Olive

2 year old Ginger

Ginger loves to wear dresses

She loves to sing
She squeezes her cats, chickens, dogs, and ducks (sometimes with bad consequences)
She loves her grandpa Ashurst
Her hair get curly when it gets wet, just like her daddy
She loves her blanky that grandma Ashurst made for her
She loves to play alone
She loves to dress up, especially with wings
She has been potty trained for about 2 months, but still insists I go with her every time
She tries to do everything the other kids do
Her and Sterling quarrel all day long
She gives good hugs and wet kisses
She is very tough, and wipes out a lot
She doesn't like mud on her shoes (which is a problem at our house)
She sucks her right thumb when she's tired
She love it when I do her hair
Every time I tell her "no" she says "why"
Her eyes are as blue as her moms
She calls her grandpa "tampaw"
She loves to play with dolls

She still cries when she has to go to nursery
We call her baby - she still is the baby of the family
She is growing up way too fast

The beginning of a Journal

My objective for this blog is to keep a sort of journal for my kids.
I found out today that a blog can be printed into a book, and decided that it would be cool to make books for my kids, so they can remember things that they won't otherwise. I will try to write a bit about each kid individually, as well as combination posts.

72 hours

I have not been the best at being prepared, until now. At church we are often reminded that we should be prepared for emergencies and bad times. Something sparked in me these past few weeks, and I have been working on my long-term food storage. One day at costco I bought 50 lbs of flour, 50 lbs of rice, a bunch of olive oil, and some other stuff. I felt pretty good about it.
Then on Sunday, I looked at an ordering list for the cannery. I felt inclined to order some more food storage. This time dried milk, oats, and spagetti. Unfortunately some of those things are not available, as so many stakes are currently pushing preparedness. Anyways, that got me thinking about our 72-hour kit. Back in 2001, Joe parents gave us a 72-hour kit for Christmas. I really didn't have any idea what was in it, so today I pulled it from the shop. Besides the fact that all the food was 7 years old !!!, it was also very incomplete. Back in 2001, we only had 1 child. Now we have 3. Also, there were no clothes, and some other essentials were missing too. The nice thing was that I didn't have to buy any of the tools, or other accessories that belong in a kit.
I ordered some MRE (meals ready to eat) and then went to Wal-mart. I replaced all the food, and bought enough for our family of 5. The only thing I still need/want to get is some backpacks to put all the supplies in. I think this will be easier to grab in an emergency situation.
As I was thinking about food storage and preparedness, I also realized I really should have a grain mill. They sell a mill that you can use either by hand, or attach it to my Bosch mixer. I had looked at this mill like 4 years ago, but didn't want to fork over the money. But today.... well, I guess I realize that I would really like to be able to feed my family.
So I am feeling pretty good about our preparedness. If something were to happen we have
- meat ; we can slaughter our animals
-fresh eggs
-water from our lake
-bulk grains (although I still need to order the wheat and get more sugar)
-things like baking soda, baking powder, shortening, salt, powdered milk
-fresh veggies from our garden (hopefully)
By no means do I think I have it set. There are still some vital things missing, like a water filter, and buckets to store my wheat, flour, rice and other bulk foods in. More foods, and more money in the bank.

$7 Bread

According to Joe I made 2 loaves of $7 bread today. I had bought some fun grains and seeds a while back, and today I had the baking itch. So I made whole wheat bread with sunflower seeds and Bulghar Wheat. For lunch I had some of it, still warm, with Dutch Gouda cheese. Yummy!! It melted in my mouth.
The reason I don't bake more often, is that it just takes so long to rise! Tonight for dinner I wanted to make Angela's home made pizza, but then I realized it had to rise more than an hour. And well, I just don't usually plan that long in advanced! I am lucky to start thinking about dinner at 5pm. Of course there's the occasional special day when I know exactly what I will make by noon, but that is not the norm.
The norm is: 5pm rolls around. I look in the fridge and disappointedly realize no meat is ready to use, it's all frozen solid. Then I decide to just use chicken, because it's easy. Then I decide on rice, pasta, or potatoes. After those 2 selections are made, I look in my pantry to see if there's anything in there to make a complete meal.
Often I find myself looking on the "meal list" and not wanting to make any of the recipes. I like to try out new things. But the drawback for that is that you usually need ingredients for those, that are not used regularly. Sometimes I'll make a weekly menu, and that really works great. When it's time to cook, it's not so hard to decide which recipe to make, because there's just a few choices, and I know that I have all the ingredients. But then there are those days that just nothing sounds good.

How NOT to grow a vegetable garden.

Ok, this is installment number 2 of how to grow a vegetable garden
Back in February I was very optimistic and naive about my great big vegetable garden plan. I bought a bunch of seed, and was delighted to see them sprout. Then, in March, I planted some of the supposedly "cold weather plants" outside. They all died. So I got discouraged and stopped my project all together. Somehow, last week I got a second wind, and decided that to be successful, I had to have the garden closer to the house. So I fortified the fence, and borrowed my neighbors rototiller. Those nice perfect little rows sat empty for 5 days while I contemplated what my next move would be. I read somewhere that you should put the plants outside several days before you plant them, so they can "harden". Well, I guess mine had been babied too much, and pretty much all of them wilted. This morning, after dropping off the kids at my friends house, I decided I had had enough. I caved, went to the store, and bought a bunch of -much larger- plants. Hopefully this time they won't just survive, but actually produce some veggies. No matter what you think, this is not really my favorite hobby. I just want some FRESH veggies, dag-nabbit.
Veggies I HOPE to harvest in a month or two:
Roma, Cherry, and Big Boy Tomatoes
Zucchini
Yellow Squash
Cucumber
Cantaloupe
Cauliflower (low hopes here)
Okra
Basil
Red, Yellow, and Jalapino Peppers
Beans
Watermelon
Pumpkin

Weaknesses

It seems that sometimes I get so wrapped up reading other people's blogs, that I forget to write my own. There are plenty of times when I read another blog, and I think I could write a lot of random important stuff on the subject. But then I somehow feel guilty. Would it be considered plagiarism? Of course not. But what if this person reads my blog, and thinks : "Can't they come up with their own ideas?". Honestly.. no. I have a hard time coming up with my own ideas. It is the same with my art. I love having some sort of assignment. I guess that's why I like contests and such. So I have considered joining some kind of group of artists that does just that. They have meetings and give assignments. Then you get back together and compare results. The only thing holding me back is the idea of having to meet all these new, strange people. What if they're freaky 40some year old men, with bad breath and no sense of personal space, have no social life, and are just waiting to become stalkers?? So there you go, those are some of my weaknesses. I am not very creative, and I'm scared of meeting new people.