Continually Thankful

1 Chronicles 16:34
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.

 Psalm 28:7
The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to him in song.

 Life continually has its ups and downs and with those we remain continually thankful and remember in daily life and in our prayers no matter how stressful or down it may seem, there are ALWAYS things to be thankful for.

This morning I am thankful for the little things...a hot cup of coffee, watching the sun rise with a sweet pup at my feet. The children getting up one at a time which gives me those few sweet individual moments with each of them to greet them good morning, hug them, tell them I love them. A quiet prayer of devotion while I listen to some music. Knowing today brings another opportunity, to serve God, to be together as a family.

Blessings to your families from ours this wonderful Sunday.

Lots of Play - Lights & Kites & Running Cavies

Friday night, was hubbies last night at work, so he was gone by 2:30pm to head out for the remainder of the eve. The kids and I had dinner, watched a show- then turned off all the lights while the kids first started making hand shadows then totally turned silly as we all couldn't stop laughing as they shone the lights on each other, their faces- some good entertainment! Love these two silly kids.

Saturday's bring a mix of play and work as I work from home over the weekends but we also do most of our house chores- or at least the deep cleaning...so rooms were picked up, desks were organized and I got started on the kitchen.  In the afternoon, being that two litters of our cavies are old enough to separate, we got the boys in one large cage together for a few weeks until our daughter attends a show and plans to part with a few to new families. Although many say you can not let boars (boys) live together, we permanently have 2 pairs of boars who have lived together for a long time and do very well. We believe that as long as one of them is really young, or both are really young, they should do well, and in pairs, but it really depends on personalities. We also put daddy in to say hello and video's a little boy crazy time...

Took them all about 15 minutes to all settle down!

Sharing a meal from last week- From Love & Lemons -Sweet-potato-vegan-alfredo

Trying new recipes, this dish was a winner, but very rich in taste! An 'okay' from the kids, but hubbie and I both enjoyed it, it was a process to put together but worth the taste. 

(check out the link, her pic is much 'prettier' :) than mine!)

And the afternoon brought some kite flying since winds had died down, strong enough to fly our kite but not turbulent so that it struck it down..although it did still go down a few times!

Feeling blessed we get two days together all four of us.

Creativity Friday

Listening to Music, Playing Piano Songs, Drawing, Colored Pencils, Watercolors, Sketching, Card Making, Holiday Crafting, Decorations....Getting our creativity flowing today.

Feeling joyous working with our hands and our hearts today.

Wind Power, Lemon Noodle Soup

Making us lazy, the wind blows loudly outside today, cool in the shade but feels decent in the sun...outdoor work or play has just not happened today because of it. Its been an indoor sort of day. Continuing from yesterday we looked further into wind mills and wind power with a few video's. With the wind blowing, we decided to test a new kite outside although it proved too turbulent to allow us to fly it very well, so our son asked for it to be hung from his ceiling until its next flight- sure, why not! A beautiful Macaw hanging now in the corner of his room. While he and I were outdoors fighting with the kite and the wind our daughter worked on her drawings, her art work then began prepping lunch. We chatted a bit over the weekend and she has decided to cook two meals a week for our family. She is the picky eater in our family but this gives her a chance to try new things that she chooses on her own. Today she made lunch of Lemon and Ramen Noodle Soup. Although not a big stretch for her, still sticking to her noodles- she still did well, cooked it all, served and even though she didn't especially like the flavor, ate most of it. A little cool math, some reading, checking on our sprouting plants- rechecking when the ones who haven't sprouted should come up and now some quiet time.

Our daughter researched recipes and decided on this one: Lemon-chicken-and-ramen-noodle-soup 

Being non-meat eaters, she used vegetable broth and vegan chicken can be used as well.

And it wouldn't be a normal day in this household without animal snuggling too. Bunnies & Cavies were all loved on.

Hubbies off at work already and the remainder of the afternoon and eve we have plans of board games, music, reading, dinner and bed. A quiet sort of day.

Fires & Inspiration: 'Moving Windmills'

While fixing breakfast yesterday our son noticed a lot of smoke coming from outside...sure enough, just like with every year, the farmers that own the fields surrounding our small 7 home neighborhood square were burning the irrigation ditches of their weeds. At one point standing in the back of our property watching our son stated it appears there was a 'line of fire' surrounding us. Watching, the kids looked on as the farmer controlled the fire, putting part of it out then moving down the line, so careful.

 Right outside our dogs fenced in yard...

After the morning fires, we moved on to take care of the animals and head in to work on our studies...together we read this book- 'The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind', a true story then watched a short video of him. The kids most liked that he was 14 and didn't even have school- he learned these things from books, taught himself English and figured out on his own how to build this. 

An inspiring story.

And a few books for Momma from the Library. Though we checked out the youth version of the story, the library also had the adult version that I read many great reviews on. 

 Then a little Mindful Parenting and Homesteading. Joy in my heart.

After our together studies our daughter moved on to working on a website she's been playing around with, working on writing content and our son and I went outside to work in the yard while reviewing some multiplication and spelling as we raked, played with chickens and cleaned the yard.

Lunch came upon us quickly then some afternoon family time with Dad since it was his day off, a quick errand to the store and an evening with a Movie - "Rio" our Son's favorite (my bird boy) with a Vegan treat of  'Hot Dogs' for dinner. Meatless of course. Into bed for the children and some quiet time for me and hubbie.

A beautiful day once again.

Crockpot Taco Soup, Sprouting, PE-Tennis

Such a long weekend made us want to do nothing but rest come Monday, so rest we did..yesterday, Tuesday, feeling a bit more energized we cleaned out numerous animal cages then made our way to the library for our weekly books so we could get back into our structure of school on Wednesday and also pit stop at the park for some PE time- tennis, play, running and fun.

Sharing a recipe from last week- we tried a few new vegan recipes, both crockpot recipes- this one is  

Taco Soup.

All ingredients go into the crockpot, on low, for 8 hours - loved that I put it together in the morning and by dinner it was ready, felt like no work at all!
2 cans kidney beans (drained)
2 cans pinto beans (drained)
1 can corn (entire can)
1 can diced tomatoes (entire can)
1 can diced tomato/green chilies (entire can)
1 pack taco seasoning
Serve, Added dab of sour cream, cut up warmed flour tortilla, cheese and cilantro on top.
Recipe adapted and made vegan from this site: Crock Pot Recipes

Sprouting...5 days

The lettuce's and kale are sprouting up a storm! When our son saw this he said we'd better hurry and finish up outdoors- so that's the goal this week, to get the yard finished up and cleared. The thought of these tiny sprouts turning into food for us is beyond exciting in this house.

Tennis & Park Play

 

Excitement for the week- on the brink of having a garden!

4H Smallstock Show & New Babies

Our Show weekend- 4H- Smallstock 2014, Cavies, Rabbits, Poultry, Waterfowl, Pigeon.

Tons of fun, showing, hanging out with friends, meeting new kids, catching up with old friends, being silly, working hard, kids teaching kids, kids helping kids, leading, being a role model. 

An awesome weekend.

And when we got home we were greeted by a surprise...our last pregnant sow had her babies while we were traveling home from the show- luckily everyone is healthy, thriving, running around and weeping already- 3 girls and 1 boy. 

White Crested Golden Agouti Momma

 White Crested Babies- 1 Red Boar, 1 Black Sow, 2 GA Sows

A great way to end a great weekend meeting the last of our litters.