A Gracefull Place

Not a long post…..today was the Specialty Goat show, where Susannah showed her "geep"!   Josephine the Nubian/Boer/Angora cross goat (she’s not big enough to merit that long lineage!).  I’ll let her update later on the Seven Sisters Blog as to how she did!

 

 

Tomorrow begins the real insanity with Rabbit Show at 9:00 a.m., then the Dairy Goat Show at 4:00 p.m.    We have to be there before 8 a.m. for the girls to milk out their milking does!  Meaning, I’m going to bed very soon!

 

 

The big red van has a water pump issue, so we will play tag and ferry with our mini-van and maybe a friend pinch hitting for us to help bring the 10 of us to the fairgrounds every day this week!    Just another twist to the Fair Week Saga! 

 

 

And I had to pop in and say that we are up to 24 milkshakes from the Lions Club Dairy Stand!  

 

 

Only 76 more to go to hit our goal of 100!!!

 

 

And since we’ll be there from 7:30 a.m. to about midnight…we should be able to get our daily quota in!  

Lest you think that I am perfect (you probably didn’t, but just in case!), here are reality photos!

 

This is the sewing room a few months ago.

 

 

 

 

Another view….

 

 

At that point in the venture, NO sewing was done out there.  Oh, I take that back.  You can’t see it, but there’s a serger on a counter, and the girls would go out there and stand to serge!!! 

 

I did clean it up a LOT before Christmas….it’s not quite as bad now, but still bad!!!   More reality photos to come as well as finished product of a clean, organized sewing room!!!  (Please don’t hold your breath, though. If you do, I claim no responsibility if you pass out while waiting!)

 

We started adding on over two years ago.  My husband’s goal was to get it done and not drag it out over 10+ years like the first addition!  (It bothered him more than me!)   So he worked hard to get the upstairs part done, so we could move upstairs while he tore out and then remodeled the master bedroom and bath.  (It used to be a small bedroom, no bath!)   We were up there for about a year, then we were ready to move downstairs.  Jessica and Leah prepared to move into their new bedroom (where we resided for the year!), so they put the things I had not gotten out of their closet out on the landing.  I wish I’d taken a picture of THAT before I started!!!  It stayed there…until….December!

I got a burst of energy and inspiration and decided to get it done.  But you see, that entailed straightening up our old closet to make room for this stuff off the landing!!!

Here is the landing after I took off several boxes!!!

The boxes were actually stacked in two piles almost as high as the top of the picture!!!

Here is the aforementioned closet before I started:

(Now you know why I was dragging my feet a bit to do this!  What you didn’t see, was that there were four boxes of homeschool books to get out of that closet, too!)

Here are pictures of my room with all the "landing boxes" strewn about!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And after a few hours, here is the closet again!

 

 

 

 

The bottom is definitely fuller, and so are the shelves behind, although you can’t see them too well!

 

 

 

 

Another view of the closet:

 

 

 

 

Yes, ALL those boxes stacked on the left, plus the one in front, plus the three or so you can’t see, were stacked on the landing!  And there’s that box of books still on the landing to deal with!!!

 

 

 

 

Here are "after" pictures of my room!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ah!  Orderly again!  You would never know, unless you peeked into the closet before and after, that all that mess had been there!

 

 

 

 

Oh, and guess where the unused homeschooling books are?!

 

 

 

 

Give up?

 

 

 

 

Under the bed!  

 

 

 

 

Now for an amazing picture!

 

 

 

This is a pretty good rendition of our house, "drawn" on a pocket Etch-A-Sketch, by Leah!

 

 

 

 

Here she is holding it in her hand, to give you an idea of the detail this took!

 

 

 

 

 

And what do YOU draw on a Pocket Etch-A-Sketch?! 

 

I think I have found our new family motto!    And where?  Dove milk chocolate/caramel wrappers, of all places!!!!  (Sweeeeet!!!)

 

I don’t read them all, but when I read this one, I saved it.  It’s perfect!!!!

 

"In chaos there lies opportunity."

 

So there you have it!   The Richardson Family Motto in 5 words!  

 

Off to find more opportunity in the chaos!!!

 

(A short post….but a sweet one!!!    )

 

Blessings!

 

 

My garage is full.  My sewing room is full–I guess it’s a STUFF room now!  My entry is full.  I mean, literally, you have to walk a sideways shuffle to get to the door, then you can only open it part way.  I had to apologize to the guys bringing our new refrigerator (that we use in the garage–for produce and goats milk!) that I couldn’t open the big garage door–STUFF would fall out all over the place! 

 

Where did it all come from?  Nearly 50 years of marriage and 32 years in the same house.  My mom is officially moved into her new apartment (the girls can see her windows from our property and she can see our barn from her window!).   We need to clear STUFF out quickly so if her house gets shown, it will look nice and……empty.    My mom can only handle an hour or so at a time of going through STUFF.  So we got the STUFF she needed right away moved over and the rest…..resides in boxes in my garage, sewing room, entry, and even a few boxes upstairs!

 

 

Less than two weeks until the 4-H judging then a week later the fair officially starts (although for us, it "officially starts" the 30th due to project judging then shaving goats before the animals go in on the 5th!).  So the STUFF will have to wait until July 14. 

 

Until then, if you come to visit, just be prepared to either do the sideways shuffle or go through the garage—but don’t look at the STUFF!

 

 

Trisch

You can’t do fractions while someone is singing a drone accompaniment to a song!   At least, that’s what my 16 year old daughter found out while trying to do some math.   Her younger siblings were singing "One, Two, Three, Jesus Loves Me" and one sister was singing an accompaniment that was more like a drone.  A  high pitched drone!!! 

 

We also found out, in another study the same day, that it’s hard to have your quiet time when two daughters are singing "We Three Kings" in various harmonies.  Oh, they all sounded nice, but they must have done it for 10 minutes, and only the first verse each time…..

 

One other study–the best way to make yourself insane is to leave your Christmas sewing until 5 days before Christmas, not including the blouse and jumper you want to make for yourself for a tea tomorrow (blouse is almost done…), and still have to shop for your oldest daughter’s birthday the day before Christmas!   And I can’t talk her into waiting to celebrate her birthday after Christmas!    

 

Thankfully my dear, dear husband is willing to pick up a few things for me so I can stay home today and sew….but it’s already 1:15 and I’ve not made it to "the temporary sewing room" yet…..

 

I think getting up at 4:30 when my youngest woke me to nurse might have been my best option!  Then I could have gotten a lot done before the interruptions started…..but a mother’s life is made up of interruptions!   As Annie Keary stated, it is the planned work for that moment, that day!   The Master’s plan, that is!   The only question is, will I humbly submit my agenda and lovingly take care of the multitude of things that make up a mommy’s day, or will I resent those "intrusions" and insist on my agenda?   OUCH! 

 

Oh, by the way, the "temporary sewing room" is our soon to be master bath and bedroom….I’ve got one daughter sewing in the walk in closet, another in the master bath–just the shower is in there right now–and yet another in the old closet, which is very small.  Maybe she should get the award for "sewing in the smallest space" or "most dedicated to sewing"?!  And the cutting table, my sewing machine, ironing board and sawhorses with the trim my husband is painting are all in the main room.   It’s a big room–good thing!   I just don’t know how we’ll manage when we actually make it a bedroom!  And my husband says he is not adding on again…..

 

My present to you (if you haven’t already gotten it through my e-mails or from someone else!!) is a funny video entitled "A Homeschool Family" (to the tune of "The Addams Family"–turn up your speakers!)

 

http://www.doublesharpevideo.com/HomeSchool2/Homeschool2.html

 

And here is one that will probably bring tears to your eyes–a young man that believed in his dream, and an admonishment (to me, at least) to not prejudge!    Also, I think it helps me to not give up on my dreams–even if it’s just to have everything run smoothly for ONE day! 

 

Again–make sure your speakers are on!

 

http://www.maniacworld.com/Phone-Salesman-Amazes-Crowd.html

 

Merry Christmas!

 

Trisch