Kristen in the Country

Christmas is upon us and I'd be remiss if I didn't take the time to retell one of my most favorite Rob & Kristen holiday stories. Us at Christmas, but not the one from this story I like to call it Fist Fighting at Christmas, also known as Kristen's Christmas Miracle. I'm not entirely sure, but it had to have been between 2002 and 2009 because we didn't have kids.  Every single year of my life I've gone to my grandparents' for Christmas Eve so that evening we loaded up our gifts in the truck and headed over to good ol' Funcie for a night of family festivities. Before I get to the good stuff, it's worth mentioning that my husband is an avid and skilled outdoorsman who loves and appreciates the wondrous glory of nature.  He has a deep affinity for noticing and reveling in the beauty around him and being outside brings him peace, comfort, and joy.    Keeping these attributes in mind, I shall draw your attention to the part of the story...

We've reached an important milestone in our renovation plans for the house. We finally started. Technically, lots of work has been done since we moved in, starting with the garage and eventually moving on to the basement (still a work-in-progress as far as mortar and wall repair are concerned).  Rob finally has a proper (and heated !) shop so we took a month or so to regroup, reevaluate, and decide on a renovation strategy.  As far as we were concerned we had two feasible options: 1. Buy a trailer, put it on the property to live in, gut the house, and go for it. 2. Renovate this bad boy, one room at a time. Since we still haven't found what we're looking for (a money tree), we went with door #2. The attic has been on Rob's mind for a long time because in order to insulate the ceilings above all the bedrooms, the attic floor will need to be taken up so insulation can be put down.  Before any of that can happen, the attic needed cleaned out.  When his mo...

When we moved here, one of the first projects Rob started was converting half of the garage into a workshop.  The framework was already in place so he had to insulate and put up walls and a ceiling.  He also wired it for more lights and outlets and added a ceiling and exhaust fan.  All that was done in the fall so the first winter here, he worked in his shop wearing coveralls and using a salamander heater to make the shop temperature just slightly above tolerable.   In the spring, he began talking about adding a wood-burning stove to the garage to heat it during the winter and thus the latest project began.  After searching several designs, he decided making his own was the way to go.  Although not necessarily cost-effective to purchase and make, it is unique and fits the space he has in the shop perfectly. The body of the stove is made from three 24" steel semi-tire rims purchased dirt cheap at a local junk yard.   Bought 4, used 3 (one will b...

We just finished our home school year a couple weeks ago.  This means in January, we'll officially have a 4th grader, 2nd grader, and our very last kindergarten student.  I was kinda sad about that until I realized I have an extra set of Kindergarten student sheets for our curriculum tucked away and I am gonna save $55 when I place my new curriculum order here in a couple weeks.  BOOM.  Not sad now! Anywho, here's my official review of our 2018 school year and curriculum.  Feel free to close your browser or hit the button that takes you back to Facebook if the idea of reading about curriculum bores you. Year : 2018 Grades : 3rd & 1st; pre-K Curriculum : My Father's World Learning God's Story (1st grade) & Exploring Countries & Cultures (3rd grade); All In One Homeschool Level 1 (pre-school) Curriculum thoughts : We've used MFW since Quinn was in Kindergarten.  I love the format, style, presentation, and delivery of all lessons.  Thi...

Around here, The Japanese Beetle Plague 2018 is still in full force, as is an apparent appearance of the Where's Waldo? of tomato plants, the disgusting horn worm (even though I'm just guessing because I haven't found him yet).  So, while we put our eight year old on Japanese beetle eradication research duties, we thought it would be a good idea to invite a new insect into our garden: Mason bees. Based on the small amount of reading I've done, I've learned mason bees are not carpenter bees.  They (males) don't sting; females do but it has been described as no more unpleasant than a mosquito bite (I'll let you know the first time one stings me). Mason bees are great pollinators, which is why we built three houses to attract them.  There are kits you can buy online but Rob built some using scrap 2x4s we had laying around.  I don't anticipate any bees living in our houses this year because we didn't hang them up until well into the summer.  Typically...

Well, hello there!  My sister told me I should blog about our garden and she's right.  I haven't updated anything here for several months and it was literally -10 degrees the last time I blogged.  Remember the thermal images of our (non-existing) insulation and walls?  That was the weather last time I posted.  Today it's the complete opposite but thank goodness for central air in this old house! (You thought I was serious, didn't you?  Window A/C will have to do!) ( But seriously, it's hot in here) ("'Bout to take off all our clothes"--c'mon 90s folks, you know that Nelly lyric went through your head) But I digress.  The garden. But first, some newly hatched baby robins  Ok, now, the garden for real this time. Peppers!  Serrano, habanero, and jalapenos are jammin'.  We made potato salad last weekend and threw in a couple jalapenos and woah .  I almost threw a serrano in until I looked up the heat level and realized they'...