Introducing Youngest

Exactly 4 years ago today, I had Youngest at home with the help of a midwife. She was a surprise pregnancy and when I figured out the day she was conceived, it was on the very last night in our old house! We were too busy packing and painting and making moving arrangements, plus we had two little ones to care for, to have any fun but we made sure to have one last farewell romp in our old bedroom. Hmm. :o) After moving here, I couldn't stand how the office smelled, to the point where I was ready to gut it out. Andrew couldn't smell anything weird and smart guy, he managed to prevent me from doing anything drastic. I finally figured out I was pregnant when I missed a period *gasp!* Well, good thing we moved to a bigger house then, right?

As with the first two, we wanted another old-fashioned name. Once again, we had no idea what the sex of the baby was, but we still couldn't settle on a boy name. We had several girl names we liked, so we thought maybe it would be a girl. After 3 pushes, the baby was out-- a girl! Meet...


...Sylvia! Today, the birthday girl turns 4!! Happy Birthday Sylvia!

She is such a sweetie, a tender-hearted little girl, who plays well by herself as long as she is within sight of me. A girly-girl, she loves pink, pink, and did I say pink? If she could, she would wear dresses every single day, just like the one she is wearing here. I have to make her put pants on or put on a long-sleeve under it because it's 27 degrees outside!

Here's her birthday menu requests: Pancakes for breakfast; Hot dogs and macaroni and cheese for lunch; sandwiches and potato salad for dinner; strawberry cake with chocolate frosting.


Andrew calls her my shadow. Where I go, she goes. She is always near me and when I go outside, she'll come with me. Even if it's just a quick in-and-out, she wants to come with me. When it's time to pick tomatoes or grapes or something from the garden, she'll always be my helper. Though when it comes to the chickens, she tends to stay in the house-- She doesn't like the rooster because he pecked her before and tried to keep her in line like he does the hens. I tell her she is bigger than he is, but in her eyes, he is the big one. Maybe come Spring, her fear of him will loosen and she'll help me gather eggs.


Her older sisters tend to play together and leave her out sometimes, though we try to stay on top of that and encourage games and other activities that include everyone. When it does happen, she'll play with Baby and if he's napping, she'll play by herself. She imitates her sisters, always trying to sing what Gretchen is singing, or using Evelyn's language or copying her attitude. Evelyn was always starting a sentence with: "The problem is..." even if it had nothing to do with the topic. So little Sylvia was saying that: "Mama, the problem is...I love you!" Always a pause after saying "The problem is..." I would be busy feeding Baby and she is impatiently tapping my arm, which is kind of annoying to a deaf person, and then when I snap "what?!", and this is what I'll see-- Sylvia signing "I love you" to me and then I feel bad for snapping at her.

Such a sweetheart, always giving me hugs and kisses and only wants me to put her to bed at night and always sneaking her way onto my lap when I'm at the computer or when we are watching a movie together. She sits next to me at the table and will not have it any other way.

We love you Sylvia, very, very much! Happy Birthday little one, and may you have many, many more!
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Spotted...

I've never seen this before-- antlers for your car. I wasn't too impressed, and as a matter of fact, the first thought that popped into my head was: oh, more crap for people to buy.

Then Youngest spotted it and said: "Look! A deer-car!!!"

Which then prompted a whole conversation with Daddy about who was driving the car (an old man and an old lady as a passenger), where they were going, why they had a deer-car and so on.

So now I think it's cute.

hmph.

A deer-car. :o)
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Random Tidbits

I have some random things and pictures I need to unload out of my head. You know the feeling, stuff that clutters up your brain and rattles around in there until you decide what to do with it. Well, I've decided to put it all in one post, tidbits and stuff that's happened this month, sort of a way to sweep out the old and welcome in October! Dang! October already? Really?

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The garden is still giving us tomatoes. The temps are going anywhere from the 60s to the 80s during the day and drop to the 50s and sometimes lower at night. It was pretty chilly today, most of the windows stayed shut, so I may have to pick all the green ones and make that green tomato salsa I've heard about. We haven't been overwhelmed with tomatoes but I did manage to can 10 pints of chopped tomatoes and it looks like I may be able to can a few more tomorrow.

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One day, when the husband had a day off from work, I made up some pie crusts and chopped up some apples for making and freezing mini apple pies. Hubby picked up a mini pie maker at a yard sale somewhere so we tried it out and it's a nifty little thing. One side cuts out the crust, other side folds and seals the edges.

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Pretty soon, the girls took over and edged me and the husband out of the pie-making operation. We ended up with about 50 mini pies to go in the freezer and the ones with ripped crusts got baked and eaten. They were tasty! I also made and froze 2 regular size pies. I planned to make 4, but my pie crust was not cooperating with me that day and kept crumbling. I gave up and pressed the crust into a rectangular cake pan and made a deep dish apple pie with crumb topping. We are still eating that, it was so good, but it's a lot of pie! I would make it again if there was going to be a crowd coming over to eat.

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I finally used up the last of the apples from the 6 bushels we bought. I canned another 6 quarts of applesauce tonight for a grand total of 70 quarts! I originally planned to can 100 quarts, since the 52 quarts I canned last year didn't make it to the next apple season, but I got to thinking-- Baby is not eating applesauce daily like he did before, so 70 ought to do it. Plus, I'm tired of apples. I'm tired of peeling them, coring them, chopping them, stirring them, eating them. And being chased by bees when I take the apple leftovers to the compost...

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My coupon-cutting is time-consuming, but effective in saving us money. I have to do my "homework" to search out different websites for coupons and deals and then sit down to match up coupons with prices for cheap deals. I am not complaining, we are eating well. My local food store had a bargain sale on store-brand mac 'n cheese for 10 cents a box and spaghetti for 59 cents. The husband loves spaghetti, it's his #1 favorite meal, so we eat a lot of that, at least once a week. And I love mac 'n cheese-- who doesn't? With trying to save money, I have been making it from scratch, but with a deal like this, I'll happily buy some. The photo above is what happens when you let your 3 year old put away pantry items: boxes of spaghetti and mac 'n cheese stacked anywhere she could put them. We ended up buying 60 boxes of mac 'n cheese (do the math, that equals $6!) and 60 boxes of spaghetti.

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I made a meal tonight that cost less than $2.00 to feed the 6 of us:

1 box of mac 'n cheese- .10

1/2 lb ground beef- .75

2 tomatoes- free (garden)

1 carrot- .20

1 tube biscuits- .75

Total: $1.80 for a yummy tomato/mac 'n cheese/beef (with grated carrot hidden in the sauce) dinner

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The bright side of saving all this money is that we have a little extra money for other things-- like fixing my van. We have been having trouble with it lately. The tires needed to be replaced- they were bald in front and leaky in the back; we had to pump air into the back tire before we went somewhere. Bought 4 new tires and now something else is happening to the engine. It sputters and lurches and then shuts down. Our neighbor mechanic is working with us, replaced this and that, still no go. Hopefully we will pinpoint the trouble soon and it won't cost too much.

I have been "trapped" at home lately, because the one vehicle that works is the husband's truck, which is a stick-shift and 6 of us don't all fit. I am counting my blessings, we have a truck that works and if that means I have to stay home and give him the grocery list to shop for me, then so be it.

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I think my head is not rattling anymore. Thanks for listening. :o)

Grapes

Husband and Youngest helped me pick the last of the wild grapes today. I previously picked some, but I couldn't reach the higher-up ones without some help. The ground where the grapes are at slopes down and it makes for an awkward time with the ladder. Husband came up with the idea of backing the truck up to it and putting the ladder in the back of the truck bed. *!!!* What a good idea! I was then able to nearly get all of the high-up grapes and then used the truck itself for a platform for the other areas where I just needed a little bit of help.

The wild grapes were plentiful this year, I assume because of all the nice rain we had and the birds and animals had plenty of other food to munch on. I had been keeping my eye on the grapes, waiting and watching for them to ripen. I want to try making grape juice this year, since I still have plenty of grape jelly from last year's harvest.

Youngest and I set up grape headquarters outside on the bench and got to work plucking grapes off the stems. Youngest is always following me and helping me in whatever I do. She's my little helper.

Things were going well, until a bee flew by and landed on her shoulder. I was about to tell her not to move, when she jumped, and then the bee stung her. Poor girl, I know how she feels. She took it much better than I did when I got stung by a wasp back in July. After soothing her and giving her some meds, we moved the grape operations indoors.

After cooking the grapes and straining the juice from the pulp, I found that I don't quite have enough for the recipe I have for grape juice. I'll have to play with it for a little bit, halving the recipe and then tweaking and tasting until I have it right. I have plenty for making more jelly, but I really don't want to make more jelly at this point, I have enough kinds of jams and jelly in the basement to last for a long while. Wild grapes are very tart, and it would take a lot of sugar, so maybe I'll blend it with apple juice to stretch it out a bit and also to sweeten it naturally, using less sugar that way.

Next year, I would like to try growing conventional grapes for eating and juicing. It would be nice to expand on our little mini-orchard and grow even more of our own fruits.

For Teena--

Is this the same dress you got for your wee one, too??

Look at her shoes! :o)

She always puts them on the wrong feet!

Life in Sentences.

I let the housecleaning slide a little bit, we've been way too busy and I have to pick what's more important:: cranky me cleaning a house or having a little fun with the kids with a crumb-y floor? I chose the crumb-y floor, but then I also chose the cluttered counter tops, dirty dishes in the sink, messy bedrooms and dirty laundry in the hallway.

Why is it when my house is messy, that's when I have strangers come by-- the phone company guy to replace the modem on our computer and carpet people come and install new carpeting in the apartment. I was embarrassed about the mess, and apologized, then kicked a toy under the hutch and picked up a few torn scraps of paper off the floor. I know there's nothing I can do while the guy is standing in the office, waiting for the computer screen to warm-up and all he can see is the mess in the house. sigh... Let that be a lesson to me:: it's OK to let the housework slide, but not too much!

Here's a quick update::

The garden is growing,
the kids are thriving,
the chickens are establishing their pecking order,
the dog is chewing up barbie dolls,
the husband is still working his part-time job,
the baby is soon a year old,
Archie the cat has a tick on his eyelid,
the cars need inspection,
the van needs new tires,
the garage needs a new garage door opener,
Lucy the cat catches and kills voles,
then leaves them near the food bowls,
the pears on the pear tree are the size of walnuts,
the chicken coop still needs finishing touches,
BC the cat still doesn't like the dog,
the mulberries are ripe and ready for picking,
my canning jars are washed and ready,
I'm itchy with bug bites,
we need to have a major yard sale,
I just picked up a sweet sewing basket at someone else's yard sale,
I have more pee-pee sheets to wash,
Baby's rash is better,
Youngest is getting a heat rash,
Oldest just had a growth spurt,
Middle wants a hair cut,
Husband is smelling mighty fine,
my heart goes pitty-pat when I see him,
I finally loaded the photo program,
the printer and the computer are not speaking to each other,
I have 37 missed calls on my videophone,
Husband found 'Papillon' at the used dvd store,
Baby is walking,
no talking yet,
something is munching on my peas,
I forgot the blanket drying on the line outside,
it's after midnight and I am ready for bed,
Good Night.

Flower Power

Youngest is a flower crazed little girl. She picks every single flower she can get her hands on and I have given up on trying to discourage her from picking flowers. She gets immense pleasure from finding them and giving them to me, and if she didn't pick them, they'd never get enjoyed as much as they are now.

When we go out, she points out all the flowers she can see-- the redbuds, the pastures flooded with yellow flowers, purple, white and pink phlox, the azaleas and dogwoods. Spring time here is so colorful and beautiful.

Look how happy she is! Today, it's dandelions. I like dandelions and I remember picking my fair share and giving them to my mom when I was little, too. Then I'd make the mistake of licking my hands and getting that yucky taste from the milky-white sap all over my hands from the dandelions. Do you remember doing that?


They look pretty in a glass even if they don't last long. I like the way they smell, too.


She picked every single buttercup I had. I have no more left and it looks like I won't be getting anymore, either. Previous owners planted these way in the back of our garden area so they would never be seen if Youngest didn't pick them. Buttercups always make me think of the old Willy Wonka movie when Gene Wilder drinks from then eats a buttercup flower.

The red tulips are another story. I took the girls yard sale-ing with me on Saturday and at one of the homes we stopped at, they had bunches of flowers all over. Youngest wanted to pick and I had to tell her repeatedly that we don't pick other people's flowers. Well, the nice owner overheard me and said she could pick a flower and helped each of my girls to pick one flower each. I appreciated that because Youngest was heading toward a meltdown when I told her she couldn't pick any.

We have lilacs outside our bedroom window and they just smell heavenly. Youngest is begging me to help her cut some more blooms off, but I can't bring myself to cut any more. They smell so strongly, I can smell the ones in the dining room all the way down the hall towards the bedrooms. I can only imagine how a few more would over power the house.

My lilies are coming up, but they won't bloom until June, if they can survive all the trampling from the girls. Their days are numbered when they do start to flower because I can only imagine how happy Youngest will be to pick them and bring them to me.

Treasure

I love the way Youngest holds onto those flowers.

The way her little fist tightly wraps around them, taking care not to drop any.

She is my nature girl.

Whenever we are outside, she has her nose to the ground,

searching out little bits of nature's treasures.

Fallen acorns or hickory nuts;

lost feathers or crinkly leaves;

flowers or pretty rocks.

She has her own drawer in our art cart and like a squirrel

she stashes away all her finds.

I've peeked in it and she has put in there

all her favorite little people characters

a vintage hot wheels car pilfered from Daddy's stash,

pictures her sisters drew;

and if I didn't know better, I would have cleaned it up

and thrown all her treasure bits away.

If only she could know,

she is my treasure.

Meet Dolly

My children have too many toys. They go to their playroom and dump out every single bin, filled to the brim, and make a mess all over the floor. I'm all for creative play, but I would appreciate it if they'd pick up afterwards. The way they play leaves too much destruction behind because they step on something and it breaks; they trip and drop something and it breaks, or they just push something off the shelf to make room and it breaks. Grrr!

A couple months ago, I went through the toys and pulled out the broken, the dirty and the lesser played with toys. It amounted to 5 large boxes. Yes, they have too many toys. It's easy to amass toys when you go to yard sales and people see cute little girls and tell them they can have whatever they want for FREE. I want to throttle those people. Thank you for your kindness, but my children don't need anymore toys. The few times I said "No, Thank you", the look they gave me made me feel like some sort of terrible mother that deprived her children of toys. I've found it easier to let them pick a toy-- it keeps them busy in the car and then I'll pluck it out later on.

Then two days ago, the husband and I went through the toys AGAIN, and with the girls, we thinned out the playfood (who needs eleventy-one million toy plates and 23 individual french fries?!), let them pick one barbie each with 5 outfits each, 2 baby dolls each, 3 plush toys each, left the legos, took the blocks, took out all my vintage little people toys that I was so nice to let them play with and discovered lots of damages to several buildings (sob!), and then swept up all the bits and pieces and vacuumed and ahhh! SO much better.

That said, when it was time for Youngest's birthday, we didn't have a party so as not to encourage more toy gifts and really, they don't need a party for every birthday, do they? (that's not a question, don't answer that!) But then, the night before her birthday, I had a bit of mommy guilt because we didn't get her anything-- they're still playing with their Christmas gifts. So I brought out the sewing machine and spent the night trying to make her a doll like I made her little cousin for Christmas.

This is as far as I got before I called it quits at one o'clock in the morning *yawn*. I culled ideas from different handmade dolls across the 'net and made this without any patterns. I was vexed, to say the least, but I'm pleased with her hair and face.

I didn't finish on her birthday, but she knew she had a birthday doll coming to her. She saw the head, arms and legs and after finding out they were for her, kept asking me when I would finish. I knew then that I couldn't put it off or I'd go crazy with hearing her constantly ask: "Is my dolly done yet? Are you done with my dolly? Where's my dolly?"

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I got busy on the doll today and finished her body while the Baby napped and the girls watched a DVD. I originally planned to make a permanent dress type body, but I wanted her to have something special so I decided to make a plain body and then make a reversible dress for it.

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Reversible dress? What was I thinking?! For such a simple design, without a pattern mind you, although I did look for one on the 'net but found nothing I liked, it took me a while to figure it out. I had to take a break and go outside for a bit to clear my head and think it through. Turned out better than I hoped, and I like that she has "two" outfits to wear but won't ever lose one or the other.

The happy birthday girl with her new dolly, named: Dolly. Of course.

The reverse side of the dress is the purple diamond fabric you see in the first picture behind the head.

I'm gearing up to make another one soon for Middle, whose birthday is next week. Hopefully, making the reversible dress will go easier for me this time, now that I have one under my belt already.

Three

My baby is three today. Youngest (technically she isn't youngest anymore, but she is still my youngest girl) was born in the morning, at home, 3 years ago. She is my only home-birthed baby and the only one of us born in West Virginia.

My hillbilly baby.

She was a happy baby. So easy to please, as long as she had her mama holding her and nursing her whenever she demanded. As long as she had clean diapers and a full belly.

She had a reddish tint to her hair and we all hoped she would have red hair, or at least strawberry blond, but it was not meant to be.

She is daddy's girl. They ALL are daddy's girls. She is sitting in the best seat in the house-- Daddy's arms.



She is a charmer and cries at the slightest wag of a finger. She doesn't like getting mad at and I often have to reassure her that I'm not mad at her when I am getting mad at her sisters.



Though Youngest is constantly surrounded by her sisters, she likes to play alone with her dolls or with some other toy. She can play for hours by herself, ignoring the silly antics of her older sisters.



Even when she gets into the markers and does this to her pretty face, I still think she is beautiful.

Happy 3rd Birthday, my sweet. May you have many, many more!

WARNING:

Do NOT leave your children unattended with markers!

Hammin' It Up!

Despite the fact I never shop at the malls or buy specific brand clothing, my girls have seemed to develop a style all their own. The clothes that I picked out for them to wear get rejected in favor of frilly, shiny, glittery, ruffly, girly stuff instead. I was such a tomboy when I was a kid, so it shocks me how much my girls like wearing dresses and skirts. I have to be firm with them when it gets cold and insist they wear long pants. They found a loophole and wear leggings or stockings in place of pants.

One chilly morning, I was trying to get Youngest to wear jeans and a long sleeve hoodie. She wouldn't have it no matter how much I tried to appeal to her 2 year old mind. I love the hoodie and told her if I could wear it, I would. Finally I came up with an idea-- if you put on these clothes, I'll take pictures of you and you can be my model! It worked! Here are some of my favorite pictures from our "modeling session".



Is that not a cute hoodie and jeans? Isn't she a cutie??

"Whatchu lookin' at dude? Wanna make somethin' of it?"

How about this one?

"This is my angry face."

It is? More like a smoochy face to me-- c'mere and let me smooch you!

She is such a ham! Just look at those blue eyes!