So Excited; So Busy (plus a favorite poem!)

I'm so excited about getting to sing in the Christian Heritage Chorale at the Washington Home School Convention!!!  We are learning four real, live choral arrangements:

• The Heavens Are Telling from The Creation by Joseph Haydn
  hopepublishing.com – search C5531
• Fairest Lord Jesus arr. by Mary McDonald
  Lorenz.com – search 10/3936L
• Ain't That Good News
  JWPepper.com – search: #10070496; 3-part mixed; closer look
• God So Loved the World
  Arr. John Leavitt – no online audio sample

(I guess if you go to the links above, you can hear samples.)  Anyway, it's hard work, but I'm enjoying it.  Hopefully we'll have pictures and maybe some video for the blog.  We have to wear long black skirts, white shirts, black hose, and formal black shoes.  So fancy.  We finally have it all gathered up, picked out, and tried on.

 

So, a favorite poem...

 

The Twins

In form and feature, face and limb,

I grew so like my brother,

That folks got taking me for him,

And each for one another.

It puzzled all our kith and kin,

It reached a fearful pitch;

For one of us was born a twin,

Yet not a soul knew which.

 

One day, to make the matter worse,

Before our names were fixed,

As we were being washed by nurse,

We go completely mixed;

And thus, you see, by fate's decree,

Or rather nurse's whim,

My brother John got christened me,

And I got christened him.

 

This fatal likeness even dogged

My footsteps when at school,

And I was always getting flogged,

For John turned out a fool.

I put this question, fruitlessly,

To everyone I knew,

"What would you do, if you were me,

To prove that you were you?"

 

Our close resemblance turned the tide

Of my domestic life,

For somehow, my intended bride,

Became my brother's wife.

In fact, year after year the same

Absurd mistakes went on,

And when I died, the neighbors came

And buried brother John.

 

HENRY SAMBROOKE LEIGH

 

Rest Assured

No, we did not dye our hair; yes, we have a weird sense of humor.
So how many of you were taken in?

Busy!

Dear fellow crazy people, here is a blog post, and, no, I’m not Kate!
Umm, I’ve been really busy lately and I’m about to get busier! Perry, Kate, and I are going to sing in a chorale at the Washington home school convention and our music came today; so exciting!!!!!!!! We have to wear black skirts and white shirts; we’ll try to post pictures! Been doing a lot of school reading lately; we’re studying stuff in the 16th and 17th centuries, like the Age of Exploration, the Pilgrims and the Renaissance. I don’t like all the reading but Mom says my spelling has been getting better because of it. It was really warm out today, and Pearl climbed all the way to the top of the hill behind the house all by herself... she is something else! Lol And all you people back there in the old country, I REALLY miss you....... thought about you a lot during the day of the church picnic. It’s been 5 months since I last saw you all, it only feels like 3! Isn’t that weird?
Okay, I finish my ramblings by saying my cousin is getting married in June to a Navy Seal!! Ooohhh.....COOL!!! And yes I’m a tiny bit jealous. Lol

Pearl enjoys climbing!


The three crazies...


Checking those hair lengths!


Paul reaches the "summit"...


Wonderful big brother!

My Book

I am in the process of finishing a book I have been writing. I first started writing The Heavens Declare several years ago when my mom suggested I write a ‘living’ science book about the solar system for my younger siblings and others to read.

The Heavens Declare: Five Children, Eight Planets, One God is about a homeschooling family vacationing in the mountains of Northern Arizona. The children learn from their father—an amateur astronomer, and mother about each of the planets in our solar system. Along the way the family learns of God’s goodness and to trust Him with their hopes, plans, and days. The Heavens Declare is filled with action such as playing ‘pine cone wars’ in the woods and looking at Venus through a telescope. From dreaming about landing on Mercury to trying to move the family van during a heavy rainstorm, from having family devotions to rescuing ‘princesses’ in a ‘tower’, this book weaves interesting facts about the solar system with everyday, ordinary family life. It is sure to hold children’s attention, causing them to desire more knowledge about their God and His creation!

With this book, I intend to:
-inspire in 8-12 year old children an interest in the amazing creation of God
-present an ordinary homeschooling Christian family learning together about their extraordinary God
-express a biblical worldview that revolutionizes the study of science as well as the everyday lives of the characters in this book
-supply avid young readers with wholesome, interesting reading material

I have finished my draft copy and I am working on drawing the illustrations. (To the right is the illustration for chapter two which involves an owl.) I have three families beta testing the manuscript, Dr. Jay Wile checked and corrected my scientific accuracy, and I am hoping for reviews from several other people. Currently, I am writing a book proposal I hope to send to an acquisitions editor at Zondervan soon. I am also slowly working on doing the website for the book. It’s all very new to me, fascinating, and very enjoyable. I have always loved to write! I remember the feeling of having great ideas and plans and always coming out with a not-so-awesome piece of 10-year-old writing. Now, though I can’t write like Lewis, I can WRITE!

I was completely planning on self-publishing with Lulu, but a friend had a contact with Zondervan, so I’m going to give that a try first. I fully expect it to be rejected (especially since it’s for such a niche market!), but—why not try? So, if Zondervan doesn’t go anywhere, I’ll need everyone to link to my website and tell everybody they can possibly think of about it since I’ll be self-publishing! :)

Necklaces

I’ve been making a lot of clay things lately... when I get a chance! I have some Celtic knot work rubber stamps that I have tried stamping in clay, but I really want to figure out how to do it free form. You could make some really neat stuff with that, maybe a cool Celtic knot work medieval cloak pin! Anyhow, here are a couple necklaces I have made.





I have a neck ache. Ouch! I really am a pain in the neck! (And no, the necklace didn’t do it!) Lol

A Banana in the Box and When Dad Makes Breakfast

I won't tell you who I am because I want you to guess. I'm the third oldest child, third oldest girl, second tallest child, fourth tallest person (in my family), and—to top it off—the craziest. Guess who? Kate. :) Did you notice that all my posts are about food? Except the one about my purple dress and seven dead mice. This is a banana in the box, but I just got another dress from Dad and Mom for my birthday. I also got a wooden pen from them. One of my aunts gave me soap-molding supplies, and the other gave me a book by G.A. Henty and a gift card for Borders bookstore. Our neighbors (some friends from church) made doughnuts and they gave us some.

Okay, to my real point and story... This was not the healthiest breakfast ever, but it was really yummy. It was the day after Easter and (you heard about how tired we were) anyone who would usually get up and make breakfast was asleep. I woke up around 9:30, hearing the younger and "less tired" kids awake. Dad was working away in the kitchen at making a dish of "egg in the hole" for everyone, but because it was the day after Easter, he called it by one of its many names... "Bunny in the Hole". (That's not unhealthy, so far.) Some of the kids were suspicious of the dish, never having had a dish with somewhat runny eggs in it. Okay, I'll admit that I was too. Guess what Paul ate off of? A Tupperware lid. Dad didn't know that the dishwasher was done with its cycle, so we ate off of some unusual things. :) Mom got to eat off the "birthday plate." That's a special plate we use when it's some one's birthday. When the rest of us sleepy-heads arrived and most were done with their meal, Dad pulled out the left-over ice cream! It was really good!

 

Recipe for "Egg in the Hole"

Basically you make toast in a skillet except you cut a hole in the bread and crack an egg into it. Make sure the egg isn't super runny. :)

 

Recipe for Ice-cream

Sorry, I don't know how to make that at home. I think you need an ice-cream maker and some cream and sugar too. But we don't know the amounts of ingredients or how to do it so we just bought ours from the store.

Late "Happy Easter", Passover, Courtship, Scarf

A late Happy Easter or Resurrection Day to everyone! The happiest day of the year!
We had a great day, but I was exhausted for most of it, since I was up till 12:30 the night before finishing printing, folding, and perforating the church bulletin; helping Dad finish typing and printing the two messages, and fitting in a last-minute shower! Then... I had to get up at 5:30 to go to the sunrise service at the cemetery. So, on five hours of sleep, I almost zonked out in church for the first time since I was a baby. Yep. This is me around 3.5 months old...



Passover: This year, we did a Passover Seder at church and used a nifty little pamphlet called, “Christ in the Passover” by Rose Publishing. Mom did an awesome job setting up the room we did it in, don’t you think?



And Aimee’s girly sheep is a scream. Mr. S said, “I’m not sure that gold hoof-polish is kosher...”



So, how do you get a huge, piping hot pot of Matzo Ball Soup to church down 5 miles of bumpy, curvy road? You put it in the center of your spare tire, of course! ;)



Courtship: All you suspicious people... nope. Nobody’s askin’. But a gal I e-mail did ask me what I thought about the whole courtship thing and we had a rather confusing e-mail conversation about it until I realized we were talking about two slightly different concepts of courtship. I suggested some definitions and then aired my opinion about it all! ;) So if you click the “Courtship” link at the top of this page, you can read my maybe-wacko-maybe-not opinions on the whole thing!

I combined two of my favorite elements of knitting and designed this scarf (which is still in the works, I might add). Anyway, it has two panels of Shetland Horseshoe Lace on either side of a 3x3 cable. It’s done in the same green I used for my Tam O’Shanter and I’m hoping to enter both in the county fair... we’ll see. I’m running out of time. Here’s a picture to whet your appetite, then click the Shetland Scarf link at the top of this page for more pics and the pattern!

"Two Men with Knives" or "A Country Moment"

Okay, it was Sunday afternoon and Dad had surprised us all with a trip to town for Sunday dinner! Having finished dinner, Dad (actually, Perry—yikes) drove over to the recycling machine at Safeway so I could recycle some bottles that were in the van. I got out of the van and then realized that there was quite a crowd recycling and decided to wait since I was feeling rather shy...

When I finally did go over, there were two young men standing near one of the machines, talking. I had come just in time to hear a really short dark-haired Safeway carryout telling the skinny bowlegged guy who was recycling why he’d rather be on a particular kind of war ship!
“You didn’t get your receipt,” I said to the skinny lad.
“Yeah, I did,” he said, looking at me like I was crazy, “it’s in my pocket.”
“Oh,” I said, “maybe the machine didn’t notice that you took it.” It was still saying the amount he’d recycled.
He had been digging around in his pocket and didn’t find it so the carryout pushed the button again and when the receipt still didn’t come out, he opened up the front of the machine, whipped out a knife and started poking around inside and mumbling something about the contacts.
His friend, who I noticed was wearing a camouflage belt, whipped out his knife and said, “The best eighty bucks I ever spent!”
“That’s all?” the carry out said while a little shred of paper came out of the machine.
“Well, $79.99 to be exact!” Then he started listing all the different blades and tools that were on it. The carryout closed the machine and the skinny guy said, “Man, it ate my quarters!” And they started talking about what ever it was that they were talking about before.
“Will it work? Can I recycle?” I asked, directing my question to the carry out.
“Oh, yeah,” he said nonchalantly, “it‘s fixed.” looking at me like I had just appeared. Then they walked off.... two country lads who would pay eighty dollars for a knife and still enlist in the military, one a carryout at Safeway and the other an Ace Hardware employee. It might not seem so funny to you but when I got in the car and told my sisters they laughed and made me post this. And in case any of you were wondering, the knife did the job and I got my receipt. How many carry outs in AZ would have been impressed with a certain pocket knife??