a gypsy caravan

Getting it Done: The Learning Room

I have finished working in the schoolroom.  It took me four days to complete this room.  It was a horrific mess.  You will see in the "before" photos just how much clutter was filling this room, rendering it unusable.  Every year, after Christmas the learning room is trashed because our crawl space to the Christmas decorations is only accessible through that room.  I am ashamed to post the following photos but I think it is good for me to be as honest as possible.   I hope that by seeing my mess, some of you might not feel so alone in your struggles with clutter.  I hope, in some little way, you will be encouraged by the transformations that our family is making.

I eliminated several wobbly shelving units and threw away eight tall kitchen bags of trash, inlcuding many old notebooks, lapbooks and drawings.  I gave away four bags of who-knows-what-else and will be selling a large rubbermaid bin full of books.  I moved the picture books to the girls' room so there is a lot less filling the shelves these days.  Years ago I had purchased cork tiles for one wall but they all fell down, leaving the adhesive all over the wall.  I covered that with Van Gogh calendar prints and will change the prints every three months or so. 

As you can imagine, we were not doing any schoolwork in this room when it looked like this.

Here goes!

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Nothing fancy but much neater, in my opinion.  A couple things worth noting:  I removed a small, wooden folding table from the room temporarily to serve as additional seating for when our company arrives this weekend.  The table will be back in front of the learning room window once our company leaves.  Also, though I vacuumed the carpet, we have several blotches of paint that kids have spilled over the years.  Anyone have any luck removing acrylic paint from the carpet?  The brick that is visible in my window is my neighbor's house.  It is only a driveway's width away from ours so we can easily talk out our windows at each other.  Thankfully, we are blessed with wonderful neighbors!

Well, thanks for not throwing tomatoes at me over my messy photos.   We are getting there, slowly but surely.  Slow and steady wins the race, right?  In the meantime, thanks for visiting today!

 

Peter Walsh on Oprah

Part Two of "Inside the Lives of Hoarders with Peter Walsh" will be shown on Oprah tomorrow.   I did not catch Part One but the story and quite a few links worth following are on this page from Oprah's site. 

HT: Cheryl

Just call me Rosie...

...Rosie the Riveter, that is!

Today, in a frantic effort to get ready for company (six people who are arriving this weekend), I installed two of these:

and  two of these:

Removed the old caulk and proceeded to recaulk one of these (no that's not mine in the photo):

BUT, by far the most exciting job completed today was to repair my upstairs bathtub which has not been working since last MAY. (Ahem.)  To make a long story short, the tub would not drain because the little lever thingy was broken as well as the wire thingy that you can't see that controls the little lever thingy. Once I removed the little lever thingy, the wire thingy and its surrounding plate, I dug down the overflow with a wire hanger and pulled this thing out. 

This thing apparently controls the tub's ability to drain.

Not any more!  (insert evil, sinister laugh)

At least now we can use the tub, though for the time being I will have to purchase a temporary rubber stopper for bathtime.  I didn't want our company to have to share one bathtub between the ten of us. 

Do you know that I only spent $18 and now have two working toilets and two presentable bathtubs?  I am pretty proud of myself. 

Now I am going to prop up my feet and have a glass of wine.  Then I am going to bed. :)

Easter 2008

~Happy Easter!~

A Very Happy and Blessed Easter from our family to yours!

Woodworking Projects: Dryad/Tree Spirit

Benjamin carved this Tree Spirit for me for my birthday.  I thought you Narnia fans might enjoy seeing it.  :)

Annie and Bridget

Annie is just so happy that Bridgie has come to play today!  Bridget's mom, Ann Marie,  is ready to deliver her seventh baby.  She is a week overdue today.  Won't you say a prayer for her?   :)

UPDATE: Ann Marie gave birth to her newest little fellow, Joseph Anthony on March 15th.  Thank you for your prayers!!

Neat Sites for Creative Bloggers

I have always enjoyed fiddling with my blog template.  There are a few sites that have made this easier for me and I though I would share them with you today.

Colr.org is a fun place to spend time.  You can choose  random flickr photos or download your own and the site will generate a color scheme for you to use in your blog template.   For example, I chose a free stock photo for my header.  (I'd like to tell you that I took that photo but there is no grass to be found this time of year in Northeast Ohio!)  Anyhow, I wanted a spring-y look and downloaded it on colr.org.    I then clicked "pick a color scheme" and it brought up several choices in complementary colors.  If you do not like the first choice, just hit that button again and a new batch of choices will be shown.  To find the color's number, click the little color box and then "view".  It will give you the official color number which then can be added to your blog template. 

(If you use Typepad, you can design a new template by going to design>manage your saved designs>duplicate your applied design.  After duplicating your current design, you can work in the duplicated design without changing your actual site.  Rather than using the small list of standard blog colors, you can plug in the colr.org colors and have many more to work with that complement your header photo.  Once you have made design changes to your site, you can apply that new design and republish.  This system allows you to tinker with your design without your readers seeing all the changes until they are complete.) 

Another neat site for color schemes are Colour Lovers.  Here is a beautiful page of colors based soley on butterfly wings.  Here is another page of inspirational colors taken from master artists.  Neat, huh?

Some other helpful color sites:
Color Blender
Color Schemer
Color Generator

A few months back, Lissa had posted a link (which I cannot find!) to Pixenate.  I really appreciate Pixenate because it allows me to download photos, edit, crop, resize, add text and a variety of other handy tools for bloggers.  It is not a program to install on your computer but rather a free site on which to work.  I used it to resize and add text to my current grassy themed header. I do wish they offered a wider variety of fonts but, hey, its free!  No griping here. 

Lastly, if you are looking for free stock photos, I am fond of Bigfoto.  There is no subscription or registration form to fill out.  I have found many pretty photographs there. 

Well, that's it for now.   I hope you all have a happy day ahead!  :)

Vegetable Soup and Bread-A Tasty Winter Dinner

Christine and Jenn asked for our sandwich bread and vegetable soup recipes, respectively.  I am always happy to share. :)

                                                     ****
Sandwich Bread

Makes 4 loaves

5 C. warm water
1 1/2 Tbsp. salt
1 C. honey or 3/4 C. sugar
3 Tbsp. yeast
11 1/2 C. all-purpose flour plus more to knead in.

Use a mixer or knead by hand. 

Combine water, salt,  honey (or sugar).  Add yeast.  Let sit for a couple minutes until yeast bubbles a bit.. Stir in flour and make a soft dough. You may need a bit more than noted.  Knead for 8 - 10 min. either in mixer or with floured hands on floured countertop.  Place in large bowl.  Cover with a kitchen towel.  Let rise for an hour or so somewhere that is not drafty.  When it has doubled in size, punch it down.

Divide into 4 parts. Shape each part into a loaf and place into greased (I use butter) bread pans. Cover and allow to rise for the second time until dough is 1 in. above pan. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake 30 min.  After taking from the oven, brush the tops with melted butter.  Allow to cool for a while then remove from pans to a cooling rack.  This bread freezes nicely if double wrapped. 

Another bread recipe we make often can be found here.

                                          ****

Vegetable Soup

5 quarts of water, give or take some.   
4-5 cups of rich stock (vegetable, beef or chicken or use bouillon in a pinch)
1 large can of tomatoes and the juice, whole or chopped doesn't matter. You can even used stewed.
All the vegetables in your refrigerator :) Really it doesn't matter what combination but here's what I usually use:

1/4 cup olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
Several cloves of garlic, chopped
1-2 cups chopped celery
2 cups chopped carrots
1 green pepper,chopped
1/2  red pepper, chopped
1-2 cups of frozen lima beans
2 cups or so of frozen green beans and or wax beans
Any random can of beans plus liquid that you have too much of in your cupboards (black, kidney, pinto, whatever)
5 small potatoes, peeled and chopped
2 c. frozen peas
2-3 cups frozen corn (I like corn)
Any other vegetables you want to use up

The following dried herbs:  parsley, basil, 1 bay leaf, thyme, marjoram, pepper.  Use them to taste.  I use about 1 tsp. of each, I guess, except pepper.  Just a couple cranks on the pepper mill.  Maybe more basil.  Handful of salt (maybe two tablespoons?)

Here's how I make it:

In large soup pot, heat olive oil.  Add onion and garlic.  Saute until soft.  Add water and stock/bullion and seasonings.  Add heartier vegetables that take longer to cook such as potatoes, lima beans (they take forever), celery, carrots, and raw peppers.  Bring to a boil, then simmer, covered,  for an hour or so, maybe more.  Add the rest of the vegetables and simmer until everything is soft but not mushy.  Adjust seasoning. Remove bay leaf. Add some of your favorite bread and you have a delicious meal.  Makes quite a bit plus some for the neighbors.  Tastes best the next day.

Enjoy!

Did I Say Green?

I might be eating my words that Spring is just around the corner.  Yes, it is technically less than two weeks away but here on Ohio's Northcoast we are experiencing nothing less than a blustery Winter blizzard.   I think, in my almost almost thirty-eight years of living here, I can say I've never seen a storm like this one.  Over the past twenty-four hours we have received at least two feet of snow.

There have been numerous cars stuck on our street today and despite shoveling/snowblowing the driveway a number of times, Mike was stuck at the base of our driveway when he returned from the grocery store.  One vanload of people whose car had broken down came to help Mike push the car up the drive.  In turn, he helped them jump theirs and push it to safety until a tow truck could arrive.   While the men worked on the cars, I invited the rest of their family into our home to sit by the fire.  Thankfully, we had plenty of hot cocoa mix on hand and extra banana bread to eat.  They stayed for three hours until the men were done.  So, we made some new friends today!

Here are some photos but they really don't do justice to the amazing storm we are having and will continue to have through tomorrow morning.

Chris and Mary making snow angels:

Ben and Chris in the front yard.  The bottom of the light post that you is two feet above the actual base.

The view from my sunroom window:

We have had a fire on the hearth all day long and there is vegetable soup on the stove.   I think we are going to sit tight for a while and enjoy this Winter Wonderland! 

Have a wonderful evening with your family!

Spring in My Step

I know it is not officially Spring yet but I was just itching to add a little green here at A Gypsy Caravan.  Despite the fact that my area of the country is supposed to be covered in 7-14 inches of that white stuff over the next 24 hours, I am going to pretend that Spring is just around the corner.  Because it is, right?  :) 

There are no fire ants, no prickly weeds or pesky spiders in this grass.  So, take off your shoes, wiggle your toes and stay awhile. 

"Every blade of grass has its angel that bends over it and whispers, "grow! grow!"--Talmud

"Her lawn looks like a meadow,
And if she mows the place
She leaves the clover standing
And the Queen Anne's Lace."
-Edna St. Vincent Millay

"I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars."
-Walt Whitman

"Until a Man duplicates a blade of grass, nature can laugh at his so
call scientific knowledge."
--Thomas Edison

"There's one good thing about snow, it makes your lawn look as nice as your neighbor's."
--Clyde Moore

The Grass Family

This week we followed Shanleya to Grass Island where we learned about yet another group of monocots.   Monocots have leaves with parallel veins as opposed to dicots whose leaves are net-veined. There are over ten thousand species of grass.  Plants in this family include most edible grains such as wheat, rye, millet, timothy, oats, corn, rice, sorghum and barley.  Also included are bamboo, reeds and sugarcane as well as many plants for turf and fodder. 

Wheat

Oats

Rye

The edible part of the grass plant is the seed.  Grasses are wind pollinated and do not need insects to assist in their pollination, therefore they do not have colorful flowers to attract insects.  Grasses have three stamens and a pistil and are contained in modified leaves called bracts.

Ben's illustration of the characteristics of the Grass Family:

The Guardian of Grass Island by Chris:

Supplemental learning activities:

• Bake bread using different types of flour.  Which do you like best?  Which is healthiest for you? Which state in America produces the largest amount of each type of grain?

• Taste different forms of sugar (sucanat, brown sugar, powdered sugar, granulated sugar, raw sugar).  Which do you like best?  Which is the purest form of sugar?  Where is sugarcane grown in the world?

• Where does bamboo grow?  Purchase a tabletop bamboo plant and watch it grow.

• Learn the differences between different types of sod grasses.  Which grass grows best in your region of the country?

• Visit a sod farm if you live in a warm area of the country.

• Visit a grist mill.

• Visit a bakery  (Ok, that one might be stretching it a bit. :)

In keeping with the grains and grasses theme, our family had a baking day this week.  First, we searched the recipe archives of mothers who have many children.  I figured that their recipes would certainly be tried and tested to perfection.  I was right.  We made Danielle Bean's Banana Bread and  Michelle Duggar's Homemade Rolls in addition to four loaves of sandwich bread. Both recipes produced such delicious results that I was forced to freeze the extras in fear that we would eat them all in the first 24 hours!

Here is Christopher mixing the banana bread:

The Duggar's rolls, golden and delicious from the oven:

Little Annie's chubby hands kneading the bread dough:

I can't resist posting this one as well.

The finished loaves (One did not rise so well.):

Needless to say, our freezer is stocked and our tummies are full!

If you have read this far, I thank you. :)

Have a wonderful evening!

Wordless Wednesday

Happy March!

I love March.  It is such a time of growth, change and very fickle weather!  :) Just two days ago, on the first day of March, we had several inches of snow and the kids made these...

Today we are hanging out the wash, frolicking outside without our coats and enjoying the clear blue sky!  The birds have been singing all morning long.

(This clothespin bag makes me smile every time I use it.  It is from Firefly Farm.)