Mother's Day Weekend

I had a lovely Mother's Day weekend.  Rich bought me these lovely flowers and some lemon cake.

My girl is getting so big.

Rich's mom and I celebrated our day at Olive Garden.  This was our dessert, a chocolate lasagna!

Mary made me this cute memo pad

A sachet with scented soap for my chest of drawers.

My wonderful cards

I loved Mary's creative card.  You pull on the heart and...

...out comes a message.

Plates for Birdies and Butterflies

I bought these lovelies today at our family day at the thrift store. Mary always loves to go. I had a hard time just sticking with these plates. I am going to use them in my garden for dried bread for the birds and fruit to attract butterflies in the summer. So many beautiful plates to choose from and so cheap. I think I would like a whole set of unmatched plates for us to eat on, each one is special and says something unique. Rich got more electronic parts from hair dryers, curling irons and cameras for his project to make a convection smoker for meat and cheese. We also got some wonderful music books. I got a great find of Mary's next two levels of piano books, that would of cost us $40 or more for 5 bucks! I heart emoticon the thrift store plus the money stays in the local economy and not overseas.

Lady Bug Release

Mary had fun releasing some lady bugs into our garden.  We bought them at the garden center at our local Fred Meyer's store.  She got to keep them over night to watch them and then we set them free the next morning.  She was so impressed by finding one that had just one spot.  She made an entry in her field journal about it and drew this wonderful picture of it.  Mary says she would like to be an illustrator when she grows up.  So we will see what happens with that.

Curls

This post is a Mama memory post.  Mary was doing her school work the other night and I was looking at her curls that form around her head when I put her hair up in a bun.  So I took a few snap shots for my memory when she is grown and on her own.

St. Patrick's Day

This post is a little late.  We had a fun St. Patrick's Day.  I made Mary a green clover pancake.  She was surprised when she came to the breakfast table.  Mackie wanted some too!  Rich fixed a wonderful lunch of corned beef, cabbage, potatoes and carrots.  We read the true account of who St. Patrick was and then Mary wrote about the story of his life.  The last picture is of my flowers on our front step.  Spring has sprung! 

 

Sixty-seven Years

We had a delightful evening celebrating my in-laws wedding anniversary.  They were married March 20, 1949.  We took them out to beautiful restaurant in Grants Pass called Taprock.  The food was reasonably priced, delicious and the service was excellent.  We had so much fun afterward walking around outside of the restaurant.  It is located on the Rogue River with a lovely walk way, so you could enjoy the birds and wildlife on the river.

Healing Broth

I made this a few weeks ago and it was a hit at our house.  I changed a few things...I added frozen chopped spinach and kale because I didn't have parsley and I flavored the water with chicken stock and I added both sweet potato and carrots and I added rice noodles to make a little more hardy than a broth.  We made it for ourselves then I made a big pot of it for my in-laws for a Sunday dinner.  The fresh ginger and turmeric is so good for you.  We have been taking a turmeric supplement lately and it is so good.  I was so happy to not get a cold this year, even when Mary and Rich got one.  I started drinking a lemon and ginger tea each night and it was really made a difference too!

 

 

Healing Broth

Ingredients

 

4 carrots, chopped or 1 sweet potato, cubed
2 stalks of celery, roughly chopped
2  onions, sliced
1 cup parsley, finely chopped
1 cup of shiitake mushrooms, fresh or dried
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 bulb of garlic (about 6-8 cloves), minced
1 inch of fresh ginger root
1 inch of fresh turmeric root
8 cups of water
Optional: Chili peppers or red pepper flakes

Preparation
Place all the ingredients in a pot and bring to a gentle boil. Turn heat down to low and allow to simmer for about an hour. Strain and sip for a mineral rich, healing and restorative broth. 

Homeschool Unit Study - Penguins

Wow, I have been kind of sparse on the posts lately.  So, I thought I would do a couple tonight.  We have just finished up on a homeschooling unit on penguins.  Mary loves animals, especially penguins.  First she made the cover for her pocket book.  Each pocket holds a set of activities to do.  We did reports on the different kinds of penguins, she made a chart of all the heights of the penguins, we did their life cycle, we made a bulletin board design.  We learned so much and had a bunch of fun doing it.  That is what I love about home school is you can study what your child loves and learn all the skills they need in math, writing, spelling, and even history.  We also read a wonderful book called, "Mr Popper's Penguins."  It was delightful and Mary loved to so much that we read it twice.  So here are the pictures of our different activities.