Summer time

So, what do you do in the summer time? My daughter was complaining the other day because I told her that she was still going to be getting up fairly early, she needed to make her bed and pick up her room before coming out for breakfast.  She told me that summer time was when you are supposed to sleep in.  I guess I’m a mean mom and that isn’t my idea of summer.  I figure the kids are around and they are getting old enough to be a real help to me, so I’m going to teach them what it’s like to work.  I’m not sure who will get the bigger lesson, them learning to work, or me learning to teach them.

Now don’t get me wrong, we do have fun during the summer.  In fact, the kids and I sat down and made out a list of things that we would like to do this summer.  Some of those are things that we know are definitely going to happen, and some might happen.  The list included things like swimming lessons (they are currently taking those), my daughter’s baptism, going to my nephew’s birthday party.  Those ones are pretty set but then we included things like going camping, fishing, visiting some close touristy sites like the ice caves and the Hagerman Fossil Beds.  We will see how many of those we get done this summer.

So, we have set some new routines this summer.  They are very similar to the ones I set up for Spring Break.  I’m discovering as my kids get older what works now may not work then, so we may have to tweak this as time goes on.  I get up early and get my computer time in.  I have discovered that when kids are up, the computer goes off unless we need it for something like to look up a recipe or something, otherwise it is too big of a distraction.  So, once kids are up, I get to work making breakfast while they get dressed, make their beds and clean up their rooms.  After breakfast they each have a room that they are in charge of and they spend a few minutes cleaning that room.  The first day we picked rooms it took quite a while to get the rooms straightened and organized, but now it doesn’t take them very long at all.  Once their room is tidy we will usually all work together on something.  If the weather is nice we work outside.  We put a new house in the middle of an alfalfa field a couple of years ago and there is still a lot of work to do around the outside, along with taking care of the chickens and the garden.  So we have weeding, mowing, spreading gravel, picking up the lawn so I can mow, and hanging laundry out to dry on the clothes line.

Right now we have swimming lessons so after a little work we head to those, then lunch and come home for some free time/play time.  Swimming lessons will be over after this week and our family work time will increase.  I’m a little glad for that because we have a lot of projects to work on outside.  For free time the kids will often play outside on the swings, or in “Terabithia”.  Terabitha is an area of our yard where some big trees grow and shade one of our little irrigation ditches, so the kids built a bridge over the water, it’s the “bridge to Terabithia”.  They can climb the trees and have even built little forts over there.  For her birthday last year my almost 8 year old got a pair of little pruners and she will cut off the little dead branches.  She will probably help me prune some of our orchard later this summer with those little pruners.

If the weather is less nice then we spend a lot of time reading books.  One of the favorite places for my kids to spend their time is the library.  We have just a small little community library, but we also got a library card to a bigger library in the town where we do most of our shopping.  At that library the limit is 50 books per card and we’ve come close to bringing that many home before.  The kids pick out their own books, with me making sure that there isn’t anything I don’t want in them.  They do pretty good for the most part.  My daughters are also learning some handicrafts.  The oldest is learning to crochet.  Her sister just younger is learning to make things on a knitting loom.  I love to do yarn crafts so we all spend a little time working on our latest project.  It has been so fun sharing these skills with my kids.

At bed time after we read scriptures and pray as a family they all go and lay in their beds and I sit in the hall between the two bedrooms and read a story of my choosing to them.  We’ve done a lot of classics.  We went through some fairy tales, we read Pollyanna, some Nancy Drew, and currently I am reading them The Secret Garden (one of my all time favorites).  I have a whole list of books that I want to read to them.  This helps them unwind, and sometimes it brings up topics for conversation. 

So what do you think?  Am I a mean mom for making them get up early and sticking to a schedule?  I don’t think so.  My kids are happier, the house feels more welcoming and comfortable, and it’s easier for me to be a good Mommy.

Computer Free

I had this wonderful post all ready, and I left it overnight so I could proof read it the next day, then my computer crashed.  I decided that maybe I just hadn’t learned my lesson well enough yet.  So, here is what I started:

I didn’t have the internet or my computer for a week.  That was an interesting experience.  It was different than going on vacation and not being “plugged in”.  I’ve traveled and had no computer and it was fine.  I was out of my normal and had a different agenda and didn’t even miss not checking my e-mail, facebook, or blogs.  It’s different when you are home and used to doing all of those things.

The first couple of days I just kept thinking about how I needed to blog about my experience, but I didn’t have any way to blog.  Even without the internet, I usually have my computer, but when said computer gets a virus and you can’t do anything on it, well, even that is gone.  I took my computer to someone much more knowledgeable than myself and he fixed it right up, but since he lives an hour away, it took a while before I was able to go and pick up my computer.  In the mean time, some interesting things happened.  This is what I learned:

1.  Finding recipes is a lot easier with the internet.  I had something in my cupboards that I needed to find a recipe for.  I had never eaten it before and didn’t know exactly how to prepare it.  I went searching through my many cookbooks and magazines, but I just could not seem to find a recipe with that particular ingredient.  I also learned that I need a better filing system for some of my recipes and I have a lot of papers and recipes that I don’t need and will probably never use.

2.  I missed having my music and books played at this end of the house.  I play music using Pandora or my Itunes while I’m in the kitchen or living room.  I don’t have any other stereo at this end of the house.  I do at the other end, so I ended up spending a little more time down there listening to some dramatized cd’s.  That was probably a good thing, since I don’t usually spend much time down there and that part of the house needed some tlc.  Still, I’m glad that I can listen to books and music while doing the dishes again.

3.  I ended up actually talking to people more.  Since I couldn’t rely on facebook messages or e-mail to get a hold of people, I actually needed to talk or text them.  I also realized that I didn’t have everyone’s numbers who I may need to get in touch with.  It’s good to actually hear peoples voices when you communicate.

4.  I can survive without my computer.  I joked about having the shakes for the first couple of days, but it’s only a partial joke.  I really did go through some withdrawals.  We only took the tower in to be looked at so the monitor, keyboard and mouse were all still sitting there giving the appearance that all was okay, but of course none of them worked without the tower.  I would find myself looking over there and wanting to sit down and type something.  My eyes often found their way over to the computer before remembering that the screen would just stay blank.  I was constantly wondering what I was missing and thinking about what I was going to blog about next.  After a few days, though, those urges subsided.  I did a lot of heavy cleaning to distract myself.  I read a couple of books.  I played and worked with my children.  I made it through the days and evenings with no computer and it was okay. 

5.  It’s easy to get sucked back in.  I set my computer back up and immediately I wanted to get back on and find out all that I had been missing.  I checked my e-mail.  I had maybe 20 e-mails I wanted to read and really only about 5 of those were ones that contained information that was important to me.  On facebook I had 20 notifications, but most of them were not all that important either.  A couple of them pertained to things that had already passed before I got back on, and I didn’t really miss anything.  I also went and checked blogs, but again, I didn’t really miss much.  Yes, there were some good articles that I enjoyed reading, but nothing that was super important to my life that I couldn’t have lived without. 

So, after writing all of that and having my computer pick up another nasty virus and crashing again I realized that I had picked up right where I left off on spending too much time online again.  I found other things to do, again.  I began teaching my girls to crochet and use a knitting loom.  I began knitting some projects.  I think I have maybe figured out a way to get my screen time in without sacrificing time with my family.  We will just have to see how it works out, though.

Mother's Day Musings

When I was growing up and we would ask my mom what she wanted for Mother's Day, or her birthday, or Christmas, her answer was always the same "A clean house". As a child I never could understand why she would keep asking for that, I mean, it felt like we cleaned the house all the time, why wouldn't she ask for something else, like a necklace or a book, or something. Then, I had children, and now I know.

My mom also worked outside the home along with raising her 6 children. So, she would go to work, come home, cook, clean, and help us with homework, and all of that stuff. As we got older we helped, but sometimes we were just around long enough to leave a mess, like when we would come home, grab a bite, leave the dishes in the sink, and then head back off to basketball practice or play practice or sometimes work ourselves. She often had to clean up those dishes.

My kids are still fairly young, my oldest is 7. They are old enough to learn to help out around the house. It feels like it takes twice as long when they are cleaning with me, but I know that if I take the time now, soon they can do it on their own. I'm realizing how easy it is to feel like a martyr when it comes to keeping my house clean. To feel like I'm doing so much for them and they just aren't appreciating me. Instead, I should be looking for the blessings of having a home and a family to take care of. To view cleaning dishes and washing clothes and acts of love for my family. Aren't the most fun acts of love those that the person receiving never really know about? Yes, my kids will need to know how to use the washer and dryer. Yes, they will learn to wash dishes as they rinse and scrub alongside me, but if they don't realize all that mom does, can't I view that as me being a "secret helper"? It's all in the way you look at things.

Paper Clutter

So, my goal for this year has been simplifying my life and my home. This is a hard one. The other night as my kids were in bed, I came out from reading to them, looked around, and wanted to cry. There were papers ALL over the place. I have 2 children in school. The oldest is in 2nd grade and the younger one is in Kindergarten. They bring home So. Many. Papers. There are math papers, spelling papers, vocabulary papers, artwork papers, comprehension papers, and then all the notices from the school for wrestling, soccer, baseball, this fundraiser or that event. You want to know why the schools need more money? It's because of all the papers that get used and wasted. Okay, so maybe that is an exaggeration, but it still irks me. I can have a perfectly clean room, my kids get home from school, and all of a sudden it's clutter all over. And, if the baby finds any of those papers, they soon go from a single sheet, to about 20 pieces all over the place.

I told my husband that I want to home school just to cut down on the amount of papers floating around my house. We can use a white board for spelling and math, or something. I mean, what am I supposed to do with all these papers? Luckily my girls don't form real heavy attachments to them, I've been able to throw a lot of them away without them have a melt down. But then it just piles up in my trash can. It wasn't so bad during the winter when I needed something to start the fire, but I don't need that now. I really don't want to save them up for a bonfire, although I could. The point is to get stuff out, though, not save it up for the future. There really isn't a good recycling program where I live, clear out here in the boonies. I wonder if they are compostable? But I don't know about the inks.

I am so looking forward to the day when school get out and this trail of papers quits coming to my door. Now I just need to get off the credit card offer and junk mail lists and life will be good.

Killing Capitalism

A few years ago a group of citizens gathered together looking to organize a Farmer's Market. My husband and I had participated in one in the last town we lived in and were interested in possibly being a part of this one. We went to one of the early meetings and listened to what they were proposing. We thought long and hard about participating, but sadly, our garden and orchard did not fare well that summer, so we did not participate. However, because we had expressed interest, we were put on the mailing list. I recently received an application to participate this year, along with a letter from the manager. This letter included a description of some changes they have made to the Market, including a cooperative Market plan. I was appalled as I read about this. The managers of the Farmers Market want to regulate what you sell and when you sell it. They are going to limit who can sell what. Only 3 vendors will be allowed to sell any given produce item, but they cannot all sell said produce item on the same week. For instance, if you want to sell Roma tomatoes (the example they gave), only 3 vendors can sign up to sell Romas, but each has to pick different weeks to sell them. This means that if all your tomatoes are ripe on July 1, but that isn't your week, you are out of luck. You can sell other tomatoes, if you've signed up to sell that variety, but not Romas. This is what they have to say about their idea:

Cooperating gives everyone a share of sales and avoids over-saturating the market. It also allows the Market to work for you by advertising your products--you make more money!!

Seriously!? Do they really believe this? They must if they decided to adopt this plan, but I have to tell you, it goes against so many things I believe in. If an individual wants to plant a specialty crop that they are sure no one else will have, that is great and they should be able to decide that for themselves, but if someone want to plant an acre of Roma tomatoes and take them to market to sell, they should be able to, when those tomatoes are ripe. What happens if your tomatoes are not ripe on your chosen week? Can you trade weeks with someone who maybe does have ripe tomatoes? What if yours are ripe, but you can't sell them, are you supposed to let them just go to waste, or do you try to store them until it is your turn and then you have less than great quality produce. As a consumer, we have a right to choose what we buy. We should be allowed to inspect other's quality of produce, customer service, and price to decide what we want, not be limited to what the "cooperative Market plan" says.

Now, I know I wasn't at the meeting where this plan was adopted so I can't say I was there to oppose the idea. However, this is not a Market that encourages people to participate in it. I know some people still will. They have wares and are looking to sell them. They will work with the Market's "plan" and I hope they are successful. I, however, will not be. I don't know that my garden would support me doing this, I mostly garden for my family, but even then, not sure this is a place that I would want to go. I think I would almost rather travel farther to a more friendly market that is not going to try and regulate what I can and cannot sell.

Here's the thing, Capitalism works! When we participated in a Farmer's Market before we got to know the other vendors. We got to know who had what, and who had the best what. There was one farmer who had the most delectable nectarines. He usually sold out within an hour, if you were lucky. Sometimes quicker, so you had to be there early. How sad it would be if he was told he couldn't bring them at times, and I did get there early. Another vendor had apples that were the perfect blend of sweet, tart, and crisp that I've ever had. I know I would miss it if he wasn't allowed to sell his apples. And finally, the mustard lady. I love gourmet mustards. This lady has all kinds, along with the best sea salt seasoning mix ever. I love putting her sea salt mixture on my grilled and roasted vegetables. If by some chance I went to Market and she wasn't there, I think I would be mad. Yes, maybe I would find something better, but I should be able to choose. The thing is, these vendors developed relationships with us. They learned who we were and we learned who they were. We learned about their gardens and orchards and all sorts of things. They watched my kids running around and growing year to year. Don't tell me that I can't support my friend because it isn't "their week".

When you have different vendors all selling the same thing, well, something about them needs to be better than their neighbor. Maybe they have better customer service, maybe their prices are better, or maybe their wares just look better. When you have more than one person selling the same thing, they are going to work to make sure you are getting a great deal. When only one person is selling, well, you get what you get, or you choose to get nothing. If there is a saturation of the market, well, vendors learn, and you let them fail. The market will still get whatever their agreed upon percentage is. Take away the competitive edge and you lose, the consumer loses, the vendor loses, the market loses. Allow people the freedom to learn, grow, and yes, sometimes fail, and if they are smart, they fail forward to something better. Better ways of growing, better varieties to grow, or maybe just better ways to advertise and display. People win when they are allowed to learn and grow, they lose when someone makes most of the decisions for them.

I think the saddest thing for me is that more people involved have not stood up for their freedom to choose. That the people at that meeting, while trying to help their market, are in reality adopting practices that time has proven to cause more harm than help. For our local economy I hope the farmer's market is successful. I hope that the vendors who do participate find it to be worth their while. I also hope that more people will become educated and speak out to protect our free market economy.

New Schedule

After reading a couple of other blogs and looking at my life, I decided I wanted a new schedule. I am really leaning towards homeschooling my kids next year and I need something that will work for our family. Plus, I've noticed that my kids, and truthfully myself, do better with some kind of routine. So, over Spring Break last week I decided to try something new. I've been reading about working with the kids and wanted a better way to make this work, so I decided that we would have breakfast and then work until our noon meal. Because most of my children are still fairly young I either worked with them or near them. We went through the house systematically and got a room finished before moving on, or until stopping to eat. After our noon meal there was a short "quiet time" period where the baby was supposed to take a nap (that didn't always happen) and after that we had free time where the kids could do whatever they chose. If the weather was decent enough they went outside and rode their bikes or played. If it was too cold or windy or rainy (or all three) then they read books or played make-believe. After dinner we would often do some fun family activity.

So that was the plan. For the most part it worked fairly well. My husband was home quite a bit of this week with a pinched nerve in his back, and so that kinda threw things off a bit. The kids just act different when Daddy is around. Overall, though, we got a lot accomplished. The kids did well with learning to put things away and it also made it a little easier to put their books and toys away knowing that they were going to get to play with them later. I got "help" doing a lot of the housework. I'm sure I could have done it faster on my own, but knowing the kids were helping me was a whole lot better than wondering what they were messing up while I was cleaning up. One day we washed walls, and that was hard. Little arms were getting sore and it was pretty boring. We learned singing songs while we worked helped it to go by faster. The best part, my house has stayed tidier for longer. We still have quite a ways to go because quite frankly, I'm lazy, but we are working on it.

I also tried to make our noon meal the big meal of the day. It's supposed to be healthier for you that way. This worked okay. I would get up and we'd have a pretty good breakfast, not really big, but good. I'd cook for lunch what I'd normally make for dinner. But then I wasn't sure what to have for dinner. That is where the problems came in. So, we would often end up making something heavier than I would have really liked. I would have been fine with a salad and smoothie, but the rest of my family wasn't keen on the idea. Some days they will eat salad, but not very much and the smoothie by itself wasn't enough. We also could only eat leftovers so many times before they wanted something new. I still love the idea of the big meal at noon. Maybe I could just do sandwiches or quesadillas for dinner?

I know a lot of moms (and kids) that just go crazy over spring break because they don't know what to do, but I felt like we all had a lot of fun. We had a plan, we had work and we had play. We didn't go anywhere special or do anything extra ordinary, but our ordinary days took on meaning and having a clean house made it a nicer place to be. I definitely want to use this during the summer. I am still using parts of it now. I am trying to discipline myself to work in the morning so that I can rest and play with my kids in the afternoon. I feel better when I do this, and the kids seem happier, which makes life at home a lot more pleasant. Do you have a schedule for your day?

Why Staying Home is Important to Me

So why do I think it's so important to stay at home with my kids? Well, I think many of the problems facing us today are because of the breakdown of the family. Home is supposed to be a safe place where you have people who love you. It should be stable where the rules are enforced for the good of everyone. Yes, I said rules. A safe home has strict guidelines that keep the people there safe. Home is where you first learn that hitting is not okay and if you use language that is inappropriate you may get your mouth washed out. Home is the place where when you got your feelings hurt by someone saying something mean to you, you could come home and feel loved and know that your worth does not depend on what someone else said on the playground.

I had an interesting experience a couple of years ago. I had moved to a new town and one of my friends was helping to direct a school play. A couple of weeks into it one of the main characters quit and suddenly they were a person short. She did some character shifting and asked me if I would come in and do a small part in the play. I said sure. What I saw when I showed up shocked me. Kids were missing their cues right and left. Backstage they were talking and joking, but definitely not paying attention. They were not listening to the director, or her assistant. The worst part to me, a couple of members of the cast were teachers! Instead of lending support to the director and encouraging the kids to pay attention, they were standing around talking or doing nothing. Now, you don't have to take over for the director to help encourage someone to pay better attention. I saw young adults who had very little respect for authority and I saw adults who did not know how to instill or inspire that respect in their pupils. What happened here? I'll tell you what I did. I gave a lecture. I told the kids that I had never participated in a play where such disrespect was shown. I had never been in one where so far along and kids were still using scripts and consistently missing their cues. If this had been my high school when I was growing up then the director would have either canceled the play, or at the very least pushed it back. I could not believe the disrespect that they were showing the director and assistant director, and I told them so. It seemed like they took some of my words to heart because things did get better and the play went off okay. I learned a lot during those couple of weeks, though.

What does this have to do with mothers staying home? My parent's taught me to respect authority, even if you don't agree with it, respect it. It made me wonder how many of those kids had mothers at home with them when they were learning the core values of right and wrong and how to show respect to others. Or were their moms at work? I know that there are circumstances where both parents need to work outside the home, but there are a lot of "things" that we could do without to have better children and let a mom stay home. Another "better" car, cable t.v., a closet full of nice clothes, a room full of educational toys may all be nice things, and sometimes we think they are necessary things, but what is the true cost? I've heard time and again how little kids are more excited about the box that a toy came in than the toy itself, so even if it does teach them their colors and numbers, do they really need it? Wouldn't it be more fun for both of you, and less expensive, if you went and looked through a picture book and counted the puppies or named the colors of the flowers? Bonus, child is learning all of that, spending time with you, and growing more secure and confident all at the same time. Plus, it's good for adults to stop and count the flowers once in a while.

I also wonder what has happened to our society where adults don't teach, and expect, respect from children? There are some wonderful adults out there who do know how to get respect, but so many times I've seen kids walk all over adults. I've heard kids sass their parents, and not get punished for it. I've seen kids walk out of classrooms with the teacher doing next to nothing about it. Some of these same kids are those who grow up and when they get fired from a job for not listening to their boss they wonder what happened and moan about how life is so unfair for them and their boss was just unreasonable.

I know a lot of good moms who give up a lot of things once they have children. I have friends all over the place who have decided to stay home. Some want to give their kids all that they had growing up, some want to give their kids what they never had growing up, and some want to do a little of both. One thing that is common for all of these moms is that they love their kids. They want the best for their kids and they want to be the one there to teach them, to love them, and to make sure that they are being taken care of.

I think by staying home and creating the kind of environment where kids can grow into honest, hardworking people I am helping society. I believe that the more kids who have stable home environments, who have mother and father around who love them and take care of them, who have these good role models, the better our world will be. The more families there are who have both parents at home, the fewer problems kids have with drugs, sex and violence. The more times a child sees and connects with their parents the fewer their chances are that they will get into trouble. It's not always perfect, kids each get to grow up and make their own choices, but if given direction and teaching early in life they can avoid a lot of hard times later.

I want to always be there for my kids. I want to create the kind of home where they learn right from wrong. A home where they learn that honesty is the best policy and where my girls learn how to be good wives and mothers and my boy learns to be a good gentleman. I want to teach my girls to let gentlemen open doors for them and to be gracious when they do. I want to teach my son to hold the door open for ladies and girls. I want to teach my kids the Christian values that I grew up with and believe in. Values like don't steal, cheat, or swear. Be honest in you dealings with other people. Wait until you get married to have sex. Treat others with respect. I want them to learn about hard work and how the best things in life take time and lots of work. Along with teaching them, it helps to remind me. The best things in life are worth working for, but they often take time and effort. A diamond takes thousands of years to make and is under intense heat and pressure. A good person is often the same way. They have to grow up, they face pressures to see if they will hold to their standards, they will have to face growing up, but in the end an honest, hardworking person is someone that people can count on and that is the person that you want to work for you. That is the kind of people I hope to raise. That is the kind of person I hope to be.

I know that I haven't explained myself as well as I would have liked. My thoughts always sound better in my head. I truly believe, though, that my kids will benefit from me being home with them. Yes, we may not have as many "things" as if I was out working and bringing in an income, but some things can't be bought. Time is a precious commodity and I choose to spend as much of it with my kids as I can.