Got an Old Pair of Jeans Laying Around??

Here's an idea for you if you have old holey jeans laying around. I happen to have several "old" jeans or worn out jeans that have holes in the knees etc...,laying around in my "I need to patch those up or make some sort of use out of them" pile! I tried patching Craig's jeans without success.The patches kept coming off.These holey jeans are just everyone's "work" jeans and I hate to have to go out and buy something for them to "work" in and ruin anyway. So,I still have my pile thankfully because I was taught a better way to patch those darn holes up.But,before my learning session occurred,I had a brilliant idea that came to mind when I was going over my pile of jeans.I had remembered one time being at a friends house and noticing a potted plant that someone had given to her.It had the top part of a pair of jeans on the outside of the potted plant.Kind of a cute idea, I thought to myself.For several weeks prior to this new found idea,I had been looking for some potting material for my hanging baskets.I had used spanish moss before and some other types of basket material,but,my plants always seemed to dry out really fast and,well,die on me....
I kept hoping to come across some "new" innovative idea in the garden centers for these hanging baskets and kept coming up with nothing...soooooo back to that moment,with jeans in hand....
I thought,couldn't I just use the jean material on the inside of the basket?Wouldn't it help to retain some moisture and yet provide drainage AND look really cute at the same time??
OF COURSE!!I got right to work and "tried" on different sizes of jeans for my different sized baskets and found ones that seemed to fit the best.I wanted to be able to have most of the waist part of the jeans folded over the edge of the basket,so when I put the dirt in,it wouldn't cave in and also it would add to the "cuteness" of the basket.I made sure I cut the jeans off in shorts style and overlapped the insides of the leg holes and then cut up more jean strips off of the remainder of the jean legs to fill in any gaps.It worked wonderfully.
I was so pleased with my little baskets and glad that I was able to do something with some of the jeans that I felt hopeless about.Also glad that I didn't use all of the jeans and learned how to patch properly....now I just have to get into my sewing room and put the good knowledge to work!!

Harvest

Well,here I am,finally putting up pictures from the garden..We have been drowning in tomatoes for the last couple of weeks,as you can tell from the picture above.I am preparing to can these, hopefully tomorrow.
Sebastian, Jade and Matthea all have enjoyed their garden this year. Each one of them planted sunflowers to place in their garden beds. Above is a photo of Matthea's sunflower. We'll be gathering the sunflower seeds and storing them for next year. Jade has already collected seeds from her morning glory and her dill plant.We will collect seeds from select tomatoes as well. They are all so proud of their accomplishment and how their food has been a part of most of our meals!
This photo, of the two carrots intertwined, is from Sebastian's garden.Pretty cool.
We had a few other veggies that decided to grow "together". One of Jade's tomato plants had several tomatoes that did that. The tomato plants were about to overtake our garden. They grew so fast and so big.I have been out there,I don't know how many times, to stake and re-stake those darn plants.Jade has been a big help with that. I had Craig out there too the other day. Unbelievably, it really takes a toll on your back.I think Craig's back is still hurting him,well,mine is too.
Jade has a cucumber plant that really took off.She's had a lot of cucumbers already and there are several more that are maturing.I don't know how much longer we will have for production.The weather is saying that we are going to have some cold weather here in a couple of days.Wednesday is suppose to get down to 30 degrees overnight and only have a high of 45 degrees.Yikes! That may just kill everything.

This photo, above, was taken before the other ones. This was when the plants almost overtook the garden and we were at war with the tomatoes, with stakes in hand!! It's been hard trying to keep up with all of this without Craig here. Yes, he's been in Jackpot this whole time working on that trailer.Poor guy,I had to take away his help,(Sebastian), because of school. So, he works on the trailer a little before and a little after work and then he comes here to do some more back breaking work on his off days.He is wore out,let me tell you. Hopefully this is his last week to work on it.He should be done with it. We have several people interested in buying the place.So, hopefully we won't have to hang on to it too long.

Now that school has been well under way, every minute is precious around here. There just isn't enough time in the day. I finally have Oliver into a schedule.It just had to be done. He's never really been a good sleeper for us. So, when Charlotte arrived, things got a little out of sorts here.Craig and I were not getting enough sleep.Charlotte was sleeping for us just like you would expect a newborn to.But, Oliver was still a problem trying to get him to unwind and fall asleep.He would be up,sometimes, until 11pm or midnight!!! Charlotte would already be asleep,but then be getting up around 1 or 2am for a feeding.So we decided to just put him down in his crib when it was bedtime and let him cry it out. We started putting him down at 9:30 at first and then each night move back the time a little bit.He's now going to bed at around 8 or 8:30.It worked like a charm. We did that with his naps as well.Because we would have the same scenario during the day. He would get so tired and cranky,but had such a hard time falling asleep. We just couldn't have that going on during school,for our sake and especially his sake.

This photo below of Oliver was taken during all of that transition time.You see,for those of you who don't know, Oliver has NEVER liked a pacifier.It wasn't even a little dislike for him. It was a major "I don't like that thing put into my mouth" kind of thing. He would scream and gag if we tried to put it in his mouth. But, when we started to put him to bed at a normal bedtime and I also weaned him from breastfeeding at that same time, he started to use one of Charlotte's pacifier's. Initially we let him do it. I guess because we felt bad for him. But after 2 weeks of using it.We realized he was beginning to use it ALL the time. He even developed a little sore spot on his upper lip from it.
He would take it out to say something and plop it back into his mouth. Here you can see him giving Charlotte a kiss in her swing. He has his pacifier in his hand. He took it out, kissed Charlotte and plopped it back in. It didn't take too long for him to say goodbye to the pacifier. We just had to be firm with him and after about a week, he was over it. I think he may have been just finding his place within the family. He was no longer the baby,but, yet still a baby.
What a cutie.I think you can actually see his little sore spot on his upper lip in this photo of him with me. Now, his interests are picture/word books. I still have some of Johnny's picture books that I used to teach Johnny how to read with. Oliver just absolutely loves them.He's been watching the other kids with their books and he wants to "read" too. It didn't take him long to remember some of the words to the pictures and now he'll point and say a few. He even likes to mimic the kids doing school. So we've taped a roll of brown paper to the table for him. He likes to sit there with a pencil or crayons and scribble away. Matthea and Jade even showed him how to erase! We had the paper taped to the coffee table at first.But that wasn't the same as being at the big kids table! So he's with them at the dining table. If I can figure out how to post a video on here, I will upload a video of him having a meltdown because we were putting away his crayons.We told him that it was nap time and that we had to pick up the crayons and put them away. OH MY! Did he fall apart!!!
and well, I couldn't make a post on my blog without adding some newer photos of Miss Charlotte! She is such a joy! She has started sleeping through the night now.The first night, that she slept through, she slept 12 hours! But, she has been sleeping for about 9 or 10 hours every night now.What a relief,to actually be getting some sleep around here.
The funny thing,after having 6 children, I am actually considering trying cloth diapers. I think I tried using them with Jade.But, I didn't really have anyone show me HOW or even look into anything NEW out there.So I gave up. But, networking with other people, I came across someone using cloth diapers and a whole new world of cloth diapering IS out there. So, I may be doing it with both Oliver and Charlotte. We'll see. I'm going to order a try it out kit and, well, try it out! I've had two in diapers before. Doing it again, makes me think twice about how much this is really costing us!
Anyway, Charlotte is almost 3 months old now and she is a TALKER!! She loves to make her cooing sounds and she'll let out a few squeals that will hurt your ears! If she can engage you for a moment she will be happy to "tell" you a few stories.She will talk away! It's so cute.
She is also, officially, our only thumb sucker! This may turn out to be a problem if this continues and turns into a hard to break habit. She doesn't mind using a pacifier,but, when she is really tired and in bed she'll just spit it out and stick in the thumb.
So much time has gone by since we have moved to this part of the country. It's been two years now that we have been out here. God has done so much for us and we can sometimes lose sight of what our focus should be. With all of our "busy-ness" we have not made enough time for our spiritual growth. This has been weighing heavy on my heart. My prayer for this week is for my family's spiritual well being,to be nourished by the Word , to re-connect with God and for us to strengthen our relationship with Him on a daily basis.
We've had a successful harvest so far, this year, in our garden. May I be as diligent with the garden within my family and take extra care so that there is a more abundant harvest for generations to come. For His Glory......

Just Another Day...Working, Weeding and Harvesting

Charlotte has hit her one month mark and is approaching 5 weeks of age this Friday. I hate how the early days go so fast with babies. It makes me and Craig so sad to watch it go by so quickly, with all of them. They are all growing like the weeds around here!


Well,we have postponed the start of school for a couple of weeks.The virus that had a hold of Oliver had spread to Jade, then me,Matthea and Craig. Thankfully,as of now,Charlotte and Sebastian have been spared. So as we all slowly recuperate things will get back on track.

Craig and Sebastian are away for a while,working on the trailer.They are already terribly missed. The girls and I are working together here with the animals, garden and of course home. It has been really dry here and all of the watering that we have been doing is tiring and time consuming.We are constantly going outside to move the sprinklers. We are also being invaded by weeds! You would think that since it is so dry the weeds wouldn't grow.Wrong! They seem to thrive anywhere.Weed pulling is not everyone's favorite thing to do around here. But, it has to be done. I will say, that not all of the weeds get pulled, so, there are areas that we have just given up on for now.

I keep saying that I will put up pictures of the garden.But, I haven't taken any yet,since we've planted. I really need to do that. I will just have to tell you that the children have planted so many tomato plants that I'm afraid we will be drowning in tomatoes. I need to hurry up and get some more canning jars.Because when it's time to harvest, I don't think we will be able to keep up. Matthea's garden is the largest as far as how many plants they all have and then it's Jade's and Sebastian's is the smallest.He didn't want to plant too many. He says that he's glad that he didn't because there would be too much work to keep it watered and weed free! I told him that he's lucky that I am not making him grow his own food for survival,because he would starve. He quickly replied and said that he wouldn't because his sisters had plenty and if they wouldn't share he would just eat the eggs from the chicken coop!!! Oh my goodness..what can you say to that. A work in progress, a work in progress....I have to keep reminding myself that he is a work in progress, we all are. I really need to be a little more pro active in his progress. Oh boy!
Anyway, Matthea has been providing delicious salads with her lettuce and so far Jade has been bringing in her Basil and Dill for certain dishes.I have had several tomatoes from my plants, so far, to go with Matthea's salads. mmmm... it's so much better when it's fresh.
Our cherry trees have finally been completely harvested. I had Craig pit the last batch of cherries for me. His hands and fingers were stained,but he got to eat some cherry pie afterwards.I also made cherry preserves for the first time. Something that I don't believe that I have ever had myself. It turned out really well. The next thing will be the tomatoes.Something else that I have not done before.

I will post pictures of the garden next time....:0



Time to feed everyone around here and get things shut down for the night.....

Cherries and More Cherries!!!!

Well,we've made it to our due date!.....But, nothing is remotely telling me that "it's time".So, in the meantime, I had the children out this morning picking some more cherries! This hasn't even put a dent into the trees yet.So, they have another chore, added to their morning chores, picking cherries every morning! Matthea wanted to know if it was okay to eat some while picking.I told her,"yes,of course!" and then she proceeded to tell me,"Good! because I have been eating a few here and there while picking". Funny how they ask after they have already given themselves permission to do something.
I forgot to post our "desserts" on my last post. The girls are proud of them and we are still eating leftovers.mmmm....I also forgot to mention that we made homemade ice cream last week.I had Craig get our ice cream maker out and he did most of the work.I just pureed my canned peaches and added it to the mixture and he did the rest. Nothing like homemade ice cream! The children say that it beats Baskin Robbins and all those other fancy ice cream places out there. I agree!

We did our grocery shopping the other day and I really need to chop,bag and freeze all of those veggies that I bought.I also bought more flour and yeast to bake bread.After baking that last loaf, the whole family,including myself,feels confident in my bread baking abilities. It really turned out well. So, I need to get some loaves of bread made as well,before baby arrives,and put away. I also need to figure out what we are having for dinner tonight. I didn't sleep very well Friday night and was pooped all day Saturday.So when he came home Saturday night after work,there wasn't a meal. Sebastian and Matthea made themselves (and Oliver) leftover stew around 4:30 or 5:00,but,Craig doesn't get home until around 7:00. So when he got here,Jade and I quickly decided to do bake potatoes for dinner.Craig was satisfied with that,especially since there were 4 different desserts to still choose from afterward. Phew!!! Poor guy, I've been spoiling him lately with all of the cooking and baking that I've been doing and then he comes home (expecting yet another feast) to a baked potato.He was actually starting to call or text me before coming home just to ask,"So,what's for dinner tonight?". Just because we've been doing something new and different lately. I better not disappoint him tonight. Although,I'm not feeling very creative. He may have to settle for something regular and normal.

Right now,Oliver is up from his afternoon nap,Sebastian is weed eating(weeds are growing like crazy),the girls and I are in from taking care of the animals' food and water and weeding and watering the garden.

Life is good and life goes on......maybe we'll enjoy some of that ice cream today.It's a good hot day for that! Sebastian will appreciate the cool relief of ice cream after weed eating in the hot sun.

Counting Down the Days and Livin' Life....

Well here I am at 39 weeks and 5 days pregnant and no signs of labor beginning yet. I had an appointment with my chiropractor today for an adjustment that was way overdue.I have been seeing him every two weeks,except I had to cancel my last appointment,which was two weeks ago.So,it's been a month since I've seen him.I wasn't going to reschedule until after the baby was born.I just thought that I would be good until then.Boy was I wrong.Within a day or two of missing my appointment,I started having a lot of pain in my pelvis and it just got worse.The past two or three days have reminded me of what I felt like in past pregnancies when I couldn't walk,roll over,get up etc... without being in any pain.I finally called this morning and said that I needed to come in.He told me that I was definitely in need of an adjustment.Everything was out of whack.Thankfully I felt a lot better when I left the office.I'm just a little sore from letting it go so long.It should make me feel a little better while in labor too.
We also had an appointment with our midwife.Everything looks fine,I'm still measuring at only 36 weeks and lost a little weight(which is normal).So, we all are just playing the waiting game....on top of dealing with my ever increasing nesting instinct! I enlisted the girls to help me with my urge to bake the other day and we ended up baking 4 desserts and some bread.We finished harvesting the last of the Rhubarb and made a Rhubarb Strawberry-Lime Kuchen,Rhubarb Strawberry Crisp,Rhubarb Strawberry Cream Pie,Sugar Cream Pie and a loaf of bread.They all turned out delicious!


We've had 5 chicks hatch from our incubator and 2 so far that have hatched from our hen who went broody on us.She was setting on 11 eggs and so far we've only seen 2 chicks.But, tonight we snuck in the 5 chicks that we hatched,hoping she will accept them as her own.We'll see tomorrow morning if they have been rejected or not.

Our goat,Jane Doe, hasn't given birth yet.But she is still getting larger and a little more crankier.LOL. Craig and Sebastian have finished her kidding pen and she has been in there,but,has figured out how to jump over the wall!!! I can't believe that she would even attempt to do that in her condition and just the fact that she is so large,you would think that she couldn't possibly get over it.Oh boy.

Anyway,Craig and Sebastian butchered a couple of roosters last week and well...we ate them for dinner. Very good indeed.Those two guys are getting the hang of it.We have a whole lot more to butcher and freeze now.

The garden was finally weeded and tilled.Unfortunately the kids and I did it the old fashioned way,with our hands and some shovels.The tiller is still not in working order...But,the garden was finally planted with all of our plants and the kids each have their own plots to work with.We still have plenty of room for more.It's a big garden.Matthea has,by far, the most tomato plants.She went a little nuts with the seeds when they were picking out what they wanted to grow.But,now we are thankful that she did,because there should be an abundant crop from her!!!Another cool thing is that we have two Cherry trees that have produced a huge crop of cherries.The kids just started harvesting them today.I will have to get photos of all of the cherries on here soon and the garden.Also,sometime last year,someone had told us that Asparagus grows wild out here and you can find it almost anywhere near water,especially the canals.Well,Sebastian was out by our canal the other day and found some!! Pretty cool! We steamed the asparagus and had it with our dinner last night.Yummy.

We have also given Oliver his first haircut! He did so well for me and sat there very patiently while I used the trimmers and scissors.Now he looks older and not like my baby anymore. :(

We've had a lot of things breaking on us around here too. You know the saying "when it rains it pours",well I was already thinking of that when the first thing went....when the tiller went out,that was what I was saying,"what next,you know something else is going to go"....then it was the lawnmower (twice!!)....then the garage door...then the reverse in the van (ughhh,that is the worse thing so far)...then our washing machine ( which turns out to be more expensive to fix than to buy a new one).So,the first thing on our list to fix is the van.Luckily,when we had the technician out to come and look at our washer,I was mentioning how everything just keeps on falling apart around us.I mentioned the latest thing was the van.The guy asked what was wrong with it and said that he use to be a mechanic.So I told him and he went into detail on what was probably wrong with it and what we should do before the whole transmission goes out on us.We took it in to run a diagnostic on it and the tech was right about what could be wrong.But,something else was coming up with it.Well, we have ordered the part and Craig is hoping that he will be able to put it in himself.If not we'll have to take it somewhere and have someone else do it.If that doesn't fix the problem then, it's the other problem and it will cost us a couple of thousand dollars to have a new transmission put in.Oh BOY!
So,in the meantime,we will be washing our laundry at the Laundromat and not opening the garage door until we can fix the van and move on to the next item on the list.


Hey,life could be worse. One day at a time, one thing at a time and still praise God for what he has given us.Even when "bad" things come our way.

It's Spring, Down on the Farm!!!

I am soooo happy to be living here in Idaho,where I can actually enjoy a "REAL" spring.Last year we had a longer than normal winter and when spring weather finally came,well,we drove to Illinois for my son John's graduation.I should say that we drove right into HOT,HUMID,SUMMERTIME WEATHER!!!! YUCK! We did,however,come home to some nice warm weather but that lasted only a couple of weeks before the summer heat kicked in.Still not as bad as the Midwest.We have had some beautiful weather for the past month,minus the couple of weird snow days,but overall we have had temperatures between 60 and 75 degrees every day and it looks like we will continue to do so for some time.Yippee!! We have been pleasantly surprised at all of the perennials in the yard.Just beautiful.We have trees in front and in back that have flowered.We also found some Rhubarb growing.I have never used Rhubarb and was planning on growing some this year.So,this should be exciting.



Our "chicks",who are no longer considered chicks but Pullets,have grown tremendously.They look like miniature chickens now. I went out to check on them and they seemed sooo excited to see me.They ran after me and followed me and then started to peck at my feet.It then dawned on me that one of the children must have forgot to feed them this morning.I checked their feeder and,of course, it was empty.So, it wasn't me that they were excited to see,it was me hopefully bringing them some food.When I re-filled their feeder they quickly went away from me and straight to the food.

We just added 2 Llamas and 3 goats to our barnyard critters. The Llamas are a mother and daughter team.Bess is the mother who is 6 years old and her daughter Noel who is 16 months old.They are our guard animals for our goats.Our goats are- 1 year old Jane Doe a Boer/Spanish goat cross, 1 year old Surprise a Boer/Angora cross and 2 year old Zipporah full blooded La Mancha dairy goat.Zipporah just lost a baby recently due to eating a poisonous weed and it caused her to abort the kid.But she is in milk and providing just a little.Not enough for our family.But, it is enough for all of us to practice our milking skills.
Our neighbors dogs got into the corral on Tuesday and one dog kept the Llamas away from the goats while the other one attacked them.The injuries were minor,only because the kids and I were at home.I was napping when I heard the goats and jumped up,yelled for Sebastian(of all times he was in the bathroom),I grabbed the shotgun(that we borrowed from a friend),ran outside barefoot and pregnant and holding this gun!!! I have shot guns before in my lifetime.But I had not shot this one nor did I get myself acquainted with it.So, there I am trying to figure out how to cock the darn gun and thought I did and aimed and "shot",nothing.I looked at the gun again and again.Tried to shoot and shoot and nothing.The dog had a good 2-4 minutes to run around the corral to try to figure out how to get back out while I stood there like an idiot trying to work this gun!!! I was mad!!!The dog got out and went on his way back home.UGHHH!!!
When Sebastian finally made his appearance we decided to have him staked out near the corral with the gun,because he has shot this thing with his dad for just this reason.So, the dogs were watching me,they didn't see Sebastian where I had put him.I went inside and stood at the window.Within 40 minutes the dogs were running at high speed towards our corral and I went outside.They got into the corral and Sebastian shot at them,he missed and the dogs got away again.The neighbor,after all of this ended up getting a ticket.Both times that his dogs attacked he sat there and watched.The law here allows for dogs to be loose,but,they cannot harass through the fence or come onto the property and attack the animals.This man's dogs have been a problem to other neighbors as well. Craig came home from work early that day because of the attacks.He and Sebastian went to work to secure our fencing even more so.Now the next thing on our list is target practice and we should have some bad dogs dead soon.Hopefully.















The children have their seed starter trays going and they have sprouts.They should be going into the garden in a week or so.We still have some cooler nights so we can't do it just yet.

and an update on Oliver's eczema...We got the hair analysis back and there are some things that are alarming to me on there.Actually his hair test was worse than all of ours that we had done a few years ago.The three top things that were of concern were toxic levels of Cadmium,Arsenic and Lead.We just got these back and now we have to schedule a consultation with the Chiropractor who ordered it in Illinois.We consulted with our current Chiropractor and also his former Pediatrician.Our Chiropractor here is going to work with us with whatever the test results are as well as with what our other Chiropractor in Illinois suggests.They both use the same methods of treatment. However, his pediatrician dismissed the whole thing and blamed it on the dry climate and told us to put some more moisturizer on him.We told her that we had taken him off of dairy and put him on goats milk and withing that week his eczema cleared up.She says that she doesn't believe in foods causing eczema.She doesn't really believe in any of the things we believe in and we have been butting heads with her from day one.So...we fired her.....with much relief. Once we finish with our consultation for Oliver and have a game plan on how to detox his body I will publish more then.
Matthea will be the next one in to see the Chiropractor.She has been bothered by one of her legs for the past month and it isn't getting any better.One leg is definitely longer than the other and it is making it difficult to stand or walk.She had to have injured herself during her jumping and climbing escapades and not realized it.That girl has way too much energy.She goes in on Tuesday.After the appointment the girls and I are off to Boise to have our hair cut.It's a two hour drive from here.But the stylist is well worth it.
The whole family will be in Boise on May 30th for the Treasure Valley Heart Walk fundraiser.It's a 5k walk with a 1 mile option.We will be doing the 1 mile walk for many reasons;that's what the group is signed up for,the kids may not want to walk any further,and I will be 36 weeks pregnant. Let's hope that I can walk the full mile without putting myself into labor and that I make it full term this time.
I just had an appointment with my midwife and everything looks good so far.I'm measuring at a little over 31 weeks and I've gained 19 pounds!I've also have been continuing to see the Chiropractor and he is doing wonders. I wish I had seen one with my other babies.I see him every two weeks and just in time for an adjustment.I am able to walk without pain the moment I leave his office and that will last right up to within a day or two of my next appointment.Amazing.
We are still unsure of any baby names at this point.It is driving us crazy.I don't think that I have ever had a problem with this.I usually know a boy and a girl name by my fifth month at least.And we still have not found our hardware to our crib!!! I'm starting to panic.It's in one of our many boxes....but which one.Every time we go through one it seems as if more appear.We are still looking for the hardware for the girls beds!!! and they were not even in storage! The beds and hardware moved from Jackpot to Twin Falls and now the hardware is missing....somewhere in the midst of our "stuff".Thankfully the girls are not complaining about their mattresses being on the floor for now. My nesting instinct seems to be setting in so maybe I can get more done around here and hopefully "feel" ready enough before this baby decides to show up.