thankfulness

although i've been offline the past few days--including Thanksgiving--i've been thinking a lot about what i'm most thankful for.

1. for the God who made me, who loves me, and has saved me from my sin
2. for loving parents who raised me to know Jesus as my savior
3. for a wonderful husband who's still crazy...in love with me, that is
4. for bubba--child of my womb, firstborn son, "crown prince of our family", and super big brother whose nose is almost always in a good book
5. for cj--child of my heart, my honey boy and sweet baby who likes to wrestle
6. for extended family and time spent together
7. for friends and laughing until i can't breathe anymore

of course, that's just a few of the many things i am thankful for!

sweet cj boy

little cj was very busy this morning. he played, watched tv, played some more, watched more tv, played again, and then handed me a dvd and crawled up into T's chair to watch. when the show was finished, cj was too!


i hate to wake him, so for now am letting him rest, but will have to get him up so we can eat lunch pretty soon. he can take a real nap after we eat.

thanksgiving history

bubba really enjoyed learning more about the first thanksgiving this morning. i can't recall where i saw a link to this website, but i did and i recommend it too.

The First Thanksgiving

as a teacher, i really like how they discuss historical myths and how historians determine what may have happened based on primary source information. there's also a teacher's guide with some nice extras. i think it would be worthwhile to any parent who wants their kids to have a more accurate understanding of the first thanksgiving and what really happened then.

making a list and checking it twice...

mom asked me yesterday to get our christmas lists to her so she has ideas for our gifts. my 8 year old immediately went to his computer and edited his list from last year. unfortunately, that particular computer has neither internet nor printer. thus, i get to type all his requests onto the "master list" anyways. i really wouldn't mind, but now, every 5 minutes or so, he remembers something else he wants!

Happy Veterans' Day!

T has the day off! yay! we're getting as much schoolwork done this morning as we can so we can have time to play games this afternoon.

it's naptime!

woohoo! i could use one too, but for now i'll settle for having both my kids in bed. normally, bubba and i would be doing schoolwork during cj's afternoon nap, but the poor kid looks like he didn't sleep very good last night--he's got dark circles under his eyes--and i'm pretty sure both boys are coming down with a cold. so a little extra sleep today is a good thing.

instead of napping, i "get" to make homemade chicken noodle soup. it's really good and always nice when you've got a cold.
here's my recipe:

Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup
1 broiler/fryer chicken cut up (3-4 lbs)
20 cups water
2 large carrots, sliced
2 celery ribs, sliced
1 large onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced (i leave this out 'cuz garlic gives me a tummy-ache! it's good either way.)
2 bay leaves
2 teaspoons dried thyme
1 Tablespoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, & simmer 1.5 to 2 hours until meat is tender. Remove chicken; cool. Remove and discard skin & bones; chop chicken & set aside. Strain broth.

2 large carrots, sliced
2 celery ribs, sliced
homemade or store-bought egg noodles (use a double batch of homemade--see recipe below)

Return broth to pan, add carrots & celery. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover & simmer for 10 minutes until veggies are tender. Add noodles and chicken, and salt/pepper to taste. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover & simmer for 10 minutes until noodles are done.
Yield: 12-16 servings

Homemade Egg Noodles
1 beaten egg
2 Tbsp milk
1/2 tsp salt
about 1 cup flour (enough to make a stiff dough)

Mix together ingredients. Roll very thin on floured surface. Let stand at least 20 minutes. Roll up loosely & cut into 1/4 inch wide strips.

i don't always make homemade noodles, but i do like them best for this soup. there are a few kinds of almost-home-made noodle that work well too. of course, regular egg noodles work too, in a pinch, but they really don't taste as good and the texture is completely different. oh yeah, i occasionally make dumplings in this soup too.

i'm getting hungry just writing about it!

i suppose i should mention that this soup is based on a recipe i found in the 2002 Taste of Home Annual Recipes book. i made a few changes to the recipe including doubling it so we have leftovers. and the noodle recipe is one my mom has used ever since i can remember. :-)

sentimental sunday

sorta like flashback friday...

here's one of me and cj when he was only 3 months old.

verses to remember

for my second post this morning, i found a couple Bible verses that i think we should remember now that the election is over.

Exo 22:28 Thou shalt not revile God, nor curse a ruler of thy people.

Act 23:5 And Paul said, I knew not, brethren, that he was high priest: for it is written, Thou shalt not speak evil of a ruler of thy people.

so even if someone doesn't like or agree with either President Bush or President-elect Obama, God tells us NOT to speak badly of them. ...read entire post

is it really friday already?

it's hard to believe i haven't posted since election day. i'm not going to post my opinions of this election. i'm just going to say how thankful i am that it's done now and we can begin praying for Barack Obama as our new president-elect.

it's been a rather busy week around here.

wednesday morning one of my hubby's sisters came over with her youngest daughter. we had a really nice visit and even enjoyed most of a game of Quiddler before lunch. maybe next time we'll get in a whole game! then we did our schoolwork in the afternoon and bubba had Awanas in the evening.

yesterday morning we learned about Old Fort Niagara with our local homeschool group. one of the families had recently visited there and thought it was something the rest of us might want to learn about. it was very interesting. i've never been to Niagara Falls, so i was glad to learn (and have my son learn) about the history of the fort and the historic significance it holds. the family who organized this class did a wonderful job. they had lots of pictures from their visit to the fort displayed on posterboard with descriptions, a model of part of the fort they had made with rocks glued together and toy soldiers, Lincoln Logs for the younger kids to "build a fort" with, and a 30 minute educational video about the fort with a quiz for the kids to see how much they could remember afterward. they gave out a packet to each family with a little book about Old Fort Niagara as well as a copy of the Declaration of Independence and a copy of the Constitution (these had to have been purchased and are a really nice resource that i'm sure we'll use later since we've begun studying american history this year). and they also gave out a few really nice door prizes too! amazingly, our family won first choice. (we rarely win anything!) bubba chose the Lincoln Logs--the same ones they had for the kids to play with...all i can say is woohoo! cuz i know those aren't cheap and my boys will really enjoy them. after the class, we came home, had lunch and then did our regular schoolwork in the afternoon.

election day

i voted today. it will be interesting watching the news this evening as the polls close. i think most will agree with me that it will be nice to be done with this election season. it gets so very old, hearing the same stuff day in and day out from the candidates. i've done what i can and performed my civic duty. all i can do now is pray that God's hand will be on whomever is chosen to lead this country for the next 4 years.

another cute video i couldn't resist!

okay, i know i said i probably wouldn't post any more videos, but these kids are just way too cute! my boys were playing with bubba's lightsabers this afternoon after coming in from playing outside. cj was so into it, that i had to take some pics and video of it.

here's a short clip that i find extremely funny.



maybe cj wants a room of his own...

blog code editing

as you may have noticed, i'm learning a little this morning about blogs and code. i wanted to be able to shorten some of my more wordy blogs so you only have to see the entire post if you want to. i knew it was possible, but had to find the code to do it with. and figure out where to put the code in the html. it took me a few tries, but i think i've got it working. :-) fun!

our weekend

we had a nice weekend...

we checked the theater friday night, but there weren't any movies playing that we'd want to see. instead we spent a quiet evening in. we stayed at a new country inn and suites and got a room with a kingsize bed, a separate cozy "sunroom" with a hot tub and fireplace, and 48" plasma tvs--one in the bedroom and one in the sunroom. we considered staying a second night, but we decided to save the money and sleep in our own bed instead. T and i got a lot of shopping done saturday. of course, we spent more than we should have, but most of it was stuff we need.

we got home around 8pm and after unloading the van, started watching "The Lord of the Rings--The Fellowship of the Ring." we made it a little over half-way through before we were too tired to stay awake anymore, so went to bed and finished watching it the next day.

we had both sets of grandparents over for supper last night too. T made "classy chili"--yummy yum yum! how do you make chili classy? well, T took his basic chili recipe that we like and added some bits of marinated and browned sirloin steak to it. i'm so glad there's leftovers for lunch!

btw, one nice thing about having a couple days away from the kids (besides a good night's sleep) is that you notice the sweet things about your kids more. last night, before putting the boys to bed, i was reading to cj. one of our favorite bedtime books is "Jesus Loves You" which is a read-the-pictures book. anyways, cj was pointing at the pictures as i was reading to him and saying what he saw: "rabbit" "squirrel" "rainbow" were all new words we hadn't heard him say before. his "rabbit" is especially cute...it almost sounds like "wabbit."