Granola

Yesterday Clara said, "Mom, you need to put more granola in the container," as she munched on the last few bites of cereal.

Today the girls spent hours making granola.  It's been much too long since homemade granola has been in the cupboard.  Several handfulls have already been munched on.

Training my children is so rewarding.

Mix the following in a very large bowl
2 to 3 pounds oats
6 cups of mix-ins (I used coconut, craisins and sliced almonds today, but the fruit and nut mix-ins are pretty flexible, sometimes I use raisins, pecans, walnuts, diced dried apricots, banana chips, flaxseed, wheat germ, seeds, etc)

Whisk the following in a small bowl
1.5 cups oil
1/3 cup water
1.5 cups honey or maple syrup
1 T salt
3 T vanilla

Pour the liquids over the dry mixture and coat well.  Spread this mixture on an oiled cookie sheet.  Bake at 200 degrees for one hour until golden brown.  Stir every 10 minutes.  This should make about 4 cookie sheets, so your oven will be on for a few hours!  If you use more than one sheet at a time, sometimes the granola isn't as crisp, and will form a chunky, sticky mass, but it's still super tasty!

Sick Perks - or not?

Today I am torn.  There is the perk of delegating, training my kids from a chair and eating tasty food, because once again, I had them all working together in the kitchen to prepare dinner.  I'm not sick, per se, but I still don't feel great, and I'm so exhausted after standing and working for long periods of time.  I can't even walk up a whole flight of stairs.  That's not a perk.

Another non-perk is not finishing the costumes I'm already dreadfully behind on.  Apparently, despite my best efforts to defeat this part of me, I am a procrastinator.  I know the Renaissance Faire comes every summer.  Last year I purchased everything for my new skirt, shirt and vest thing, but then I became overwhelmed creating (without a pattern) a Queen Lucy from Narnia outfit for my eldest daughter.  I've never done anything that complex, especially without a fool-proof guide.  This year, I have started my own costume, but only a skirt and shirt have been completed (well, both still need hemming).  I may be wearing the same dress I've worn for the past many summers to complete another Narnia dress.  This time she wants to be Queen Susan.  Although the dress last year is long enough to make up for her huge growth spurt, it was a bit snug around the waist last year, and won't fit around her now.  It needs to be altered for my youngest, so I hope a hem will do.

I started last week on this Ren Fest project, but I underestimated the amount of fabric for Susan's dress, the colors of the red and gold applique bled together to make a lovely pink, didn't have the proper color of orange for my shirt, etc.  Then I got sick and I've barely accomplished anything this week!  This is definitely not a perk of being sick.  I think I'll still make the deadline of 2 completed new costumes and 1 altered dress by next Saturday, but it will be tight.  I will probably still be emphasizing my "weakness" and inability to cook, clean and do laundry until then....  Ahh, the perks of being sick.

Sick Perks continued...

Blackberries were on sale at Sprouts last week, so I grabbed 10 little boxes hoping I could make a few jars of blackberry syrup.  Then I got sick.  Almost a full week of them sitting in the fridge didn't help their juiciness, but I put my girls to work.  I was still weak from not eating for 2 full days, so I did some sitting and monitoring.  I guess that's
Perk #3 of being sick - sitting while training my children and delegating tasks.

The Ball Blue Book of Canning Recipes didn't have a recipe for blackberry syrup, but since the jam recipe is the same for all the berries, I decided to just swap berries in the blueberry syrup recipe.  If I could follow directions, maybe I'd be able to better make syrup, but instead of a sugar syrup that gets syrupy, I put the sugar in the berries (AGAIN).  I didn't learn my lesson last year with the blueberry syrup, but I made a note in the recipe book this time.  After hours and hours of stirring and straining blackberry juice, we ended up with half the pints it says we'll end up with - 2.  Jim says it's the best syrup ever, so I guess it was successful.  It's also very thick, since I didn't follow the directions properly, but I would have preferred 4 pints.  The girls did a great job and I felt like I did a good job of training today!

Sick Perks

I got sick on Sunday with some stomach thing.  It's horrible, but there are perks to being ill, I guess.

Perk #1
Lay around a lot and catch up on some reading (I've been reading the All New Square Foot Gardening book).

Perk #2
Jim and Clara made cookies.  Clara adores the Food Network and watched Paula Deen make White Chocolate Coconut Cookies.  They're fantastic!

image from PaulaDeen.com

Training my little ones

There is so much I want to teach my little ones.  They're growing up so quickly and aren't that little anymore.

I want to teach them to cook, bake and nourish their own families someday.

I want to teach them to clean in order to bless their families and care for the material things they've been provided with.

I want to teach them about the feeling they can get when they grow things in their own gardens.

I want to teach them the value of creating beautiful things for their family, home, friends and others by sewing, crafting, scrapbooking, cardmaking, etc.

I want to teach them to love each other.

I want to teach them to love their work as wives and mothers.

There's so much to do and so little time.

I'm so glad I love my work and can show them these things as I go through my normal routines.

Starting Fresh with my home

I won a fabulous prize package a couple weeks ago at Raisinghomemakers.com.

I started off super excited to even enter because of the 31 Days to Clean e-book (find the link and a youtube video about it on the right hand side of her blog).  My youngest daughter used to beg me each night to read the story about Mary and Martha in Luke 10:38-42 in her children's Bible.  This e-book teaches us to have a Martha house the Mary way.  Martha spent time cooking, cleaning, etc, while Mary sat at Jesus's feet listening intently while He taught.  While there is nothing wrong with cleaning and serving, Jesus said Mary did the better thing by spending time with Him.  I want to please my Lord, spend time with Him each day and still serve my family by cleaning my home.

Unfortunately I've been in a rut and miserably failing at both tasks.  I'm constantly checking email and facebook, looking stuff up and learning how to be a better homemaker, mother and wife.  I clean other people's homes for a living (well, about 4 hours a week isn't really "a living" but it gives us a little extra money to toss into the emergency fund that Dave Ramsey said we should be building for Baby Step #3 now that we're completely debt free (except the house).  Unfortunately, I clean other homes, know how to be a great homemaker, but don't actually do it.  It's been a couple months since I actually cleaned my bathroom (other than just a quick wipe).  My kitchen is constantly covered in flour dust, and the counters covered in dirty dishes.  I get started on cleaning something, then I decide to bake a loaf of bread.  After all the kneading, the dishes still aren't done, but my arms are tired from grinding flour and kneading.  My home is no longer a castle fit for the man of this house.  It's no longer comfortably allergy-free for my health (and my little ones who also suffer from allergies).  I recently read that clutter can cause migraines, which have been an increasing nuisance to me.  My home is no longer fit to invite people over, or when they stop by unannounced to allow them to step into my home.  My home isn't filthy, but it's not what I'd like to present to people or have my husband come home to after a hard day at work.

At the beginning of 2011, I was challenged to read the whole Bible in 66 days.  I thought it to be a crazy and unattainable goal.  January 6th, I decided that I'd try to read it all in 60 days, since I didn't start on time.  I read 43 pages each night for about 40 days.  Then I started to struggle.  I knew I didn't have 2 hours each night sometimes, and I let other things get in the way.  The 60th day came and went, while I sat stationary in 1Corinthians.  After reading so much of the Bible, I gave up because I didn't reach my goal.  Once in a while I'd read a page or two, but overall, I totally neglected my relationship with God in many ways.

I'm motivated once again by this book to focus on why I clean, spend time with Jesus each day and to actually clean my home - not just think about it or read about it.

The Mary challenge for Day one is to come up with a mission statement and make it pretty.  I've been mulling over my mission statement for the past two weeks.  I would write something I think is great, then I change my mind and think it's corny.  I even tried to steal some other people's ideas at Joyful Mothering who is hosting a 31 days to Clean challenge.  This is what I finally decided on because I can't come up with something better.  It's an acrostic poem and I hope to make it all pretty to display in my hallway of aprons soon.  Right now my dear husband is trying to sleep after a 22 hour work day that ended at 5:30am.  That keeps me from my pretty papers and scrapbooking stuff.

Why I Clean

Create a castle for my family that I adore and want to serve
Lovingly train my daughters to care for their family and home
Eager hands that work bring glory to God
Able to have friends and family over
Now I can truly relax, breathe and enjoy my family

Chores

Why do my children have chores?

I am primarily a stay at home mom.  I cook, bake, sew, quilt, clean, etc.  I also clean 3 other houses for a little extra savings to increase our emergency fund, and someday pay for part of my children's car, purchase something special for our home, etc.  After working for several cleaning companies, I've realized the value of frequent dusting and vacuuming.  I've learned how few people were taught how to care for their home, and how few children are expected to clean up after themselves.

What do they do?

Not every chore they do is paid.  They are expected to pick up and actually clean their own bedrooms (vacuum, dust, change sheets, sort laundry, etc.) before getting paid for other household chores (they clean a bathroom, vacuum, dust, dry and wet mop, take out trash, clean the inside of microwaves, etc).  My children are only paid for chores I would normally do in my home.  I still periodically do some detailed cleaning (blinds, oven/stove, windows, areas that are high or dangerous like the tops of cabinets, light fixtures, etc).  The chores they finish each week will help them know how to care for their own home someday.  These chores are somewhat consistent, but rotate each 12 weeks.  I created it on a spreadsheet, with income amounts for each chore.  I also colored several chores green.  This means they HAVE to do them.  The others can earn them extra money if they chose.  Once in a while I tell them the whole list is mandatory.  Some chores aren't required every week and are grayed out (yellow in this pic), since others may do it, I'd like to do a detail clean or it just doesn't need to be done on a weekly basis.

This is a sample of the first 4 weeks.  I print 8 weeks at a time, fold in half and give one to each child.  They check off their chores, then I look over their work (or sometimes have a sibling inspect), then we sit together, calculate totals, tithe, savings, and exchange money when their bags get full of coins.

How it works.

Jim and I instituted this chore list and income for our children after we attended a Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University (FPU) class Feb 2009.  This class is detailed more in Financial Peace.  Since that class, we've become debt free except the house, and have accumulated 1 1/2 months of emergency money, that grows by a few hundred each month.  He also teaches adults (and kids) to use the envelope system for many of the regular purchases (food, gas, entertainment, clothing, etc) your family makes each month.  Dave advocates "commissions" for the extra work kids do.  My kids each have an envelope, bag or jar (their preference) for "CHURCH" (tithe - mandatory 10% of earnings), and "BANK" or "SAVE" (the next 10% of their earnings goes here).  The rest of their money is their own money to do with as they wish.  We have them calculate their "income", figure their tithe and savings amounts and use the rest of the money they earn to buy gifts at Christmas, friends' birthday gifts, save for something special for themselves, and splurge occasionally on candy or junk at the grocery store.  Sometimes I give a "bonus" for the person who completed largest percent of their chores, saved the most, or did the most thorough job.  The bonus goes directly to the bank.

Looking forward.

Paying my children income for work they do around the house will save me money in the long run.  While I teach them how to care for their own home and cook, we get time one-on-one to talk about stuff.  I teach them the value of hard work, helping, saving, tithing, counting money, and making change.  Hopefully these values will help them become excellent men and women who regularly and joyfully tithe, save and think before spending.  At this moment, Alex is debating whether to get his drivers licence (or permit) now or wait until he's 18.  He's looking at the large expense of paying for his insurance and not having enough money saved for his half of the car he'd like to purchase.  We've agreed to match what he spends on a car, to include special tools or equipment needed to restore an older car to good working condition.  He's taking a second Autos class spring 2011 to ensure he knows how to maintain and fix his own vehicle someday.  Alex is also working on the 100K mile tune-up on Jim's Accord.  Jim purchased all the parts with money saved in his auto budget, will have Alex read the manual and do the work, Jim will pay Alex, and everyone is happy!  Alex will earn money and have a better understanding of vehicles, and Jim will save money.

Since my children aren't all grown up, I can't say how they will turn out.  I am confident though, that God will direct them and teach them.  I am training my children in the ways of the Lord.  I am training them how to give, save, spend wisely, care for their homes and help others.  I pray that I am doing this in a way that will honor and please the Lord.

The Sister Spectacular

Jim and I were treated to a "fancy lunch" date in our own dining room yesterday.  The girls prepared fettuccine alfredo and garlic toast, poured our drinks and set the table with a candle.

They insisted we dress up to enjoy our meal, so I put on the new skirt I made Thursday night with heeled sandals, Jim buttoned up his favorite striped blue shirt and we sat at the table enjoying our lunch.  Alex and the girls at on the back porch to give us privacy to talk, thank God for our blessings and enjoy our Italian food.

Our date came complete with a bill we had to sign.  I don't like bills, but I often pay them 50 cents for helping with dinner anyway.  Actually it's pretty infrequently that I make them help with much of dinner.  My goal was once a week with each of them, but I am a slacker.  That is why there are no pictures of me, Jim or the food at The Sister Spectacular!  For those of you who object to paying for regular household tasks or just wonder more about how I do it, feel free to read Chores.

Jim and I are so blessed by wonderful children, who are giving, loving and know how to put together a decent date!