I miss my husband. Working from home he is a part of our lives to some extent each and every day. Today he was not even available ONLINE, which for those of you who know him, you can truly realize how completely out of the norm that is! No MSN, no gmail, no Google chat… I feel absolutely out of touch with him! And to top it off – no cell of course! Thank goodness he is staying at a mutual friend of ours and SHE got in contact with me this morning to let me know he had AT LEAST made it there safely. MEN!

So our morning started out hectic. It is always more difficult when you are short a set of hands. All 4 kids wanting to be fed at once and Trinity needing help with her meal just adds to the confusion. After everyone was fed and clothed I managed my morning raspberry harvest (I do believe we are coming to the end of the season finally) and I started yet another applesauce batch. The boys are in love with applesauce and though they are NOT eating it as quickly as I am making it they are making a valient attempt. I already have 3 containers in the freezer and a couple in the fridge.

As a super treat I made the boys cupcakes from a cake mix – vanilla fudge swirl. Not overly swirly but absolutely yummy. All I had was my Halloween cupcake papers but the boys don’t mind. 3 eggs later and we had desert. Thankfully it has not hit the hottest part of the week, so I also started my apple leather. My first tray was WAY too thick, I was starting to think I will have to have the oven on OVERNIGHT! So while I cooked the chicken patties for dinner I made a thinner batch to throw in there too. Hopefully something yummy will come from it. The boys have decided I MUST be making candy and therefore they MUST have some as soon as possible. What I have gotten seems to be… leathery…

Nom Nom Nom

Apple Leather!

By the time I managed to sneak in a bath (the boys and Trinity were watching cartoons before lunch) I had already gotten enough done to feel pretty accomplished. I printed off the number pages for 8 and 9 and got the boys to willingly colour 8 (9 will be for tomorrow). Then I went to put on my shirt – STAINED. Just a tiny stain but right on the boob… le sigh. So I had to scrub a shirt I am rather sure will NOT come clean. As if I have the cash to buy myself more clothes. Oh well.

Naptime was another chuckle. As soon as I got the boys settled TRINITY woke up and woke up CRANKY so half way through the afternoon when I had the boys’ pool filled and the 3 of them out playing I put her back to bed for another nap. This time she was kind enough to wait to wake up AFTER I made everyone supper but BEFORE I got to eat mine. Figures!

Just Loves the Pool

Zander and His Mini Waterfall

I let the boys play outside with Trinity this afternoon without standing over them. She had fun, didn’t eat any sand or marbles and they managed to play nice with her AND each other. Definitely a success. I want to try and give her a little more freedom now that she is creeping up on 1 1/2 but at the same time it is hard to let her not be baby any more.

Gavin and Trinity in the Sandbox

We did work on our last of the requested bugs. Emanuel actually finished his but Zander and Gavin’s are repairing after an ice tea incident. Gavin spilled his at dinner and though the majority of their craft was far enough to the side some pieces are being dried and squashed flat. I really need another table area for the school stuff. I am thinking if we go with small stocking stuff, one toy and then one shared gift for all 3 a table and chair set from Ikea may be the ticket for Christmas. I won’t write out the step by steps on this one since it is a little complicated but here is the link if anyone is interested:

http://www.dltk-kids.com/CRAFTS/INSECTS/mhandprintbutterfly.htm

It was great fun and turned out kinda cute creepy. Emanuel is VERY happy with his. The plan is once all these bugs are done, is to put them all up in the twins’ room. Their room is pink so anything more boy oriented is exciting to them and the scotch tape is forgiving to the paint.

Butterfly!

We took our ornaments out of the Borax mixture. The kids are VERY happy with the result though next time Zander wants to use a white pipecleaner so his purple tinted Borax mixture shows up more than it did on the yellow. They are VERY heavy but glitter ever so nicely. I wish I could get the sparkle better in my pictures. The excitement with the boys was plain though.  And already they are making plans as to who will get them next time! This is so exciting for them – the ability to make and give away something precious.

So Proud! (Gavin yellow)

All 5

I spent some time last night working on the beads. Definitely NOT something the boys could make, but I am thinking under supervision they could easily use a needle and thread and string them themselves. I am very happy with how they look and am already having fun cutting pages to get the colours I want. I just need to work on a more even winding to get the more traditional bead shape I am trying for. Quite a few of mine ended up with the look of a top. Pretty but not quite what I was shooting for.

Handmade Beads

I am debating taking a day off from the applesauce, my thumbs are now stained from the apples and I am a little bit tired of pressing out the apples. I figure I have kept up with going through the ones that are falling on the ground to the point where I am picking what I can reach so if I take a day and just be diligent with getting the good ones that fall or I can reach then on Friday I can go nuts. If the apple leather becomes a bit less of a shot in the dark I may use up a ton of my sauce making that. Of course today was already quite warm so it will depend on the weather. I am not sure if I want to get up on a stool and dig out my dehydrator. That may be something Ken and I should do together.

I am really wishing I had had more time to sew today. I am set on tomorrow starting that new stitch for my brother.  I am going to use the silver I had to frog out of my nephew’s I am sure there is enough for this one… at least I am pretty sure. Every time I have set out to dig out my big piece of fabric to cut a piece I have found something ELSE to do. Focus is not exactly high right now on anything not kid or food related for some odd reason! I have some triangles already cut for the beads as well so either I will cut more triangles or make up the prepped paper. AFTER the fabric of course…

Ken and I have a very unique relationship. We seem to fight like cats and dogs the moment one of us is not in the same town. Like if one of us heads off to Minnesota or South Carolina. We work so well together but apart… it is like the countdown has started for our first fight. Online or on the phone we just seem to clash, and we both know it is coming. I am hoping THIS time will be different, but the best I can figure is it is born out of a frustration about being apart. This could be why Ken working from home works so well for us. We like that constant contact (as long as there are times when he is secreted away or I am not here). Our family works best as a complete unit which is a great strength. I can certainly picture myself 50 yrs from now with Ken, heck the rest of my life can’t be long enough! My very own imported American Penny.

2003

2008

Well that time has come… Ken has left us… for 3 whole days! The kids are rather unimpressed that Daddy would DARE leave us for that long, so to make up for it tonight or tomorrow I am going to make a cake mix. I am not sure if I will do cupcakes or cake – depends on whether or not I can find my cupcake papers (I think I am down to the ones I bought last year for Halloween). The plan is to take 5.00 and walk to the closest gas station (thankfully there is one that is not across any busy roads and not too too far for little legs) and get something snack like as well. Oh that and crafts.

Speaking of crafts we got to work on our first official Christmas craft today – Borax ornaments. The original instructions call for making snowflakes out of our pipecleaners which I did for the example one. The boys were much more creative. Gavin wanted a square with a line through it, Emanuel a snowman and Zander “the star made out of two triangles for Trinity we went a little abstract and made the pipecleaner all “bendy.” For every cup of boiling water in our jars you add 3 tablespoons of Borax and then suspend the shapes on a pencil that is placed across the jar top. It didn’t take long for the crystals to already start forming. I cannot wait until tomorrow when we take them out. Three of them have colours in the water as well – purple, yellow and blue. If they turn out as well as they look already we will make more over the next week or so to be part of some of the sets we are giving out to our friends and family.

Everything You Need!

Waiting for Tomorrow!

Today was a big day for the boys – the return of the Lego! There was enough of a lack of cleaning for Ken to set down the law and take them away for a whole MONTH! Emanuel is pretty sure we bought new Lego and the twins are super careful so far to clean VERY well. I am hoping the lesson was learned. ( don’t worry I won’t hold my breath!)

Return of the Legos! (Zander red)

So the applesauce marathon has continued, two batches yesterday figuring out how to get the best results and another 2 today. I am using tonight’s batch to try another recipe an egroup friend suggested – apple leather. There are two ways that I have read about – with the dehydrator and the oven. I am going to try the oven version first as it seemed to be the easiest and least attention required. This has, however, led to a new wish list item for me – a food mill! The way we are making the sauce now I am just removing the cores and then once it has gone through the time in the slow cooker pressing it through the strainer. Hard on the arms! But a  terrific resulting prodict!

So I made the mistake of watching the new A&E reality show Hoarding. Not  that it is a bad show per say but mid way through I got the urge to clean. I have gotten a little behind on my basic cleaning due to the applesauce making so I vacuumed and put away the toys. Thankfully I have managed to do all the deep cleaning. Just the topical stuff seems to get put aside. I REALLY need to get those last two loads of laundry put away, but I figure I should keep with the applesauce as much as possible.

I have to admit I have lost a lot of trust, respect and faith in my government… Money that was supposed to be here LAST Tuesday is still NOT here today. This is money we are depending on to cover some pressing debts. Ken spent an hour on a courtesy phone at our bank hunting down the “why” which there was no answer and got a guarantee on Thursday. Sadly I doubt that either of us are really trusting that guarantee. Sometimes you feel like that puppy being smacked with a newspaper only for something you DIDN’T do! If it DOES come this Thursday that will go some way towards reconciling me with the situation, but it is going to take a bit before I trust doing forms and working with anything government related. (the optimistic feeling takes a definite hit at this moment!)

On a more positive note, there has been some substantial progress done on the stocking I am working on. HOWEVER I noticed one of the balls at  the top of the stocking has the year 1991 in it! So I have to rework that to stitch it out. I did get enough done that I can start backstitching as you can see in the below picture. It is amazing how much of a boost actually FINISHING a portion of a larger stitch can revitalize your interest in it. Ken designed the stitch for my brother James last night so I plan on getting to work on that one tomorrow. I will probably post at least a bit of that one as Ken made up a silhouette of one of the Enterprises. I PROMISE to get some of my patterns for these new pieces up on the site this weekend. I am also hoping on getting some videos of the kids on here in the future.

Check Out the Backstitching - Bottom Left

So beyond Ken heading out in a very hurried and delayed fashion, the house is quiet and I am lonely. But I am sure this will help me get MORE done! Now I am off to cut triangles out of the Sears catalogue – the result SHOULD be in tomorrow’s entry! Check back!

Cheese!

I have begun  my applesauce adventure today. I found a VERY simple recipe for in a slow cooker – you put the apples in with water on low for 5 hrs and then mix in cinnamon and sugar. I am hoping to substitute the white sugar with brown for any batches I keep for my own family as Trinity does not react well to the refined sugar in any substantial quantities. Our two trees are not overly sweet and for the first batch we took only from the sweeter of the two. The recipe called for 8 cooking apples but ours are tiny so we filled the bottom portion of the slow cooker and added a little extra water… trial and error I guess. I do have some store bought apples I could add  to a batch but I would rather make the most of the apples growing in our own backyard. Which I should mention I am more than willing to share the apples off of! Though you have to pick them yourself! The final result is actually quite yummy, I added half a cup of brown sugar and some cinnamon and YUM. So I figure double or triple tomorrow and then start the freezing!

Slow Cooker Applesauce (Ken says with brown sugar tastes like baked apple but yummy still!)

Since today we needed a lot of quiet for Ken we had an abreviated school time. The boys worked on the number 9, and did a review sheet on numbers 0 through 8. I do need to work on 5 and 6 with them. For a craft we made our caterpillars. All you need are paper circles (I used cardstock and a circle punch I borrowed from Karyn), a marker to write your letters on them (we wanted names on ours), pipe cleaners for antenae, googly eyes (a favourite in this house for any craft that could possibly have eyes!), white glue for the eyes, glue stick for the circles and I used tape to put on the antenae. I had pre-written the letters for each of the boys’ names on circles so we could do each name like a jumble. We did Trinity’s first so they could get the idea. Gavin added extra to the end of his since his name is the shortest. Zander chose to have an angry face on his. We did up a nice and long one for Chris and Chris as a thank you for the paper plates they gave us for our crafts. These are going to replace the trains on the boys’ doors with their names on them and I have enough left over that we could easily make more or make up kits. The twins were thinking they wanted to make one for their Cousin, I am not sure if I will have them make it or make it up as a kit for him to do on his own.

Supplies (+tape)

Finished Bugs

Otherwise the day was a slow one, kids all spent some of their day outside, even Trinity got in some sandbox time and came back in the house with it everywhere including her hair!

Zander and Trinity

Trinity also has a new word today – OW – she likes to walk around saying “ow ow ow” on top of “hi hi hi”… the boys are impressed to say the least!

"Ow"

Ken has decided to leave Tuesday night for his meetings instead of early Wednesday morning which has made tonight especially busy! Lawn to be mowed, cleaning to be done… it is going to be a wee bit lonely without Ken and has been months since we have had that long to be apart! Sewing wise I have kept working on the stocking during any of my free moments today and am almost to the point where I could do some backstitching in the heel area. There is a long way to go though and I have a couple other Christmas projects to deal with as well. A rather restive day in some respects here’s hoping for a happy and positive week!