Eleven Tidbits

If I could sum up today in one word, it would be LAZY.  With our guests gone and the first big part of my parents' move over, I felt all entertained-out and could hardly summon up the motivation to do anything.  So I did very little - almost nothing, really.  I didn't even cook dinner, because it was Jeff's annual end-of-the-year barbershop dinner out, at Wood Grill Buffet (at which the boys behaved beautifully and I had a lovely time chatting with Jenny).  I wouldn't want every day to be a lazy day (and no one else in my family would want me to have lazy days all the time either!); but for today, it was SO nice to relax and not worry about accomplishing much.

I did, however, start a project that I'd been wanting to do for a while but had pushed aside until a rainy day, so to speak.  (It did, as a matter of fact, rain a little bit here today, so I happened to choose an appropriate day for this rainy day project.)  :)  I have a basket-like file box, with hanging file folders in it.  Although some parts of it were in fairly good order, others were not; and it needed a good going-over to get the whole thing organized.  It was one of those things that I thought "this is going to take a LONG time" and "I'd better do this when I have some alone time so I won't be distracted by the boys."  But as it turns out, I was able to nearly finish the project today; and much of my time spent working on it was also spent in the company of one or more boys.  Even Shav cooperated wonderfully, and played peacefully by himself in the living room, occasionally scooting over to me to see what was going on.  I would hand him papers to be discarded, and sometimes he would crumple them and enjoy the noise, and other times, he would scoot over to the little trashcan and put the papers in it.  So helpful.  :)

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Speaking of Shav putting things in the trashcan...

We use that little trashcan, during cold weather, to collect paper and burnable trash for kindling for the woodstove.  Shav enjoys making random deposits in it; and when I pull out the trash to burn, I've learned to always check through it to see what he might have put in it.  These are some of the items I've found so far this fall and winter:
~ a spoon
~ Christmas ornaments
~ Scoop, the yellow tractor from Bob the Builder
~ a wooden spatula
~ bullet shells (the big boys like to play with old bullet shells, setting them up on end like toy soldiers)
~ a stencil
~ a large sieve
At least the sieve was easy to spot when I lifted the lid of the trashcan.  :)

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As I went through my file folders today, I found the folders I have for Medical Records for each of us.  One thing stood out to me about them:  our folders for the boys are so thin.  I discovered a new cause for gratitude...thank You, God, that my boys have been so healthy, and consequently, their folders are so thin!

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We received news a few days ago that dear Helen Rae, the mother of long-time family friend Mary Faith, passed away.  She was quite old and had been losing the battle with dementia for some years, so it was one of those deaths that is, in many ways, a relief.  But still, grief lingers.

It was poignant tonight to discover in my Wedding folder, a letter Helen Rae, always gracious, had sent to my parents shortly after my wedding.  It said in part:

What beautiful memories you have to treasure in your heart of your lovely Davene, from the time she was conceived until now.  And of course, it doesn't stop here!  Your joys are multiplied.  I'm praying that Jeff will be as sensitive to your needs and Davene's, as Jerry has been to ours.  That, indeed, is expecting a lot!  

I have never seen lovelier invitations.  I almost feel that I have been a part of it  all.  Mary Faith filled me in on all the details which you had planned so carefully.  How dear that your mother was able to attend.

It's apparent that her prayers for Jeff to be sensitive to my needs and my parents' have been abundantly answered!

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Once upon a time, I wrote a post of confessions.  It's time to add another one.

I know I'm supposed to brown meat before I cook it in the crockpot.  Roasts, Swiss steak, pork chops, whatever - they're all supposed to be browned on the stove first because it makes the flavor richer (or something).  But I don't do it.  Nope, I use the crockpot so I can be a lazy cook; and the thought of browning the meat first (and getting a frying pan all dirty and greasy, making an extra dish for me to wash) defeats the purpose in my opinion.  Maybe the flavor suffers a tiny bit; but really, if you did a blind taste test, do you think you'd be able to figure out which roast was browned and which wasn't?  I think making a great-tasting roast has more to do with the seasonings you put on it.  That's just my {humble, of course} opinion.  :)

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How do people find your blog?

Every once in a while, various bloggers that I keep up with will mention what searches brought people to them; and it's always interesting and frequently hilarious to read.  Now that Blogger has added a handy-dandy stats button, I occasionally look at mine and am able to see how people found me.  Most are very straightforward, but a few make me grin and/or shake my head in puzzlement.  Searches like these actual ones I've seen recently...

~ around my bubble
~ mother in law visits are too long (for the record, I don't think they are, but I can see why a search for that would lead to my blog)
~ maternity shop tel aviv
~ i'll go to bed now
~ avniel pronunciation
~ a thank you note from god to a grieving fisherman family
~ geriatric story nursing home story oh holy night
~ tomcat holy ghost (really?  what in the world?  I actually had to look this one up to discover what it led to...sure enough, it landed on this post...oh, yeah, I forgot about that)

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This is the way Jeff and I show love to each other these days:  whoever goes up to bed first turns on the other's electric blanket.  ;-)  It's so comforting to crawl into a nice warm bed, rather than the sheets which always used to feel frigid on winter nights.

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Why does it seem like I'm always the one to discover that there's not much toilet paper left on the roll?  Occasionally when I spot a roll that looks close to the end, I'll think, "Oh, I'll pull out a fresh roll later."  But I've learned that it's best to do it right then, because if not, inevitably I will be the one left in an uncomfortable predicament.  Why does that happen to me?   Maybe the system of justice in the universe demands that my procrastination will have negative consequences.  Or maybe it's just because I'm the only female in this household, so maybe I use the most toilet paper.  ;-)

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Do not depend on the hope of results... You may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and even achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect.  As you get used to this idea, you start more and more to concentrate not on the results, but on the value, the rightness, the truth of the work itself.

~ Thomas Merton

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Tomorrow, if I happen to have more energy than today, I think we'll start taking down our Christmas decorations.  The boys want us to leave our tree up indefinitely, but that idea has been vetoed.  I love their enthusiasm though.  :)  Doesn't it seem like it was the beginning of December just the other day and we were putting our decorations up?  And now we're taking them down already!  How does that happen?!  :)

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The chain of cause and effect which makes up human life, is bisected at every point by a vertical line relating us and all we do to God.

~ Baron Von Hugel,

quoted in an Elisabeth Elliott devotional

Let the Moving Begin!

Today was the first official day of my parents' move from their "old" house into Dad's-old-office-turned-residence.  We refer to the two buildings in grand terms:  The East House is their old one, and The West House is what they're moving into.  In the West House...

There were beautiful empty spaces, just begging for something to fill them. (And we did.)

New hardwood floors waiting to be scratched...er...I mean...um...carefully walked on and furniture set gently upon.  ;-)

Jeff and my brother David moved the beds over to the new house.

David also wielded a mean feather duster while Lori showed off her muscles by carrying dresser drawers.  :)

My mother, who LIKES detail work (bless her heart!), focused on cleaning the ancient refrigerator that they moved over from their shed.  I'm not sure, but I think the frig might be older than I am.  But being the penny-pinchers that they are (that's a compliment!), they chose to continue to use it, rather than buy a new one.

Mother was fueled by her ever-present companion, her iced tea cup.  If we were somehow able to count the number of gallons of tea that have been drunk by her from this cup, it's likely to be more than the amount of water in the Shenandoah River!  :)

Two of our neighbor girls came over to help out by watching Tobin and Shav at our house while I was helping my parents.  All the other kids (Josiah and David and their cousins) did a great job of helping; they truly contributed to all that was accomplished today.  When their energy and spirits were lagging, all I had to do was say, "I'll race you back to the old house," and they perked up right away.  I think they beat me at every single race, too.  ;-)

My strong brother held up a bookshelf while the whole earth titled.  Oh, wait, that was just the camera tilting. ;-)

His lovely wife started organizing the kitchen.  And the worst part is -- she left before she finished the job!  We should have demanded that she stay with us for a few more days/weeks/months, so that she could complete what she started.  ;-)

All in all, it was a GREAT day; and we really got a lot accomplished.  There is much more to be done, however.  ;-)

I'm really proud of my parents.  When they decided to sell this house to us, they went through a considerable period of downsizing as they moved into a much smaller house.  Then when Dad retired, he sorted through and got rid of an immense amount of medical stuff as he prepared to change his office into a house.  Now, as they go through this move, I'm reminded of how they've handled these transitions with grace, holding their possessions with a light grasp, and keeping their eyes focused on their home to come.  Their real home.  Their permanent home.

Thank You, God, that when we move there, we get to travel light...and You do all the moving for us!  ;-)

All We Need Is the People

We're hosting a fellowship potluck tonight, and today has been a day of preparation for that.  I've had good helpers, especially when it came time to make the birthday cake.  ;-)

The chairs are waiting.

The plates are waiting, too...

...as are the glasses...

...and the forks, knives, and spoons.

All we need now is the people!

We Tweak

My laundry room is a wonderful place.  (For a better view of it, click here for this post in which I did a little tour of that room.)  But there's something in us women that makes us want to tweak our surroundings, even when we're quite happy with them.  There's always a little something that could be changed: a new picture hung on the walls, or the furniture rearranged slightly, or an accessory added somewhere.  We're always fine-tuning our environment.  And it's not just something women do, by the way.  Jeff, for example, likes to tweak stuff related to his work.  Take his business website; he's often fiddling around with it, changing things here and there, updating info, using a new way of scheduling appointments online, etc.  He's a tweaker, too--just not in household stuff like I am.  I'm pretty sure he doesn't lie in bed at night wondering what to hang on our walls.  ;-)

Back to the laundry room...  I really was satisfied with it, but then I thought, "I think I can make it a little better."  :)  I realized that one thing I didn't like about the room was how, as soon as I cleared all the dirty clothes off the floor, another item of clothing would get put there, and the pile would begin to grow again.  We do have a wonderful laundry chute that holds most of our dirty clothes, but sometimes clothes get taken directly to the laundry room, and I didn't like the messy feel that would quickly begin to develop in the room once that first item of clothing was dropped there.  My idea was to get a three-part laundry hamper to put in the laundry room so that clothing could be sorted and placed into that instead of cluttering up the floor.  When I looked online to order one, I found some nice normal (boring) hampers that would have worked fine; but then I saw these animal ones...

...and soon abandoned my plan of a normal hamper in favor of these silly ones.  Besides the way they bring a smile to my face, I also wanted them because my plan is to incorporate Josiah and David more in the ever-present laundry project; and if these funny faces make it more enjoyable for my boys, that's reason enough to have them.  I'll let them introduce themselves...

Hi, I'm a friendly duck!  What's that, you say?  You've never seen a blue duck?  Well, I have one thing to say to that:  now you have!  You know how it is with the genetic engineering they're doing these days; you just never know what's going to hatch!  Anyway, my job is to hold the darks; and this family sure has a lot of them!  I'm usually stuffed to the bill.

I'm a happy frog, and I hold the light-colored clothes.  My mouth doesn't stay shut very well, so you can always peek inside me.  See Shav's sleeper inside me?  I sure love soft cuddly clothes! 

Hello!  Mrs. Ladybug here.  I love my spots, but not the ones on the white clothes I hold.  It's a good thing nobody puts me inside that big machine across the room; it might make my spots come off, too! 

When I get my act together and do a better job of guiding Josiah and David through their daily chores, I want them to, each morning, get the clothes out of the laundry chute and sort them into the proper hampers.  I think they'll have a lot of fun with this.  I am, anyway!

Inviting colorful critters into the laundry room wasn't the only way I tweaked it.  While cleaning out and organizing the cellar recently, I came across these old crocks; and suddenly an idea burst into my consciousness.  Why don't I use them to store my laundry soap?  

I'm not one of those thrifty souls who makes their own laundry soap.  Nope, I just buy mine at the store, whatever kind is cheap.  

But rather than leaving it in the box and having that sit out on my counter, I'd much rather put it into a crock (one for the detergent and one for Oxyclean, since I've been adding a little of that to every load recently--ever since Jeff's mom was here and started doing that in the laundry) and store it that way.  It's more beautiful like that.  :)

Jeff is always kind and affirming when I tell him about the ways I've tweaked things around here, but he doesn't get too excited about such things. :)  He did, however, tell me that he really likes the fact that I put the soap in the crocks.  His reason?  Because it makes the laundry room smell so fresh.  :)

Taking Advantage of Free Labor

I've been spoiled recently.  Having Jeff's mom here means having an extra pair of extremely helpful hands, ready and willing to do whatever task is at hand.  

One task that I knew I wanted to do this fall was make applesauce.  We had run out of all our home-canned applesauce, and a cellar without homemade applesauce is a sad cellar indeed.  :)  Rather than spending time in September or early October to tackle that project, I decided to wait until Jeff's mom was here; I wouldn't want her to miss out on the fun after all.  :)  (Last year, by the way, when she stayed with us for three weeks shortly after Shav's birth, our canning project was peaches.  We always make sure she gets a good dose of canning while she's in this part of the country!)

We ended up devoting the better part of the afternoon on two days to our applesauce project:  school in the morning, applesauce in the afternoon. 

We made applesauce out of about 3 bushels of apples (and despite the picture above, we did not get the apples from Romney Orchards; that's just an old wooden crate my parents have that we used to transport the apples!), and we ended up with 52 quarts:  47 canned, and 5 frozen.

We used Yellow Delicious apples, and the applesauce was so sweet that we didn't need to add any extra sugar.

I was beyond grateful to have the help of both my mother and my mother-in-law.  We made a very good team as we worked together--my mom specializing in cutting the apples to get them ready to cook and in washing the dishes as we finished up, Jeff's mom specializing in running the apples through the mill, and me specializing in the canning process--although, of course, we all helped out in a variety of ways.  Three are better than one, for they can make a whole lot of applesauce a whole lot more quickly than one woman by herself!!  That's my loose translation of Ecclesiastes 4:9 anyway.  :)

I had heard about these food mills from several friends (real-life and blogging) but did not have one.  When Jeff's mom found out that we were going to make applesauce and that a mill was available to make the process easier and quicker, she bought one for me--a most useful and appreciated gift!  We were thrilled by how much it sped up the process and by how little waste there was.  The chickens liked pecking at the skins and seeds that came out of the mill, so really, it wasn't wasteful at all!

Both Josiah and David took a turn at the handle, but David was the one who liked it the most and stuck with it.  It was a genuine help to have him doing this job.

The end result: pleasing to look at, delicious to taste, and... 

 ...a sweet reminder during winter's cold days of the time spent in my warm, cozy kitchen with two women I love.

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Encounters #6 & 7
Making friends is an interesting task:  sometimes quick, sometimes slow, sometimes easy, sometimes difficult, sometimes one-sided, sometimes mutual.

When I was a child, it seemed easier to make friends than it does as an adult.  Back in those days, if a girl was nice and if we had fun playing together, she was my friend--easy as pie!  Now, with a busy life and little time for "play," friendship usually seems much slower to develop.

Two encounters come to mind, as I think about making friends.  The first occurred when I arrived at college and discovered that one of my roommates (I had two at the beginning of that year) was a sweet girl with long, dark, curly hair and a big, quick-to-laugh heart.  Her name was Juli Yoder, and we hit it off instantly.  What a precious gift to have her friendship to help ease me into the huge transition of leaving home for college!  She left college after a semester because of her romance with Bryan, a young man back at her home who was pursuing and wooing her.  They ended up getting married during Christmas break of my sophomore year, and I was honored to be one of her bridesmaids (and wear a gorgeous navy blue velvet dress, by the way).  :)  It was her wedding that caused me to fly to Israel by myself (as I mentioned in this post).

Looking back, however, I believe that that was the last instantaneous friendship I've had.  Don't get me wrong:  I've been blessed by an abundance of friendships in the years since then, but each of them has taken more time to develop.  Like with Jayne, Carolyn, Jacqueline, and Maggie...

Those four women were part of a church in San Diego that we joined back in 1998, during the first year of our marriage; and they were the first to reach out to me and, as such, were hugely instrumental in helping me grow spiritually in ways that I could hardly have imagined I would grow.  God used them to sharpen me like iron, and I will forever be grateful for their input (as well as the barrels of fun we had and the mountains of memories we made along the way).

But here's the thing about those four women (and the many other wonderful friends we made in San Diego):  the friendship wasn't immediate.  I remember my initial encounters with them; I felt guarded and reluctant to open my life and heart to them.  They were so different from me!  Could they ever really be my best friends?

They could, and they were.  Imagine:  a Jewess, a Hispanic, an African-American, and a Texan, all creating such a circle of love and security and spiritual friendship around me.  It was amazing, and my surprise at our developing friendship led to sheer delight at how God made our paths to cross.

And so, from these two encounters, I learned that friendship, that dear, sweet gift that brings such joy to life, sometimes comes quickly and sometimes comes slowly.  But either way, it brings so much rich beauty to our days.  Nowadays, if I meet someone and hit it off right away, I give thanks for that; and if it takes a little longer to click with someone, I don't fret, but give thanks anyway!

Flashbacks...or, David as a Two-Year-Old

Recently I've been trying to find some extra minutes to spend on a never-ending project:  organizing our pictures on our computer.  Our regular computer plods along like a donkey with too-heavy burdens swinging from its sides:  it eventually gets where it needs to go, but the slowness of the ride is apt to drive a person crazy.  Jeff tells me what percentage of our computer's storage space is used up by my pictures; and although I can't remember the amount, I know it's astonishing.  And so I resolve to organize, delete, label, do everything I want to do before Jeff transfers the picture folders into other storage options.  Being a perfectionist in this area, I can't bring myself to say, "OK, have at it.  Just transfer the pictures to a disk and be done with it.  I'll sort through them later."  No, I must have them in perfect order before this occurs.  It takes a while, but Jeff is patient with me.  And our old computer plods along...

The good thing about this is that it is incredibly fun to look through old pictures and be reminded of how things were even a few years ago.  The boys have changed so much.  That isn't profound or original or surprising, but it is oh-so-true.  They've changed SO MUCH, to the point of it being a little bittersweet to even see the old pictures and watch the old movies.  I'm so glad we captured those moments, but could we please just go back and relive them?

I've finished the 2007 folder, and found some videos of David that made me smile...and made my heart ache...and made me laugh...and made me sigh.

First, this is David in January 2007; he was one year and nine months old.  Of course, I think he had impressive rhythm skills for being so young!  :)

This was taken two days before David turned two years old.  I'm so grateful that we have a record of how he {so cutely} said the name of each family member.

I thought David would never get around to talking.  His "everything" word was "ah-dah," and he used it for...well...everything.  But finally, just before he turned two, his tongue was loosed, and speech began to pour forth.  This video of him talking was taken on May 5, a few weeks after his second birthday.

David knew his letters at a very young age.  Even though he didn't say much, he was very good with all the letters; and we even joked that he would be reading and writing before he would be talking.  :)  In this video, he was two years and one month; and he had no trouble matching the letters to their appropriate place on the chart.  He's so smart...

...and cute...
...adorable...
...huggable...
...lovable.

A sugarlump of sweetness!

Last Year I Didn't Even...

...decorate my house for fall (a project that I love and look forward to with great anticipation).  I distinctly remember thinking about doing it, but then deciding not to worry about it.  Thick in the fog of Newborn-in-the-House Syndrome,  I could barely keep up with the essentials, much less the extras.  And decorating for fall was clearly an extra.

This year, however, is a different story.  Although there are still times when I feel like I'm not sure I can keep up with the essentials (like laundry...clean underwear for everyone in the house is kind of an essential!), I am keenly aware of how much more energy and vision I have for the extras this year.  I wouldn't say that life always feels easy, but it certainly feels a lot easier than it did a year ago!  My perspective is helped when I think back to September of last year, and I realize how far we as a family of six have come.

All of this went through my head this year as I joyfully pulled out my fall decorations which, although nothing fancy, are precious to me.  

Much more precious to me is the boy in the background of the above photo.  Let's take a closer look at him...

What are you doing, Tobin Bear?  Eating breakfast?  Smiling for the camera?  Happy that fall is almost here? Glad to see stuffed pumpkins and gourds and scarecrows around?

Me, too.  :)

The Clear Space

This is the blog post that I wanted to write earlier today, at 12:15 PM or so...

FlyLady says: Notice the clear space.

It's good advice, and I appreciate it and follow it. True, my nature is more prone to noticing the chaotic space, the black spot of imperfection on the otherwise crisp white cloth of my life, the things I didn't get done instead of what I did accomplish. But I know how endless that cycle of perfectionism is, and I *try* to avoid it.

But here is where my thoughts were today:

WHAT IF THERE IS NO CLEAR SPACE???

Oh, pardon me. I didn't mean to yell at you. But better I yell at you, my dear ol' blog, than at my precious ones, my little sweethearts who go behind me and make messes of areas which I've just cleaned up, my dear sons who somehow manage to make me feel like there is no clear space from the top of our house to the bottom.

As I ponder further, I realize that there are some clear spaces. Three, to be exact. One is our minivan which I excitedly cleaned out the night we got home from our vacation ("excitedly" because the clutter and crud in that vehicle was the worst it's ever been and was driving me absolutely nuts). One is Shav's room which I completely organized earlier this week as I switched out the clothes that are too small for him for the ones which fit him (and will fit him as he grows). And one is my stove top which I cleaned and scrubbed and scoured and labored over for quite a long time on Wednesday (after having procrastinated about that job for months). So yes, there are three clear spaces in my house.

If someone should walk into my house and find me standing glassy-eyed in front of my stove, keeping my gaze squarely on it and not glancing at the pile of clutter to the left...or find me laying on the tiger rug in Shav's room, looking all around his room...or find me sitting in the minivan (the parked, turned-off, in-the-garage minivan)...that person will know why: I'm noticing the clear space.

If I dare to let my gaze fall on any other square inch of surface in my house, I'll topple right over the edge of frustration and be pulled under by the wave of feelings of being overwhelmed.

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This is the blog post that I'm ready to write now...

Wow! Whaddya know?! There really is clear space in my house! And it's not just those three spaces I mentioned earlier!

As I sit to write this, I can visualize my neatly picked-up living room and my kitchen with all the dishes done. I gain encouragement from the items I deleted from the computer (our computer is so overloaded, and I constantly need to be working at the task of deleting stuff from it...mostly pictures). I feel satisfied with the paperwork I dealt with in my everlasting pile, and the "treasures" I put in the right spots in my boys' scrapbook/notebooks (not real scrapbooks, but they work well for us...but that's a whole other topic). I remember joyfully that my boys had a happy evening and that before I put them in bed, we all sat on the kitchen floor when our neighbor Rosalie came over to show us a butterfly that just hatched a few minutes previously...and Shav laughed and laughed as he watched Tobin's valiant attempts to jump (which resulted in a minuscule amount of space between Tobin's feet and the floor, but it was enough to entertain Shav). I have hope that, since the new FlyLady habit of the month is laundry, I'll do a better job with my Mount Washmore in the coming month than I have in July. I am pleased that I was able to do a small bit of homeschool planning today, enough to get us dipping our toes in the waters of 3rd grade and kindergarten when Monday morning rolls around. I am content.

I am also grateful--so, SO grateful--to this lovely lady...

...without whom I would not have gotten nearly as much accomplished and would not feel nearly as hopeful as I now do.

My dear mother kept Shav at her house for several hours this afternoon so I could focus my energies on housework while Tobin was in bed. (Because Tobin and Shav do not usually have simultaneous naps, I don't often have completely uninterrupted time in which to do my household duties; and although I'm trying to get better at doing those chores with my littlest men around, it's still a whole lot faster to do them alone!) And tonight after supper, she read to them--well, officially, she was reading to David and Tobin, but as you can see in the picture above, she drew a larger crowd than just those two--while I cleaned up the kitchen.

Thank you, Mother. I couldn't have done it without you. And that's the honest-to-goodness, literal truth. No exaggeration, no hyperbole. Just a fact. My heart is much lighter tonight and my house much more organized because of your kindness. THANKS for being available.

There's No Way I Could...

...possibly finish planning for this coming year of homeschool with our homeschool closet looking like this:

Nope. No way at all. It's impossible. I simply can't think straight with all my supplies so disorganized. For me, creativity doesn't come from chaos, but from order.

I'd better get busy... ;-)

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I just put up a post on The Foodie Spot--a recipe that my dad's mom used to make. She passed it down to my mom, and I learned it from her. I love the happy memories connected with these family food traditions!

When Mommy's Family Night Rolls Around...

...it usually involves either dinner out (so I don't have to cook and do dishes) or some kind of home improvement project (so my haven becomes a little more beautiful). I don't think Jeff looks forward to my family nights with quite as much enthusiasm as I do! But he's a good sport about it and doesn't complain a bit. :)

Last Friday night happened to be my family night; and for this particular one, I asked Jeff if we could go into our local Sauder furniture store and get a desk that was on sale there. We had talked for some time about getting a small desk for our living room so that eventually, we can have a laptop there for the boys to do their computer stuff on. One of the most basic--and probably easiest--steps to keeping your children safeguarded on the Internet is to have your computer in a room of the house that is not secluded. For us, even though we hope and pray that various Internet temptations are years away from our sons, we still felt like it was wise to go ahead and get this desk now and begin to get an area ready for a computer for them.

So we went to the store and got a desk, but it just so happened that we were having a fierce downpour at just the time that Jeff needed to load the desk into the van. Our area has been so dry that we were actually thrilled to see the rain, but the timing was decidedly inconvenient. Jeff ran out to the van, got soaked along the way, then drove it up to the door of the store so that the small overhang over the door would give some protection from the rain as he loaded the desk--and as we loaded the boys after he was done. Then we headed back to the barbershop to get the Jeep, since the boys and I had met him at his shop as soon as he finished working. We did have to make one stop along the way though: Dairy Queen for an M&M Blizzard for me, a Snickers Blizzard for Jeff, and hot fudge sundaes for the boys (for three of them anyway). :)

The worst part of the rain episode happened next. Jeff did not have the top on the Jeep, so not only was the seat thoroughly soaked, he also got rained on all the way home. Doesn't sound like much fun to me, but not a word of complaint came from his lips. What a guy. :)

And then, at home, he patiently and "without complaining or arguing" (thank you, Paul), built the desk. He had three little helpers, which of course, made the job much harder. :) Oh, but one of these days, they'll be able to use these skills he is carefully teaching them now; and what a wonderful thing that will be!

While Jeff was being busy and productive, I don't think I was accomplishing much of anything; at least, I can't remember anything significant that I did. I did take pictures...

...of the empty box.
Seeing a box with "Sauder" on it in my living room makes me excited. :)

And I took pictures of the builder hard at work...
...and his helpers waiting their turn...
...to use the real tools he gave them for Christmas...
...to help him turn a screw.

Tobin thought the box was a great place to lay down...
...and stand up.
Such sweet feet!

And then, the result of Jeff's labors...

...a simple, neat, attractive desk in our living room, ready for little boys to spread their math books on and do their lessons, ready for me to have some morning time with God with a cup of tea and My Utmost for His Highest, ready for a laptop--someday--for my sons to use for learning and fun.

Thank you, Jeff. Because of you, I LOVE my family nights!!! :)

Clues

My first clue was the general sense of uneasiness I felt when I went into the room. I just didn't like being in it; and although I try very hard to stay away from the "H" word ("hate"), in my head, I thought, "I hate this room."

My second clue was the way Josiah and David protested when it was their turn to be in this room for quiet time. Maybe that had to do with the fact that they could hardly find a clear spot on the floor to stretch out and do anything because of all the toys lying around.

My third clue was the fact that I haven't given Josiah a piano lesson in weeks, mostly because of the fact that the piano was in this room.

My fourth clue was the reluctance I felt about anyone seeing this room, even to the point of closing the door during potlucks or other times when we've had company over. We are open-door people, not closed-door, so having this room blocked off felt unnatural to me...but at the same time, I wasn't about to invite people into this room.

My fifth clue was this...

...well-defined handprints that someone artistically placed in the dust on top of my piano. That someone, by the way, is probably about five years old and has a name that starts with "D."

The handprints did me in. I decided that I absolutely, positively, most definitely had to clean the library this week, even if I had to abandon my summer project of reorganizing my kitchen, even if I wasn't caught up on the laundry, even if the mess in Tobin's room was multiplying at an alarming rate. No matter what, something had to be done in our library.

So I did something. Fortunately, with today being Wednesday, Jeff was off work and helped me tremendously by taking the boys and leaving the house for long stretches of time. As soon as he left this morning with the three older boys, I carted up from my dad's office one of the big green trash cans he has; and by evening, it was full. All the way to the brim. We had so much junk in that room--junk, junk, JUNK--that I was being driven batty by it. Clutter is hazardous to my health, and that room was a prime example of how destructive it is!

To be sure, I have a long way to go before that room becomes what I want it to be: a room which only contains things we need and/or love, a room in which the old adage "a place for everything, and everything in its place" is true, a room of order and simplicity and cleanliness.

But today was a start; and although I'm tired in body, I'm relieved in spirit. I know I won't have nearly as much time tomorrow to work in that room, but I hope I can carve out at least a little time to make some more progress in it. Decluttering and cleaning and organizing can be addicting! :)

Spinning My Wheels, and Strawberry Jam

At least I'm not spinning my wheels IN strawberry jam. Regardless, today was one of those days in which I had high hopes for getting SO MUCH accomplished; but at the end of the day, I found myself thinking, "Hmmmm. Did I actually do anything at all today?"

I did have fun tonight with Emily on our DQ Blizzard run. :)

My parents did celebrate 47 years of marriage today. Happy anniversary to two of my heroes!!! (Previous anniversary posts here and here and wedding pictures in this recent post).

I did print out directions and information for an upcoming homeschool conference we'll be attending.

I did make 5 and 1/2 pints of strawberry jam...

...but that happened two days ago so that doesn't count.

I did not finish going through the pile of paperwork by the telephone.

I did not fold the clean clothes languishing in the laundry baskets.

I did not shine my sink tonight.

Oh, well. Maybe tomorrow will be a more productive day!

Answering the Why

So why was Jeff making a hole in the wall late last night? Good question!

For those who don't know me in real life and have never been to my home, let me explain a little bit about the layout of our kitchen and living room. There is a wall between the two rooms, with wide openings at both ends, making a nice oval through the rooms. But Jeff and I wanted it to be even more open. In fact, before we realized that we would be living in this house (the house my parents built in the early 70s, the only house I had lived in as a child) when we moved back from Israel, we had thought about buying some land and possibly having a log home built on it. I can't say enough how much I admire log homes, and one of the features that stands out to me is the way the floor plan is usually quite open. When we knew we would be moving back to this house, we began to think about how we could achieve an open floor plan here. We even considered knocking out the dividing wall between the kitchen and living room entirely, but there was the "minor" issue of whether or not it was a load-bearing wall to think about. ;) We discussed knocking out most of it and just leaving two pillars. We also talked about making it a half-wall with two pillars on the ends. We thought maybe we would make one big hole in the center of the wall. But finally, we came to the conclusion that we would leave most of the wall, but make two holes, fairly close to each end.

Why choose this option and not something more drastic that would remove more of the wall? Mostly because we wanted the wall space for some paintings that Jeff's dad did (he was a professional artist, for those of you who don't know). We actually don't have much wall space at all in our living room; and without leaving a good-sized chunk of that wall, we wouldn't have room to display the Daniel painting in particular. The second reason is because of furniture placement. An open floor plan requires some creative furniture placement, and we weren't creative enough to figure out how to do that. :)

We had talked about all of this, but always in sort of a vague way. "At some point in the future, we will..." But not now. Not until we get some money saved up and are able to ask a professional to do it (because how in the world does someone make a hole in their wall - and have it look nice?!). :) That was my thinking.

Unbeknownst to me, our potluck last Friday evening was the straw that broke the camel's back in Jeff's mind. He looked around at the 43 people trying to cram into our living room and decided that the situation would be helped by having some open space between the kitchen and living room. In the future, if need be, some people could be in the kitchen but still be able to see and hear more clearly and feel more connected to what was going on in the living room.

With all that in mind, Jeff set to work last evening. I found out later that he had searched and found a video that gave instructions for this do-it-yourself project, and he got some handy tips from that. I am so grateful for his I-can-do-this attitude...AND for his uncomplaining willingness to enlarge the hole when I saw his original one this morning and decided that I really would rather have it bigger. That's true love. :)

And that's the reason we now have two lovely holes in our wall. It is not, as my parents suggested, so that I could keep a closer eye on the boys when they're in the living room. ;) Instead, it's so that we can have a feeling of openness and light and space and freedom - in both rooms. I like it so much.

The process isn't done yet. Jeff finished putting up the plaster (or whatever it's called) tonight, then had to wait for it to dry before he can sand it. But here are some pictures from this afternoon to give you an idea of how the wall will look.

Jeff was amazingly patient with little "helpers" who wanted to watch.

The living room side...

The kitchen side...

Another view of the kitchen side...it was quickly obvious how much more natural light the kitchen gets now...

The downside of this project: dust EVERYWHERE. It's a very fine dust and is very difficult to clean thoroughly. So for now, we have footprints on the floor. Special, isn't it? :)