Chores and Allowance

Dave and I have been mulling over the whole chore-allowance subject for a few years now.  My girls are very helpful around the house, and we have wanted them to have specific responsibilities they are in charge of.  We have also mulled around the idea of an allowance or commission.  On one hand I think my kiddos should help around the house, no matter what.  They live here, they contribute to the mess, and we are here to serve each other.  But we also want to teach them about money and an allowance is a great way to begin to do that.

So, we have a chore chart.  At the end of the week they will get a nickel for every chore completed.  These include making their beds, helping with the laundry (folding and putting away clothes), helping in the kitchen, clearing their dishes from the table, emptying the silverware from the dishwasher, and cleaning up their toys before dinner.  HC also has to wipe the table and counters.

Both girls are very eager to help and get stickers for their chart, and I like the extra incentive it gives them.  Since the girls have no need of money, I have been talking to them about what they can do with all the money they earn at the end of the week.  This morning I went onto World Vision's website and showed them a bunch of videos about how they can use their money.  They can buy a chicken, or some ducks, they can buy a family some seeds, or help a child go to school.  I thought this was a great way to get them involved and most of the gifts would be attainable in a few weeks, if the girls pool their money together.  SO far both of them have decided on World Vision's clean water campaign.  We'll see how long it takes us to make that $20.

After a Long Silence

It’s been 7 months since my last post, and of course there have been lots of reasons for that.  I am not sure that I want to go into all of it at this time.  But I am sure as I become more and more comfortable posting there will be more and more thoughts that come out.  I do feel like I have a lot to say and a lot that is stuck inside of me that is bursting and to come out.  But these days things seem to come out like a slow trickle. 

Enough about that.  We’ll save it for another day.

Here are some things we have been up to since June.

July

Celebrating True’s first birthday. 

A trip up to OH to visit my grandparents, and introduce True to his only living great-grandfather.

August

Sending Hadleigh Claire off for her first day of kindergarten.

September

The girls started ballet and we painted and rearranged our bedroom with the help of my bff Erica. 

October

Halloween and pumpkins

November

Celebrated Annelise’s 4^th birthday.  We took her to see the musical Cinderella and it was a  memorable experience.

Spent Thanksgiving on a wonderful little island beach.

December

Took the girls to see the Nutcracker

Celebrated Christmas here and then took a quick trip to TN to visit with Dave’s family.

January

Lots of fun things seem to be in store for us in 2012.

The Cuz Gets Married

At the end of May we journeyed up to TN to celebrate Jon and Leigha's wedding.  The girls love their cousins, Jon, Josh and Jacob, and their cousins are super sweet to them them.  Now the girls finally have a girl cousin and they are super excited about it.  

All of us gals ended up matching in our black and white dresses, which was quite by accident, but I am sure it made for great pictures.

Fourth Year of Strawberries

About a month ago we trekked out to a farm not too far away for some yummy strawberry picking.  This was actually our fourth year at this particular place, and we managed to pick our usual two buckets.  True was on my back this year, as opposed to inside my tummy, so I came away with different aches and pains. And then the following night, Dave and I made our first batch of strawberry jam.  I gave jam making a whirl last spring for the first time, and quickly became obsessed.  We go through jam quickly at this house, so after the strawberry batch, I made peach, and plum and triple berry.  We opened our last jar the week before we went picking, so I went through an entire year without having to buy jam.  Sweet!

I think we were successful with our strawberry jam this year, and I am looking forward to making peach and plum in the coming weeks.  Random side note: as I was taking these pictures of the girls this crazy lady kept jumping into the picture and trying to tell the girls how to stand...you can only imagine their reaction to that, but it did make for an eventful picture taking moment.

Risotto

I love risotto.  I also love gnocchi.  A few winters ago we planned to go to Prague with our buds Jim and Kristen.  The morning we were to leave it dumped 18 inches on us and we had to cancel our trip.  Instead we bummed around our little place in Hensctal, ate some spicy, BB (butt-burning) chili, rode sleds, and ate at our favorite Oriental restaurant.  The next morning we decided to go to Lucerne, Switzerland, which was much closer than Prague and we could drive there for one night.  That night it was raining and cold, and after walking around all day we stopped for dinner at this little Italian restaurant.  The first thing they served us was a bubbly aperitif.  I usually do not like bubbly alcohol drinks, but it made me warm inside and it was a perfect start to our dinner.  I ordered gnocchi and I cannot think of gnocchi without thinking of that night.  It was a great night.

The nice thing about risotto is I can actually make it, unlike gnocchi, which I will leave to the professionals.  So here is a wonderful recipe from P-dub.  I did not use wine in this, and I added my own variation of veggies.  It was WONDERFUL!

Little Ballerinas

The girls took ballet this year.  I signed them up late (October), but it was a sweet little program at a local church, and they could be in the same class.  They loved it, although at times I wonder if that is really Annelise's thing.  Hadleigh Claire loved every minute of it, and Annelise especially liked jumping from dot to dot and making faces in the mirrors.  She did pick up a few moves, and overall I think it boosted their confidence.  We missed their "big" recital, but still were able to dress up for the rehearsal, ballet buns and everything.  It took me an hour, lots of gel and hair spray and bobby pins to get their hair up.  I am hoping to get their hair a bit longer for their next rehearsal (next spring).

Victory Garden

We have a victory garden!  This is our third year with a vegetable garden and it looks like it is going to be a great year.  I am so thankful that we started this three years ago, and we have gotten a lot of practice and experience over the last couple of years.  We started small and keep growing it, so it has fun to see the garden evolve.

Dave and I read several gardening books this year and decided we wanted to give the square foot gardening method a try.  So far, so good.  I am still not exactly sure where my cucumbers and zucchinis are going to grow, but we will see how it all plays out.  We also decided to move the garden, so it now sits right outside our kitchen door.  This is a nice location for watering purposes, and it also helps me to remember to check for veggies and bugs that might kill the veggies!

Our neighbor had a bunch of granite stone sitting in his side yard, so Dave went and asked them if we could haul some away for them, and they agreed!  Insane!  So our garden is made out of granite and it looks lovely.  My only complaint is that I think we barely get 6 hours in its current location, so it seemed to take the veggies a little longer to get started, but now they all look great, and we haven't had to put any pesticides on it yet (of course we have organic pesticides).

We planted most everything from seeds, except those dern tomatoes.  I just cannot seem to grow a tomato from a seed.  We also bought the sweet potatoes, but I think next year I will grow those from seeds.

This year we have enjoyed spinach, which is already past its prime, romaine (and I am so happy with this variation).  We also planted basil, and have a huge rosemary bush in the front yard.  Yum!

Tri-colored Bush Beans (purple, yellow and green)

Edamame

Zucchini

Sugar Snap Peas (Holy Moly)

Red and Yellow Cherry Tomatoes

Beef Steak

Roma

Jalapenos and Tri-Colored Bell Peppers (yellow, orange and red)

Lemon Cucumbers and Persian Baby Cucumbers

Pumpkins and Sweet Potatoes

Poppies