Happy Birthday To ME!!!!

We had a no school day on Tuesday - or should I say a field trip. Yes that sounds better. Anyway, we went to a little town a couple of hours from us called Leavenworth. It is a neat tourist trap of a town. The town faced severe economic difficulties and then in the 1960s they came up with this brainstorm idea to turn the town into a bavarian village. It is a very cute village in the foothills of the cascade mountains with lots of shops and restaurants. They have festivals at different times during the year and bring in bavarian dancers and singers. On weekends throughout the summer, they have art in the park. It is a fun place to visit or stay for a couple of days. We had a great drive and got to see the fall colors, stopped at the fudge shop and had a great lunch out at a place called Gustavs. It was a very enjoyable way to spend my birthday.

The Vote is in . . .

And 80% of the union members said yes to the contract and going back to work. The strike is over and none too soon. We were due to be without Health Insurance tomorrow and though we enjoyed having hubby home for the past four weeks, it is difficult to pay bills with no income. Now we can get back to a normal routine and breathe a little easier. One thing that we implemented during the strike and that I want to continue- was daily menus that included inexpensive meals. We became more diligent on our grocery budget and balanced eating. This is something that I should have done all along but it took a financial struggle to force it upon me - so something good can come from every tough situation.

HOORAY!!!! I HOPE!!!!

We just found out this afternoon that Boeing and the Union had secret negotiations this weekend and they came to a tentative agreement. The union is recommending that the membership accept the contract. This contract contains most of what the union asked for and it looks very good to us. The members vote on Thursday and, if accepted, hubby will go back to work on Friday. We have truly enjoyed having him home each day - but unfortunately, Boeing will not pay for him to be home with us each day. Please pray that the members accept this contract.

For the Beauty of the Earth

For the beauty of the earth,
for the beauty of the skies,
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies:

Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This our sacrifice of praise.

For the beauty of each hour,
Of the day and of the night
Hill and vale, and tree, and flow'r,
Sun and moon, and stars of light:

Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This our sacrifice of praise.

For Thy church that evermore
Lifteth holy hands above,
Off'ring up on ev'ry shore,
Her pure sacrifice of love:

Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This our sacrifice of praise.

Click on the title and you can here the melody. This is one of our family's favorite hymns.

We made it . . .

We made it through our first week of school and all of us survived. The week went pretty well and I am learning of adjustments that we need to make in our schedule. Skinny Skater did pretty well with his notebook and working his own schedule. He is having to learn to keep track of his assignments and his workload. We need to work on writing this year - so there will be more written narrations each week and that in itself is a big adjustment. Our family is reading our first Shakespeare play - we each took parts and read one act of Henry V. It went pretty well, but I chose too much for one sitting. We will need to break it down in smaller portions. We have read several plays in Lamb's Tales of Shakespeare and Nesbit's Beautiful Stories but this is our first time tackling an actual play. We have been having Hot Chocolate time in the evenings and reading our poetry, doing picture study and music appreciation. This has been a big hit with the boys and it is a great way to wind down for the evening. Another new thing we started this year is joining another family once a week to do some Washington State History together. We met for the first time on Friday afternoon and it was a nice change of pace. Since hubby is out of work during the labor dispute with Boeing, he is able to participate in some of our activites and that made the week special too. Overall, I would rate our first week at about an 8 on a scale from 1-10.

First Day of school . . . well sort of

Today we had our first official day of the new school year. We had a special breakfast of apple puffed oven pancake with syrup and whipped topping and bacon for breakfast. We also had sparkling apple cider served in the crystal stemware. I wanted to start the day out special - to help encourage good attitudes. We didn't do a lot of actual "school work" but went over each of the boys schedules, their notebooks and school books. We did do copywork, Skinny Skater helped me make home made soup and we had a writing activity. Everyone read and we started up our family devotion time again. We ended the day with hot cocoa time, a poem and reading a portion of Diane Stanley's Leonardo Da Vinci. All in all, I would say the day went pretty well, even with the added dynamic of dad being home all day long. Tomorrow we will work at a whole days schedule.

Poems

Poems by Robert Service

A poem should be like a brook,
As dulcet to the ear;
And it should need no second look
To make its meaning clear:
As chrystal as a rill it should
With music meet your mood.

A poem should be like a bird
And to green joy belong.
That should inspire each jewelled word
With pregnancy of song,
And be of brooding thought no part,
Appealing forthright to the heart.

A poem should be like a flower
That gems a sullen space,
To live ineffably its hour
Of ecstasy and grace:
A lily, violet or rose,
That in sheer beauty glows.

A crystal brook, a flower, a bird
Are poems perfect planned;
We have no need of graven word
Their grace to understand:
So wrapt in them is my delight,
A poem I've no need to write.

At the sculpture park. Me clanging a gong. There were a few bells/gongs throughout the park and I gonged every one of them.


The marina in Roche Harbor.

The garden in the English Camp



Hubby in the garden and
The Historic Hotel in Roche Harbor.



The Lime Kiln Lighthouse.

Just a few of the pictures from our wonderful trip.

San Juans in September

We decided to take advantage of hubby's extra free time and take our anniversary trip to the San Juan Islands. We stayed two nights in Friday Harbor in a very nice Bed and Breakfast. The house was built in 1907 and since converted over to a B&B. Our room had period furniture and a native american flair, it also had a fireplace and huge jacuzzi tub. The breakfasts were scrumptious. The weather was beautifully sunny and in the low 70s. We toured a neat sculpture garden that had trails through meadows & forest with different sculptures at places along the way. This was like a nature walk and art appreciation all at once. We went into the little village of Roche Harbor which features a historic hotel that was established in 1886. The hotel had a beautiful garden and the view of the harbor was pretty. We went to the British Camp and the American Camp that were established during a dispute over who owned the islands - a war was almost started over an American settler shooting a British settler's pig. We also went out to the Lime Kiln Pt. State Park and watched for whales - we didn't see any, but we had a nice picnic lunch there. We toured the island, walked a lot, ate out and relaxed. It was a great way to let the anxieties of life drift away. This trip was provided by very generous family and friends. We truly count ourselves very fortunate to have been blessed in this way. I will post some pictures from our trip in a separate post.

We have the answer to the question . . .

Well the verdict is in and the union voted to strike. Hopefully the company and the union will come together again soon and the strike will be short. What it means for now is that Hubby will be around a whole lot more - - - which is good for us and bad for the pocket book. Too bad the company won't pay him for staying home. Please keep us in your prayers.