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Thaleia

What We Did ALL Week: July 29-August 4

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How bad is it that I cannot remember everything that we did this week? Good thing I have some pictures! We celebrated Princess’ birthday on Sunday with an AG Craft party. She had 4 friends, 2 cousins, and 2 brothers in attendance for the kids. She got some nice gifts and money. She loves getting cash to figure out what deals she can get and how much she can buy:)

The kids spent so much time out front playing with neighbor kids that our next door neighbor asked if we needed to borrow his mower:) Oops, our backyard grass and weeds grew suddenly and needed mowed. I got inside our fence mowed one day and outside the fence mowed another. I took hedge clipper and chopped some way overgrown weeds and tress to fence level. Hoping that using round-up full force (after all these storms/rain are gone) will kill them so we can dig them up by the roots! I had the revelation that if I dig some of the small trees and weeds up by the roots they cannot grow back so quickly. I set to work to create more places to plant something more beautiful in our backyard. It is still a work in progress, but I want to be able to enjoy out back yard and not dread it. After all, that is where our climbing toys, garden swing, and picnic tables are.

We met up with more cousins at Newport Aquarium and quickly I realized why we like the zoo SO MUCH better. Not just because its way cheaper, but much more kid/family friendly! It was very packed and we had to just stand in wait to get through with our umbrella strollers so we didn’t run flip-flop feet over (zoos have ample space even in busy season to roam and enjoy the views)! The kids were getting restless ’cause we were late for lunch. We chose to follow the rules and leave our cooler checked before entering and did not have any snacks! (usually at the zoo we can eat whenever and wherever we want so no whiny kids!) Both Princess and Eldest took pics and videos which they turned into collages to share with you:


She fancied her collage up!


He kept his plain and simple!

We also worked on tweaking our calendar pieces a little more. (See post about replacement calendar parts.)

Frugal Ways to Stake Tomatoes

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Some may say “redneck”, but I claim Frugal! I was given 20 plants from my mom. (We kept 8, gave 8 to the neighbor, and 4 to a friend.) These were volunteer plants that grew up in a garden bed she did not want tomatoes in. I planted these in our front-side yard. They are watered daily sometimes twice a day, but have been neglected to be staked! UNTIL TODAY.

I saw some really nice orange to small grapefruit sized tomatoes that were very pale green. The sun has not been able to reach them due to the stalks, vines, and leaves blocking them. I also found another cantaloupe that was hiding under the tomatoes! So I decided today was the day to get them exposed to the sun so they can ripen before they rot.

Here’s what I did:

Found 2 free wooden stakes & 3 torches (from MIL’s garage), 3 large sticks, and large plastic coated twist ties left over from toys.

Used rubber mallet to pound the stakes into ground.

Used twist ties to attach various vines to stakes making sure that the tomatoes would be exposed to the sun and ripen. Our tomatoes are the low-acidic yellow and orange kind-yummy.

What have you done in your garden today? Do your children help? What are your favorite veggies that you grow? I would love to hear what you are growing.

Calendar Replacement Parts- Works for Me Wednesday

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Okay, if you know me you know that I am a bargain shopper. I went to a huge community garage sale and found this calendar for .50.

 Yes, that’s right a savings of $26.49!  The big kids love it and will help to teach Lil’ Red during Tot School! The only problem is that it is missing some things like: Thursday, Rainy, Sunny, Windy, September, and years 2013+. Realizing it’s August and we are starting school soon made we want to get this calendar complete!

So I set out to make the missing pieces myself. Matching fonts tended to be the trickiest part, but I was successful. I used Word with clip art and text boxes. Text Box instructions over graphics:

1. Select graphic or clip-art. Resize to what you need.

2. Create a text box. Adjust font to Century font size 28. Type in text.

3. Format text box. Select No fill and No outline.

4. Format image with Text Wrapping- Select In Front of Text.

5. Drag text box onto image and adjust to where you want your words to be!

Viola you should have something wonderful like this

Now the fun part of printing the images on a transparency and using it like a rub-on to transfer onto fabric since I’m too cheap to buy fabric that is thin enough to send through my printer:) Will show pics of the next steps of printing, rub-on transfers, and sewing backs with soft velco or thin flannel.

Note: printing in reverse took my over an hour to figure out:( Newer Word and printer drivers do not allow mirror image printing like they used to. I could do it on my laptop within WORKS, but never in WORD.

Here’s how it’s done. You have to create a word art and you can play around with fill/outline/shape to get it to look “normal” and match the calendar. Then under format tab you can flip to create reverse image. I printed on the SHINY side of a transparency and laid on top of fabric (old pair of white pants- see I told you I was cheap frugal!) Rubbed while I held transparency taunt. VIOLA! a pretty decent transfer. Princess helped me and then used a fine tip sharpie to go over the letters to darker them:)

Linking up with Works for Me Wednesday!

Things I’m working on…

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my blog! Well, okay. Here I am sitting down at the PC trying to decide what to do next. There are so many things to learn when you begin blogging like linking Facebook and Twitter to your blog posts as well as learning the “language of twitter”. I found out about Twitter Tuesday and a great group of like-minded bloggers. Then I was encouraged by one of these bloggers to participate even though fast-paced (and crazy fun!) She suggested I focus on 2-3 bloggers to connect with and go from there. Great idea AMY @ Homeschool Blogging! I better prepare with some reading up on using twitter!

Right now do I learn some more tweet etiquette or learn how to link my blog to twitter or just write some more content? I am constantly pulled in various directions (I am a creative, short attention spanned person so I can easily get distracted!) did I mention I am mommy to 3 very active children. I still need to learn better SEO and the whole categories vs. tags thing:) Amy also suggested I make a list and research those things. I got a 3-ring notebook and a 1 subject notebook all for blogging-just like the big girls do (Jolanthe, Mama Jenn, Erica, Amy, Jamerrill)

 Then the whole Facebook blocking thing is a little irksome and on my mind! I’ve been friend/message blocked twice since I started a new page on Facebook! I do not try and solicit people who are not in the same sphere of influence or who aren’t already on my friends list. According to Facebook I have had several people not friend me and so that has caused suspicion. YIKES, I am not trying to do anything shady and spammy, I am just trying to make my mark in blogosphere!

I know that I want to participate in the  “NOT” Back-to-School Blog Hop this month on iHomeschool Network not just for a little PR, but because I feel that I “know” some of those great ladies since I have been following their blogs off and on! When I began to homeschool I did tons of research and continue that research. I also love free stuff and anything homeschool and free is right up my alley. Plus the encouragement is hard to beat when you get a great group of Godly homeschool blogger mom’s connected via blog hop or series or carnival! Off to take some pics and jot some notes about our homeschool curriculum space, students,etc.