Tot School Delay!

on Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Tot School
We were supposed to start Tot School this week. We are both very sick with massive sinus infections. My poor kiddo can hardly breath and I don't want to pick my head up off the table. I can only imagine how she is feeling because she is unable to vocalize her symptoms and I'm a whining wreck. I'm sure that everyone that tries to home school runs into these issues. We will have to see if we are feeling better within the next few days. If so, we'll start and if not, we might need to delay a week. It seems like I keep delaying this and might make you wonder how committed I am. I want to be honest in saying I'm so excited to do this with O but it seems we keep running into road blocks. She is just about 16 months old so she is still young for formalized learning which makes delaying tot school a little less of a bummer for me. Hopefully, we'll be feeling better quickly and can finally do some of the tot school activities I have planned.
-M

Yummy Apple Butter!

on Sunday, September 27, 2009


As you can see O loved it! It was all over the place. She stuck her cracker in to her small cup of apple butter and licked the cracker clean. She eventually ate the cracker once the apple butter was gone.










From Left to Right:
Cinnamon Applesauce, Spicy Apple Butter, Not so Spicy Apple Butter, Applesauce and Raspberry Jam

We were able to get 2 quarts of apple sauce and 1.5 quarts of apple butter out of our remaining apples on Wednesday night. We have finally used up all of the apples. Yesterday, S's mom made two apple sauce cakes using our homemade apple sauce. Yummy!

A little late!

on Thursday, September 24, 2009

Tot School
This week I trying to assess O to see what she needs to work on most. She is beginning to learn her colors but each week it seems she picks a color and then everything is that color. This week everything is blue. The conversation goes a little something like this:
Mommy: "What color is this?" (a red ball)
O: "Blue"
Mommy: "No, it's a red ball"
Mommy: "How about this one? What color is this ball?" (green)
O: "Blue ball"
Mommy: "No, it's green"
O: "Green"
Mommy: "Yes, green"
O: "Blue ball" (handing me a yellow ball)
Last week everything was yellow. She meeting and suprassing the doctor's expectations in physical development. I will continue to assess her as best I can this week and next week we'll start with our themes.
-M

Have you ever wondered...

on Friday, September 18, 2009

about the person that had your phone number before you? Today, I received two phone calls for a woman named Judy. I've had my phone number for over a year and I also know that the college student that had my phone number before me was not named Judy. I only know this because when I first was given this number I receive a lot of phone calls for Jenn about school projects. The calls for Judy had me wondering on my three hour car ride about her and the man that was trying to get in touch with her. Was this Judy's number at one time? If so, how long ago could it have since at least one other person had the number before me that was not Judy? If this was an important person in Judy's life shouldn't she have given him her new phone number? If not, why is this man trying to get in touch with her now after years?

Then again it is completely possible he just misdialed twice.

-M

Our Harvest

on Wednesday, September 16, 2009

I'm disappointed that I didn't take a picture of all of this fruit when we got home from the orchard. I think it would have been a great picture to have for memory sake. I did not weigh the items that were given to us so I can't honestly say how much we got from the CSA but I did weigh all of the produce we picked at the farm.



The Totals:
Plums: 3.5 pounds
Green Beans: 3.2 pounds
Strawberries: .5 pounds
Raspberries: 3.8 pounds
Red Peppers: 5.7 pounds
and for the big finale
Apples: 43 pounds!

So far we've made:
1 loaf of Apple Bread
17 Raspberry/Apple Muffins
5 pints of Raspberry Jam
4 pints of Applesauce and
3 pints of Apple Butter

And there is more to come... (with pictures)

Tot School!

on Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Tot School
After the nice introduction to Tot School last week I'm sure you expected to see pictures, read lessons and be inspired but that is not going to happen this week. When one becomes a mom one tends to fall victim to mommy brain once in a while. I completely forgot that O was going on vacation from Friday of last week until Sunday of this coming weekend. We went to my parents' house Friday-Sunday. O is staying with my parents until Friday morning then I'll be joining her for the rest of the weekend. We will arrive back home on Monday morning and Tot School will resume on Tuesday (9/22).
-M

This Weekend!

on Monday, September 14, 2009

Thursday


The Orchard II
Originally uploaded by OneEyedJax

We had an eventful weekend to say the least. It started Thursday for me because I took the day off from work. Thursday was our four year dating anniversary so we went out to dinner. We brought our little pumpkin along to The Curry Club which is just as it sounds, a restaurant that specializes in curried foods. I was a bit nervous doing this as O has never had curry before and is working her way out of an eating pattern similar to a food jag but not as severe. She has been subsisting on bread, milk and the occasional watermelon. As per usual O behavior, she surprised me. She had curried goat and not only did she eat it but ate it at such a rapid pace I could not cut it fast enough.

Friday

Friday was uneventful actually. We drove three hours upstate to visit with my parents. We stayed at my parents' house with my brother and his girlfriend. When we got to my parents' house we found out that my mom was given of her friend's share of the local CSA. My mom was uninterested in much of the vegetables and so I was able to bring them home with me. She gave us 4 peppers, 1 head of lettuce, 1 quart of green beans, 3 quarts of small tomatoes, 5 large tomatoes, a handful of basil and a handful of another leafy green I've never heard of. The CSA also included a broccoli and a cantaloupe which my parents kept. I feel like I'm forgetting something else, either way it was all free to me which is awesome! My brother just bought Rock Band and we spent most of the evening playing after O went to sleep.

Saturday

We went to a graduation party. I've been to many parties at my best friends' house but S and O never have. O came for a short while before the crowd became a little out of control and my parents took her home to go to sleep. The party turned into a large drunken mob after dark and I was ready to leave. We hung around for cake but I was really ready to leave by that time and took my cake for the road.

Sunday

Sunday was the best day of all the days on my long weekend. Well, minus when I found out my car needed a small repair. However, my stepfather was able to do this free of charge! WOOHOO! S, O and I went to the local orchard and picked a lot of fruits and a few vegetables. We ended up spending $56 which is more than we intended but are very happy with the results. We picked apples first. O seemed to pick up more rotten ones off the ground than ripe ones off the low branches of the trees. It was her first time and she's only 15 months old so she's forgiven this time but next year she better pull it together. I'm only kidding. She had a huge smile for the first hour or so. Next, we picked raspberries. I was nervous about bringing O into the raspberry patch because of the thorns but she carried the basket for Mommy smoshing one handful at a time. We loaded O back into the car to drive to a different spot in the orchard and she fell asleep. One of us sat in the car and the other picked the fruits and vegetables for the rest of the time at the orchard. S and I were shocked when we weighed the produce. We had no idea how much we actually picked.

Stay tooned post to follow with the totals of our trip and what we've made so far!

-M

A new idea!

on Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Tot School

We are going to try something new, something fun, something called Tot School! O turned 15 months old today and I feel like we are not providing her enough educational opportunities. She attends a gymnastics class once a week which at her age is more or less ten or so tots running around, climbing on stairs, sliding down slides and hardly interacting with each other except to bop each other with a rain stick during music time. This is exactly what we expected when we signed her up for the class but a trip to the play ground once a week can teach her the same things for free with no bopping. We will be keeping her in the gymnastics class because she hardly sees other children.

Anyway, I'm on a tangent now. Back to tot school! I feel, which may just be my first two years as an education major speaking, that she needs a little more loosely structured activities throughout her morning as opposed what we're currently doing. As I have posted before, I am a full-time working mommy but I work evenings four days a week so I have plenty of time for some Tot School in the mornings with her before Grandma takes over. I am still in the process of planning our Tot School curriculum for the next few months and I'm sure whatever I plan now will be changed as we go along. I am hoping to fully plan two days of planned Tot School each week with reinforcements the rest of the days. I'm going to try to cover as many areas as possible without being overwhelming for either O or myself. Once I'm able to get a rough idea of what we're going to be working on I'll post it.

I'm so looking forward to this special time with O.

-M

Happy Labor Day!

on Monday, September 7, 2009

Today is a holiday which means a day off of work for most but not for me. I don't absolutely need to work but it is holiday pay which will dramatically help bring the e-fund back up after last month. Most days, I enjoy my job but today I don't feel well and would much rather pop in a DVD, cuddle up with my one year old on the couch and fall asleep.

I haven't felt well all weekend which caused some of our plans to get thrown out the window. We planned to go apple picking on Saturday so I could make some applesauce along with some apple baked goods. We weren't able to go because I was so sick. On the upside, it is very early in the apple harvesting season here in New York so there will be just as many if not more apples to choose from next weekend. We were able to go to the county fair on Sunday. I continued to blow my nose every five seconds while the rest of my family played games and had a great time.

Hopefully, I'll feel better soon! We have plans that I'm looking forward to later this week as well as apple picking this up coming weekend.

State of the Finances

on Thursday, September 3, 2009

September - current as of 9/3/09

Savings:
Emergency Fund: We used a large portion of this to pay S's college tuition this semester so we are down a lot. Our balance comes to a measly $149.

Travel Fund: We used $1000 to pay down S's credit card. We are down to $1305. We are not going to reach our goal and will need to reevaluate our vacation plans in the next few months.

M's Retirement: Still chugging along at 4% of my income.

S's Retirement: Still unemployed so he has not opened an account yet.

O's College: We had a couple of deposits which increased this to $240. We will surpass our current goal. Hopefully, we'll be able to reach our stretch goal. This is one area where we are not funneling any extra money right now and most of her deposits have been gifts from family members.

Debt:
S's Credit Card (Our #1 Enemy): We paid off $1300 this month so we are down to a balance of $300 which will be paid off next month!

M's Student Loan: We are ahead of our target of $15,000 for this goal. It is down to $15,065 and will be under the goal after this month's payment. We will not get to our stretch goal but hopefully we'll knock a few hundred more off by the end of the year.

S's Student Loan: He's still in deferment due to being in school so this hasn't changed and won't for a few more months.

Net worth:
Our net worth has gone down yet again this month. We are making progress with our debts but S's student loan interest bill came in the mail last month and that was tacked on to his loan there for our net worth went down instead of up. We are at -$26,740. Even with our net worth going down we are thrilled by our progress for the month and can't wait to see what next month brings.

-M

We're Back!

on Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Welcome to September!
We just got back from our vacation on Monday morning. Since then things have continued to be hectic as the end of a vacation can cause. This morning I washed five loads of laundry, none of which have been folded. That will just have to get done some other time. I'm still working on getting all of our finances in order so look for that post in the up coming days. Today, I took a large portion of our travel fund and paid most of S's credit card off. Together, we decided that the money is not earning enough interest in the savings account to counter act paying the interest on his credit card and so we pretty much wiped the card clean. Now that his card is just about paid off we should see some improvement in our savings accounts in the up coming months. We, finally, feel like we are moving in the right direction.

-M