Tales From The Bonny Blue House

43 Things

I'm a little jazzed up today. Lots of coffee to combat the fatigue involved in staying up late to WATCH THE YANKEES WIN THE SERIES!!!!

I'm sorry, was I shouting?

It was an exciting game, a great culmination to an exciting series. However, I'm tired.

Today's post will be a little different. In honor of a day that may or may not be a little bit special I thought I would reveal 43 things about me you may not be aware of. The number 43 may or may not be significant. (Hint: it has nothing to do with the Yankees).

1.       I was born in Brooklyn.

2.       I was raised in Nassau County.

3.       I attended a public school through 8^th grade.

4.       I attended an all girls Catholic private school for high school.

5.       I learned all my best swear words in that high school.

6.       I attended St. John’s University.

7.       I was a business major until I discovered that I would have to take four calculus classes.

8.       That day I changed to an English Lit major.

9.       My father thought I was nuts.

10.   I have a double minor in Economics and Finance, mostly to appease my father.

11.   I never took any of those calculus classes.

12.   I worked for a dentist for a year after graduating because the stock market had crashed and I couldn’t get a job.

13.   I took a job as a secretary in a big name investment bank rather than an associate position in a small one to get a foot in the door.

14.   It was a good choice.

15.   I earned more money as a secretary than all of my friends in other “better” jobs.

16.   I couldn’t type to save my life.

17.   I was promoted pretty quickly which was gratifying.

18.   I traveled a lot which was fun.

19.   I had a secretary, she could type.

20.   My firm was paying for graduate school.

21.   I hated graduate school.

22.   I started to hate traveling when I met my husband.

23.   When again, faced with calculus,I quit school.

24.   I took a knitting class at the New School.

25.   My father is still annoyed about it.

26.   I can still knit and I  have still not taken calculus.

27.   Lack of calculus has not affected my success in life at all.

28.   Don’t tell my kids.

29.   I have always written stories.

30.   That I am a non-fiction writer surprises me.

31.   I married the love of my life at age 26.

32.   It was the best decision I ever made.

33.   When we were first married we lived in a great apartment on the beach.

34.   I wanted to live in NYC but he loves the beach so I conceded.

35.   I want to retire to Manhattan.

36.   I love Maine.

37.   My house is decorated in reds, browns, taupe and black.

38.   My house is also decorated in toys and dirty socks.

39.   I have a cleaning lady come once a week and I feel very guilty about it.

40.   I love to cook.

41.   I love to clean, hence the guilt in number 39.

42.   I want to own a mini-cooper someday.

43.   I think being a wife and mom rocks.

In progress...

Some Globe Theatre dioramas

And some happy religion coloring.

Morning Basket Questions

Lots of people have emailed me, and a few commented, on my Morning Basket post last week. Thanks for all of the kindness and warmth!   Especially since I was basically copying a lovely idea orginated by uber-homeschool mom Jen. As an aside I strongly recommend waiting until the kids are in bed pouring a nice cup of tea or a glass of wine and spending an hour or so going through Jen's blog. It's full of lovely ideas.

If you are an Angels, Mets or Red Sox fan, you'll have some time tonight. (hee hee hee)

Sorry. Had to do it.

Anyway. The questions. Lots of people wanted to know how long all of this takes. It really depends but generally it takes between a half hour and forty-five minutes. Which isn't very long. I try to begin at 8:30 but since Brendan is not a sleeper we sometimes start at 9:00. No big deal.

How did I decide what to include in the morning basket?  Well, much of it was inspired by Jen but I also thought that for the basket idea to work for me it would have to include those things that I wanted to get to in my school plans but never seemed to have time for. The workbox system has helped tremendously with that but I always have some little enrichment type things I like to include.  I took the nature suggestions of Jen's by subscribing to Nature Friend Magazine which turned out to be every bit as valuable as she said. The kids love the articles and the photography has inspired some nice drawing.

Katie's rendering of a bird.

I rounded out everyone's religion studies with the catechism (always a good beginning to the day) and the Acts of the Apostles and then I just picked things that are seasonal or tangenital to what we are doing. Does that make sense?

Do you do it every morning?

Ah, no. As a matter of fact I haven't done it at all this week since I have a horrible cold and I actually lost my voice over the weekend and I am still raspy and hard to understand. My voice is grating on my nerves so it must be driving the kids crazy. On the upside they had a quiet weekend :).

Another thing worth mentioning is that the basket pretty much lives on my long dining room table so morning basket can be a lunch or dinner basket if that works better on some days. It's important not to get caught up so much in what I do or in what Jen or anyone else does but make things work for your family and do the things they enjoy. My basket might bore your children to tears so explore your children's interest. Or bookmark this post and categorize it "next year" and don't put pressure on yourself.

Have a blessed evening.

Temper, temper

"I mad at you" says Sean crossing his arms firmly across his chest. I had just informed him that there would be no TV. 

"I going to bed", he informs me and he turns on his heel and walks himself down the hall to his room.

Believe it or not I was able to fight the urge to screech, "No, no don't go and lie down and give me five minutes peace, please!!"  I don't know how I found the strength. ;)

Multi-tasking

Today at the Bonny Blue House

Thank you to everyone for the lovely emails and comments. Your prayers and support continue to be a real blessing to Dave, the children and I.

I thought I would give a little peak at what we are doing here. It always seems so much less until I write it all down. Then when I see what I manage to get done, I want to go lie down.  It goes without saying that there were many interruptions and distractions throughout this whole school day.

 

Katie:
Studying collections in Life Science (started planning for a leaf collection, we'll do a nature walk Monday)
Math Saxon Lesson 30
Stories of Saints
Faith and Life: Chapter 9, discussion about the prophets (going to have her start reading some Old Testament tomorrow)
Lingua Mater: conjunctions and a little catch up from last week ;)
Spelling
Silly Halloween math drill sheet
Worked on a research report about ancient and modern day Rome.
Helped Kelli with her FHC notebook (took out hers and read it to Kelli, very cute)

Erin:
Saxon Math Lesson 32
Stories of the Saints: Catherine Laboure
Sketched a Miraculous Medal and recited the prayer
Language of God
Spelling
Faith and Life: Chapter 9, Abraham (good discussion)
Science: read a chapter (she hates this book - going to have to re-think this)
Halloween word search
Read to Kelli and Kevin
Reading Journey to the River Sea

Kelli:
MCP Math, two pages
Language of God (question words)
Maps book
Spelling
Halloween coloring sheet (from my files, sorry no link)
Faith and Life (Jesus as the new Adam discussion)
Worked on guardian angel page for her FHC notebook
Read a chapter from Devotional Stories for Little Folks (she reads a paragraph and I read two)
Read an angel book
Handwriting
Watercolored
Let the Children Come to Me practiced a song with Kevin and mom.

Kevin:
MCP Math, two pages
Handwriting (much hemming and hawing about this)
Halloween Dot to Dot
Read Noah in Catholic Picture Bible (with mom)
Used money flash cards and large cardboard money templates as a matching and counting game.
Watercolored
Read a bunch of Bob books (no complaining here, he loves to read)
Read about the difference between animal life and plant life in Childcraft encyclopedia (I love my early 80's set given to me by a friend)
Sang with Kelli and mom (see above)
worked on a few puzzles

Mom:
I kept all the above moving along.
Baked cookies
Dropped the ball on history (so what? there is always tomorrow)
Dropped the ball on dinner (what should we eat?)
Nursed a boogie-nosed, teething baby a million times
Drove three girls to dance
Bathed the twins then did it again after Bridgie coughed herself sick.
Baked cookies (its worth mentioning again, they were good)
Did a bit of laundry (see above about the baths)
Wrote a blog post with pretty leaves :)

I did all of these on my third night of less than three hours sleep. 

Have a blessed day!

All is well

The laptop is working fine. Better even since Dave performed some updates and cleared up some nonsense in the innards. Thanks for your prayers, unnamed child and I are friends again and we are all happy again here.

Apple juice + Laptop =

Disaster. Please offer up a prayer for a Barrett child who is on the outs with his mother. Offer up a prayer for his mother too. She's in need of some spiritual sustenance.

The laptop is now in pieces drying. I'll let you know how it works out.

A Birthday Walk

I have to confess that this birthday started out a little gloomy for me. It was drizzly, I miss my husband and the election results had me down in the dumps. Then my beautiful children presented me with their gift. A Canon Power Shot SX10IS. Oh the joy! 

I've been complaining concerned about my camera for a while now as it has periodic fits.  Now I have this new fancy machine that even I can't screw up.

To make the day even brighter I was allowed to escape, by myself, for an hour to downtown Savannah to stroll. By myself. Alone. Yipppeee.

Here's how it went.

First stop The Paris Market which I have been wanting to visit since I got here. It's just chock full of deliousness.  Not a place to bring small children but a lovely place to wander.

They are already decked out for Christmas. Too soon, but very pretty.

Bags of vintage jewelry for $5. I was so tempted and now for the life of me I can't figure out why I didn't pick one up.

A display of antigue Infant of Prague and saint statues. Surrounded by soap. Makes no sense.

I fell in love with this chair. I fell out of love with it's price tag. 

Cool coffee table and loved the couch. Could live without the giant plastic pillows though.

I covet this unit.

There are no orange or black sticky, gooey candies here. It's all just pretty and slightly sophisticated.

I don't know if this was a Christmas tree or just how they display these woodsy little ornaments but it is very homey and pretty.

Next stop.

Hey, I was in Savannah. Y'all.

Paula's tree was much more my style.

Here she is. I felt just too goofy asking someone to take my picture with her. I knew Katie and Erin would love it, they are big fans, but I just could not bring myself to do it. I also knew that Chris would never let me live it down.

I did do a little Christmas shopping for the fans in my life just so you don't think I'm too terrible a mommy.

Back in the car for a drive around some of the squares. I love the way the trees meet over the streets and the Spanish moss hangs down. Very southern.

Does anyone know what that sign means?  We ignore them back home in NY.

A Savannah Square .

Pretty gazebo hidden in the middle of Wright Square.

And that was it. I was away for a little over an hour and I enjoyed myself immensely. The city was quiet and so was I.  Now I have to get ready for my pizza dinner and cake. Yum.

Whew!

It's been a crazy week here.  The construction fairy finally waved her wand and everything came together, financing, permits, inspectors and contractor. We had to boogie to move hearth and home out of the house and now I write to you from Savannah where the children and I are hunkering down during demolition. I have some pictures of the front of the house as they poured new foundations for the new porch but the camera cord is among the missing as is Kevin's underwear, Katie's favorite purple shirt (you do not want to be me right now) and Kelli's Biddy Baby.

I'll be posting of our southern adventures soon but first I need to find that durn shirt.