At Home…in Alaska

Archive for February, 2004

Snowed lightly today and was overcast most of the day. Kind of a ho-hum day. Was busy trying to coordinate a new co-op…not sure how it’s going to turn out or if I’m up for it…but started the ball rolling and will decide in a few days. Have some other things on my plate I’m researching too and busy with. Long time desired things that will hopefully come to fruition soon. Busily occupied…even if I’m not sharing all here. Homeschool is rolling right along still too although still not as fast as I like. I thought we would have picked up momentum after all that sickness but it has yet to happen. Draaaaaging our feet…ugh. At least we’re moving forward huh?! :-/ Baby is still teething! I don’t know when these bottom molars are going to poke through but I hope it’s soon!!! His grouchiness is making me cross-eyed!!! Sorry so short. I’m feeling out of sorts and not very talkative…

Love you Boo-boy!

(See all those teeth!)

I added a link in the left margin (if you are using Tamara’s Room to access this weblog) to some initial photo albums. February has pics taken with my new camera. Summer and Dec. ‘03 are pics I scanned a while back but never did anything with. I was going to post them at our Backyard and Beyond page but I know (photo)graphic heavy pages load slowly. So, I held on to them while thinking of another solution. The place that we have develope our 35mm film has free storage of photos, etc. but I wasn’t real happy with the layout. It’s been a while though since I’ve been there…perhaps it’s changed. At any rate, I wanted something simpler…don’t want to offer to buy prints, etc. So, Photobucket will work for now. Of course, I’ll update here if I make any changes…to the albums started or their location or if any more are added, etc.

Today was a beautiful sunny day…starting around noon anyway. Oh so wonderful! I wanted to be out in the shed putzing with gardening pots or something (haven’t done that yet as I said I was going to because I was sick this past week) but I had other pressing things to do in the house. Plus, there is still a ton of snow out there and I knew if I went out with that intent, the snow would quickly discourage me anyway. The snow is really disappearing from the mountains though! Wow! The bare patches up there are becoming quite numerous. That’s a great sign! Spring will be earlier again like last year I think…like I’ve already said, there are pussywillows out and small buds forming on the trees and that was near the beginning of Feb.! Of coarse, due to the steepness up there and the angle of the sun, etc. it goes faster than down here. Flat(er) and tree covered makes the snow linger and makes me antsy! LOL However, my dh dared to predict that perhaps with the snow going faster up on the mountains and the warm days coupled with cold nights allowing the snow to actually “evaporate” rather than melt and pool up will mean we won’t have as much trouble in the basement. Pray for God’s merciful dealing with us on this!!!

Ok, I have to run and finish getting dinner on the table. Ciou!

I finally took some time to “play”…with my new camera! Wow! It has so many features… I’ll have to hang the instruction book around my neck for a while to memorize it. Anyway, uploaded a few of the pics I took last night/today and some dh took of his shop. I’m working on an online album to share. Stay tuned.

A close family friend died Thursday morning so I have been emotionally subdued. Salvation isn’t certain…and that makes it hurt more. I had the impression I should pray heavily for her about 10 days before we found out she was in ICU. Not to pray for her healing but for salvation. I don’t know if I’ll ever know this side of Heaven if God granted those prayers affirmatively.

I’m also having a relapse of that nasty respitory crud.

My baby slept for almost a full 12 hours last night. From 10pm to about 9:30am this morning when I actually had to go wake him up (which has rarely happened before). Sigh. The nursing phase of our lives has only a few more months and that makes me a bit sad too. My other babies self weaned between 12-16 months.

So… Life presses on.

You are Shetland Wool.
You are a traditional sort who can sometimes be a
little on the harsh side. Though you look
delicate you are tough as nails and prone to
intricacies. Despite your acerbic ways you are
widely respected and even revered.

What kind of yarn are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Kind of explains a previous post or two huh?

I forgot to say last night that our baby has a vocabulary now of four words! Mumma came at about 5 months, daaadad at about 7 months, kitty at about 9 months and lately his new word is buuubub which we think means baby. He’s also working on duck as in rubber ducky [Oh those infamous duckies. ;-)] although it’s not clear enough just yet to call an actual word.

It’s sunny and blue skies here today with a temp. of 32F. Give the sun another hour and it will be shining directly on the thermometer and I suspect it will show something more encouraging. I’ve started some beans with the children mostly because we are doing that age old experiment about plants and sunlight but I do intend to keep the healthy ones for the garden.;-) I started plants around this time last year so in the next day or two I’m going to go out to the shed and dig out some starter pots, etc. This year though I have a baby crawling around so I won’t be able to line everything up on the floor next to the sliding door to the deck where we have the most wonderful southern exposure. I’ll have to move an extra table I have in the schoolroom out here and put everything on there. But, with that extra space I’ll still be tempted to fill all that space on the floor that will be left under the table! Can’t have the baby eating the dirt and the starts though so I’ll refrain…I will refrain…

Things have heated up a bit in the homeschool arena here in AK with a proposed bill that would subject *all* children to tracking by the State Legislature. Not only that but the info would be sent also the the Dept. of Health and Human Services. Public school children and those enrolled in “public homeschooling” programs (oximoron huh?! :-P) are already tracked so this is intentionally targeting *independent* homeschool families. Bad, bad news!!! Anyway, the reason I came here to blog is that a person commented on the akhomeschooling email list I am a part of that he was tired of all the emails about it…particularly that it seemed to only be a certain few people and was it really *necessary* to have their letters posted, etc. that they wrote to their Representatives and so on and so forth and his subject line was “Another group?” and that he was tired of using the delete key and couldn’t everyone keep track of this stuff themselves!!! I responded with a temperate post, compared to what I said to my husband, and there was another reply right after by someone who was more “tolerant” sounding. I said that I appreciated all of the other posts, hearing how others worded their letters, hearing ideas that I may not have thought of, etc. I am busy homeschooling my children and I don’t always have the time to read the newspaper or go to the legislature website or whatever to keep up to date. I appreciate others sharing and notifying me of what’s going on. Plus, NOBODY knew about this until HSLDA email the President of our state homeschool assoc. (or so it appears) and he posted about it on the email list. If it weren’t for that post they would be sneaking it through!!! NO JOKE!!! Without the deluge from their constitutants opposing it. Anyway, I didn’t write *all* that…I didn’t have to be redundent. Anyway, I felt a little guilty at first. But, you know what? I got over it real fast! I have “0″ TOLERANCE for a “Man” to whine when facing such an important issue as our FREEDOM!!! I’m tired of having to SHUT UP because someone may be offended!!! Or, not voice my opinion or whatever! I was not abusive. In fact, I felt I was pretty toned down. I had my husband read my message before I sent it and he approved. In fact, after he returned from an errand, he asked if I had sent it. I said yes and “expounded” a little more and if my husband said phrases such as, “You go girl!”, he would have! LOL In fact, he told me you should get on there and give that guy what for! I believe that that’s a “man to man” thing though and I do want to temper my words in love as a Christian should. So, if there are any more responses, I’m going to tell them all what I told you all here! LOL I think I’ve vented enough… Men be men. Not whiners!!! Men stand up for “inalienable rights”!!! Don’t try to squash the free and “liberal” exchange of ideas just because you’re “tired” [violin music] of your inbox filling and it’s so “hard” to keep using that delete key!!! Did I say I was done venting?!?! I am now! [grin] For now anyway… [wink] LOL

Quentin’s second 1rst molar came in last Thursday (Feb. 12th) but not the one expected. It was the top left this time. He had a slight fever this afternoon and took a long nap so either of the bottom two will poke through soon.

My Sweetie got me a new digital camera (never had one before!) for Valentine’s Day!!! A Sony DSC-F717. Again, like the new laptop, I have no idea how that compares on the market, but it looks so cool! I’m so excited to start using it! But, I haven’t had a chance to read through the manual and such yet. Hopefully tonight as my bedtime reading… He also got me a new camera bag, memory chip, and base thingy majigy to put the chip in so that you don’t have the camera plugged in but can continue using it while you download your pics, etc. Until now, I have been using a device called Snappy to capture video images for stills. It has the capibility to feed a video still image straight from the camera to the computer and with a click there you go! A jpg image. If you have seen any of the things I’ve put up on eBay, you can see how clear this method was. Still, it will be soooo nice to just point and shoot! Plus, it’s increasingly harder to find “patches” to continue to make this device work on more and more advanced computers. Sad really as it is a quaintly good idea…

Ok, that’s it from me for today. I’m tired but my dh has a movie for us to watch and if we start now I might be lucky enough to not fall asleep during it.

Goodnight!

I just checked the thermometer…it’s 60F in the sun!!! Please, oh pretty please, can I get out my gardening stuff?!? Huh? Can I? Can I?

(Yeah right. After we just got another inch of snow this morning. :rolls eyes:)

The eaves are dripping like crazy now though and the Pussywillows are still blooming and the joggers are starting to hit the street again!

Hurry Spring!