2012 Garden

Today I planted the last of my garden for the year. (Except for the radishes which I will start from time to time all summer.) That's always a great feeling of accomplishment. Now to keep the weeds at bay...
This year Daniel is helping with the green beans and Reagan wants to help with the Strawberries. We'll see how that goes. I think Reagan got the best of the deal :-)

One of my neighbors at the garden (I rent 2 plots from the city) has beautiful onions every year and mine have been... Well they've been less than desirable. Think 1 in. bulb and you have it about right.One of the things he does is he covers them up to help them grow. So here is my little greenhouse that I came up with for my onions. Structurally it's old metal hangers that are holding it up that I took apart and bent. Then simple plastic sheeting from Home Depot which cost me less than $2.50 and I got 2 greenhouses out of it. I'll let you know how it works out. I'm hoping to put them over my green beans as well as they tend to really start producing about the time the frost comes, and if I could get them to grow a little faster I might get a better crop.
This was my first harvest for the year of which I'm very proud! Rhubarb and Chives. I've had two pickings of both of them and I almost have enough dried Chives to last me the year. With the first batch of Rhubarb I decided I had to share with the kids and made them Rhubarb fruit leather. The next batch of Rhubarb is going into a Rhubarb tart for me, which I probably won't share :-)
Should you want to make Rhubarb fruit leather for yourself, here's what I do-
Chop the stalks up into 1 in. pieces or so. Place in a heavy bottomed pan with a little bit of water and cook on low heat until mushy. Stir occasionally. When done place in a blender with 3/4c. sugar. Feel free to play with the amount of sugar. I think this is a good amount to one blender full. Occasionally I also add in a bit of lemon zest. If you are lucky enough to have a dehydrator you can use that for whatever the recommended time is for fruit leather. I don't so I pour it in a cookie sheet with sides (a blender full should fill about two of them) and put it in the oven at the lowest heat I can get which is usually about 175. I prop the door open with a towel so that the moisture can escape. You don't have to do this but it will take longer if you don't. Leave it there for at least 6 hours. I don't like it very sticky to the touch. You can play around with what texture thickness you like. I personally like it a bit tough and crunchy. Rhubarb fruit leather reminds me of the apricot fruit leather my Mom used to make when I was a kid. This never stays in the house long as the kids and I devour it!

Fun in the Rain

So after last summer with extreme amounts of rain (think  raining every day for over 30 days) and this past winter with 11 feet of snow... I guess it was time to give us a break as this spring has been really dry. I mean really dry. Like no rain. Which was fine as the snow needed to melt and the ground needed a break but eventually you do need rain again. And Reagan needed rain...
For Christmas Grandma Lois had gotten the kids rain boots and umbrellas. The kids have used their rain boots repeatedly as we went through Break Up (the 5th season in AK). I can hardly get Daniel to wear anything else. (He is trying to get out of having to tie his shoes.) But they had never gotten to use their umbrella's as it hadn't rained yet. One day last week it finally did, and Miss Reagan looked out the window and said, "Yay it's raining! I can use my umbrella!" So we put all our stuff on and they got to use their umbrella's even though it was barely a sprinkle and I had some happy kids.

I finally broke down this year and got them rain coats. We've always done rain boots up here but I've never done the rain coats. This summer my goal was to get them outside more in spite of the rain (think Seattle rain only colder). We enjoyed the rain for a couple days and now we're back to no rain. Now if it would only warm up just a little more. Instead of just looking like it was going to rain and not doing it with the temps hoovering around the high 40's.

Changes

I've been gone from here for a while. Life has gotten in the way so I thought I'd bring you up to date on where we are at.
The 2nd of April we received a phone call from our landlords telling us we had 30 days to move out as they were moving back in. This caught us totally by surprise as we had no plans of moving in the near future. The search for new housing wasn't promising. Luckily one of Paul's coworkers, a dear friend found a town house for us right across the street from him. We spent the month scrambling to pack. Paul was supposed to compete Nationally in an Army shooting competition at the end of the month but took pity on me and canceled it as he realized that he wouldn't get back until after we moved. So luckily he was there this time.
School work took a back burner for the month although I tried for Daniel's sake to  have him do a little every day so that he could continue his routine. Luckily we were ahead in pretty much everything so it didn't matter academically. I've just gotten a lot of push back from him as we have tried to return to our schedule now. He doesn't deal well with messing with his routine.
Our new house is wonderful. It's a bit bigger with a two car garage and an extra room that we have made into an office/schoolroom. My kitchen has even more cupboards than I know what to do with, even though it isn't that large. It's so nice to have a working dishwasher again. In our last house our landlord's never had the money to replace ours so the last 9 months or so I'd been washing them by hand. Daniel has had a difficult time adjusting to his new room. Difficulty falling asleep, and it's a fight every day to have him get dressed in his room. But he likes it here.
We moved to the other side of town which is still new to me as we have always live on the North side of town and I'm still finding my way around. That also meant a new ward for church. They have been so welcoming it has been so wonderful. They helped us move in, they called another teacher to help with Daniel's Primary class before we even got there, his teacher came to meet him the day we moved in to help transition him, they watched my kids without my even asking so I could clean our old house and helped me clean it, invited us to a party and that was all within the first week! We are very grateful to this new ward for helping us feel so welcome.
Another change we have been dealing with is that we had Reagan tested for food allergies. She had been complaining for awhile that her tummy hurt after eating. Some days I want to go back to life before the test! We found that she was allergic to wheat, soy, oats, corn, potatoes, rye, milk, beef, and pork. With beef, corn and milk being the worst. Ever try pulling out half the food you eat? Changing completely the way you cook? The doctor told us that we should take her off of all this for a year and then we would retest and she would probably get some of it back. So we get to try all kinds of new things like quinoa, rice pasta, coconut flour, rice milk.A lot of people looked at the list of things she couldn't have and said no problem, you just buy the gluten free stuff. Unfortunately all the gluten free stuff has potatoes, corn or soy in it. There is only one bread I can buy her and it will make maybe 5 sandwiches and costs about $6. I'd try making my own but again, all the recipes for alternative breads have one of the ingredients that she can't have and let me tell you, all these strange and different flours are much harder to work with as they have no gluten. It's an adjustment that we are still working on and do better some days than others. The upside has been that she no longer complains that her stomach hurts and Daniel who has had constipation issues since he was about 12 months to the point of needing daily medicine, has been doing better without the gluten in his diet. Sad news for me who LOVES to bake...
Paul was home for about a week and a half after we moved and then left for 6 weeks to Augusta GA for a leadership training class which will help ensure his promotion this summer. He is still there and bored out of his mind. They are done with class by 9:30am every day and apparently there isn't much to do there.
Well that's about it for our current changes. I'll try to get a few more posts up with pictures in the next few days.

Teaching Language Arts

One of the things that made me question homeschooling is the very vivid memory I have of my Mom trying to teach my sister how to read. Prior to my parents starting to homeschool we were in public school and my sister was in Special Ed. The teachers had told my Mom she was doing great. She was in 3rd grade when we were taken out of school and she couldn't read at all. I remember lots of screaming and crying from those days when my Mom worked intensively with her trying to help her learn how to read. I did not want to go through that!
Fast forward many years later and my parents are on the tail end of homeschooling with only 3 left at home. I remember a conversation with my Mom a couple of years ago when she foresaw this end of homeschooling and she said, "I don't know what I'm going to do when I don't have anymore kids to teach to read! I may have to go volunteer at the local school." My thoughts were," What?! You want to keep going through all that again when you don't have to?!" I couldn't understand it.
I think in part I do now. I can't tell you there has never been crying or yelling on one or both of our parts as occasion warranted due to his disabilities but, as Daniel gains speed and ability to read, the feeling of accomplishment is awesome! Not just for him but for me to. I taught him that and no one else did. I taught him a life skill that will effect all other areas of his life, and he will benefit from for the rest of his life. That is such an awesome feeling! I can't wait to start Reagan, but I must be patient as she is just not ready yet.
A skill that goes along with reading is spelling. I've been interested to learn that speech also plays a significant part in spelling. Which makes sense when you think about it. When you can't remember how to spell a word right off the bat, you sound it out in your head and spell accordingly. Hopefully spell check knows what you are trying to spell and corrects any imperfections from there. :-) Daniel and I have been working on different blends of letters and sounds lately and he is at a spot where he is working on the "r" combinations. Cr, dr, br etc. These were some of his words today-
Crab    - he spelled cab
Dress   - this one he got right
Drop    -he spelled dop
Drum   - he spelled dum

This is because he doesn't say his "r" sounds properly. He doesn't hear it when he says it, so why would you put an "r" in there in his mind? I just find it fascinating to see how our minds work, especially his in particular. So here's my scientific discovery for the month.

Paul's travels

In January Paul went to Reno Nevada with the military and redid his MOS for the Military. What is an MOS? Basically it's his job description. He changed it at their behest when we first got up here and he changed it again at their request. Basically he does communications with radios and computers but now at a leadership level. It was a tough course and he hated being gone the 5 and a half weeks. Hated Reno too, but he finished and it will help to hopefully ensure his promotion this fall. He leaves again for another school in May for 6 weeks. We love it when he's here and miss him when he's gone but are grateful he works so hard for us.

Lemon Meringue Pudding

Ever really want some pie but you don't want to go to the trouble of making pie crust. Or you really don't like pie crust? Here's my solution just make the filling!

Absolutely delish!

Iditarod -40th Anniversary

The first year we moved up here we went to the Iditarod and it was less than pleasant. Paul was working security for the event and I had the two kids who were 2 and 3 at the time and they were just miserable in the cold. Because of that we didn't go last year but this year I decided to try again and it was a pleasant experience for the three of us. (Paul had to work.)

A few details about the Iditarod. This was the 40th Anniversary. The ceremonial start is in Anchorage. One dog sled leaves out of town every 2 minutes. They announce them and tell you a little bit about the mushers (sled drivers) and perhaps their team (dogs) as well. It's a carnival atmosphere and it really marks the end of a week and a half long winter festival called Fur Rondy. The teams drive through the city and drive to a place called Willow.There they will officially start the race on Sunday morning. I don't know how that one works as we have yet to go out there.

One of the interesting things of note- The dogs are wearing shoes. In this case they are hot pink and yellow. Some of the other teams had just a navy or black. Each team is different.

With the ceremonial start the sleds are a bit like floats in a parade. One team all had Dr. Suess hats, some would have a politician riding in it that was running for office. Some had little kids in them.

Really, I had to add some local color. Here is a woman all dressed up in traditional Alaskan clothing.

Then there was this guy. I couldn't resist taking his picture. This is a crocheted beard and mustache! It was awesome! I wondered if it was a joke for Fur Rondy where one of the contests is for the best beard and mustache or if it was to keep him warm.

Then there was this guy's hat. Now that's a hat. I think it was a fox. I didn't get a picture from the front but it still has the ears.... The one below looks really warm. I want one! Too bad I don't have the several thousand dollars it would cost.

What to do while waiting for the next team? Why play in the snow of course.

 One thing you should know is that those dogs LOVE to run. They can't wait to get out there and run. You can just see the anticipation in their bodies and the joy. Below are two who just can't wait to get out and get hooked up.

Don't forget to say hi to the Polar Bear.