WFMW Rubber Bands

It's been a while since I participated in Works for me Wednesday.   Today a common household device brings me back the handy dandy rubber band.

Here are 2 ways rubber bands have worked for our family recently.

1.
I have found that at the factory job I have had for the past 6 months that overalls  were the best thing for me to waer.  The problem was that I only had 2 pairs of overall and one was missing the metal fastener that holds the snap up as you can see in the picture below.

I got this brain storrm to use a rubberband to replace the fastener.  It looks a little awkward but with a shirt or sweater on over it, none are the wiser.  

2. Recently the power cord formy laptop has become very persnickety.  Unless you are holding it at a certain angle and applying a pretty good amount of pressure, it will not recharge the unit.   My lovely wife found that by attatching the laptop to the power cord with a  that it would not only properly charge the batter, but could also allow us to power it without the battery.  This had become impossible without use of the rubber band.





So that's how the rubber band works for me.  It has saved us money, time and frustration.  To find out how other things (some not even elastic) work for others, click here for more WFMW at We Are That Family.

Wasted leftovers, any advice?

Our family does not do well with leftovers, because, I guess we forget about them.  So we waste a lot of food, which makes us feel so bad.  Wasted money down the drain, wasted food, etc.  As many of you know, I have been working evenings so that I can homeschool the kids during the day, while Amy works.  To say it's been a juggle is an understatement.  But one of the reasons we are going through this season in our family is to beome more financially responsible and more honoring to the Lord.  This pile of wasted food flies in the face of our goals!  Any tips on how to avoid this problem?

Chucking leftovers and the money that went to buy them definitely does not work for us.  Asking the good people stopping by from WFMW at We Are That Family if they have any suggestions. 

Project Week (With updates)

After a medium-sized summer (don't want to declare it long or short--I do have two full weeks left before I (Amy) go back to work) of swimming, laying about reading, frequenting the zoo, hanging about libraries, etc., it's time to get some long-neglected projects done around the house, before fall hits in full swing with soccer, ballet, school, work, Awana, etc. So here's our list (accompanied by some "before" and "after" photos, to keep us honest): *Clean & organize playroom (also doubles as an entryway/bunny house) Before: After: (That's not a feather, it's sunlight!) *Clean out craft cabinet Before: After: *Organize school shelves *Clean out bathroom cabinet *Make front yard look better *Make back yard look better *Put up a clothesline? (thinking of trying this click the word this) *Clean out kitchen cabinets *Clean out under sink Before: After: With everyone's help from young to old, we should be able to accomplish all of these tasks, along with some afternoon swimming, and some packing/prepping for a weekend family camp-out, and a Dad and Spider Droid trip to Joplin, MO, to help out tornado victims. Let the projects begin! (or, continue...working hard!)

Tuesday night update: Dave, ever the meme participant, wanted me to remind you that having a project week, involving the whole family, and taking before and after pictures of the projects work for us. To see what works for others go to WFMW at We Are That Family.

Wednesday Night Update: Dave and Spider Droid worked on projects outside of Grandpa's house with cousins, uncles, nephews, brothers, fathers and grandpas (depending who you ask) today. Nothing new on our project list got removed. We girls relaxed and Bunny returned the favor and kicked me from Baltic to Boardwalk in Monopoly.

A commenter told me about Tackle it Tuesday @ Five Minutes for Mom and Dave linked me up there. If you are visiting from there, welcome. you can head back by clicking here.

HSD Rewind: Newspaper Fried Chicken

I have a little feature on my blog that announces the most frequently viewed post on the blog. I titled it the post of the week. I was surprised over the weekend to find that the most viewed post was a recipe post Amy wrote for Works for me Wednesday 2 years ago. So let's review the taste sensation that's sweeping the nation and get in the (not so) way back machine to

Original Air Date: June 30th, 2009


I have asked my lovely wife to contribute one of my favorite recipes for this special themed edition of WFMW. This dish works for us as a dish to pass at summer cookouts but also makes a great family dinner. Here is the lovely and Talented Mrs. Dad . . .



This is called "newspaper chicken" because we got the recipe from the newspaper. Creative huh.


**NOTE: This is a two-day affair, but well worth it!


Here's how I make it, but there are any number of variations you can make to make it your own. I take 5 lbs of boneless chicken breasts and cut them into small strips or chunks (I get the bag-o-frozen chicken from Aldi.) I cover them in water in a large tupperware bowl and add 1 cup of salt. Yes, one entire cup of salt. I put the cover on it, and shake it a few times, and refrigerate it overnight. Sometimes during the night, if I happen to get up, I shake it a few more times. In the morning, I dump out the salt water and rinse the chicken well. Really well. This brining isn't for flavoring. Then, using the same bowl while the chicken is on a plate or drainer, I put 2 cups of milk (I use skim) in the bowl and 2 tablespoons of vinegar and stir that up (handy dandy buttermilk.) Then return the chicken to the bowl and make sure the chicken is covered. If not, add more milk. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. I like to double dip my chicken because it comes out so crunchy, really good. I put 2 cups of flour, along with 1 tsp of the following: salt, garlic powder, chili powder, and 1/2 tsp of pepper and dry mustard. Mix it really well in a large ziplock bag (I've tried doing it in a bowl, but doesn't work as well.) So you take chicken out of buttermilk and save the buttermilk! Put chicken on a plate. Then with a pair of tongs or "grabbers" put a few pieces of chicken in the flour mixture to coat, then grab with grabbers, drop in buttermilk, and then back into flour mixture.

Place coated chicken on a tray (I use my pampered chef "stackable cooling rack" laid on top of a cookie sheet.) Once all chicken is double coated, let the tray sit in the fridge for another hour. This ensures the coating will stick to the chicken. **Sometimes I do have to make another bag of flour mixture. This double coating is messy, but it really makes for nice, crunchy chicken. After an hour, get a frying pan ready with enough oil to be 1/2 way up the sides of the chicken. I fry it over medium high heat. Once the oil is hot, place a few pieces of chicken in the oil. If you're doing it right, as the hot oil is cooking the food, the salt water is coming out of the chicken, therefore, making it a nongreasy affair. Love it. So you fry it on one side for about 4 minutes (try to leave it alone here, don't check it a bunch of times), and the other side for about 4 minutes more. This, of course, varies according to size. Using bone-in chicken will take longer. Now, this is important: do not try to keep the chicken warm to try to serve in an hour or so. Either serve immediately, or allow to cool and either serve cold, or microwave to warm it up. If you try to keep it warm in the oven, it gets gooey, and nobody likes gooey chicken! This chicken also freezes quite well. I usually have enough for a meal right away, leftovers in the fridge, and then some in the freezer for a later meal.

Ingredients at a Glance:

5 lbs boneless chicken breasts
1 cup salt, water to cover chicken
2 cups milk plus 2 TBLS vinegar (or buttermilk if you have it)
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt, garlic powder, chili powder
1/2 tsp pepper and dried mustard
oil for frying

Thanks Amy. She also does a great impression of Jimmy Stewart saying chicken. She is certainly a woman of many talents.

Meanwhile back in 2011. Amy is still a woman of many talents. Today she got a job that she neither applied for nor interviewed for. She merely told some people she wanted it, and bam, it was hers. It's actually her same job just in a different school, one much closer to our house.

So she will be able to get home quicker and make this fantastic chicken. We still love it and hope you will too. If I repost this in ten years time I might have to remind people what a newspaper was.

As with last time I shared this recipe, I am sharing this @ We Are That Family for Works for me Wednesday because (wait for it) Newspaper Chicken works for me. click here to see what works for others who may not have chicken on their mind and be so easily defined.

Good Hair Day

Puppy has lots of hair. Okay Puppy had lots of hair.

Here is her hair in action circa last August.

Her is her hair in Action last November in melodramatic fashion

Up until today it had never been cut. Today it was cut. Why? Because Puppy heard about Locks of Love and decided that she wanted to donate her hair to be used for wigs for cancer patients. We did some research and even though Locks of Love doesn't use all the donated hair on wigs for cancer patients (They sell some of the hair to wig makers and put the money they receive towards operating costs.) we were satisfied that theirs is a worth while charity and honored puppy's request.

Here are some pics from today's festivities. . .

So long hair!

Getting ready.

Supportive siblings or voracious readers? You decide.

The hair before.

The hair after.

Her reaction to seeing her ponytail w/o her head connected to it.



A sucker for a good haircut.




Here she is sporting the new doo at the library.


Puppy is growing up. In less than 24 hours she has lost her first two baby teeth and had her official first haircut. But more importantly she is growing in understanding the needs of others. Sure she screams sometimes when she doesn't get her way. But this hair brained scheme was of her own volition. We weren't sure about the idea at first, but she was. She is even looking ahead to a year or two when her hair is long enough that she can donate again. One cool thing we did not realize is that our hair cut place cut her hair for free and mailed the hair off to Locks for Love as well.


Watching (and letting)our child give to others sure works for us. To see what works for others click here to join Works for Me Wednesday at We Are That Family.

In which I give away Mavis Beacon.

It's been a little while since I participated in WFMW and it's also label time here at Home School Dad. Today we complete the 3 way tie for # 12 with Crazy Dave's Giveaways.

One of the things I first noticed when I started reading blogs were the cool give-a-ways. I love winning things, but more importantly I love to give things away. The problem has been that for many of my give-a-ways I have had too few people participating, even though I linked it to several give-away sites, some that are now defunct.

Even when I did get a winner, I sometimes had trouble getting the winner to come forward. This has kept me from expanding this section of my blog and Crazy Dave has gone into semi-retirement.

Today he comes out of retirement to offer areal cool product for any one willing to enter.

About a year ago my Dad called me up and wondered if I wanted a typing program he had on CD ROM. My Dad and I are very similar in that we don't mind clutter. We are a little different in how we don't mind it. I don't mind it because If I had my own way I would collect every scrap of anything on the off chance I might need it again. My Dad doesn't mind clutter as long as it's not in his house. So, he calls me up every couple weeks with something he wants to unload on me. Now my wife likes to curb my propensity for clutter by putting my clutter on the curb. So we have come to an understanding. I say no to my Dad as often as I can. My Dad just moves on to the next child in his Rollerdex. (Yes, our last name is Roller, and that was a bad pun.)

On this occasion, I said yes to my Dad because Amy and I had been talking about getting the kids involved in a typing program. My Dad gave me the disc and I put it somewhere and moved on with my life.

Fast forward to June 2010. Amy and I are at the Home School Convention and we remember that we want the kids to take typing. So we bought a CD Rom called Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing. I forgot all about the fact that I already had a copy of it that my Dad gave me.

About a week later I found the copy my Dad gave me and the 2 oldest kids and I started using it. It is a fantastic program that allows children and adults to progress at their own pace. What I like best about it is that the kids just love using it.

Here is what the opening screen looks like when my oldest starts her lessons.

Here is a sample lesson that I have been working on.

That is why Mavis Beacon works for me. I'd like it toy work for you also. We are using version 15 and I am offering an unopened copy of version 18 to the hundredth caller. I have been advised I do not have a radio show and have not given out my telephone # so I will go ahead and give this copy to a random commenter. If you post about this giveaway on your blog or Facebook page or other social media, leave another comment with the link. Also, if you are a follower of my blog just say I am a follower on your comment and I will give you one more entry. If you are not a follower of my blog, this would be a good time to do so.

This give-a-way will end at 6 pm central time Sunday October 3rd. So please leave a comment and join my give-a-way. I will believe it will be just your type.

For more of the Carnival of Homeschooling click here. To get back to WFMW click here.

Next Time: Summer Reading

What a thing to say.

Label Appreciation Society is reconvening with # 12 in a (3-way tie) Random Postings.

The label random postings could easily be placed on 40 % of my posts. I am in my very nature random. However, I have saved this label for the truly random like my post about alternate names for our home school or when I solicited opinions about keeping my beard or shaving it off, or my classic April 1 2009 post how High Fructose Corn Syrup works for me.

Today's random post is about a cocktail party game that Amy and I made up called what a thing to say. In the spirit of full disclosure, I must admit that between Amy and myself we have attended a total of zero cocktail parties. I mean we're only in our forties, we're pacing ourselves. I just imagine it's a game that would go over well at cocktail parties. We play it at social gatherings like weddings, wakes, funerals, reunions the sort of thing where much small talk will occur.

The way we play is like this. Before the EIQ (Event in Question) one of us thinks a phrase that the other person has to say and the # of different times they have to say it. They are not supposed to reveal that they are playing a game and just work it into conversations. In November of 1997, Amy and I were recently engaged and were at my grandfather's wake. This is the first time I remember playing. I gave Amy the phrase "People don't floss as much as they used to." She played it like a champ. One year at Christmas with Amy's side of the family I was to use the phrase "the all-mighty dollar" and I just kept bringing it up into conversation and no one other than Amy had any clue that it was all pre-arranged.

Other phrases soon followed like "I don't like (whoever had just been mentioned) they supported the war movement" this was funny at the time because it was the late 90's and there was really no war movement to support. We still laugh when we remember Amy telling her Aunt that she doesn't like Oprah Winfrey because she "supported the war movement." Especially when her aunt thought Amy had made it up just then.

What a thing to say has not been all that popular with us in the past 8-10 years as we have both been to family parties where we don't remember having any conversations because we were so busy herding children. Now that our children are becoming a little more self regulating it may become a game we play more often. Maybe at our first cocktail party.

Next Time: The return of 7 word September

Skills Round Up

Six weeks left until school starts!

Howdy Homeschool Pardners! How are your doggies getting along now that summer's breaking at your home school on the range?

Well lissen up cowpokes. I want to tell ya something we use during the summer to make sure we don't have any strays when we start driving facts and figures in the fall.

It's called Skills Round Up and it works for us. But lissen up City Slickers, how ya say it. It is not pronounced skills round-up. It's skeeeeeeeeeels round up. Plus when ya say it, you have to motion with your hands like your throwin' a lasso. That is, if you don't have your own lasso to throw.

Okay, Buckaroos here's whatcha do! Perty much once a week during the summer, gather up at the table and review some of the stuff you've learned in the past. Amy likes to put 'em through their paces in state capitols, continents and Bible verses. You can do it with just 'bout anything from historic dates to the periodic table. I think they call it the periodic table cause you have to review it periodically.

The nice thing about skills round up is you can do it any time, anywhere. In the back 40, in the van, in the store, anywhere! All the prep work is on the parents end (Amy can never remember that French fella that's the capitol of South Dakota.)

So, the next time things are slowing down on the home school ranch, mosey up to your tool kit and pull out your lasso and skeeeeeeeeels round up!

Howdy WFMW folks. Skeels rounds up works for me. It can work for you whether you home school or not. To find out what else is working. head over to We Are That Family.

If you are stopping by from the Carnival of Homeschooling click here to mosey back.

Next Time: Tennis Anyone?

Something's Got to Give

Life has been very busy at casa de Roller lately. I am working a temporary job in the evenings and weekends. Each of our three children is busy with an extra curricular activity. I have decided to slow down the blogging until my temp job ends. I wish I had done a little more Bulk Blogging like Kristin talked about an her most recent WFMW post.

I will be publishing Things Fortnightly tomorrow. But then I have nothing planned for a week or two until the temp job ends. Remember that today is your last chance to comment on this or any of my posts since last Monday for an opportunity to win a copy of my Washington D.C. Journal and a few D.C. knickknacks.

Next Time: Things Fortnightly

Dear WFMW

I haven't participated in Works for Me Wednesday for quite a while. Today's WFMW is a backwards edition. In essence: you state what doesn't work for you and hope the blogosphere will help you resolve it. It reminds me a little of an advice column. SO I composed an open letter.

Dear WFMW,

My wife and I have been having problems recently with our four year old. Even though she has little to no trouble going to bed in her room. She regularly wakes up in ours. Between 4 am and 6 am she makes the commute and often wakes up my wife with requests for food and or attention. We have tried many things: bribery, a gate and several others. Nothing seems to work when we put up the gate, she either climbs over it or screams until I have to go and deal with her. What we'd like her to do is stay in her bed, or climb up on to her sister's bunk. But most nights she heads on over to our room. We did not have this as a regular occurrence with our first two children.

Is there anything that we can do? Because having our (mostly my wife's sleep disturbed each night) does notwork for us!

Sleep deprived in Suburbia

For more Backwards WFMW head on over to We Are That Family.

Next Time: Things Fortnightly

Baker's Half Dozen

Six Word Saturday time again. Here are mine:

Baked my first cake from scratch.

I am teaching a class in our home school co-op this semester called "Let's go to the store." It is a pre-school class featuring stories and crafts about groceries and grocery shopping.

Last week I took my students and their families on a field trip to Meijer. Why Meijer? They give out cookies to children 11 and under. Some call it bribery, I call it incentive to behave.

This coming Monday we will be talking about deserts. I decided that I would bake a cake for the class, and since the class is about shopping, I thought it would be good to talk about all the ingredients needed for a cake. I have been baking cakes using box mixes since I was in the single digits. I had never made a cake from scratch before.

So today at our test kitchen/house Lulu and I baked a cake from scratch. On Sunday we will bake one for the class. I used a recipe for chocolate cake I found at Suite 101.com.

I had hoped to include a full tutorial on how to make the cake but preparing a cake , shepherding a 4 year old and photographing each segment turned out to be too much for me.

Here are the few pictures I did take . . .

The ingredients.

Mixing.


























The cake turned out pretty well. Yes, I forgot to preheat the oven. Yes I accidentally turned the oven off when I was checking to see if it was done. I also had a few other kinks that I think we can work out on Sunday.

Here are a few reasons why baking a cake from scratch works for me:

1. Baking a cake from scratch is not difficult at all. I had to melt chocolate for ours, which I had never done. A lot of cakes take far less preparation than that.


2. Teaching my children how to make a cake from scratch is a useful educational tool. I would have never envisioned myself as a Home Ec. teacher. But as long as I wear the home school pants int he family, I guess that's what I'll be.


3. My 4 year old is an excellent helper. She often helps my wife mix biscuits and other things. She has been wanting to bake this cake for two weeks since I announced the idea to the class. She really did most of the work: beating the eggs, pouring the butter milk, measuring and sifting the dry ingredients, and decorating the cake.



So those are my six words and why baking a cake from scratch works for me.


For more Six Word Saturday head on over to Show my Face dot com. To see what works for others head over to We are That Family for more WFMW.


Next Time: A School by any other name.

A cool use for a GPS

It's been a while since I posted a Works for me Wednesday post. I thought of one last week that I thought I would share.

If I have a place to go to during the day and I don't want to be late for it instead of setting an alarm clock I set the address in my GPS. The GPS will tell me what time I will be arriving at my destination. I leave the house as the arrival time on the GPS nears the time I want to arrive. Not the most usual use for a global positioning system but hey it works for me.

To see what works foe others head over to We Are That Family.

Next Time: A New Look for a New Year

WFMW not workin' for me

Word Count Wednesday :
100 Words or Les

Works For Me Wednesday is among my favorite blog features. I have been a frequent contributor in my first 9 months of blogging.

WFMW hasn't been working for me lately. As they say in break-up parlance, It isn't them it's me.

My usual WFMW routine had me up past midnight on Tuesday nights. I have a men’s group that meets at 6 a.m Wednesdays. Something had to give. Sleep won.

I’ll still contribute to WFMW but today I am starting a new Wednesday tradition. Tell me what you think.

Next Time: 3TTT

Apple Butter Day

Fall is a busy but fantastic time in our family. We usually visit an apple orchard and generally have many family related fall outings. One that we do every year when possible is called Apple Butter Day. Apple Butter Day is hosted by Gerald & Mary Jane White of Tennessee, IL. Gerald is a retired math professor at Western Illinois University where Amy and I went to college. Mary Jane is related to almost everyone in Mcdonough County. They are also the parents of one of my closest friend and the PIL's of one of Amy's closest friends.

In 1976 the White's celebrated the bicentennial by making Apple Butter in the same cauldron that according to Gerald's grandmother was used by her grandmother for the same purpose. This became an annual event on the White's farm each fall. The Whites would invite family, neighbors, church friends, WIU associates and students, and assorted others to a pot luck dinner and especially to take turns stirring the apple butter throughout the day. As the afternoon progressed the apple butter is put into glass containers and distributed to the guests. I have attended about a dozen times in the last 20 years. The above picture is of Amy and I from an AB day in the early 90's.

There are many distinctives about Apple Butter Day and these distinctives have evolved with the event, and as Amy and I have made the transition from college students to family friends. The highlight during my student days was playing football and volleyball and getting off campus. After we graduated, going was more of an opportunity to catch up with old friends. The past few years as our family has grown, the focus has also included keeping tabs on 3 kids and making sure they enjoy themselves. Our friends (Gerald's son & daughter in law) has 10 children and AB day gives Amy and I a chance to hang out with their family. The main highlights for our children besides hanging with the other kids, are eating funnel cakes, going on a hay rack ride through prairie land that Gerald is developing on his property and hunting for geodes.

Geodes are a type of geological formation common in volcanic and sedimentary rocks. The geodes that we find at the White Farm are part of a creek bed. The geodes have crystal formations that have developed within rocks. At first glance it is difficult to know whether you have found a geode or just a rock. A geode will break much easier than a rock and the crystalline formations are a give-away. Here is a picture of a geode found at Wikpedia. Here is a picture of a geode we found this past Saturday . . .

Apple Butter Day is generally held the first or second weekend in October and the weather is usually unusually gorgeous for the event. This year, according to Gerald the weather was the worst in the history of the event. It was actually below freezing when we left our house 5:45 Saturday morning. It warmed up to about 50 degrees and sunny but much chillier than we have been blessed with in the past.

Geodes aren't the only precious commodity that is easier for our family to get their hands on in Mcdonough County. Each year we stop my Macomb's Hy-Vee super market on our way in or out of AB Day and snag the following essentials: Caffeine free Mountain Dew and Sterzing Potato Chips. Now not everyone agrees with my gastronomical choices. Many people, including my dear sister, wonder why you would ever want to put up with Mountain Dew if not for the caffeine. I actually enjoy mountain Dew for the taste and there is little discernible difference in my opinion between the caffeine free and regular variety. For whatever reason caffeine free Mountain Dew has not been available in the Chicago area since the late 80's early 90's.

Sterzing's Potato Chips (click on the chip bag for more product information)are made in Burlington Iowa and are are in my opinion one of the seven wonders of the snack food world. They are a kettle cooked variety of chip that people either love or hate. Amy hates them I love them. They developed a less fat variety a few years back which are okay but since I am 4 hours away from being able to eat them on a regular basis, I don't mind at all getting the not-so-good variety once every year.

Apple Butter Day is a fantastic day for our family. Enjoyable day outings anchored in family traditions certainly work for us. Going down memory lane for junk food is just a perk. Special thanks to, Katherine at No Fighting, No Biting, for featuring this at the Carnival of Home Schooling; to see what works for others head on over to We Are That Family.

Next Time: Three Fears Thursday

I'm biking on purpose, for a purpose.

I love bicycling. Ever since I was a kid I have spent most of my free time bicycling. Our town's library was right across from our house and I used to spend hours biking around in it when the library was closed. When the library was open I would bike around town.


When I got into high school I became an even more avid cyclist. My youth group went on two cycling trips a year. We would bike 3-5 days riding 60 miles a day. In addition to that I would often bike 10-25 miles (one way) to visit various friends. Once I was there we would often go cycling.

When I graduated high school I volunteered for 3 years at my youth group and continued my biking frenzy. But in the past 22 years I have mostly rested on my biking laurels. I would occasionally go on a 30-40 mile trek but those treks became few and far between. When I moved to South Carolina in 1995 I went through great pains to bring my bike with me and then rode it a grand total of twice in 2 years. When I got married in 1998, I made great pains to make sure my bike fit into our apartments and rode it a grand total of zero times in three years.


Last year when I lost my job in July I started cycling again with some regularity. This year we made sure the whole family had working bikes. While the rest of the family has been doing most of their biking in a church parking lot on our block, I have been hitting the roads and bike trails of Kane and McHenry county. 10-15 miles at a time is now a grand accomplishment but I am finding that I still enjoy cycling as much as I did in those days of youth.


A little more than a month ago I was told by a facebook friend of mine about a bike ride that International Teams (IT) was putting together. IT is a missions organization that I was somewhat involved with back in the eighties. I say somewhat because my involvement was to train 3 months for a two year missions trip that I ended up not going on. My facebook friend trained with me and went on the missions trip. IT is very involved in sharing the Gospel in refugee camps throughout the world. They are really in the forefront of refugee ministry.


Their annual bike ride benefits refugees and refugee ministry and is aptly titled the RIDE FOR REFUGEES. The ride is being held in 3 countries over 2 continents. Bikers will ride 5-60 miles and will raise funds as well. The day I heard about the ride I had just completed my goal of biking over 100 miles this summer. Back in the day I would do that in the week, but 100 miles in 2 months is much better than zero miles in three years.




I decided I would do the ride this year. On October 3rd I am going to bike 30 miles which is 10 more than I've bike at one time in a decade. To prepare for the ride I've put on 100 more miles and have raised $260.00. My goal is $300 and anyone wanting to donate can contact me or donate on line by clicking HERE.


So to sum up, biking again after many long years away works, but making that biking count for others really works for me. To see what else is working head on over to WE ARE THAT FAMILY.





Next Time: Three Things Thursday.

A Place for Everything; Everything on Floor.

WFMW is having a special themed edition on organizational tips today. Organization is not one of my strong suits as my title suggests. My late brother made that wry observation once, noting that while I often had an elaborate organizational system nothing ever seemed to get where it was supposed to be.

So why am I just not laying low until next week? A good question. I think what I want to share today is what I would title as a "Works For Me" in progress, something that I chronically struggle with but hope to subdue someday.

Here are some ways I am trying to get Organization to work for me:

• Looking through the mail.

Before: Stopping everything I was doing to get the mail when it came in and invariably leaving junk mail and catalogues I "was going to get to" all over the house.

Now: Try to wait until I am able to deal with the mail to take it out of the box. Go through mail near garbage can so I can throw away all junk immediately.

Working On: To be able to deal with all mail in one setting putting bills and correspondence where they belong and disposing of rest.

• Keeping house in order.

Before: Leaving job after job 1/2 done with idea of getting to later. Dealing with cleaning and organization on as needed or crisis to crisis basis.

Current: Attempting to order as I go. Finding that I often still am under the command of the tyranny of the urgent. I also have tinkered with "multitasking" which usually ends with a 1/2 cleaned mess in every room and a frazzled and frustrated me.

Working on: To finish one job completely before moving on with another. This isn't to say that I can't have the lunch in the oven while I'm finishing the morning lessons. But the idea of helping one kid cook ramen, one with a computerized math lesson, and one with math at the table simultaneously while emptying the dishwasher is now a complete anathema to me.

• Involving the children with the household tasks.

Before: Spend most of my day coaxing the children to do minimal amounts of work and generally having to redo their work myself.

Current: Every one has a routine in the morning that is to be completed before school starts. I try to split up tasks like preparing for or cleaning up a meal so each child can participate to their abilities. I still find myself cleaning up after them much more often than I'd like.

Working On: Breaking responsibilities in component parts and assigning them in advance. For example: Emma is in charge of feeding the bunny and replacing his hay each morning. Charlie changes his water bottle. I empty the bunny's tray each day. Emma is teaching Lucy how to brush the bunny's fur and they will rotate that job. Charlie, Emma and I rotate vacuuming the area where the bunny's cage is. I also am working to have them complete a job without my intervention.

So working on getting organized works for me. To see what works for those less organizationally challenged than myself step on over to WE ARE THAT FAMILY. To see all my other WFMW posts click Here.

Next Time: Hoppy Birthday

Zoos

Zoos work for me because they create memories like this.

That is Lucy in the background screaming "do it again, do it again!"

For more WFMW head back to Kristen at

We Are That Family

To see my current give-a-way click here

Next Time: 4 Weddings and a Funeral Part II

Knowing Your Neighbors

I bet I could write an excellent blog post about the importance of meeting and befriending your neighbors. How to get out and become a community with those who live in closest proximity to you. Yeah that would be a great post, it's just not this post.

I am talking about something completely different. I am talking about my WFMW neighbors. Each week I view some excellent posts about what works for others here in blog world. My problem is that so many of these posts I never get around to applying because of the enormity of fine posts each week. So I developed a system that helps me review past posts and save some of the good ones for posterity.

Here is what I do: Each week after I post my link, I mark the posts immediately before and behind mine as favorites and put them in a folder called "WFMW Neighbors." This is my 25th WFMW post and that means that after I link this up, I will have 50 neighbors in that folder.

After a few months I decided that I wanted to honor some of my favorite neighbors, so I reviewed all my neighbors and put the ones that I thought were best in a second folder called top 10 neighbors. Each subsequent week when I organized my neighbors I put the especially good ones in the top 10 list. My top 10 list often had more than ten items at a time but once a month or so I would weed it down. Today I would like to present you with my Top 10 Neighbors:

Starting us off at #10 is Lynn's Kitchen Adventures who introduced Frozen Hot Chocolate (July 09)

Speaking of neighbors, weighing in at #9 is Kristen's neighbor from Bake at 350 with Mini Moo Cards and coupon! (July 09)

How to Clean a Kitchen By Joyfully Retired (January 09) checks in at # 8.

Which brings us to #7 Protecting Your Marriage (and Money) with A Spending Communication Policy By Sarah @ Real Life (March 2009)

# 6 is Don't Bring Me Down by ELO. (Sorry my inner d.j. escaped for a moment.) Didn't mean to bring things down. It's time to Exhale. Return to Center as they What's Working: Our Mud Pit (May '09)

A Back Seat Boredom Buster is what awaits us at #5 found Inside the White Picket Fence. (July '09)

Momedy (Ba Ba Ba Ba Da) Momedy (Ba Ba Da Ba) presents Making Procrastination Work For You (April '09) at # 4.

At #3 we have Pause your Nose Again from Heavenly Homemakers dot com (February '09)

The Animator's Wife hits at #2 with Cheap Shots- Christmas (January '09).

And my #1. neighbor is A Simple Walk with her beautiful post, A Bag Full of Pennies (January '09)

Introducing My New Neighbors . . .

Tonight Kayren of Everthing's Coming up Daisies blogged about Getting Chewing Gum Out of My Dryer.

AND

Over at Blessed With Grace Lisa shared Things I Liked About Today ...

Welcome to the neighborhood!

Keeping tabs on my WFMW neighbors works for me. Thanks to all 50 of my neighbors for their excellent ideas. To see what works for others, bop on over to Kristen's at We Are That Family. A special shout out to Shannon at Rocks in my Dryer who got this party started. Many of my neighbors originally linked there.

Next Time: A Letter from the President

Home School Convention

There is a special edition of WFMW this week. It is a back to school edition. Things here at the Izola Becker Home School won't get started until the last week of August but I do have a back to school tip to share.

We really like going to our local Home School Convention every year. Even though it is held generally at the end of our school year it really sets us up for what we will do the next year.

There are several things we like about going to the convention: 1)Amy and I get to spend time in seminars and large group settings learning more about home schooling. 2) We get to spend time together. 3) We generally run into and catch up with several home schooling families that we know. 4) Amy likes switching name tags with me during the convention, which is usually hilarious when I forget we switched and someone calls me Amy.

But the best thing about the home school convention is the vendor's hall. This is where rows and rows of companies sell their textbooks, videos, computer based programs and so much more. The majority of these vendors have their best sales of the year at these conventions so this is often where we (as well as many others) buy the bulk of their curricula for the coming year.

The Vendor Hall can be a very intimidating place. Even with all the discounts it can be a very expensive place. What works for us is having a system of how we are going to work the hall.

A. Before the convention we discuss what we are planning on as far as the curriculum for the next year.

Amy and I decided we wanted to try Konos for the coming year as we already had the curriculum from a previous home school convention. Konos is a multi level curriculum that includes all subjects except Math and Phonics. Amy and I then decided that we were satisfied with the Math that the kids were doing with Alpha Omega and would most likely stick with them in the coming year. We also discussed that we would want to focus a little more on Art as all our students show an affinity with that subject and that we also wanted to work more on penmanship as none of our students were showing an affinity with that.

B. We decide how much money we can or want to spend on curriculum.

C. Before we purchase anything we go through the vendor hall and look at what they have. Sometimes things change at the conference and our direction changes from what we were discussing before. Sometimes we end up getting exactly what we were talking about before the conference.

D. We leave the vendor hall and we discuss what we are going to purchase. Often the product is available at more than one vendor so Amy pulls out her calculator (me) to figure out what vendor has the best cost. Sometimes at this point we don't have everything decided yet. If that is the case we might divide and conquer where one of us will buy what we are certain about while the other will continue to look at products and make a decision

E. We generally find at least one new product at each conference that we are very excited to try out. This year we found out about the Draw to Learn series from the Notgrass Company. Remember how we wanted to have some more Art for the children. This book combines Bible Study and Art by having each student describe each of the Psalms in pictures. Click on the book cover for a sample page.

So that is how we make the vendor hall work for us. We are looking forward to a great school year and encourage you all to do the same. To see what has worked for me on previous Wednesdays click here.

To see what back to school nuggets await you at WFMW go back to We Are That Family.

This Article has been included at the Carnival of Homeschooling #189: The Lolcat Edition being hosted this week at Homeschoolbuzzdotcom.

Next Time: Remembering Millard.