Checking In

I'm still not sure if I will come back to a regular posting schedule, but since I updated the Haphazard Homestead On The Road blog, I thought I would make a quick post here as well. We have been very busy this summer.

We are doing life learning (a type of homeschooling) now and technically began that on July 1. We have made new friends, had camping trips, enjoyed field trips with other home schoolers, had picnics with other life learning families, visited museums and other points of interest, went to the Missouri State Fair, and have done many other things both at home and away. All of those things have been both fun and educational.

Kat at a family art event at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art earlier this summer.

Shane continues to work most of each week in Joplin, MO, with occasional Fridays worked here in Kansas City. None of us really likes having him gone, but it is better than being laid off. Our garden has been very atypical this year, mostly because the weather has been atypical.

Rowan turned 10 in July 4.  We celebrated with a camping trip and a visit to museums in St. Joseph, MO.

Here it is late August and we're just now getting cucumbers, our peppers haven't matured enough to set on fruit yet, and we're picking lots and lots of green beans. I canned 20 pounds last week, have another 25 pounds picked and ready to can, and I expect another 10-15 pounds before we are done.

In terms of those goals I set at the beginning of the year, I've reached my reading goal and increased it from 18 books to 24 by the end of the year! I have read a few of the stacked up magazines, but unfortunately have done very little toward the other goals, including all those crafts I was going to make.

We have two more camping trips planned for our season, on next weekend for Labor Day, and one in October. I hope to write about those on the other blog as they happen. That, in a nutshell, is what's been going on here the last couple of months. I just want to say if you're still checking in here, thank you. I appreciate your support although I haven't been a very good blogger lately. I'll see you again...perhaps.

Here's A Rock And There's A Hard Place...Guess Where I Am...

Just checking in to say I'm still alive; we're all doing well, we've been traveling with Shane a bit while he's been working out of town, doing some other fun things closer to home, and I had the chance to meet, in person, someone who's been my e-mail friend for the past ten years!  (Hi, Melinda!)

But here's the deal...I've had absolutely no inspiration to post anything here for quite a while.  Neither am I ready to close the blog for good. 

So...I'm not sure when I'll be back, but I probably will be.  Just waiting for blogging season to come back around.

Home Again

Hope everyone had a great weekend. 

We are back from camping and I've put up two new posts at Haphazard Homestead on the Road.

Ready to Roll

It's Memorial Day weekend here in the US. Though not the original reason for the holiday, it's usually considered the unofficial beginning of summer. For us, that means camping season is finally here!

There are new tires on the RV, and it's clean and ready. Our clothing, personal items and food have all been packed, so we're ready to roll as soon as Shane gets home from work.

Unless things have changed in the past few months, the park where we will be staying has no wi-fi service, so it will be likely be Monday evening or later before you hear from me again. Considering how few my posts have been lately, that's probably comes as no surprise.

Anyway...I hope all of you have a safe and fun weekend, wherever you are!

What the...?

Have you ever seen anything like this?  We found it in our back yard earlier this month, right after that freak snow on May 2.

It's dandelions...a dozen or so...but all the stems were conjoined. 

One of the strangest things I've seen since the circus came to town when I was a kid.

Garden Pics and Stormy Weather

Our garden is finally beginning to look like a garden. 

That's great, in general, but the late growth is presenting a few problems.  Our early crops, like broccoli, Brussels sprouts and cabbage, are just starting to take off.  They are cool weather plants, so not only do we wonder if they have time to mature properly before really hot temperatures arrive, we were counting on them nearing harvest by now so that we could sow other seeds in their place.

What to do?  What to do?

As they are still rather small, we are considering transplanting them back into pots and trying to over-summer them and put them back in the ground as large bedding plants in late August for a fall harvest.  I'm thinking this isn't the best idea.

We could just sacrifice them so we can use the real estate to plant our summer crops (i.e., zucchini, peppers, etc.)  It would work, and monetarily we'd only be out a few seeds, but I just hate the idea.

Or, we could leave them be and add more beds (raised or in-ground) to plant our summer crops in.  This is probably what we will do.

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We had thunderstorms with strong winds overnight.  Here is a limb from a small maple that has broken and is draped over the power line running from the pole to our house.  Our electric utility has been notified, but because we still have power, we are not on the priority list (apparently lots of folks lost power in the storm).  We've been told a crew will come out soon, but probably not today.

Problem is, more storms are on the way.  In the 15 minutes it's taken me to write this since taking the pic, the skies have grown dark again and the radar is turning red.  If there's much wind with this next round, we could easily lose power.

Still, I'll take this weather any day over the snow we had three weeks ago.

Unfortunate Weekend Events and A Week of Ham

Our weekend didn't turn out at all like we expected.  We had planned a nice visit here at home with my sister and brother-in-law on Saturday afternoon, with them staying overnight in the RV, then on Sunday we were going to join up with my niece and her family, as well as my daughter and son-in-law and spend the day at the zoo.

Instead, shortly after they arrived, my brother-in-law fell ill with some episodes of dangerously low blood pressure and he and sis spent the entire weekend in the hospital, with us making a few trips back and forth ourselves.  My BIL is 68, and has a known serious heart problem, but they ruled that out as the cause right away.  He is also diabetic and I think they have determined that some late and missed meals on Friday and Saturday, as well as some late medication, were the main reason his blood pressure was plummeting.  His blood pressure has since stabilized and he should be released today after one more precautionary test on his heart.

Because of the sudden change in plans, I have a ton of food in the house.  In anticipation of our weekend, I had baked a large spaghetti casserole for our meal on Saturday, prepped ahead a big pan of breakfast enchiladas, and I had thawed a half ham to cook today.  I also bought several kinds of individual-wrapped snacks that I had planned to take with us into the zoo.  Of course, very little of the prepared food was actually eaten, and I still have that ham to bake today.

I invited my daughter and son-in-law over for supper last night, so that took care of half the spaghetti casserole, and I individually wrapped half the breakfast enchiladas and stuck them in the freezer.  They'll go with us on our first camping trip in two weeks, along with the pre-packaged snacks.

Here's what I plan to do with the ham:

Monday:  Baked ham, mashed potatoes, peas and carrots, asparagus, rolls.

Tuesday:  Ham with parsley sauce, boiled potatoes, green beans, salad.

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Wednesday:  The rest of the Baked spaghetti casserole, garlic toast, salad, home-canned peaches.

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Thursday:  All-American Ham and Cheese Roll, potato cakes, corn, asparagus.

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Friday:  Hawaiian Ham Quesadillas, tater tots, salad.

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Saturday:  Ham and shrimp pasta, garlic toast, salad.