Words of Wisdom and Tid Bits of Daily Life...

Remember always that you are just a visitor here, a traveler passing through. Your stay is but short and the moment of your departure unknown.

None can live without toil and a craft that provides your needs is a blessing indeed. But if you toil without rest, fatigue and weariness will overtake you and you will be denied the joy that comes from labor’s end.

Speak quietly and kindly and be nor forward with either opinions or advice. If you talk much this will make you deaf to what others say and you should know that there are few so wise that they can not learn from others.

Be near when help is needed but far when praise and thanks are being offered.

Take small account of might , wealth and fame, for they soon pass and are forgotten. Instead nurture love within you and strive to be a friend to all.

Truly compassion is a balm for many wounds.

Treasure silence when you find it. While being mindful of your duties, set time aside to be alone with yourself.

Cast off pretence and self-deception and see yourself as you really are.
Be of good cheer and with this understanding, summon strength and walk on.

Faith is like a lamp and wisdom it is that makes the flame burn bright. Carry this lamp always and in good time the darkness will yield and you will abide in light.

This was written by Buddha. I know I will be adding a copy of it to my Inspiration Journal.

Since our break from school, I have been doing a bit of sewing for Doodlebug and Doodlebug has been having a blast with summer activities. It is so good to see her enjoying her summer so.

Below is a photo of a little country girl top that I made. She is really into wanting to dress like a country girl these days.


I am still intending on adding an applique of a chicken to the bib top and making a little pair of ruffled leg capri pants to go along with it. I think I will add a farm animal to it too. She loves it and it fits pretty good. I made it from a McCall's pattern that I had not used before. I was not pleased with the pattern. I had to make quiet a lot of adjustments. I will be adding a note card to that pattern envelope with all adjustments needed so, that won't be a problem again.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful summer and also too, I hope all the dads have a wonderful Father's Day!

Blessings!!!

More Homeschool Adventures "Making Cheese"

You may want to pop down to the bottom of this 
page and turn off the music player before viewing.

Doodlebug and Papaw sure had a good time making cheese several weeks ago. Papaw picked up a cheese making kit when he was in Atlanta. He knew it would be a good homeschool science project for him and Doodles to do together. As you can see from the little video, they had a great time in the kitchen.

The little kit was awesome and had everything needed to make cheese except for a couple of gallons of milk. There were recipes for making all types of cheese but one of the simplest ones was the Farmhouse Cheddar. There was enough ingredients to make several batches of cheese so, next we are going to make a goat's milk cheese. We want to try making a soft type of cheese and thought goat's milk would be wonderful. I will be sure to let you know how this turns out and maybe take a few photos.


I wished I would have snapped off a few photos of the waxing process but, I was sick the day they waxed it and wasn't near the kitchen. Right now, the cheese has been aging a couple of weeks. We are thinking that it maybe ready near Easter. We will be sure to let you know how it tastes. I am so excited. I have always wanted to make my own cheeses. I have a secret dream of owning my own goats someday.

We stay so busy these days it is hard for me to find time to blog much. Doodlebug has been taking an enrichment geography class and a gymnastics class on Mondays. She has really been enjoying it so much. She should be going today but bless her heart, her allergies have really been giving her a hard time this spring and she isn't feeling real well today. She is so stuffy and I am afraid she may have a sinus infection because of the allergies. I had one myself last week but I can tolerate my home remedy to put an end to it but she can't handle it. I will be so glad when the tree pollens are down some but then, “Hello Grass Pollen!”

Will write again when I can. I am promising to try harder over the next few weeks.

Blessings!!!!

An Update On Life and a Few Homeschool Moments.

(I started writing this posting almost 2 weeks ago.)

As I write this, it is quiet in the house and I love this time of the morning. It is the time that I check emails and the website and catch up with friends on Facebook. These days this is my only free time.

Since at the beginning of December, I started homeschooling Doodles. It is a long story as to what led up to us taking Doodles out of public school and I won’t go into the details; although, I will say that we are more than certain this will be a very positive experience for her. Public school was no longer reflecting our values and morals. Also too, the school system did not seem to have its primary focus on academics. As it seemed to us, the school’s main goals were to teach the children how to excel on the TCAP test without really learning the basics. Many hours of a child’s day at school were being spent in prepping for this test rather than really learning how to read and answer a question but how to interpret the answers from an image provided. This was only one of our concerns. Our other concerns were the moral values were being overlooked and it seemed to us that more passive behaviors were being taught, which to us seemed to take away a child’s sense of determination to excel. We may be wrong in our view of the way the public school system is educating the kids these days; however, there were just many things that we felt we would prefer to teach Doodles instead of passing that responsibility on to another that maybe didn’t share our views, morals and values.

With that being said, Doodles does miss her friends from school but is doing tremendously well with homeschool. We are enrolling her in a few enrichment classes and gymnastics. Hopefully she will find other homeschool kids to develop friendships with. We just joined the homeschool network for our community and are starting to reach out to get involved in field trips and opportunities with other homeschool families. It is a lot of work and the day is filled with assignments, learning games and lesson planning. I am having a wonderful time though. It just seems spending this time now with her learning and seeing all the “light bulb” moments, I am the one who is being blessed.

We are having fun exploring together and she is getting to learn through hands on experiences too. Here are a few photos of some of our home school moments.


I know the photos looks a lot like just playing with straws although, it was a learning opportunity for her. We found a book called Inventing Toys that inspired this project. She Google searched towers. She was so excited to learn how to do that and she has found many places where the some of the towers are located that she wants to visit on vacation. It was a great opening into getting her to explore and learn more about the states and it was a great spring board for us.




Also started a unit study on things that grow. We decided to grow wheat grass. I had never grown wheat grass but all I can say is, WOW!!! It grows quickly and not a lot of seed is needed. There are wonderful health benefits from using wheat grass in smoothies or juicing so, it was a great decision to grow it for this project. She noted it's growth daily and watered it. As soon as it put off the second sprout of grass, we harvested it for smoothies.

Doodlebug loved getting to cut or mow the grass as she called it and make the smoothies. I figured the best way to get her into really trying the smoothies and maybe liking them were to let her be the one who picked the fruits and veggies to add. It worked. She loves veggie/fruit smoothies now.



The wheat grass gave the fruit smoothie a bit of a melon flavor. It was quiet tasty.



Doodlebug thinks one of the best things about homeschool is getting to do her work in her pj's. She also likes being able to help make the choices of the things she would like to learn more about. We have a basic curriculum book that we work from each day. We also use unit study books for more involved studies and they are so much fun. This is where her chance to explore really comes in. I am learning but there are so many wonderful resources on line. I have also learned that most homeschool families are some of the most generous and kind people and share books, equipment, resources, knowledge and are just so helpful. It has been a wonderful adventure for both Doodles and I.

I will try and share more photos soon and some of our activities. I am in hopes that very soon Doodlebug will work a bit more independent and give me a bit of time to blog again. Until then, blessings to you all!

Getting Into The Holiday Spirit

Our Christmas tree will be going up this weekend. Our outdoor lights will not be going up this year. Our decks and porches are being rebuilt and I don’t know if they will be done in time to make decorating worth it this year.

Most all of our Christmas shopping is done, yeah! I will not be out shopping on Black Friday, double yeah!!! I wish all of you that are going to be out there great success in finding what you are looking for. I also hope that folks remember to just be kind to one another. I think that would make shopping on Black Friday much more fun too. Remember, kindness spreads.

In the past few days, I have been glancing back at a few of our holiday photos from last year and thinking about how it would be possible to take different portrait photos of the family this year. It is pretty hard when I have no intention of changing anything about the tree this year. As you can see from some of the crazy photos, our family is a little nuts. I guess it doesn’t really matter what the set up is, just taking the photos with these clowns is memorable for me. Last year everyone was such a clown that it was almost hard to take the photos because I was laughing so hard. By far, these are in no way the funniest photos taken. These are just a few that I thought were cute and I would share. You can see more of the photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/tnmamaw/sets/72157622992635261/ You will get a better idea of what I am up against when I break out the camera.








I love this photo. I took so many photos the kids were seeing spots. I think this was my clue to stop.


The photo below is my favorite photo from last year. It is just so Luke, always keeping an eye on what his sister is doing.





I am still thinking I should change up some of the decorations on the tree but I have a style that is a simple, country look and haven’t thought about changing it in years. The other day Joe and I were in the store and he found Christmas lights that he and Joey would love to put on the tree. They were shot gun shell lights. I giggled and almost considered it but it just doesn’t seem right. I think they should put up a Christmas tree in their man cave/barn and decorate it. There is no telling what it would turn out like. Wow, I just totally got of track there.

In looking at the photos though, I would love to come up with another angle setup or something different and special for the 2010 photos. If you have any suggestions, I am open to hearing them. If we don’t change it up, it will still be lots of fun to take the photos. We always have fun doing them.

We are looking forward to spending time with the family for Thanksgiving. It will be nice to have a long weekend. This will be one of the first weekends in a while that Joe has not been working late on Fridays and on call for Saturdays in such a long time. I hope he will be able to kick back, relax and get some rest. He is battling a cold and hasn’t been resting well. Hopefully this weekend will give him some well needed rest.

I am looking forward to hanging out with the grandkids. Doodlebug is planning a family baseball game. It is suppose to rain this afternoon and tomorrow but hopefully it will be nice weather by Thursday to get a game going. I discussed this with Granny last night and she is willing to play too, if we can get a runner for her. I told her that wouldn’t be any problem we would put Doodles on her team. I think Doodlebug runs faster than anyone in the family so, I want to be on her team too.

Well, that’s all I have for this blog entry. I hope everyone has a wonderful, blessed Thanksgiving day with all your loved ones.

Blessings and hugs to you all!