Ordinary Time

We are supposed to start school this week, which is why I spent all morning and early afternoon finishing up the details of the school planning. I have never left it until so late, and this was cutting a bit close even for my taste. I need to make a mental note that next year I just need to do it in late July whether I feel like it or not and just get it over with. I have left much less wiggle room in the schedule this year just because there was so much I wanted to include. This also makes me a little nervous because I know how frequently life can undo a nicely planned schedule. I can always cut some things out if I find that they aren't going to fit. So what was I doing today? It was all those little odds and ends which get left for later. Some of the books I had placed on hold didn't come in until Thursday, so after looking at them, I had to figure out where they were going to go. This changed the original flow of the schedule, so the biggest thing was to reassign which ...

The number of additional titles this post could have is numerous. They would be along the lines of "The rotten day where I lost my patience" or "How very, very close we came to not actually having this dinner" are a couple which come to mind. Yes, it was that kind of day.  It started out well enough. G. and I did the barn in less than an hour, so that was very good. My plan was to spend part of the morning doing map work to (finally) finish our travel journals before we start school next week. Well, one child could not find the journals. This resulted in me going into this child's room to see if I could find them, and was instead appalled at the amount of garbage (actual, literal garbage) that was shoved into various places. Why? So I might have lost my mind a bit. This was followed by realizing that books were also strewn about, so I spent some time repairing them. Having to repair books is always the precursor to a great big lecture about good stewardsh...

I'm currently reading Late Bloomers: the Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement by Rich Karlgaard. I'm not very far into it, but it is proving to be an interesting book. For some reason, as I was beginning it, I flipped around to look at the end pages. (I love bibliographies because I like to add to my reading list.) Anyway, I found myself glancing at the epilogue and came across this: "... America and many part of the world face a crisis of untapped and undiscovered human potential. I wonder whether today's angry populism, seen at both ends of the political spectrum, is a misdirected cry of pain from those who see themselves as untapped and undiscovered. Large swaths of people in this country feel unacknowledged, unappreciated, and disrespected. They want us to see their pain but also their potential. This shouldn't happen in an affluent society like ours. But out of ignorant good intent, we've designed a human sorting machine with a co...

I feel a little bit as though I'm a day late and a dollar short here on the blog. This is the post I was going to put up last night. But, well, I spent half the night sitting with R. as she wept. That is an improvement from speechless anger. I think. It's different at least. So, no blog post, and I'm running on a little less than five hours of sleep. The masses have been warned that their mother has no patience reserves at the moment and a high irritability index. I feel like a weather report... thunderstorms looming in the south... Anyway, you weren't really going to get much content anyway, just a lot of pictures. Here are some new(er) ones of the three dogs who live here. Good old Kenzie. He is such a sweet boy, when he is not barking or scaring strangers. He is also just a mass of anxiousness whenever something unexpected happens, which would be everything. He is also starting to look more grey around the face which is new the past year of so. That doesn't m...

J. and I were able to go out to dinner last night, so blogging didn't happen. There are many moments throughout my day that I am overcome with how blessed I am and overcome with how God has provided for us all these years. This was especially true as I was riding one of my horses on Friday. I am still wrapping my mind around the fact that I live in such a beautiful place and actually have horses. G. and L. are having a sleepover with B. at his apartment tonight. Do you think they are having a little fun? We have a new microwave. The microwave which came with the house was not terrific, and slowly, over the past two years, it has become more and more decrepit. We knew when the door handle came off that its days were numbered. Finally, it went out with a bang when the glass in the door fell down, shattering all over the kitchen. We lived without one for nearly two weeks, but yesterday, I couldn't take warming my coffee up in a pot on the stove any longer and went a...

For various reasons yesterday, I ended up scrapping my dinner plans, taking whatever ingredients I had on hand, and making up a meal. It turned out quite well, if I do say so myself. So I'm going to share it with you. Really, I'm sharing it here so that when I want to make it again, I'll remember what I did, but you benefit, too. Chicken and bacon over pasta *Boneless chicken thighs (I used 6 thighs) *2 pkg of bacon (though this was kind of gilding the lily, and one would have been just fine), cut into pieces (I use scissors to do this; it's easier) *2 onions, sliced *Swiss chard, washed, sliced, and the center stem removed (I'm not sure how much. I had a bag of sauteed chard in the freezer that I had uncovered and decided to use) *Garlic, maybe 1 or 2 teaspoons or maybe tablespoons (I'm generous with garlic), minced (once again, this was in the kale, so I'm guessing how much was in it) *2 cups of chicken broth or bouillon *1 cup of red wine (okay,...

Instead of telling you how the van's serpentine belt broke as I was driving it (the van, not the serpentine belt) home today causing all sorts of alarming things to happen including the power brakes and power steering to go out (and a 15-passenger van is mighty hard to stop and turn without those things), or about how the van is currently stuck on the top of the tow truck at the car dealership because the van was too heavy for the tow truck and broke the hydrolic system ( because AAA doesn't quite seem to understand exactly how large a 15-passenger van is ), I will show you a picture of K. and his best buddies. They just had a three day sleep over fest together. It sounds as though they had a ball. But K. is now pretty exhausted. How can I tell? Well, he fell asleep during tea time and was too tired to eat much dinner. I think he would say it was totally worth it.