A Quick Hello

yes, we're still here! : )

Lately i've been trying to get myself organized for the upcoming school year, while trying to finish up this one.  We got such a late start that we are still working .... but that's ok, NC summers are awfully hot and school work keeps us from being indoors with nothing to do in the middle of the day.  Mornings after breakfast the kids do head outside for a bit ...and also in the evenings after dinner.

We had a surprise trip to the eastern part of the state recently as my father-in-law ended up in the hospital while at a conference.  The kids got to spend the weekend with their cousin (and aunt and uncle) - they enjoyed the visit immensely...i think my brother and his family survived!  : )

Now everyone is home and as i said earlier, we are looking toward this new school year...and a new little one who will be here sooner than later!  
This year i am trying something new for us, combining grade levels i guess you could say.  T and Ladybug are supposedly going to be studying church history together as well as zoology, art and music.  Cat and Bear will be doing about the same just at a lower level...except not zoology but physical science montessori style.  And they are all doing geography - continent boxes and such if i can get my act together. Oh!  And Catechesis of the Good Shepherd. 
Unfortunately the printer is out of ink so i an procrastinating.... i need to just do things the old fashioned way and be done with it!  Also, i lack any motivation what so ever so things are slow going at the moment.  I'd like to start the 15th of August but we shall see....

We are also in the planning stages for 'other stuff' for the new year.  FLL/FTC/JrFLL and the homeschool group are our focus it seems ...sports will wait til spring, if we make it that far! : )

The house is coming along, slowly but surely.  Eventually pictures may appear here on the blog. 

We are awaiting a visit from Great-aunt Pat and Great-uncle Bob, maybe Aunt Monika (if Nina - my mom - can talk her into it.  She is going to be in the states for a month and we would love to see her!) and eventually Nina.  My mom will come down around the baby's due date ... hopefully.  Time will tell.  Papa will be home working crowd control, which should be easy seeing as only uncle Mike is still at home! : )  

Well, i best run.  Have a blessed evening...and thanks for stopping by!

Blueberry Pie

You know we picked um.  You know we baked um.  They tasted yummy!  But....

the pie was not perfect.

I got the recipe from allrecipes.com.  As i'm sure you know, people comment and make adjustments, etc.  So what do you follow?  Logically it would be the original recipe, but sometimes enough people comment about a particular part of it that you begin to wonder if a changes is not necessary. 

So i made pie, based on recommended changes - the first one was good but a little runny.  Not too sweet.  I decided to add more sugar and cornstarch.... we were a bit surprised at the runniness of the second pie.  After much thought i realized that the extra sugar was pulling out more of the blueberries' juices and so for the third pie i cut back to the recipe stated amount while adjusting the corn starch.  PERFECT!

We had a perfect Blueberry Pie last night.  Today the changed factor will be the blueberries.  I froze what we did not need for this last pie and didn't eat.  Bear wants a blueberry pie for his birthday 'cake' today so my hope is the frozen will be just as wonderful as the fresh.

I will post the recipe later.

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And sorry about the lack f posts - my carpal tunnel is really acting up with this pregnancy and typing is becoming a huge problem....
have  a blessed day - we will be celebrating a 6 year old's birthday!

Funny!

Label on the side of a box in the garage....

seasonal and too small kids

We had T check to be sure there were really no kids in there! :  )