Hippie Road Trip Ideas

Here's a link for me to save for my Hippie Road Trip. I will expand on this crazy idea of mine this weekend. Hold your breath. ;)

How To Sleep in Your Car

Some interesting links

"We are Going to Homeschool": Matt Walsh Blog

This was a well-written article about why homeschooling is a viable option for many parents. We are jumping on the train next year, having decided to homeschool our kids through middle school. I'm a little bit scared, I'm not gonna lie...but I agree with Matt, it really is time for parents to step up and say, "Nope. Not anymore." 

Pinterest Review: Chicken Parmesan Bake

I made this off of  Pinterest last night; the kids loved it, I was not a huge fan. To be fair, I did things a little differently than the actual recipe--I had less tomatoes than called for, and I baked it in a casserole dish. The result was not the rosy, cheesy, crisp goodness pictured above, but rather a slightly pink, homemade mac'n'cheese--like I said, kids thought it was great. ;)  Too much cheese for me, I think!

Finished my book, Lady of the Rivers--first in a series of four from Philippa Gregory. Fantastic. Waiting on my mom to finish the second one. I just started The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan, which is the first book in the Roman series of the demigods made famous by Percy Jackson. :)  I love this story line Riordan has created. Its such an intriguing idea! I am not, however, a fan of his writing style. I don't think you have to "write down" to kids--Harry Potter, anyone? If Rowling can make a series in a 5-7th grade reading level and still write well, so can RR. Since he didn't, however, I will push through the "dude" mentality for the sake of the story. :)

Not much going on at the homestead. Fall is a slow season here. Halloween is around the corner! 

Marla's Movie Musings

Okay, so I'm a little behind the times on this one, since it came out in 2008! BUT I read the book over the summer, and put it in my queue...and it just came yesterday. (Probably because I was putting Downton Abbey episodes in the number 1 and 2 slots for three months straight.) This movie is FANTASTIC. It was awesome to me that the three leads are all singers by trade--they were fantastic. It was awesome to me that Dakota Fanning is still such a talented actress. It was awesome to me that it stayed very true to the book--which was awesome. I highly recommend the book AND the film--but read the book first!! You'll get so much more out of the movie, I promise!

Rating: A for (wait for it...) Awesome!

Weekend!

Its amazing, the feeling of contentment that comes from the promise of a weekend, some sweatpants, and a good book.

Homesteading and Self Sufficiency

Self Sufficiency

This article was posted on facebook by one of my friends (who happens to be a rather interesting conspiracy theorist, but that is neither here nor there), and I love it. My mind is sometimes blown by how dependent my generation is on the government, and on commerce. Is that the right word? Meaning--if Walmart and Stater Brothers shut down tomorrow, who would be okay in a week?? If the government had to regulate our food supply in an emergency by handing out staples (say a sack of flour and a bag of potatoes)--who would know what to do?? This first came to my attention about six or seven years ago when Ridgecrest had a two-day blackout. No electricity. People left the city in droves. No, seriously, people packed up and left to wait out the time in a hotel room, in "nearby" cities an hour and a half away. When we did get power back, there were lines outside the gas stations with panicked people waiting for their gas. Wow. Got me thinking. My parents' generation (not necessarily my parents, mind you!) would know what to do if things just stopped working. Ours? Some people would be in a lot of trouble. Is that scary to anyone else??

Anyway, self-sufficiency, along with avid reading of pioneer settlers accounts (usually women's journals from the late 1800s who came to settle the west coast) are a bit like my hobbies. I often wonder at a time when these hobbies were methods of survival--if you didn't garden or raise livestock, you would die. Could we do it?? Out here in the Mojave? 

In this article, the thing that I not so good at is the concept of debt. Credit cards make it easy for me to buy things on a whim. A goal of mine would be to pay only cash or not pay at all. Do you have a goal to make your life-style more self-sufficient? In this day and age, can "normal" families achieve a measure of self-sufficiency? What about true self-sufficiency? (Not talking about the hippie guys living in RVs on BLM land--although I'm totally jealous.) Marla Wants to Know!!!

I saw this today. I liked it.

Marla's Movie Musings

I went to see the movie "Gravity" today with a group of people I work with...I'd heard a lot of generic good things about the film, but really had little idea what to expect or what it was about. Here's the run-down:

1) This movie is basically "Castaway" in space. If you liked Castaway, you'll love this film. And you'll also know how it ends. :p

2) I had a very hard time separating Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as celebrities from their characters. They are so well-known that it was hard not to see THEM on the screen--which of course makes the plot a whole lot more far fetched. To be fair, I had this same problem with Tom Cruise in "Oblivion". Its probably just me.

3) Okay, seriously--there were LOTS of shots of Sandra Bullock's incredibly toned, skinny legs. But here's the deal: she had been in space for a week and half!! DOES ANYBODY REALLY SHAVE THEIR LEGS IN SPACE???

Rating: B

Christmas Card

Had to share this here, for my memories! This will be our Christmas card this year! I don't usually do Christmas cards--but really, who can resist sending this out?? Happy Wednesday!!

Garden dreaming

I am garden dreaming this morning...already. :)

My first garden was on our new property this year. I was discouraged at the time that I had to let it die off, and thought it was an experiment gone sadly wrong. I vowed never to garden again! But since then (time and thought), I have realized that every garden is an experiment! Some things will go well every year, and some will not--the point is to learn and adjust! I'm reading the book "No Time on My Hands" again (second time, first time was maybe 6 or 7 years ago?), and Grace Snyder had many gardens just ruined by the Nebraska/Wyoming hailstorms or by her husband's horses, or etc., and that was their grocery store!! So of course it never occurred to her to "give up"! Ha!

My pumpkins and tomatoes did very well. I just planted too many tomatoes, and my garden was in a place with no shade. While this may sound fantastic to Nor-Cal folks :) , in the desert, this was a mistake. It took a lot of watering to keep them from wilting. My tomatoes next to my son's cabin did much better, thanks in part to the shade. My potatoes were a total bust. This time, I am trying potato towers. :)  My poor, poor peppers never did take off. We had one plant produce two beautiful peppers--only to come home on day and find the rabbits had helped themselves. Heartbreaking, I tell you!!! However, I have since learned that I planted my peppers too close to my tomatoes--peppers are apparently selfish plants, and like their space. So they will be my container-gardening experiment this spring. I am going to try cucumbers, and also melons and watermelons...I think vine fruits do well in our desert, surprisingly!! I am composting through the winter (and I have no idea what I'm doing...)--I'll post some pictures of my little compost bin later. I am thinking of how to fence off my area, whether or not to do raised beds, how to level the ground, how much ground I want...I didn't realize how much work it would take to maintain our garden, especially in our summer heat in the full sun. One reason I am making adjustments. It needs to be something I can manage in the early morning through the summer. The place I'm considering now has a watering system built in it. Oooh, I also just read that you can make your beds out of bricks?? That would satisfy my aversion to power tools and asking my Handsome Husband for help. (Call it pride. Go ahead. I dare you.)

101 Gardening Tips

Garden Dreaming. :)

A Good Read

This Matt Walsh guy has been popping up a lot on my facebook feed. I think I like him. A lot. This article NAILS it. Truly.

http://themattwalshblog.com/2013/10/15/easy-no-kids-today-do-not-have-it-easy/

Watching to see the doors God is opening for our family. We'll see! :)

Gem and MIneral Show

We took the kids to the Gem and Mineral show in Trona, which is a nearby town. (Like, the ONLY "nearby" town.) We had a lot of fun exploring and looking at different rocks and minerals found in our desert. It was a spur of the moment thing; next year, we'll plan a little better, with some spending money for rocks (Mallory has a great rock collection) and a trip out to the mud to dig for pink halite. We had a good family day this year, and hiked around the Pinnacles for a bit as well. Dad kept teasing the kids that he had lost the car on the way back...and I fell for it too a little bit, can't lie about that one! He's a good trickster! Plus, hiking around in circles in the desert for an hour, everything starts to look the same. There's a reason we still have miles and miles of unclaimed land out here! The girls spend their recycling and egg money on geodes, which they cut at the show for them--it was a neat experience!

Down Time

Dear Santa

http://www.amazon.com/The-Illustrated-Encyclopedia-Country-Living/dp/1616084677/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1381586646&sr=8-5

Don't you hate it when you find a book you REALLY REALLY WANT two months before Christmas?? 

Just musings

Its 6:19 on a Sunday morning, and the rest of the family is asleep. I am such a morning person...mornings are my time, my sacred time, even; the time where I am an adult, alone. I would never actively choose that time, I think--or perhaps I should say, rarely would I choose that time; but its nice to be given the gift. Over a cup of ritualistic hot coffee, I listen to the strong wind swirl its fall sounds and cooler temperatures around our desert homestead. It is still dark; daylight savings time has yet to alter our perception of "day" and of "night". I am taking advantage of the moment to be grateful.

A year ago this September, we moved to our house. I guess I still think of it as our "new house", but I could not imagine living anywhere but here. It was truly a gift from God--I know we couldn't have managed it otherwise! We used to live in a pretty normal neighborhood with neighbors stacked upon neighbors and streets of houses all connected to each other with more neighbors, pretty centrally in our little town--we were three minutes from just about everything. Our new place is ten miles outside the city limits on ten beautiful acres of desert--and having grown up here, I think my desert is beautiful. Breathtaking, really. One of the few places left in this country where wilderness is still thriving, mostly because there is little competition to take it over--so many prefer the ocean or northern California with its Oregon-like weather and greenery, or the central location of even Lancaster or Bakersfield, which "they" consider a vast improvement on Ridgecrest. On our property, we have chickens; I had my first garden; the kids catch lizards and grasshoppers and even snakes; we have quiet and security; we have fruit trees, and a well; we are setting up for bees in the spring; my house itself is built like a rancher's home with a big kitchen to feed all the "hands" and wooden floors with a big open room perfect for a country dance--I am so blessed. I know I must have many in my life who, in passing, have wondered why on earth I turned back to our hometown for marriage, career and children--I think I was an unlikely candidate for one "stuck" in Ridgecrest. But--truly--this is my choice, and I love it here. Love it in my soul. I am so blessed.

Somewhere, in all of this, I have been wrestling the past good year with the ticking clock--are we done? There is a part of me that wants more children in a desperate way--an emotional way--but is it a spiritual way? I don't know. I am answered with the many reasons why not to--I want to take good care of the children I have, some of whom are entering the phase where they think they need less guidance but actually need more...I don't want them to remember Mom as "tired all the time." I don't want the cuteness of a baby (or two??) to replace the magic of a 9 year old, or an 11 year old; room is definitely an issue, although one I can talk myself around *fairly* easily; working is an issue that I can't talk myself around nearly as easily. I trust God will provide, but I don't want to "get through" any baby years. I want to cherish them, as I was able to with my three. I want to travel--and some days that yearning is huge. But--the future is an uncertain prospect! In my head I think I've convinced myself that no more children = opportunity to travel? And of course, neither of those things guarantees the other. Forgive me for the highly personal post. I think this is probably a common struggle of women my age ;)  and it helps me to write it out and process. I'm sure all the answers will now magically appear.

Mmmmmm; now back to my cup of coffee. Lay my small struggles down at the feet of the Lord, and revel in His love; Life Is Good.

Yet another sign of Fall!

The huge piles of fall/winter clothes hauled from the shed and spread all over my living room floor are slowly disappearing as they make their way through the laundry and into the kids' drawers :)  Definitely a fall-weekend project!

Bounty

What was left after a Saturday of dehydrating and saucing 

My Star Trek joke to the kids: The apple's core has been compromised!!

My two canning Bibles...one given to me for Christmas by my mom, and one that came my way from my Grandmother Pearl's house after she passed away; she was the Canning Queen! Lots of memories of coming home from Georgia with suitcases packed with canned tomatoes, beans, and jellies. Love you, Grandma

The final product! Mmmmmmmmm!!!

My husband said when I make applesauce, the house smells like fall. :)

Webelos

My son Daniel is 10, and started Cub Scouts in September. We were actually waiting to jump on the Boy Scout train in December, but my dear friend offered to start taking Daniel with her son--the boys have been friends for a couple years. Even though there isn't much time for him to "do much" in the program, he is loving every minute it of it! He earned the Fitness and Athletic Badge at this past Den Meeting. (uh, is that the right terminology?? We're new!) He moves into "11-Year Olds" in December, and then the things he works on go towards Boy Scout awards and on a new shirt. We are trying to get his religious knot before he leaves Cub Scouts. Its been great for Daniel, he really loves it! I am so proud of my (huge) boy. :)

Putting up apples

I started putting up the first of our 40 lbs of apples today with my helper :) I'll probably do two batches in the dehydrator--three if Larry will let me!! I love dried apples!! :) Applesauce is next on the agenda. This year, I think I am going to try apple butter with a "recipe" a friend gave me that uses the apple peels and cores from the apples. Can't hurt to try it out! I love my apple corer/peeler! I bought it from Amazon when I was first married, and made apple "slinkies" for my 6-year old Cindy and my 4-year old Lance. It is still working well!! (although somewhere along the way I lost the red handle cover...)

Miss Holly loves to peel and core the apples, and eat the "spaghetti"!

Letter Writing

There is a saying: necessity is the mother of invention, or something like that. In this day and age of communicative technology, letters are a truly disappearing phenomenon. But we have recently become an army family--my oldest daughter is in boot camp! We got a letter from her today, and just like a scene out of Little Women, we sat around the couch after dinner and read it aloud. The rest of the evening was spent writing letters back, and it was soul-warming to watch the kids learn in real time--"Mom, how do you spell this? Do I underline this? Should I ask questions? Can a draw a picture?" Gave them some dictionaries for the spelling, how old school is that?? We worked on our letters until bed-time. We should have a nice pack to send Cindy when we finally get her address. I hope she enjoys my bumper sticker. ;)

Broke in the new running shoes yesterday! Over the summer, I was doing 3 miles every day in about 42 minutes, and felt great! It was a long stretch of exercising for me, I tend to go in spurts...as soon as school started, the routine flew out the window. It was really the combination of rehearsals + school that did me in! The weekend after the show, I had dental surgery (no, no, it was really fun), and THAT has taken a week and then some to recover from. But I started!!! 30 minutes, 2 miles, and a Dr. Who episode. These shoes have a funny story; we were going to the ranch for camping and I had forgotten my tennis shoes. (remembered everyone else's shoes, though!) Right outside of Kernville there was a sporting goods Mom and Pop store--women's tennis shoes, size 10, for $12! Oh yeah! I never did get to use them on the trip, but that's another story. :p  They were great yesterday! Here's to another half hour today!