Thanksgiving Brunch

Thanksgiving in Ohio. The leaves are off the trees and the bare look of winter has set in. We have not had any snow that sticks on the ground yet.

Our tradition on Thanksgiving is to go to church for a Thanksgiving brunch. On of the families organizes it and does much of the food prep. The rest of us pitch in with the side dishes. It is always a special time. Most of the college students are home and people are in visiting. One gets to see friends that we haven't seen in awhile.

Plus, the food is yummy!! This year they served breakfast burritos, sausage and gravy as well as fresh fruit and lots of muffins and breads and other good things. This year the local on duty firemen showed up and joined us. They came in the ambulance and firetruck. They had to be ready to go out if they were called.

Baby Sadie just keeps growing and doing more things. She is doing a lot of chewing. She is a contented baby although she rarely smiles.

After eating we all go in the big room and sit in a circle and share what we are thankful for this year. The circle sure has grown a lot over the last 42 years. Mr. Meehling and his wife Betty started this tradition back in 1967. The Markoviches took over once the Meehlings were unable to do it. It was special to have Mr. Meehling able to attend again this year. It is a real labor of love. The meeting ended as promised by 11 AM. That is also traditional.

Nathan and Anita, and Mom and Dad, it is really nice to have almost all our family come. It is so important to stop and thank God for His blessings to us. I get really aggravated when people call it 'Turkey Day'. Turkey is not what the day is about. Especially, in these somewhat challenging times, we have much to learn and much to rejoice in and even more to thank God for.

~Mom

Mystery Dinner 2009

This is a great way to get to know people.

What is a 'Mystery Dinner' ? This is an idea we read in a magazine several years ago, and have had a lot of fun using. We do not do it real often as it is a fair amount of work for the servers. Michelle and Brooke had a lot of fun planning and preparing this meal. JoAn helped them serve it. The first thing to do is to plan your guest list carefully. Do not invite party-poopers who do not know how to relax and not be in charge. Next, plan your menu. We start by making the menu for a several course dinner. We try and use as many leftovers as possible and also incorporate foods that tend to be liked with a couple of weird ones thrown in. Then the creativity comes in. You need to relabel your menu and add in the eating utensils. For example, instead of corn being on the menu it is called 'gold', the spoon might be called a 'trencher', apple sauce became 'baby food', a 'spear' might be a toothpick or a fork, and water may be a 'Lake Erie cocktail'. It is important to serve at least some sloppy foods like soup and mashed potatoes. Things that are hard to eat without silverware. That is part of the entertainment value. The next step is to print off the menu and organize the kitchen/food.

When the guests arrived, we invited the family that schools with us, you give each person their own menu and ask them to select 5 things for each of the four courses. They will have no idea what they are ordering if you have done a good job renaming the menu. Then the kitchen crew, it helps to have 2-3 servers for a gathering of 10-15, put together the plates as ordered for the first course. The rule at our house is that once you get a piece of silverware off the menu, you may keep it, as long as you don't leave it on your plate when it is cleared. The kitchen crew serves each course one at a time and clears them in between. Each person receives exactly what they ordered. Dessert may show up first with the meat. You may have several beverages and not much to eat. It all depends on what you order.

I am afraid that this first course had a little one in tears. Water, apple cider, brussel sprouts and a knife and fork. A tender hearted daddy traded for the brussel sprouts for some pot stickers on the condition that the trade be reciprocated back at a better course.

Ulysses was real happy when dessert showed up before the veggies.

Some of the middle boys were more than happy to be silverwareless. They even intentionally sent it back after the course it came with. What is with boys?!!! We all had a good time.

One word of warning based on experience. Don't serve too much food in the early courses or people won't have room later on to eat what is served.

Have you ever tried something like this before? How did it work out for you?

~Mom

One Piece of Leftover French Toast, 6 kids?

Sunday evening meals are almost always fend for yourself in the leftovers or make a bowl of popcorn. Last night Michelle,Thomas, T-Bob, and I didn't want the single piece of French toast left from Saturday breakfast. Especially since Mr.Boots said that the contending party would have to arm wrestle him for it. Elizabeth, however, was up to the challenge. (I don't think she knew what arm wrestling was :).

They began. Strong Mr.Boots let her struggle against his seeming indifferent arm for a while, before closing the match. He was kind enough to share it with her though. So they fixed it up and ate it. One plate, two forks. It was funny. Whoever could cut quicker,eat faster and take bigger bites got more. (Can you guess who that was?) Elizabeth just enjoyed her bites.

Mr.Boots & Elizabeth have a great relationship, but sometimes they tease each other for the fun of it. But we are saving those stories for other posts.......

~JoAn

P.S. My most recent project? De-cluttering. I haven't gotten to the family room yet though. How can you tell?

Autumn Gardening

This post is to show you what is still growing in our garden in the middle of November after several hard frosts. The brussel sprouts are doing dandy. We leave them in the garden until we are ready to eat them or until freezing weather comes.

Some late broccoli will continue to grow until it matures or until the deep snow comes. Whichever happens first

The red cabbage is ready, but this is another one we leave out in the garden until we need it. Today we made a very yummy sweet and sour red cabbage dish to go with our roast beef. I shredded the cabbage and added chopped apple, chopped onion and cooked it in apple cider. I then added some clove and apple cider vinegar and maple syrup and let it simmer. Delicious!

The turnips are still forming up, but we can always just use the greens if we want to. They like cool weather.

Parsley will keep growing and you can pick it right through the snow. Some of the other herbs are still producing (thyme and sage). Like to have those fresh herbs to use in the kitchen.

Now these peas were planted too late and won't produce anything. I left them there because I like the spring green of peas against the autumn brown. Plus, I want to see how far they will grow. More simple things that please me.

~Mom

Brussel Sprouts

This our first year growing brussel sprouts and they did really well. You are not supposed to pick them until after the first frost. They grew about 3 and a half feet tall. A lot bigger than I expected.

The sprouts form on the inside of each big leaf that grows off the stem.

The stem is so hard that I could not cut it with a big knife. You almost need a saw. The leaves fall off easily. The sprouts spiral around the stalk. They break off easily. They were DELICIOUS! We all really enjoyed them. Our children really like them. 'Baby cabbages' are so good.

I forgot to take a picture of the big bowl of brussel sprouts we had for lunch.
~Mom

November Saturday

Mr. Meehling is staying with us for the month of November. We are so happy to have him here with us. He is a great example of godly living and staying the course. He is 91 now and lives in Seattle, but he likes to come visit. He was our neighbor until 18 months ago, but he has known our family for years and years. I think he even attended my parents wedding. He does calisthenics and takes long walks (3-5 miles) every day. His mind is real sharp too.

Saturday was really nice and warm. The high was about 70 degrees. We used the beautiful weather to clean out the garden. We pulled all the beans, tomato, and dead basil plants. I will do a garden Post soon and show you what we still have growing.

Mr. Boots did bicycle maintenance. We need to have a few more bikes going.

Thomas was giving Dallas some attention.

Elizabeth was enjoying wearing just a short sleeve shirt without a sweater being needed.

We had a late fall picnic. It was great! No bugs. They have all been frosted. What a great day.

Our woodpile hasn't started shrinking yet. We are enjoying hearing Mr. M's stories. He can tell stories about his dad and the civil war. He remembers, and not with fondness, all the antics of FDR. His attempts to federalize all the utilities ( Starting with the Tennessee Valley Authority), His increase of the Supreme Court to get his own way, and the large amount of socialists/communists he included in his administration. Sound familiar?

Here's a picture of Mr. Boots, not wearing boots. It does happen on occasion. We are enjoying our Indian Summer. Do you know why they call it that?

~Mom

Keeping up with the Smith's

The following is something that I read and really appreciated. I e-mailed it to some of you, but I wanted to share it further and to put it where I can easily find it. The article was written by Becky Shah an Emmaus alumni. I also liked Kathy's response that follows. I trust you will appreciate it. I really don't know any real Mrs. Smiths. I think she is just a figment of our horizontal imaginations. We should really be looking up to God and not comparing ourselves to each other.




I am sure you all have heard of the Joneses with all their material possessions and materialistic pursuits, but have you met their cousins, the Smiths? Mrs. Smith is a woman like no other.She has 10 lovely darlings, though still wears a size 2 and hasn't hardly a wrinkle or stretch mark on her tummy. Each one is perfectly obedient at all times, perfectly groomed: nails are never overgrown and pants are never too short. She spends several hours each day catering the special needs and interest of each individual child. Of course, she is homeschooling and each child is exceptional, knowing classical Latin, Biblical Greek, and Hebrew by the age of 8, and on track to graduate with their bachelor with a full scholarship by 18. Each child has already started a business venture of their own and is making a sizable income, plays an instrument with skills surpassing their years, excels in organized sports, and yet they all still have several hours a day to just play. When Mrs. Smith is not investing in her children, she is caring for the household: laundry, vacuuming, dusting, washing windows, cleaning cabinets, polishing door knobs...all chores are are completed daily so the house is always at its best. Of course, she also provides 3 home cooked meals for her family mostly from produce she has grown in her own organic garden and fresh bread from grain she as milled herself. She has even managed a business on the side to help with the family income.The family is highly involved in their local church attending meetings 3 days a week, as well as helping with the church sponsored ministry every Sat.She has not forgotten to practice her faith outside of the church either, befriending the neighbors, having coffee and a Bible study with the elderly lady across the street twice a week, babysitting for the single mother regularly, and making sure that the grandparents get as much grandchild and child time as they want.Mrs. Smith makes sure that her husband does not feel neglected. Of course, when he comes home from work, she has the children quietly engaged in a project, dinner hot and ready to serve, and she herself, is perfectly groomed, hair fixed, spit-up free clothes, dressed to go out just to stay at home with her family. She saves all her evenings just to be with husband, listen about his day, and watch the game with him.Last, but not least she has not neglected her own spiritual growth, getting up at 4:00 in the morning to begin her day with a 2 hour devotion and prayer time before starting. Mrs. Smith is a woman to be admired. She is Godly, loving, productive, exceptional. She is the woman that I often find myself striving to be. She is also a woman living in a world with 50 hour days and unlimited energy. LOL!!! Please understand, ALL the things she does are wonderful (though some more wonderful than others). There is not fault to be found in these things. The fault I find is in me, striving for a perfection out side of Biblical standards: creating a Christian wife standard that would have made the pharisees proud with its unattainable goals and ability to destroy the one in pursuit of trying to succeed. I don't know how I get caught up in these things. How do I jumble up the great things to do with the good things to do? I know I need to seek the Lord more for His blessing on each days activities, and I know that the things I may need to cut out may not be the same for another. Because I am not Mrs. Smith, because there is NO way I can live up to her standard, I need to be sure to choose the BEST for each day, that which will bring the most glory to God whether in the church, or in focusing on the family and raising the children, or fully involved in ministry outside the home. I know His plan for me is not the same as His plan for you, so I need to make sure to stay in touch with Him and following His lead. Trying to follow Mrs. Smith would leave me exhausted, depressed, frustrated, and destroyed. I am so glad to remember that Jesus' burden is light and He will give me the strength and ability to do what He desires of me.
Kathy (Shields) Kerwin 10/28/09
I don't think it's possible that ANY woman could attain all that was listed there without passing out of sheer exhaustion. I also think that most Moms struggle with finding the balance between family, church, ministry, etc ... For myself, I tend to overbook. I don't do it on purpose but suddenly I look at our calendar and there's not a single day free of some kind of event/activity/practice/gathering, etc! Then I become completely overwhelmed and stressed trying to balance all the balls at once. I'm also one who tends to be hard on myself thinking that I'm not doing enough for my kids - especially when it comes to school work! I feel like so many weeks we are so busy that we're lucky if we get language and math done and all my other 'good' intentions fall by the wayside. What other balls do I drop on a regular basis? Oh yeah, I hardly ever make time to exercise, I often don't make time for my quiet time with the Lord and many days the house is messy b/c we've been so busy. And there's more ... oh there's always more! So what does one do? Honestly I think it's more about the need to sllllooooooowwww down. This week I canceled on 3 things simply b/c we have had a busy and stressful week and we needed to slow down a little. The world would have us think that our kids need to be in every program, activity and sport - but what our kids really need is a family who spends time with each other and is dedicated to the Lord. I'm trying to learn that lesson myself. I need to stop comparing myself to other homeschool Moms who are doing A LOT more with their kids, with other Moms who are thinner and healthier b/c they spend hours a week at the gym, etc ... I heard this awesome quote this past weekend at a women's retreat ... "Live your life before an audience of ONE" {one meaning the Lord, no one else.}

Kathy

~Mom

Getting in Art and Writing

One thing I am trying, in our push to write more, is to have the children write a description of a piece of art work. I ask them to describe the picture to someone who can't see it. At some point I would think it fun to have them write a description of a painting in a book and have the other children try and pick it out. Another thought would be to have the other children draw a picture based on the description. This painting is from N.C. Wyeth's book of book illustrations.

Chance: There is a building with a lot of people standing on it. There is a man wearing a hat with three yellow stripes. The building is mostly white. There is a man smoking. There is a woman wearing a pretty hat. A lot of the people are wearing hats. The building is two stories high. There are two smokestacks.

T-Bob: There is a man in the picture smoking. It looks like there is a ferry in the background named the Prairie Belle. There is a woman who has a hat with a flower on it. I see two smokestacks puffing out steam. Multiple men are wearing top hats. The captain is up in the bridge staring out. There is railings on the ship to help so people don't fall out that much. On the lower deck of the ship there are supplies. One of the men in the top hats has a cane.

Thomas: This painting's focal point is a roughneck pipe smoker. He is wearing a plaid shirt. He has a conductor's cap on top of his tousled brown hair. One of his hands is holding a pipe. The other hand is on his hip. He has a sour expression on his face.

There are two people standing a little to the left of him. They appear to be a lady and a gentleman. The man is wearing a top hat. He is holding a carpet bag with roses on it. He has a suit on. The lady is wearing a hat with flowers. Her clothes consist of a blouse, skirt and vest. She has black gloves on. They are both looking disdainfully at the first man.

There is a steamer in the background called the Prairie Belle. It is a white ship with two decks. It also has two smokestacks.

Brook: There are about 14 people in the picture. The sky is a brilliant blue. There are people on a boat. The boat is called "Prairie Belle" . The boat has three decks. There is a man smoking a pipe. He has a captain's hat, so he may be the captain. There is a lady with a fancy hat looking at him. She has black gloves. She is standing with a gentleman with a black top hat and fancy clothes. He has a long walking stick. He is carrying a bag with roses on it. There are two smokestacks. There is a man on the bridge. There is a gold bird on the roof. There is a thing on the other side, perhaps it is the horn. The man and lady are looking at the man out of the corner of their eyes. The man smoking has a blue and white checkered shirt. It looks dirty. He has big rough hands. He also has a mustache.

Michelle: In this picture is a guy smoking in front of Prairie Belle the steam boat. He is wearing a blue checker shirt. He has a captain's cap on. A guy in a top hat is glaring at him. There is also a woman in am expensive hat staring at him. There are two smokestacks on the Prairie Belle. The captain's looking down from the bridge. There are 13 people in this painting. This is a white steamship with two decks. On the first deck is a rich family. On the second deck is three slaves stacking barrels. There is a bale of cotton in the front of the picture. The sky is a very pretty blue. There is a railing on all the decks.

Mr. Boots: The main focus is on an unkempt man in a checkered coat. The man is smoking and the boat is smoking too. In the background is a virago who is gossiping to her husband. They are all on the wharf. The Prairie Belle, A rear wheel steam boat, is in dock. It is white and is made of wood. It has two stories and a pilot's house. It takes the whole back of the painting.

There are people on deck. In all there are 13 people in the painting. On the lower deck three slaves are loading the ship.

The main focus has a glove on one hand, but not the other. He also has bad posture. He looks to be at home in a bar. The man is definitely out of place here.

The painting is oil on canvas and measures 32 1/2" by 25 1/2". It was drawn by N.C. Wyeth.

I like how there personalities and interests come out in their writings. We will see how there writings improve throughout the year. You can read along with me.

~Mom

It's About Time

Why did we take a picture of the clock? Look closely and you can figure it out. No, it's not because the classroom was only 63 degrees. That's pretty typical for us hardy Ohioans. Michelle and I have this thing where we watch for the clock to turn to 11:11. When I see it, it reminds me to pray for her. On November 11th we saw the ones all line up and Michelle actually timed it up so that we got a picture of it to the very second (11:11:11) Pretty impressive. The simple things that make my day.
~Mom

Reformation Festival

Halloween is not something the Mangos choose to celebrate. This year we had the opportunity to do something different. Some friends of ours were having a Reformation Party in honor of October 31st being the day that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Thesis to the door.

They had some stilts out for the children to play with. Mr. Boots did very well on them.

T-Bob stood around and was cold. It was very frigid that evening!

The boys checked out 'the door' with the Thesis printed out on it.

They listened attentively to our host.

Olivia, our host's youngest daughter, was dressed for the occasion. We all enjoyed the chili for supper, especially when it was such a chilly evening.

Our host gave a short history lesson and explained the significance of the evening. We also sang some hymns, including, of course, Martin Luther's famous 'A Mighty Fortress is Our God'. Being that our host is such a music guy, he had us sing it to a totally different tune than usual. We made it through.

Thomas and some of the rest of us snuck in the house for a bit to warm up.

The garage was the place to be, though. They had decorated it so nicely with Christmas lights and other things. The rest of the evening was spent in doing English country dancing. It was so fun to see the children enjoying being together and having fun. JoAn, Mr. Boots and Elizabeth had a good time dancing together. T-Bob didn't want to participate at all. Michelle and Thomas did join in.

The parents were the wall flowers. There was between 40-50 young people. There wasn't room for us more mature people. As it was the dances extended down the driveway quite a bit into the cold, dark, evening. It wasn't too bad as long as they kept moving.

Gabriel, one of the host's sons, was all gussied up.

Many of the guests came dressed in as close as they could get to period style clothing.


Here are JoAn and Mr. Boots dancing down the line. This really looked like fun!

Michelle and Thomas went swinging down the line as partners as well. It was a great evening. Not sure what Martin Luther would have thought, but we enjoyed it.

~Mom

Who's in the Doghouse Today?

Mr. Boots heard some strange noises coming out of the dog palace. It sounded a lot like silly giggles. He blocked the door so that these strange creatures couldn't escape. They slowly lifted the lid off to see what was inside and guess what they found?!!!

Two silly children reading books. They thought that reading in Dallas's house sounded like a lot of fun.

Dallas didn't care. His current preferred bed is a bed of leaves. He only goes in the dog house when it is really chilly. He didn't like it that the children left their books in his doghouse though. He carried them out and chewed them up thoroughly. So if you find a spare copy of "I Wish that I had Duck Feet", let me know.

~Mom

Manly Man Work- Widening the Driveway

The fight for premium space in the front yard continues. We really need another parking space that can be used and still allows cars to pull through the driveway circle. We have been using the grass over beside the garage, but it was slowly becoming more mud than grass. The Boss determined that if the grass and dirt was dug out and the space filled with gravel, that it would work much better. The week that The Boss was away at his Aunt's funeral, the boys went to work.

Dallas was highly excited to have the boys working on the other side of his fence. They let him out and gave him the role of Official Supervisor.

T-Bob and Mr. Boots did most of the digging. They got it down about 12 inches and a little deeper along the driveway where they put in a trench.

It was a lot of work and, the fact that it was already very muddy didn't make it easier. I think they enjoyed playing in all that mud. They then refilled it with gravel. We still need to get more gravel. Eventually, the plan is to put bricks over the top once everything is settled and the vehicles have pushed down the gravel.

Good Work Gentlemen!!

~Mom

Random Writings

Once again I assigned the children a writing assignment that involved them giving 6 random words and then putting them all in a hat and drawing them out. Each child then ended up with six words to incorporate in to their story. I have each child write at least as many sentences as their age. Their required words will be marked. The children had less than 20 minutes to come up with these'masterpieces'. Incidentally, Mr. Boots ws reading the book 'Million Dollar Words' while I was collecting their random words.



Chance's Story:

Once upon a time there were two brothers. Their names were Yoda and Luke. Yoda had a cat. Luke had a dog. They each had a toy bomb. Yoda liked to play tea with his little sister. They always used teacups. When they had finished it usually was night time. But before his little sister had to go to bed, they would go outside to look at the moon. In the morning they had cheese and bread with their pancakes buttered.



Michelle's Story:

A fifteen year old boy named Luke walked into the living room and flumped into the nearest chair. He was bored. He was very tired of Star Wars Legos. His cousin Thomas was so very obsessed with Legos, ostensibly. How could some one like Star Wars Legos that much? He could not stand even thinking of Lego's. So instead he studied his mother's dingbat. Why would someone name the tassels on the furniture that? "Ding-Dong, Ding-Dong" There went the doorbell. He went to answer it. It was two girl scouts trying to sell cookies. "Would you like to buy some cookies?" they asked him. "I would love to buy some, ostensibly" he said and went into the house. He then forced himself to go raid his mother's cookie jar. ostensibly that is.



Mr. Boots:

Crunch, the underbrush was ostensibly pushed aside. A Lion and a horse ran out followed out by Yoda, the master. They were all being chased out by a virago, who happened to be Yoda's mom. The running was out of this world. They were on a planet called Doll. Doll is a very desolate planet, that is lit by a giant candle. As they were all running away from Yoda's mom, they came across a nearly deserted village, where all the viragos live in solitude. They were a very primitive village. They had one form of communication, tell-a-woman. Yoda, his horse and his lion swung right. They picked up Speed, a very amiable cheetah, and ran on. They ran and they ran and they ran. In the distance Yoda saw the candle. Yoda's mom saw it too. It signalled the end of the chase. they would all stop running and eat the sausage gravy that was being cooked by the candle. If you ever see a lunar eclipse, it is probably breakfast time on Doll, a moon.

If you don't believe this tale is true,

Ask the blind man he saw it too.



Thomas Tale:

One day as I was watching a movie about dinosaurs and the Bible, I happened to glance over at the turtle cage. I saw that my turtle eggs had started to hatch. There in the cage was a beautiful newborn turtlet. One down and nine more to go, I thought. I ran downstairs to grab the video camera and let the others know. When I got back three more had started to hatch. Two hours and eight turtle eggs later, one egg remained. I was so disappointed. I went to bed, tripping over my plastic light saber on the way. As I went to asleep that night, I tried to think of names for the turtlets. I woke up the next morning feeling very happy. I immediately raced to the turtle cage and saw a little crack on one side of the shell.

"Mom,Mom", I called. Then my aunt, a virago type woman walked into the room.

"Why are you yelling so loud this early in the morning?" She demanded.

"My last turtle egg is hatching."

"Your Mother isn't home."

"Where is she?" I asked.

"Out shopping."

Five minutes later the turtlet had hatched. He was a brilliant tomato orange. I decided to name him Sparky. I developed a great bond with Sparky over the next few weeks. I played Dolly with him in the cradle, and adventurer in the sand box.

One day a terrible incident occurred. I was playing with Sparky on the mantel and suddenly my father's cutlass fell and pierced poor Sparky. I was so sad.

I have always hoped to find another Sparky, but have unsuccessful. If you ever find a blaze red turtle, let me know.
~Mom