As I watch the sun dip down beneath the horizon a little earlier each day, I know it is coming- The long winter. My heart races a bit when I think back to the dark commutes to work, followed by the dark commutes home to dark evenings with dark dinners. With the dark came the illnesses, the constant barrage of sickness and injuries that marched us through the cold winter months. The long nights when Tim worked late and I nursed sick children and then dragged myself to the office the following day if they were well enough to leave.

Everyday I have to remind myself that it isn’t the same. The dark evenings don’t matter so much because I have the kids during the day now too. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I was under the weather this morning, so today was pretty lazy. We collected more black walnuts from under a neighbor’s tree. I sat on the driveway and hulled a huge pile and spread them on the shelves to dry in the sun. I bagged up the ones I had dried over the past few days and hung them in the garage to finish curing. We will be opening them soon.

I checked our persimmon tree and the fruit is not quite ripe and I still don’t know if the wild grapes are poisonous, so I need to research that. I’m contemplating getting a bushel of apples and making jars of apple sauce and apple butter and maybe some cider.

This evening as the kids traced their shadows on the driveway in chalk, I sat with a book and read to them. They have taken a liking to mysteries, and I had recently picked one up I thought they might enjoy. It was an easier lift than our previous book and a faster read. We stopped for dinner, and after we ate, we curled up on the couch and I continued to read. My plan was to only go through a few chapters, but the kids were so engrossed, and I enjoy reading to them so much that we ended up going through all 142 pages! That was over two hours of straight reading and my voice was definitely feeling it by the last few chapters.

They are all asleep now and I am enjoying the last few minutes of quiet before I crawl in bed myself. Goodnight, friends.

Last weekend we visited my in-laws. Saturday morning we had a birthday party to attend, but on the way I wanted to make a stop and see a dear friend. Tim had to go to work and wouldn’t be joining us at the party. When I pulled out of his parents’ driveway the low tire pressure light came on. I turned around and got Tim outside to look at it.

Now Tim and I have been married for going on twelve years, and one thing I know is that we definitely approach these types of situations differently. I overreact and Tim under reacts! When I see any lights come on on my dashboard, it takes me less than three seconds to imagine myself stranded on the side of the road never to be heard of again. (see… overreaction.) Tim, on the other hand, sees a light come on the dashboard, does a mental calculation about the chance of getting to his destination, and quickly ignores (at least in my opinion) said light. (under reaction.)

I should note that if Tim was telling this story, he would say I overreact and he reacts right on target, but he’s not here so you get my version. 🙂

But I digress. So, I dragged Tim out to the van and he checked everything, drove it for about 20 seconds and told me it was fine. Which it probably was, but he hadn’t been in my head where I was already stranded on the side of the road with three kids in the back.

Somewhat annoyed I got on the road determined to put air in the tires before going much further. The first gas station I went to didn’t have a machine, but thankfully the second one did. (and to make it even better, it took credit cards!) So I started filling up the tires. (btw- they were all low, but not too bad, so Tim’s under reaction was probably on point.)

As I was filling up the tires, an older woman drove up in an SUV. She got out and asked me if I knew how to run the machine. I told her I had figured it out and she asked me if I could help her too. I said sure and she waited for me to finish with the van. I pulled it away and she parked by the machine. She handed me her credit card and I got to work.

As I was bending on the ground filling the tires we started to talk. We got on the topic that I homeschool my kids and she mentioned that she had been a teacher for about 30 years. She listed the schools she had worked at and they were all familiar to me. I told her I even attended one of those schools for my kindergarten through second grade.

It was then that she told me what her name was and my jaw dropped. I was putting air in the tires of my second grade teacher!!! I hadn’t seen her since 1988! When I told her my maiden name she reached out and hugged me and we both got watery-eyed as we began to fill each other in on our lives since we last met. She remembered me and that I had a sister. I introduced her to my kids. We laughed and cried and smiled. It was an amazing experience. We made sure to exchange information and we took a few pictures together to document our reunion. We have since texted back and forth.

It really was a special experience and I laughed later at how annoyed I had been that Tim hadn’t come to my rescue over the tires. If he had, my teacher and I would likely have never crossed paths again.

I spent the rest of my day telling everyone I ran into about my unexpected encounter and she was doing the same thing. 🙂

As a mom, I daily have to choose my battles and the great sock discrepancy of ’19 was one I didn’t engage.

If you are wondering, my hands are still quite stained. I have washed and scrubbed and encouraged in every way imaginable the stains to disappear, but they have only slightly faded. I still look ridiculous.

But on a positive note, the kids helped me lay out the remaining walnuts (from this current batch) onto shelves set on the driveway. The hope is that 1- the squirrels don’t run off with them, and 2- the sunlight will hasten their drying so that I can hull them easier.

Today the mesh bags that I ordered showed up and I was able to place all of the hulled walnuts into one and hang it in the garage for further drying. I have also acquired a large box of nitrate disposable gloves, which should ensure no more happy little stain accidents in the future.

So, as you can see, aside from the unfortunate burnt marshmallow thumbs, the experiment is going well!

In just under a month, this sweet boy turns five. How is such a thing possible?

There was a book that came with Big E’s curriculum last year that I never got to. I have a hard time with non-fiction books, and so I tend to lose interest pretty quickly. A few weeks ago I saw an IG story from my sister-in-law where she was talking about going through the book and I decided to take another look at it.

It’s a book that talks about the importance of reading and literature. It also has comprehensive lists of books they recommend you read or let your children read as they grow up. I flipped through the lists and checked the online library catalogue to see if I could reserve a few.

One of the books on the list that was available to borrow from our local library was “The Children of Green Know.” I’d never heard of this book before but it takes place in an old English manor, and since I love most things British, I decided to give it a try.

When possible, I like to read ‘up’ to the kids (read books that are slightly above their reading level) so they get challenged by new vocabulary and more complicated sentence structures. Green Know is definitely one of those books. It was first published in 1954 and is actually the first of six books. The language in the book is more difficult than what they are used to, but it hasn’t stopped them from enjoying it. I stop every once in a while and explain sections I can tell that they don’t understand and then we move on.

This evening we spent about an hour and a half reading 55 pages. We ended up stopping because my voice was terribly tired or we would have read more. We are about 110 pages in and I’m hoping to finish it by the end of the week.

Since this is a story I had never heard of before, I would be interested to know if any of you have read it. What were your thoughts? Did you/your kids enjoy it? Is it worth reading the other books?

PS- I did notice there is a British Miniseries from the 80’s that we could watch on YouTube. I watched the first seven minutes and it seemed spot on with the book.

After we had harvested our first batch of black walnuts I decided to research them a bit. I had heard they were a lot of work, but well worth the effort. The articles I read talked about the timing of harvest, hulling, and shelling the nuts. I read and heard lots of warnings about wearing gloves and that black walnuts can stain your skin.

So I felt I was at least marginally prepared when I sat down this afternoon to start removing the outer hull of the nuts. I wore gloves to make sure my hands didn’t stain. After nearly an hour of opening walnuts I decided to take a break. I pulled off the gloves and to my horror, my thumbs were nearly black!! Apparently the gloves were more porous than I realized. My hands never felt wet and I had no idea the stain was working its way through!

But it did and I’m here to tell you that black walnuts were aptly named.

I stopped immediately and went inside to try to get it off, which not shockingly, didn’t work! I looked up and tried a bunch of various methods to no avail. So… now I have black thumbs. A couple of my other fingers are a little tainted, but my thumbs look like burnt marshmallows!

I’m not sure how long it is going to take to wear off, but it looks absolutely ridiculous. If only the weather was cold enough to justify gloves 24/7 until it fades, but alas it isn’t, so I have to go out into the world with burnt marshmallow thumbs for the foreseeable future!

You might think this has dampened my resolve to finish my walnut experiment, but if anything I am more determined to see this project through to the end (funky thumbs and all!)

A BBQ and a birthday party on the same weekend?!? There’s nothing better than family time around a campfire, s’mores, beach time, and playing with cousins. We are home now and everyone is snug in bed. What a fabulous weekend!