Chicken Update

It's been a long, long time since I've thought of posting a chicken update, so here's a quick one (I hope).

We now have twenty hens laying full force, giving us between a dozen and eighteen eggs every day. Most of the pullet-sized eggs have moved on to mediums or larges, with some jumbos and a rare egg so big that I wouldn't know how to classify it (too big to fit in any egg carton we have).

Needless to say, we have plenty of eggs for personal consumption (I usually keep about three dozen in the upstair's fridge for us), with up to 9 (or more) dozen a week that we can sell off. Whenever we get about 8 or 9 extra dozen, Kenzie loads her wagon with eggs and goes door-to-door, selling eggs, with a big brother in tow as bodyguard. Today she had over 9 dozen eggs when she left, and had 15 eggs (and $22) when she got home. She gave one dozen away to a customer that overpaid last week because nobody had change. She's stilling them for $3 a dozen, but told everyone today that next time, the price will $3.50, unless they return an empty egg carton, in which case she'll keep the price at $3. We used up all our saved up cartons and had to buy more, and they cost between a quarter and a half-dollar each, so she just added the higher price to the eggs.

It seems that every time she goes a-sellin', she finds new customers. If they all ever decide they want eggs at the same time, we'll never be able to supply them all.

I always get a little worried when I see the supply of eggs piling up in the fridge, because I wouldn't know what to do with a gross of eggs, but somehow she always sells them all. We haven't had to give any free ones away to our close neighbors for months. I really don't want to go "commercial" because I don't want to get the government involved in our little backyard lesson in economics, entrepreneurship, and free enterprise. I figure, when Kenzie's ready to go that step, she'll be asking if she can call the county and get herself incorporated, regulated, and overtaxed, like any other business.

Cooking With Heart

I made biscuits for dinner. I rolled the dough out, and just as I was about to cut it, I noticed that, quite unintentionally on my part, it had formed a heart shape. I couldn't resist taking a picture of it. Believe it or not, I really, really did NOT do this on purpose.

School's Out Due to Gall Stones

Ugh. In all my 42 years, I've never called 9-1-1. So, when I call for myself in the middle of night, it must be bad. The pain in my mid-section started about 7 pm and got steadily worse throughout the evening until finally, at midnight, I had to call for help. Poor Vicki; she was sound asleep and had to get up to wait for the ambulance with me. I didn't even have shoes on. I didn't car at that point. Off to the ER I went, where they gave me pain killers and some tests. Ultra sound showed gall stones. The tacos for dinner did me in, I guess. First time we had tacos in about 2 years, too. Kenzie's fault, she asked for them. Back to the story: At about 4:30 am, this am, I called Vicki to come pick me up. She had to wake up Alex to let him know he was in charge while she was gone.

I go to a specialist on the 18th for a follow-up, and to see if I keep my gall bladder, or not. If they take it out, I hope they let me keep it in a jar. That would be a great homeschool teaching tool. Several lessons: anatomy, organ preservation, nutrition (eat less fat, etc.). Not to mention the 'ick' factor. I'll put it next to my fetal cat-in-a-jar that I got from a college anatomy class where we dissected dead cats (mine died while preganant). I know, TMI, TMI, TMI as Connor would be saying right now. Don't worry, all the cats we used were either euthanized at a shelter, or were road kill.

Anyway, that's how my Second Day of School ended, and my Third Day of School began. I'm still debating whether to actually do school today, or not. Again, we'll have to wait and see.

First Day of School...ok, I'm serious this time.

God gave us a fantastic first day of school today. We did have that one dress rehearsal day last week, but that was kind of shaky and it was still August, so I didn't really count it. Today, Alex left bright and early, at 7 am to catch the county bus to his school. The rest of us headed to the classroom to start our school day at 8 am.

I didn't really stress getting every little thing done, but it all got done regardless. Kenzie and Connor went their own ways to work out their schedules on their own. Kenzie had a few issues, like not spending sufficient time on some subjects and not reading instructions carefully enough, but I addressed that with her, and we'll see what happens tomorrow. I still haven't checked her work for the day, which will tell me if she devoted enough time and effort to the job. Connor took longer to do all his work, and he's always been pretty conscientious about his work (we won't discuss the cheating episode of last year; I think he's felt enough guilt over that to last a while; especially after confessing it all Father Jennings, our pastor) but, again, I haven't checked today's work yet. Both Connor and Kenzie have been eager to start school this year, for some reason, so i don't expect too many problems, at least for a little while.

Tay and ty are usually my most daunting projects. They are SO different, not only from each other, but from all the other students I've taught. I have begun by splitting them up this year. I am going to try teaching them Religion, History, and Science together, because they take turns doing a lot of out-loud reading and I want them to get good at reading and following while somebody else (not me) is reading. Then they split up for Math and Language Arts, which is where they differ so much. They either do different things in the same room, or I send one away while I teach the other; depends on the moods we all experience at any given time. Tay clams up, Ty turns on the waterworks. Today, I dealt with both scenarios much better than I have in the past. This is evidence that my prayers for calm, patience, wisdom, etc. may be reaching God's ears. Taylor even practiced piano after he finished his classwork.

Bekah also started some preschool stuff, even though she doesn't even turn 3 until October. Kenzie took that job from me. She had more fun helping Bekah cut and paste and learn some letters and numbers than Bekah did, I think. (It also keeps Kenzie busy until I get time to help with her stuff)

Alex's high school soccer team had their first official game today. They lost, 3-2, but Alex wound up being a starter at Halfback, which I am very proud of. He has worked very hard at the practices, and it seems to have paid off. I credit today's loss with his team's bus sitting in traffic for three hours because of a school bus accident (not his bus) en route to the game, which started over an hour late. Because the team had to leave school a couple hours early, he missed a couple classes for which he had to get today's work last week. Well, he worked very hard over the weekend to get all his work done, without complaint. I have to say that I am very proud of him. I'm going to have to stop grumbling so much about all the upheavals this new school thing has caused us. Alex is dealing with it all very well so far (much better than I).

Well, tomorrow is the Next Day Of School. We'll have to see how it goes.

Happy Labor Day

Hope your weekend is/was as fun as ours was today. We had another shore party to end the Summer vacation. Here's most, not all, of the family members that showed up today. If you're ever on the road and see the red beast with the kayaks on top, wave to us.

Happy Labor Day, everybody.