We Have Plants

With all the gardening going on and with Spring right around the corner, we decided to start the kids on learning about plants. As I mentioned yesterday, I ordered Apologia's botany class and it should be here later this week. (We absolutely love Apologia's Science curriculum and find that it is really in depth without being over the kids heads).  Well, imagine our surprise when we finished our lessons and went to take a picture of the Aeropods for our "Grow Diary" and found not one but three pods with small seedlings growing. Last night before bed the kids checked them and there wasn't anything breaking the surface of the soil so finding the small plants today was definitely a highlight.

I haven't really been documenting too much of our school activity lately but that's because much of what we've been working with are going to be highlighted in upcoming reviews.   However, we have been working hard with a new math program and with a science supplement . We've also been working hard on independent reading and on writing.  I purchased Startwrite 6 over the weekend so that I could start making my own practice sheets for their daily writing. They despise copywork so it is my hopes that by being able to make custom sheets with photos of their activities and their names, that they will be more inclined to work on them (which seemed to work well today).

Worksheet with a picture of the kids that I took yesterday.

The same picture.. Enjoying grass that normally is not in our back yard. LOL 

Gearing Up For Gardening

The warm weather is upon us here and so I figured it's time to get started on our garden. Most people would probably think we're nuts for thinking about putting anything in the ground just yet (especially when much of the country is dealing with snow) but the temps are in the high 70s here, the hummingbirds are back, the robins have been bouncing around for a few weeks and within the next 2 months, the temps will soar into triple digits. Its still getting cool at night but nothing too bad, only in the 50s and right now the desert is alive with green from all the rains we had last month.

We wanted to start small so this afternoon, armed with a cultivator, a hula rake and a regular rake, my husband and I set out to clear out a plot of land to start growing our garden. We've grown vegetables before but always in a pot so this will be our first true attempt at putting something in the ground and growing it.

First thing we did today was the kids and I went out and collected 2 snack bags full of dirt from the area I wanted to make the garden at and we performed a test to check the PH of the dirt. We ended up only running one test  as our first test, mixing some of our dirt with some vinegar produced a positive response showing that our dirt was alkaline. We were already planning on mixing a manure blend into the soil so hopefully we can naturally lower the PH to a more neutral setting.


Here's what we started with.. This looks pretty good compared to what it normally looks like. As said, we had rain last month so most of the yard looks green for once.. Usually, its brown.. No plants, no grass, just dirt.  So it was almost upsetting to be digging up green stuff..

Before it can be said, the only reason these pictures show my husband doing all the work is because I was the one using the camera to take pictures between steps.  Note our dog, Lex, supervising. The kids are off playing on the swingset in the yard so they aren't in the pictures.

Mixing a manure topcoat blend into the soil along with blood meal and some osmocote.

Giving it a good soaking with the water hose

A final raking

The lens on my camera really makes the plot look like its small, but it's about 7 wide and 4 foot deep.

And here's a pic of some of the seedlings ready to go into the ground.. My tomato plant in the front is growing like a weed since I bought it 2 days ago - it's really enjoying the LED lights from the Aerogarden.  There's also some garlic chives and Brussels sprouts ready to go as well.  We also started some more seedlings for things that won't go into the ground until April, such as okra, zucchini and tomatillo. 

The kids helped with the planing of the seedlings tonight. However, with all the planting, I decided it was time to do something I was thinking about doing for a long time. Wednesday the UPS guy is bringing a copy of Apologia's Exploring Creation with Botany.   We already have the lapbook from Knowledge Box Central that I got from Currclick when it went on sale. I knew eventually I was going to do the course with the kids, I just didn't know when.. Now I'm glad I bought it when I had the chance. :)

Exploring Creation with Botany

Exploring Creation with Botany

Valentines Day and Learning about Gardening

Valentines day is right around the corner and one with think with a elementary school on base, finding those cheap lil Valentines that schoolkids exchange would be easy to find but alas, it wasn't the case. The kids are involved in a Valentine exchange with other homeschooling kids and I figured sending out 35 of those lil cards would be easy peasy.. Just get the kids to write names, put them in an envelope and mail them out. How hard can it be, right??  HA!

Actually, I should start by saying that originally, I was going to have the kids make Valentines. My plan was to slap a handful of paint on them (pink for Ashleigh, blue for Garrett) and have them put their hands on a piece of paper in such a way that it formed a heart.. Then I would get them to each sign their names and mail those off. Well, the kids weren't having any of that so I just decided what the heck, we'll buy the cheapo ones and mail them out..

I sent my husband out to the BX here on base with the mission of buying approximately 40 valentines per kid (I figured two boxes of 24 each).  He comes back shortly after and states that there were none of what I was wanting; that the only Valentines they had were boxes of 12 for 5 bucks each and he wasn't about to spend 40 bucks on Valentines (not that I blame him)..

Our next step was to drive to Walmart and pick some up there.. Driving to Walmart isn't a big deal for most people but for us it is a huge ordeal. Its a good 45 minute drive to Walmart.  Luckily, they had Valentines. As I managed to find some really great Veggietale valentines, at the kids eye level were these 3D ones - Ashleigh immediately determined she wanted the 3D cats and dogs while the other 3D option for boys was guitar/skulls. Not the best options to send to some pretty religious families.. I ended up getting boxes of both. I wish I hadn't - the 3D ones turned out to be hard to write on and the kids couldn't manage so for the 12 of those we sent out, I had to write their names for them without smuging.  But, the others they managed to write on themselves and I was pretty happy with their writing (for the most part - Garrett got a bit sloppy after a bit).

Kids hard at work filling out their Valentines for their homeschool friends

Since we were already at Walmart (or Wally World as my kids call it) we decides to look around. As we moseyed over to the garden area we started looking through all the wonderful seed offerings and decided that this year we were going to try to do a full garden in the back yard.

In the past, I have grown tomatoes but something always seems to happen to my plants right before they are ready to start producing.  One year, I had this absolutely beautiful beefeater plant that was making some really nice sized fruit.. One day I went out to water it and noticed it didn't look near as good as it had been looking - then I noticed about 2 inches of the main stem was completely gone where a squirrel chewed it in half. I tried to reroot the plant but it was so big that it couldn't produce roots big enough to support it so I lost that plant..   Last year, I had a really nice Russian Black Heirloom tomato plant that was looking great but needed some extra soil in its pot. I bought a small bag of potting soil.. Not sure what the heck was in that soil but when I watered it, the run off in the bottom looked like coca-cola. Next thing I knew, the plant was dead.

So to say that my husband wasn't too thrilled about the idea of my wanting to spend money on a garden would be a bit of an understatement.

We did pick up some seeds however. He decided on some pumpkins in the hopes of having some nice ones for jack o lanterns in October. I picked up some vegetables such as Kohlrabi, onions, lettuce, radishes, and snap peas.  We also bought a couple of new tomato plants - a big boy variety for me (so I can get some nice green ones for fried green tomatoes) and a Solar Fire variety for my husband. The idea is that this weekend, we will prepare a small 4 foot by 4 foot plot near the house for a garden .. Any squirrel crazy enough to go after the plants there will quickly meet my dog..

Want to get husband to say yes? Perfect this :)

Then, that night, I received an email from Amazon telling me about their wonderful "Deal of the Day"..   They were offering  the Aerogarden Extra LED for only $139 plus free 2 day shipping since I'm a prime member.  Well, I'd been wanting one for a LONG time now so I gave hubby what I call the  "Puss in Boots" eyes and asked nicely. My wonderful hubby said go ahead and I had that thing ordered quick as that.. LOL

The tracking said it was due to arrive today via UPS so I waited with baited breath all day for that brown truck to arrive. He showed up around 5pm. By 530 I had the Aerogarden completely set up and seed pods already inserted. This led to a really great conversation with Ashleigh and Garrett in regards to hydroponics because they wanted to know where the soil was. We decided we would start keeping a photo journal and document the growth of the plants as well as observe the root growth, which will be great since the kids have been learning about weights and measurements lately.

It doesn't take much to get me super excited

Ashleigh finishes putting the caps on the pots and looks over our work

Day 1: Pods are in and the pump is on

We ended up "planting" 7 pods :   two mighty mini cherry tomatoes, 1 mint, 1 basil, 1 dill, 1 chive and 1 parsley. Ash helped me put the nutrients into the water and put the caps over the plants and was completely amazed by how bright the light is.

This weekend my oldest will be in Monrovia with her high school Robotics team for Regionals so I guess the rest of us will go out and set up the garden and plant our various seeds since most of them need to go in to the ground now (except for my husband's pumpkins which will wait til May).    I might even break out the Apologia Botany book and start some lessons with that as we learn to grow our own food :)

We Will Just Call This a Field Trip

Yesterday we loaded up in the car early and headed down to Pomona for the NHRA Winternationals. We were fortunate to receive three free tickets from an organization who gives tickets to military and so we bought two more tickets and made the 2 hour trek to go watch some race cars and have a day of fun.

Unfortunately, we didn't get to see much racing as halfway through the first round, it started drizzling and didn't stop and so the races were cancelled.  However, we turned a disaster into a fun lesson about how oil and water do not mix, how water on the track at 250 miles per hour would not be a good thing and how that same rain would be like bullets at that speed.  Turned out to be a very educational experience for them.

Since the racing was shut down, alot of the racers themselves came out into the pits and were interacting with the fans. Ashleigh wanted to meet a few of the female racers and so we ventured out into the pits to see who we could find. She ended up getting to meet Ashley Sanford and Leah Pritchett. We also got to meet Cruz Pedregon and Jack Beckman before we picked up our first hot dogs from Pink's (who is a staple in Los Angeles) and headed back to the stands to enjoy our lunch. Shortly after, they announced the races were cancelled but we still had fun.   Since it was more educational then entertainment (due to the rain) I guess we'll just call this one a Field Trip ;)

For those of yall who are photographers and who are looking at these pictures going it looks really bright - most of these were shot at ISO 1600, f/5.6 1/4000 and I had to really do alot of postwork in lightroom.. It was barely 2pm and they were already having to raise the lights it was so dark and cloudy :(

Vasquez Rocks on the way to Pomona

The Direct TV Blimp

Guess what kids.. These cars are made out of wood  (Look at Alyssa's face - WHAT?)

Kids with one of the cars in the Staging area

Tim Wilkerson tearing up the track

Garrett and Alyssa

Ashleigh absolutely LOVED the races

Meeting Jack Beckman

Meeting Ashley Sanford

Ashleigh claims Ashley is now her favorite driver

The family with Cruz Pedregon

Ashleigh with Leah Pritchett

Enjoying Pinks Hotdogs

Cooking with Garrett

Today Garrett decided to help me out in the kitchen. You would think in a house with two girls (one of whom is a teenager) that they would be the ones wanting to spend time in the kitchen with me but it is usually my son who joins me in the food preparation for dinner.  Today we decided to make Buffalo Chicken Taquitos.

Earlier today I boiled some chicken breasts along with some vegetables to make chicken broth for later this week and had let the chicken cool so other than mixing things up and assembling, the hard part was already done.   (Please excuse his shirtlessness - he cannot stand to wear a shirt in the house).

Mixing up Chicken Wing Sauce

Shredding Chicken

Mixing everything together with rice cooking in the background

Putting taquitos on the baking sheet

He even made drink mix while the food was cooking

Nice and Crispy

Big smile for a Job Well Done!!!

Our Dinner for Tonight - Courtesy of Garrett

The Recipe:

What's in the Skies This Month - February

Counting Pinecones has asked if I would be interested in writing occasional articles and doing Q&A sessions in regards to amateur astronomy and night sky observation.  Those of us involved in Amateur Astronomy are a very tight knit group and we are always more than happy to help spread our knowledge so I am more than happy to help contribute. 

First, a quick introduction. My name is Charles and I run Chuckwalla Observatory out of the Mojave Desert. I have been involved in amateur astronomy for the past decade. Like most starting with astronomy, my fascination with the night skies started with a small telescope similar to what many families buy their children for Christmas. Over the years, that passion has led to bigger and better telescopes and equipment.  Amateur astronomy is a hobby anyone can get into. All you need is the eyes you were given and the night skies to get started with. My goal is to help keep you informed with upcoming celestial events that are easily observed either with the unaided eye, a pair of binoculars or a small telescope. It is my hope in doing so that your children will become the next generation of amateur astronomers. 

Here's what's in the sky for the month of February.

Feb 3 will see a Full Moon. This is a poor time for galaxy and nebula observation as the light of the full moon is so bright. You will still be able to see planets however. Venus is very bright in the early evening sky and second to the moon is easily the brightest object in the sky.  When observing the moon with a telescope during this time, try using a neutral density filter on the eyepiece to reduce brightness and increase contrast of lunar features such as craters and valleys.

Feb 6 is the opposition of Jupiter which means that Jupiter will be directly opposite the Earth in it's orbit around the Sun at this time. This is the best time to observe Jupiter because of it's proximity to Earth and large apparent size. A moderately sized pair of binoculars will reveal the Galilean moons as small dots on either side of Jupiter. A small telescope may show you surface features on Jupiter such as cloud bands and the Great Red Spot.

Jupiter and three of its moons

Feb 18 is the New Moon. If you own a telescope, this is the best time to observe galaxies and nebulae due to no moonlight to compete with the light from deep space objects.

Feb 22 will see Venus and Mars in Conjunction. The planets Venus and Mars will appear very close to each other in the sky on the evening of Feb. 22. Look to the west after sunset to spot two bright "stars" very close to each other near the horizon. The brighter "star" is Venus, the dimmer one under it is Mars.

How Venus and Mars will Appear during Conjunction

Feb 24 is the greatest western elongation of Mercury. Because Mercury is a inner planet like Venus, it never strays too far from the Sun which makes it difficult to observe.  It will be at greatest western elongation on Feb 24, meaning it will appear to be furthest from the Sun's western side at it's farthest point above the horizon. This will be the best time to observe Mercury, at approximately one hour before sunrise.

 For those with binoculars or with telescopes, Comet Lovejoy (2014Q2) is still available for observation. While it is past its prime viewing window and will increase in magnitude as it travels further and further away from earth, it is still out there waiting to be found.  The Sky Live is a great website to help you track where the comet is located in the sky.

Comet Lovejoy - it gets it's green coloring from cyanogen gas and diatomic carbon (C₂).

* I would like to thank Charles and Chuckwalla Observatory for taking the time to write this article for our site. You can find more information about Chuckwalla Observatory as well as informative videos on their youtube channel . *

34 Weeks of Clean: Week 4

I hate my fridge.. (Heck, if you remember my post from last week, you'll know I basically hate my kitchen in general.. haha).  When we moved into this house, it had a really nice fridge, granted it was a bit older but it worked well.. A little over a year ago, the housing office here on base decided we needed updated appliances and so they came in and replaced the stove, dishwasher, fridge and added an overhead microwave. The stove and the microwave are very nice, I can deal with those. However, the dishwasher and the fridge lack alot to be desired.  The dishwashers are well known on base for breaking down  (mine broke down about a month ago and still is not fixed). The fridges have proven to be the worst as they can't regulate a temperature and usually freeze better than the freezer portion does.  When we received it, it was obviously used and refurbished as it has scratches and stains all over it and looked as if it had been covered with white out, had ripped seals and a water filter that leaked everywhere.. The shelves are very oddly positioned so things are placed inside it like Tetris rather than with any organization.

We make do with it..

So you can imagine my groan when I saw that this weeks 34 Weeks of Clean was to clean the Freezer, the Fridge and the Floor.. It was probably the groan heard around the world. However, it was a chore that I knew needed to be done and so I set off with a bowl of sudsy warm water, a sponge and the mindset that I would get that fridge looking better than it had the day housing gave it to us.

Freezer stuffed full

Old veggies and Yup, thats Doggie Ice Cream.

Tetris Fridge.. with lots of leftovers..

I quickly realized something. There were things in my fridge and freezer that I did not buy. There were things in my fridge and freezer that I honestly had no clue were even IN my fridge and freezer. There were things in there that other people who had moved away from base had given to us rather than throw it away and it had been sitting in my fridge ever since. I quickly determined that all of that stuff needed to go - so I tossed a jug of marinade that I knew I would never use, a bottle of alcoholic Eggnog that I knew we would never drink, and tossed out frozen meats that I had no clue what the heck they were.  I did decide to keep a bottle of wine that was given to us, who knows, I could probably give it to someone else..


In the process, I found an Arby's cup in the back of the fridge. It had been at least a month since we ate at Arby's so I know that had been there for a while. My youngest informed me she put it in the fridge after filling it up with water because she wanted cold water without ice. Sure enough, the cup had cold water in it.. That got poured out and the cup was tossed.

In the freezer, I found a few unidentified meats and a package of shark meat that was at least 3 years old.  If I didn't know how old it was or even what it was, it got tossed..

Each shelf, drawer and barrier was removed and washed and wiped down.

When everything was said and done, I had to admit, it looked MUCH better.. All the ancient, frostbitten and decrepit veggies were gone. No more shark meat hidden in the back corner.  I even emptied out all the ice so that it would be replaced with fresh ice.

The fridge isn't quite such a Tetris level. I tossed out three jars of pickle relish that had maybe a tablespoon or two left in it and kept one jar of relish, 1 jar of pickles and 1 jar of jalapenos. 

Most of the random alcohol that we won't drink is gone and everything is much more organized (although, now I'm looking at this picture and realizing that rather than putting the cheese where it goes, my husband shoved it in the door tonight after tacos. ) 

Notice my cat in the background supervising?

I will admit, I did not clean under the fridge just yet.. When I saw exactly what was under it, it was obvious to me that the last few times he'd stripped the floor and mopped that my husband didn't bother with under the fridge so I'm leaving that job for him this weekend ;) But I did sweep and mop everything else

Its still not too late to join Michele over at Family, Faith and Fridays and the 34 Weeks of Clean Challenge. Just click on the link below and sign up :)