What's UP?

So on August 15th, I finished the 30 for 30 clothing challenge. I admit I was sick of the 30 items I had chosen to wear for 30 days- but it wasn't really that hard of a challenge. My husband told me that I should always be on a clothing challenge... that was after I emptied my entire closet onto the floor of my bedroom to see everything I had put in storage for the past few months. It's like seeing long lost friends, and getting all kinds of new cloths at the same time :)  I will probably do something similar this fall once I get myself more organized. The challenge freeing and fun at the same time.

I do have a confession to make about the no-spending challenge. We were doing family picture recently, and my older son (almost 6) had to wear his little brother's jeans because he had none that were suitable. And my baby (age 2.5) has been barefoot most of the summer because of a shoe issue. SO- my hubby basically forced me to go shopping for shoes for the younger two and jeans for the oldest. I did go to my thrift and consignment stores first but had no luck. Thankfully I found what I wanted on extreme sales, and we are all very happy. But I broke my challenge, and I feel bad about that. Oh and I bought the boys suspenders, and a clip on tie (super cute and they wanted them sooooo bad) at the thrift store while we were on a holiday in Canmore. Phewf... confession over.

I am not sure what my conclusion for the no-spending challenge is. I feel like I am just itching to go out and spend money now. So is it really better to withhold for a while if you end up going out and spending lots? I will probably be satisfied with hitting up a few good sales and garage saleing before the season is over... but I could go really crazy if I wanted to, feeling justified because I haven't spent in so long.

A couple things I have gained from this experience is to really evaluate what I am spening money on, and to use coupons more. I have started teaching the boys some criteria for spending- do we need it? is it a good price? do we already have something like it? do we have a coupon?

What else have I been up to, you may be thinking...

Well, I made DILLED (pickled) SNAP PEAS!! I know, when I first spotted these at a farmers market in BC I thought it sounded weird. But I had to try it. AND WOW... they are amazing!

I've made raspberry jam, though it ended up too runny this year- but it tastes amazing mixed into some homemade yogurt!  I canned peaches. We have been freezing everything we can get our hands on... strawberries, blueberries, cherries, and raspberries. Yum.

I made a couple jars of dilled carrots, and my first attempt at dilled pickles too!  I grew my own cucumbers in order to do this, so I am quite pleased with myself really. I have no idea if they'll be any good, and I only was able to make 3 jars (though I may have enough cucumbers in the next few days to make more). I made borscht like crazy the other day with my beets- my first beet crop ever. I tell ya, I will grow beets again. I love the versatility of that vegetable! I also made some beet leaf roll ups  which were time consuming but taste amazing. The last 24 hours was applesauce. I made close to 30 - 1L jars of apple sauce. I am tired, but it was so worth it! I hope to score more apples to make some apple pie filling later. I am in awe of my tomatoes that are growing and can't wait to make tomato sauce and salsa in a couple weeks. Oh I love this season!!!

I am enjoying trying new things, experimenting with new recipes and putting away food for the winter! I need to pace myself though. For my sake, and the children's.

my first attempt at pillowcase dresses... made from my husband's college pillows. Navy and yellow, summery and sweet

Because my kids have been crazy the last while due to no routines, late nights, lots of company etc, I decided to start homeschooling at a really slow pace this week. We are getting the morning routines established, and then are spending about half an hour doing real school. I'm experimenting teaching my gr.1 student and my preschool boy (4.5) language arts at the same time. It's amazing for me to see that they are nearly at the same level in reading but such a huge difference with written language. My middle boy started reading really young, and hasn't really progressed much, staying about the same as his brother. But my oldest son has always been more interested in writing, and does well at it. So teaching language arts to the two of them at the same time will require some creativity, and perhaps having the older teach the younger. My middle son gets so frustrated easily if he can not do something perfect, so learing to write his letters is going to be very painful for him and us. I am attempting to make it fun for him, and we will see how we do.

In looking ahead at the next weeks I see so much potential. This is my favorite time of year (I may have said that a few times already) and I look forward to celebrating birthdays, harvest, preserving more and having a few fun adventures with the boys. We are going to be learning together about 'creating color' (which is a gr.1 science unit!!), and the communities in our community that we are involved in. There certainly is lots to be thankful for and lots to anticipate:) We are blessed!