and got Subway (veggie of course for me). Mary was so cute driving home from town. She just sat quietly sucking her thumb in the back seat with her brown-bag triangle hat on top her head. I watched her through the rear-view mirror as I drove. I love my Baby Bee-ya.

I also forgot to take Mary to soccer practice! The girls went to Ella's house for about an hour this afternoon. I tried to get Leia to take a bottle - no such luck! I tried soy formula, regular formula and then just expressed breast milk. She WILL NOT take another nipple. She didn't eat all afternoon till about 7 pm. I finally breastfed her. After the 5 hours of crying in the car on the way home from Rexburg, Idaho, I realize this is one stubborn baby, and I probably will not succeed in changing her tastes for different milk or nipples.

I bought size newborn socks and shoes for Leia today in Walmart. She is almost 5 months. The newborn shoes fit her perfect. So cute.