Mom hints: Enjoy being at home

The fruit of the Spirit is...joy.  Galatians 5:22

You are home with your children, day after day after day.  Every day seems the same: get up, fed everyone, get everyone dressed, clean the bathrooms, clean the kitchen, wash the clothes, wash the dishes, settle squabbles, pay bills...

It's enough to make you want to chuck it all and get a job!

But wait - this IS your job!  Don't be fooled into thinking that taking an outside job will be more fun or glamorous than being at home.  It won't.

Being a stay at home mother - a homemaker - is the highest calling of a woman.  It doesn't have to be boring, dismal drudgery.

Do your job, and do it well.  Don't let your house be a messy place that's no fun to look at.  Clean it.  Clean it early in the day so that it's done and you can enjoy the peace that comes from having an orderly place to live in.  If you clean it every.single.day, it will only take minutes.

Don't have a clue how to get your home in order?  Here is a place to learn:  flylady  This is a wonderful site with lots of hints and tools to get your house under control, and keep it that way.

If you are a homeschooling mom, be assured you don't have to spend hours and hours and hours doing school.  Yes, you are a homeschool mom, but that is not all you are.  See the first paragraph.  Those are all your jobs, too.  I determined many many years ago that our homeschool would not last more than two hours a day, and I have stuck to that.  Over the years, I've learned that all learning does not have to come from textbooks.  We read, we visit the museum, we go on field trips with our co op.  I've been a homeschooling mom for 22 years, and I have success stories now to show that I have done my job and done it well.  That will come for you, too, if you can keep it light, and keep it fun.

And lastly, make your home a place you enjoy.  What are your interests?  What do you like to look at?  Surround yourself with those things.

I happen to love birds.  I have chickens, turkeys, and geese outside.  I usually have a few birds inside, too.  Recently I read a book about Tasha Tudor.  Did you know she had 41 birds?  I decided if she can have 41 birds, so can I.  I'm on my way - between son Tommy and I, we have nine.  The bird mart show is next month.  I plan to go!  For now, here's my favorite, little Manderly:

My house sounds like spring all the time.  Well, daughter Rachael thinks it just sounds loud and annoying.  But I love bird songs, and I love to hear Manderly saying "Hello.  Hello.  Birdy, birdy birdy " when he wants my attention.

I also love raggedy Ann dolls, so I collect them, and scatter them around my house:

Things that make soothing noises are nice, like the wind chimes son Gage brought me home from Viet Nam and now hang in my bedroom window:

Little lighted water fountains from WalMart are soothing, too:

As are big water fountains, like this one I got at a garage sale for $10.  Today, it is bubbling away in the rain:

I absolutely love this clock I bought for $5 at another garage sale.  It has a beautiful chime, but it's quirky and it chimes at four minutes past the hour, instead of on the hour.  Maybe that's why it was only $5?  I don't know, but I just love that it does that!

Last but not least, it's always good to have a hobby.  And as much as I love raising chickens, I think I love crocheting more.  Especially when I find shimmery yarn and a beautiful pattern:

I guess I will never understand why anyone would want to work outside the home,  if it is possible to stay home?  I ran a home daycare for years, because I hated working away.

So the keys I have found to being happy at home:  keep your house clean, it really isn't that hard.  Not spotless, but clean enough that you aren't embarrassed if someone drops over unannounced.  Surround yourself with fun things that you love and that soothe.  Have a hobby you really enjoy.

There's no place like home!!

Country Life - my heart's desire

Psalm 20:3-5 May He give you what your heart desires and fulfill your whole purpose.


I don't love EVERYTHING about the country life.  Rattlesnakes bother me a lot.  I had already had one experience in May, when one surprised me in the henhouse.  You can read all about that HERE.  That was quite enough, thank you very much, especially since we have lived in this house for ten years, and it was only the second time we have encountered one.  I figured it should be at least ten more years before we had to do that again.  So I was quite dismayed to hear the kids coming running in screaming earlier this week that there was one in the baby bunny cage.
Beau quickly came to the rescue with the .22, but not before the snake had struck two baby bunnies and they died an awful death.  Poor little things.  Why would even a snake want to harm something so sweet and cuddly?

Angel-Leah spent the rest of the evening in tears.  But the dad of this house thought the rattlesnake would make a great snack: after all, they had tasted it at the rattlesnake round up.  So he and Beau skinned the mean old baby bunny murderer (Beau is preserving the skin) and Bill took the rest inside to the stove and fried it right up.  Gross.  No I did NOT eat it - but I think Angel-Leah and I were the only ones who didn't...

Now, on to one thing I do love about living in the country...

Luke's two sisters are staying with us.  If you remember, they were the ones we were asked to adopt, we said yes, went through the whole process to be licensed with the private agency , only to then be turned down by CPS.  You can read that story HERE.  Anyway, they are still allowed to come for visits with their brother, my son Luke.  They will be with us for two weeks.  We are having fun, and so glad they are here.

I also have three grandchildren staying with me for a few days.  To say I have a houseful is an understatement.  But hey, we live in the country and there is a LOT to do.  Big sister loves to build, and she has quite a construction crew.  They have been working on the tree house out in the chicken coop for days.  Big sister is the president, which means she calls all the shots.  Grandson Mikey is the vice president.  Angel-Leah tells me she is the presidents servant, and Tommy is the mascot.  Until today, Luke and Beetle were not in big sisters crew, they were going to make their own clubhouse.  But after two days of watching how much better her work was going, they decided to join her.  Little sister, however, is a different story.  The work is hard.  The boards are heavy.  It's hot.  She didn't know the rules.  She didn't hear the other kids when they read them to her.  She stood on the boards while they tried to build.  She didn't know she was standing on the boards  She didn't know she was supposed to say sorry when she did something wrong.  She didn't know that when you DO say you are sorry, you aren't supposed to roll your eyes.  It goes on and on.  So she is regularly kicked out of the club.  Today, "I" made the rule that each day is a new start, and she can try over.  I think she lasted a total of three minutes before she was kicked out again...

This club has a password.  Before you enter, you must tell President Big Sister the password.  Here is mascot Tommy whispering it to President Big Sister:

Here's Angel-Leah working hard.  I wonder why she doesn't work so hard when it's time to clean her room?  At least it's air conditioned there!  That's grandson Beetle chilling on the bike, and little sister wishing she hadn't broken the rules:

The rules are posted on the front of the clubhouse.  There is a zero tolerance law for breaking them, it seems:

When we found the first snake, Bill spent much time cleaning the chicken pen.  He picked up all the boards, cut down brush and low hanging limbs, raked grass and threw away broken toys.  It was amazing the work he did.  It made hunting eggs back there so much nicer and so much less scary.  Unfortunately, the chicken pen is back to being a construction site, and things are messy again:

But honestly, I don't care.  I have ten kids over here, and the beauty of living in the country is that they never run out of things to do.  It's a wonderful place to raise children and have grandchildren over to play.  I am so blessed to have this messy little place. 

our days

No one has every accused me of having a boring life.  Today was no exception...

My morning started out kind of nice since the little kids slept late, and I didn't.  Having a little bit of time in the morning to get my bearings is always a good thing.  I read my Bible, checked my emails, and then talked to son Gage, who also got up early to jog, for a little while.  Tommy was the first little one up, but he was out the door before I could feed or dress him.

I was just getting up to get dressed myself when the door flew open and Tommy came in, talking a mile a minute.  I could tell he was upset, so I headed for a chair and sat down, and he flew straight into my arms and curled up in a ball.  That is unusual for Tommy, who is not affectionate.  But it didn't take long for me to find out what was wrong.

"I went for a lalk (walk)," he said, "an' a bi' (big) dog lased (chased) me.  An' he wa' bawkin' (was barking)."  Big tears sprang into his eyes and his lip began to quiver.
Tears threatened my eyes too because he looked so pitiful.
"What do you mean, you went for a walk?  You mean you left our yard?"  I asked.
"Les (yes)." he answered.  "And a bi' bwack (big black) dog lased (chased) me!"
"Where did you go?"  I asked, getting worried that he had walked far enough down the road to meet up with the rottweiler that even my 14 year old daughter and 17 year old son are scared of.
"Jus' to Mr. Bomee's (Bromley's) twee (tree)."
Whew, okay, that is allowed.  Now I knew he had stayed within the rules, and Mr. Bromley's dog is pretty gentle, even if he does protect his property by barking.
And we do have speech therapy scheduled, they just haven't gotten all the clearance to start yet.
"So why were you walking down the road so early in the morning when you haven't gotten dressed yet?"  I asked.
"I was hunin' gwasshoppuhs (hunting grasshoppers)."
Well, how dumb of me.  That should have gone without saying...

So I baby my son for a while, which I really enjoy, then feed him, dress him and send him off to play again.  I get myself dressed, and go off to get the chickens caged up and check on the other animals.
The goats are tethered in the yard to eat grass.  I decide to check their water and make sure they aren't tangled.
I had a paper plate in my hand that I had fed the chickens scrapes off of.  As I approached the male goat, he became VERY interested in the paper plate.  I decided to use it to walk him around the trailer he had wrapped his cord around.  The cord was tangled on a wire, so I laid the plate down to get it loose.
As I did, the goat made a threatening gesture at me with his horns.  That should have been my first clue.
I got him untangled, and reached for the paper plate.  He didn't like that, so he charged me.
Okay, a goat is not an overly big animal, but I am not an overly big person.  And I give to goats.  But I didn't give quick enough.  The horns hit both my wrists and my thigh.  I'm not sure if it would have been worse had he not been tethered, but I was able to back out of his reach.

I was not happy.  More and more, this goat has been making threatening gestures at us, and I had seen him lower his  horns at Tommy recently.  As I looked at him in dismay, Bill walked towards me.
"Did you see that?"  I asked  He hadn't.
"That goat just hit me with his horns!"  I said, showing him my wrist, where a cut was making way to a huge knot, and my thigh, where a bruise was also rising.
"That's what bucks do."  Bill said.
"I can't have a dangerous animal around here...I wanted this to work so bad, but without a good fence, I guess I should just sell them."  The fence had been discussed thoroughly the week before, and it was decided we could not afford it right now.
"You do so well with chickens," Bill said.  "Why don't you just stick with that?"
Sigh...
So I advertised the goats on Facebook and Craigslist.  I got a couple of emails, but one wanted me to lower the price and another, who it ended up I knew through her daughter, didn't write back yet.

And then I thought of Rose...

Remember Rose, from the goose saga?  How many times has she lugged her goats over here in the back of her car to breed them with my buck?
I called her and offered her the buck.  I lowered the price and offered to take it in trade in a way I knew she could pay.  Two hours later, she arrived for him.
Sitting at my table, with her shy, odd way of talking, she said, "I never pay this much for a goat, but you've been so good to me..."  Then she looked up at me, and her eyes filled with tears.
Oh, my...twice in one day?  I smiled and began to talk quick to get us past the awkward moment.

We went outside to get the goat.  Rose was a bit afraid since I told her he had hurt me, and that's why I decided to get rid of the goats.  We roped him with two ropes, she took one, I took the other, so that he could not lunge at either of us.  I got a cup of corn, and we lured him into the back seat of her car.  She tied his back legs together as he ate the corn, then jumped in herself for a quick drive home.  I watched as she pulled out of my driveway with that stinky goat (have you ever smelled a goat in rut?  They...ummm...tee tee on themselves.  It's rank...)
I thought, not in a million years would I have put that stinky, mean goat in the backseat of a small car and drove off...

From there, it got better.  My car has been having trouble for most of the summer.  It just dies, and you never know when.  I might get all the way to Burleson and back and not have trouble, or it might die while I'm driving down my own road.  I finally told my teenage daughter that we just couldn't risk it - driving down the highway at 60 miles an hour on a 115 degree day and having the car die is not safe...
So we stuck to Grandview, and finally got the funds to put it in the shop.  It took a week, but today I got the call:
"It's fixed!  Come get it."

HURRAH!!

We put on bathing suits and took off for a snow cone and a trip to the Splash Pad.  Tommy is getting well enough that he can have a treat now and then without working up a rage, which is GREAT.
I decided to drive by the Splash Pad first, and unfortunately, it's closed for repairs.  It seems like it's closed half the time.
So we went for the snow cones anyway.
Mary Susannah has felt very deprived that Tommy's diet has kept her from getting snow cones every week like we used too, but today, she got one:

And so did the little ones:

(they are in bathing suits, we don't normally wear shorts around here, and the girls are dresses only)

I got a snow cone, too, but my picture didn't get made, which is fine!

So now we are home, lesson learned that it's best to go with the buddy system when you take a walk at the crack of dawn.  We are one goat less around here, with two more to go, and best of all, we have a CAR AGAIN!!

New adventures to start tomorrow, while we do a whole summers worth of fun that we've missed without the car.

In the meantime, anyone want to buy a doe?  Or two?

Ordering Our Lives

Psalm 119:133  Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.

  Is there such a thing as a second menopause?  Or is there no excuse for the grumpiness I've been feeling lately?  What's been going on in our house that makes it seem kind of...out of control?
Especially Luke.  Luke is happy, healthy, cheerful and full of energy, and his energy has been stepping all over everyone else's toes, making for lots of cries of "Luke!  Stop that!!"
I felt like all I've been doing lately is fussing at him, and he's so sweet, I just hate that.

So two nights ago, I went to bed determined to pray and pray before I slept.  Tired mommy that I am, that prayer time didn't last near as long as I wanted it too.

But God is faithful, and I woke up knowing what was wrong.

We weren't ordering our days.  A scipture was going through my head, and while I had some of the words wrong, it was still the right answer.  I was misquoting Psalm 90:12, saying it this way:  "Teach us to ORDER our days, that we may apply our hearts to wisdom" when actually it says to "Teach us to NUMBER our days."

But still, that was the problem.  We were just getting up and doing whatever we felt like doing at the moment, rather than having a plan.

So I decided to order our days.  Now these two are not problem:

Beau works full time in the 115 degree heat building barns, and yes, he deserves that frappie.  Mary Susannah runs the kitchen, cooks most the meals and bakes everything AND cleans up the kitchen when she is done.  She could probably MAKE a frappie as good as any Starbucks could.

It was ME and the little ones who needed help.
And yeah,  I do work.  I clean the bathrooms and wash the clothes and sweep the floor and buy the groceries and change the sheets and feed the animals and ...well, I'm a homemaker.  You get the idea.

But that's not enough. We needed a plan.  Proverbs 29:15 says "A child left to himself brings his mother to shame."

And what God revealed to me was that I have the perfect setup to order the kids days.  I'm a stay at home mom on a minifarm.  What more could I want?

So I dragged out the "Family Friendly Farming" book by Joel Salatin (see my book review blog to read about and buy that book!) and I started planning.

It seemed to me that the perfect thing to do is give the boys, and maybe Angel-Leah, an animal to raise.  I talked to the boys, and right away they wanted ducks and geese.  Now get this: Tommy wanted geese!!   Check out past blog posts to refresh your memory of Tommy and the goose!  I guess he's a glutton for punishment, but right now, I'm planning on taking my boys to First Monday at Canton, Texas in September and getting those ducks and geese for them.  In the meantime, I told them we will also expand our rabbits.  I lugged them out behind the barn, and we pulled out cages and took inventory of what we already had.  Then, I said, every morning, we were going to cut some hay for the bunnies and baby chicks.  So that's one thing we've been doing:

They had a lot of fun the first day we did this, but this morning, after one basketful, Luke wanted to know if I didn't think I could do this by myself.
Nope, sorry...

Then we lug the hay over and feed the rabbits:

My plan is to build rabbit tractors eventually (maybe soon, since son Gage is coming home for a while THIS WEEKEND, and he always builds me something while he's here?) and we will put the rabbits on pasture to raise.  Then my boys job will be to move the tractors a time or two a day.  We'll see how that works.
The geese and ducks, I want to put under my fruit trees and see if they will eat enough grasshoppers to keep my trees from being eaten down like they were this year...

Angel-Leah has been a bit easier to work with.  She likes being inside, and she is learning to crochet:

We redid the floors in Mary Susannah's room while she was gone earlier this week, and that bonnet was uncovered.  It's been on Angel-Leah's head ever since.  Fits her, doesn't it??

So, crocheting, ducks, geese (in our imaginations), rabbits and cutting hay with scissors...that's been our last couple of days.  We'll start homeschooling soon - maybe sooner than I planned too, and that will take up some more of our days.

I would love to hear how you order your children's day?  Or how you used to, when they were young!