Bob Evan's Farm Festival

Well, Hello there.

I haven't seen you since Wednesday!

You didn't really miss much. If you'll recall, Tuesday I was pretty sure I was on death's door. Well "IT" didn't really get really horrible until Wednesday night/Thursday day. The only good thing about it coming to such a horrific apex is that when you start to feel even the tiniest bit better you feel like you're the healthiest person alive!

I'm better now. Just a tiny sniffle. Of course,, T2 has it now and Daddy-o has spent all day with us so it's only a matter of time!

By Saturday I had such cabin fever! The boys and I decided to go out and select a few pumpkins for carving next week. Picking our pumpkins is serious bizniz! We eat have our own special criteria.

These are mine and Dad's. I'm a stem girl. I like a nice big healthy looking stem. Preferably one with curly ques still on but we were at wal-mart, I didn't get REAL picky! I think the one of the left needs to be carved sideways, never mind that is the only way it'll set!

T2 is a fan of roundness. He likes his pumpkin to have a nice traditional shape. Forget about the stem! This is a HUGE pumpkin too. You can't tell by the picture.

T1's requirement is a smooth "face". He doesn't like carving through the ridges. He's also a "stem man".

And just because I've been reading too many Martha Stewart and Better homes and Garden's Magazines, I had to have a few "funky punkies". Cool huh?

Library Class

I sucked it up yesterday and went to the downtown library. I'm glad we went. The class will be good for the boys. The lady that was teaching them was very entertaining and I think the kids will like her. They were all very quiet this first time out tho.

OK,, small vent.

She (the library lady) went ON and ON and ON about how she expected them to know more and how surprised she was that were not at the level that she expected and blah blah blah. I'm sure she was just saying this to try and explain HERSELF to the parents but it felt like a passive aggressive jab at homeschoolers.

Ok,, venting over.

Initially this was supposed to be a one time class for each age group but now it's going to be a multi-part class. If you missed the first one, don't hesitate to come to the next one!

The boys and I searched out some books on Frank Lloyd Wright and I picked up a few on magnets.

The book we're currently reading, The Wright 3, is about some children (we're not that far into it) that are trying to save the Robie House. The Robie house is a very famous Frank Lloyd Write house in Chicago. I'm very surprised how interested the boys are in modern architecture. Way more interested than I am! LOL That kinda makes it tough, but I'm doing all I can to spark their interest! We found a book called Frank Lloyd Write for Kids

That is very good. We also got a DK book on Architecture and a biography. That ought to keep us busy!

On the health front.... Colds STINK! I made a pot of chicken soup this morning and it cleared my nose but my head still feels like cement. We have so many things to do today but I just don't feel like doing any of them.

Maybe later.....

Oh, and if you are in the Cabell Co./Greater Huntington area, you should sign up for the Cabell Co Homeschoolers Yahoo group! (see the button to the right!). A few of us moms talked about it yesterday and decided we needed a group to keep everyone updated on local events and opportunities. Any home schooler in the area is welcome to join!

Well,, I think I'll take another nap. Later!

I might be dying

I'm calling it. Day off.

I'm very ill. This is a nasty bug indeed. T1 came down with it the other day and I hoped to evade the nasty germs but alas...... I have it.

I thought it was allergies but there are just too many other disgusting symptoms for that.

We have a library class today at 2pm. I really want to go. If I can find a drug cocktail that works for me by then I still may. If you see me, avoid me like the plague, I won't mind!

Until then, I'm crawling back into bed. Wish me luck on that one, I can't get comfortable to save my life. On the up side, everything tastes gross, so I won't be eating my weight in Doritos.

I need TLC.

Fluffy pillows.

Fresh PJs.

Chicken soup.

NyQuil.

Tiffany's.

Cartier.

I'm just sayin' .

Old bottle

The guys went outside to shoot a new crossbow they built. I say that with heavy laden despair. Wow, I've been so so so so bored lately but building a crossbow is not what this "only girl in the house" mama has in mind. Oh well. I don't really know what I have in mind. My shoulder hurts too badly to knit. Darn physical therapy. I've eaten everything under the sun and now my pants don't fit.
Ugh.
Ever just have the "can't help it's"?
So anyway.... on with the crossbow. They were shooting arrows into the hillside. They went over to retrieve one and found this bottle! Pretty cool huh? It's a Whistle Soda bottle from 1947. Want a great tasting drink? Just Whistle!
Here's a better picture from a collector.
http://www.angelfire.com/tn/traderz/whistle.html





It's in pretty bad shape but man,, it's been outside for 60 years! You would be too! I'm surprised that there is any paint left on it at all! I'm kinda fascinated by old bottles and such. This one is nice and heavy. It doesn't have any knicks or cracks in it either!
It's interesting what can be lurking in your own yard and you not even know it! It's not surprising that the house in front of us was built in 1947. We found some neat stuff when they dug the foundation for our addition. Nothing that was in as good shape as this bottle though. A few crumpled steel beer cans and some bottle bottoms with dates.


The best part about it is the "WHISTLE BOTTLING CO. HUNTINGTON, W. VA." part is still very visible. Very cool.
This kinda sparks my interest because I've had many family members who've worked in the glass packing industry. I wonder what the Whistle Bottle Co. Was like? I wonder where it was?
Ahh,, a mystery indeed!




Here you can see the bottom. Not very interesting but it does reveal the date and the bottlers symbol.

On other fronts. We tried to do school all week this week and we were mostly successful. Dad was home this past week and there were many distractions.
We had an interesting math question:
If the perimeter of a room is 80ft, what is the area?
Easy right?
uh,, it SHOULD be but think about it!
If the room is square then the area is 400 sq. ft. (i.e. each wall is 20ft)
If the room is 10 by 30ft. then the area changes to 300 sq. ft.
If the room is 5 by 35ft. then the area changes to 175 sq. ft.
So on and so forth!
Interesting huh? We concluded that even Saxon math would not expect a 6-7th grader to wrap their mind around a concept so organic and it must be a typo but it really threw us for a loop.
In my mind, it shouldn't matter how short 2 of the walls are,, the shape should contain the same amount of room but it's just not so. It's a ratio thing. I still don't fully understand it.

The kids have been fighting like cats and dogs. It's a good thing they still have separate corners to go to. If we had given in a few years ago and purchased bunk beds I wouldn't have any way to separate them. They need more to do I guess but wow....... I don't want to do more! I don't like to be run ragged all day long. This is going to be a busy week. Physical therapy 3x for me (YUCK!) a library skills class, band and we must must must do some fall (spring) cleaning because the junk is taking over again and the boys closets need cleaned out big time in preparation for winter.
I'm a little scared to see what kind of clothes the kids have for winter. I'm afraid it may be NONE. It was easy when they were little. Now T1 is wearing a small man's size and he was so hard on his clothes that most of the hand me downs are not suitable for T2.

Time to hit the Goodwill (but don't tell the kids!).

Reasons why it's good to have your husband home

1. Spiders.

Need I say more? I mean,, gah! Look at that awful thing! He's in the bathroom and I screech. I screeched like a little girl. He agreed that it was a nasty looking one indeed and proceeded to try and kill it while it was on the curtain. of course he just knocked it off and it ran. I told him I needed to see a carcass or I was calling a real estate agent. As if I could sleep in a house where I knew that critter was crawling around! He had to move the entire bed before he found it.

He did show me the dead remains so I could relax.

My hero.

Co-op 10-2-07

Today was Co-op day. My station was on the Mound Builder Indians.

It was kinda tough to come up with enough interesting information on them to fill the amount of time I have with each group of kids.

I decided to try and make some mounds for our jr. Archaeologists to excavate. The kids liked that.

I used 2 parts plaster of paris, 2 parts dryish dirt (I found out later that the damp dirt WON'T set up!) and 1 part water or enough to make it "mud pie" consistency.

I used Styrofoam bowls as my moulds.

I put in a little mud, then I placed a "people cracker" dog biscuit in the middle. Put in a little more mud and then placed a few Halloween skull rings in the mix. Then I finished it off with a nice covering of the mix. Work quickly, it sets up fast! Or,, rather... it's supposed to. Some of ours didn't but I think my ratio went way off after sundown.

The dog biscuit was meant to symbolize the Indian chief in the mound and it was almost impossible to excavate him in one piece. I wanted to be able to explain to the kids how careful archaeologists had to be with their work. The skull rings had a 2 fold purpose. 1) skeletons,, duh. and 2) jewelry. One of the girls found a rock in her mound and it had a fossil in it!! We totally didn't do that on purpose! Cool huh?

We also brought a sampling of real ancient pottery shards, arrowheads, drill points, and a hammer or axe head.

In this age of technology, gotta have it right now, and as seen on tv, it's nice to play in the dirt every once in a while! I think they learned something too!

Shhhhh,, don't tell them!