melted and refroze - january ice storm tennessee - february 4

 

Charlotte and Melody (goat) had discussions with me this morning about the ice still outside, and about food stores.  I am increasingly glad we went for that extra animal feed run last week and bought extra bags while we were there.  And Esme found that gallon of milk, and I keep weird things in the cabinets that I will eat even though they may be time-intensive and I don't do them often.  We had filled ALL of our propane tanks in the days leading up to the storm, standing in line for an hour on the last one (which was when everyone else decided it was time to fill), and still ran out before this ice was done, so that is on our 'to be better prepared' list - another 40 gallon tank to keep full.

They've declared a state of emergency, closed the schools for the same full two weeks I've been iced in, and I do know we're not the only ones - although much of the towns and main highways are clear, there are a lot of people asking for help and also a lot of people getting themselves and rescuers in trouble on the road trying to drive in these conditions. 

It melted some a couple of the 40 degree days and only reformed into harder and tougher ice during the cold overnight temperatures.  It got up to maybe 36 today, and maybe 38 tomorrow.  We still feel lucky to have the electricity fixed (after that outage last Sunday) and the water pipes working.  Although I will admit : my feet are so cold, I've done double socks and slippers and a wool rug under my feet, and been able to work at my desk.   Esme is wrapped up in hoodies and blankets in her room, which is well-insulated and next to the house furnace.  Mark is sitting next to a wellhouse heater just to stay warm enough for his lungs - and I did bump the whole house heat up some.  Our elderly animals are enjoying the heat lamp he set up.  At dinner we pile up under some covers and are watching a criminal investigation show again for a few hours before bedtime.  All of our chickens are winter-type breeds and they are doing quite well, although not laying any eggs (understandable).

I am also lucky I've been able to work from home a little and actually help out with some things that needed to be remembered and/or done at work.  I've been allowed to log a little time on that.  I know I will have stacks of things to do when I can get in - buckle down and power through those physical paper things that I could not get done this week not being there. 

I took a few more walks out today, with the last one being a full two mile walk with the camera and took a couple of videos as well that I posted on FB.  It is still ice out there - even where it melted yesterday, it has refroze.  Just look at that garbage can - with the sun on it and some melting it is now sitting in a hole in the ice berm.

 

in order : our hill going up into our driveway 

 

looking back at our drive from Grandma's house and mailbox 

looking out at the next neighbor's house past Grandma's

Looking down the hill into the intersection with the county road

This is the only place you can see some road, because the neighbor ground the wheels on his very large 4 wheel drive truck on one of the slushy times 

 

 

down and around the first corner 

looking up at this side of the double 'S' hill, there was the sound of water running all the way down into the gullies there - and the sides of the road are clearing up some, which means another couple of days of melting it will maybe be passable (for those who don't have a huge 4 wheel drive truck) - but I think that the neighbors, too, got out at the slush time with that truck and haven't been back in since the melt - and that their relative with the baby had left at the beginning of the storm and is wisely staying in town.

Mark had me looking for the yeast today, which we have some but it is four years out of date.  I made a box of jell-O.  We still have food for dinners that everyone would want for a few days, Mark says 'because we're weird, cook from scratch AND keep a lot of stuff in the freezer / cupboards' - having pumpkin seeds, hazelnuts, peanut protein powder, making pea soup and onigiri and a variety of other things, yes, that's about right, but he is still thinking I might try to make some other bread experiment with Esme tomorrow.

On languages?  I'm studying Turkish on one platform and have kicked into the high grammar Japanese on the other and some Lithuanian practice here and there.  I'm listening to Japanese cartoons and French.

assemblage of thoughts

1.) keeping all those odds and end vegetables in the freezer and bags of split peas and lentils in the cupboard pay off making big pots of soup to eat during this freeze in.. even if Esme and Mark don't eat it, I eat it and they can eat the other things.  I just don't actually get to making the pots of soup often enough and when they make dinner I usually eat it with them.

2.) we did the stock up runs last week 'just in case' and just in case did happen - we bought extra goat feed, cracked corn and chicken feed, and we've opened them all.  I should have stocked one extra bag of dry cat food, too.  We have enough because I stocked up an extra stack of their wet food they get every night - but it would run out before the other feeds

Our prep was running after work to what place was open - feed store one day, propane the next day (we stood in line for an hour, luckily did get some), stocked up on a few groceries that day which we are using now - Esme found the very last gallon of whole milk at that time the store had - and we are using it - and the store was out of almost all kinds of bread and many vegetables already - next day hunt for bread and a few other things, got one loaf, next day : hunt for bread for Grandma and a case of water, dropped her off one loaf from the same place we got one the day before, which we used just a little bit when the power was out and the well was off.  

used : both containers of ready-to-mix pudding I bought, Esme's ramen, frozen biscuits, bacon, split peas, all the cookies, baking powder

could have used but then found some in our storage : quart jar rings!  and we need to find the propane adapter for the bottle - we didn't need to use the camp stove this time around but we came close , I filled all four clean quart jars we had with water and put rings on them and put them in the room with the propane heater in case we really did get to a bad level with our water.  we wished we had filled up the two five gallon buckets and set them in the bathtub (our bathtub does not hold water long-term) although we had filled about six gallon containers and used three of them before the 9 hour power outage ended.  We were SO lucky to not have pipes burst.

glad to have had in storage : brown lentils, whole wheat flour, regular flour 

3.) Mark and Esme aren't eating the soda bread, either - but I am.  I've had it every day since I made it in some way or other.  I had put half of it, sliced, in the freezer, and put that in hot soup today.

4.) when I'm studying lots of languages together, my facebook has NO idea nor my pinterest - they're picking it up somewhere as a cookie or something, and then my ads and recommendations are in all sorts of wild languages.  Interesting, but also eyebrow raising.

5.)  you'd think I'd start editing one of my books, yea, you'd think that

6.) did start a weaving, made a washcloth, finished a rug, and cleaned part of the upstairs

7.) did the budget for the next few months being pessimistic because I have missed a week of work and I know we will need to be even more careful

8.) reminded myself that risking vehicle, life or limb is the worse of those situations, multiple times, and of course I still beat myself up about it every few hours

9.) audited my knit items that I've made that I was told by many 'you'll never use that' etc... yea, ta-da, using all of it, thank you.  It's not time wasted.  The shawl that took months to finish, wrapped around me right now.  The other little shawls that were 'why do you need that?' one of them is in my bed as an extra shoulder cover at night.  The gloves that took weeks, each pair, EXTREMELY useful, and when one is wet the other one is ready.  The rugs and small wraps and slipper socks and hats and scarves.  I've got them, and I know how to use them.  The queen sized knit striped blankets I spent more than a year making - four of them - one for each of us and one for grandma - we each have one on our beds right now and are using them.

10.) staring at my garden seed trays that I never planted much out of last year, but did use the things I did plant

11.) Mark has grown an absolutely enormous and lovely aloe vera crown from the bits he took off my plant upstairs that is still struggling to live

12.)  Turkish, Polish, Czech, Japanese, Lithuanian/Latvian, French, and that guy in the podcast assures us that if we don't focus on just one language for an extended period of time we'll never learn it.  Spock Eyebrow.

13.) If we had breeding goats they'd be dropping tons of babies right now - seeing it all over the feed, quadruplets, quints, sextuplets, etc. etc.. one goat is a lot, and fifteen chickens - and I don't spend quite enough time with them as it is. 

14.) We are thinking about getting a few more chicks this year because of the aging out of the flock we have - and winter hardiness was always a big point for us - the Sapphire Gems have done fairly well, still have four out of the six but the two that we lost a few years ago were one right after the other.  The Cinnamon Queens have been the best.  I feel sorry for my little Americaunas sometimes so much smaller than the others, except the yellow one, Speck, which might have been a cross over from another box, because she grew up an entirely different color and size than the others.

 15.) lots of notes, what we need to stock up on again, budget, reminders for later etc.

 16.) ribboning the extra whole fresh carrots and putting them in the freezer from the meal a few weeks ago worked great - the last of that went in the soup today.

17.) when the soup is nearly overboiling on the stove, the celery seed smells strongly *ha* 

split peas

frozen bits of bacon, onion, summer squash, carrots, ginger,  

 bit of olive oil

celery seed

 black pepper

small bit of 5 spice powder

water

boil long until the split peas are well mushed

blend it all up, put up a quart jar to cool and then in the fridge

eat the rest

*eating the rest* 

 

  

Sing the Golden Path

Sing the golden path

what else can you do? 

in this space between winter and spring

it is not foolish to dream

of the flowers in winter

only to expect them

to suddenly appear

 

 

 

bits

I'm glad to have another day off to get some things organized.  Summer has went by so fast - and the time leading up to the oral surgery was stressful.  Mark and I are both glad that I was able to get in at their earliest cancellation and get it done.  Gail at work told me there is a visible change in my whole appearance showing the effect of the removal of the infected wisdom teeth.  I don't quite see it - but I know I'm not as tired as I had been..and that is a good thing.

Esme is all ready to start her homeschool - and coming up with new ideas daily.  She is so much more grown up since last year - homeschooling has been very good for her.   Her language has advanced noticeably and Renee at work said she can see a new confidence in her now when she comes in with me to talk to my friends.   She is back to being creative, drawing, painting, building things everywhere... and she can use up her energy outside or with her sports equipment in the house without having to worry about schedules so much.  If I had been keeping 'track' of the last few weeks I am sure she would have gotten school requirements in..but I didn't want to push it.  I love seeing her learning be spontaneous and all the connections and questions that come from regular play.

Next week, though, we will be on 'official' school time.  I will be posting some projects to the blog as we move in the school year, but not the timed lists we did last year.  We will still keep those, but in our personal journal with her attendance.  Since we have so many big projects to do I know there will be plenty to blog about!  I also want to encourage her to continue her photography - as several people have commented she has a natural talent for it.

I am now at Level 5 in Spanish Duolingo, so I can help her more with her Spanish lessons as we move along.  I am trying to find (or print out another copy) of the poetry book we were going to read and illustrate - as I had found a few more to add to it.

Grandma came down today and saw our new pups and Esme was proud to show off her 'organized' room and all the things she has that are special.  She also showed Grandma the things she has built in the new Minecraft world and explained what they were.  We will be helping Grandma some more tomorrow, and I've asked her for her help in the family tree project in our Social Studies book that will be coming up in the first few weeks.

Article: The Benefit of Homeschooling - its Innovative, its Eclectic, its Organic, its Academic
This is written by Blair Lee, the leader of the Secular Eclectic Academic (SEA) Homeschool group.  It is an excellent article and reflects many of the reasons we are educating Esme as we are. 

Article: Success isn't necessarily a top college 
I will take that lesson to heart with Esme's choices for the school year.. she is making lots of progress and I still want it to be fun...  still want to go fishing and swinging on the swing and reading a fun book because it has great pictures etc...soul food. 

bits

We went to the library yesterday - and then on to work for me.  I need to close again tonight...this week is just too long...that six day stretch.  But, on to the bits.  I finished reading 'Girl with All the Gifts'...scary as heck..I bawled about a third of the way through...disgusted with 'crunchy reality' halfway through it and the end left ashes in my mouth.  So sad...poignant, I guess one would say.  I read 'The Road' and 'Blindness' on reccommendation a few years ago...also chilling human-horror/disaster stories. I couldn't not finish them, but they don't ever leave the brain either.  I'm on to 'The Green Ember' now...such a different thing - it's like Watership Down and Nimh put together, so far.

Esme's 'Gifted and Talented Reading, Writing and Math' workbook came yesterday.  I had worried it had gotten lost in the mail.  But, it's here, and she paged through it and said it looked great.  The writing is high-end for her (that is where she struggles) but has good ideas for 'how to proceed'. The reading/English activities and the math are going to be great go-tos for her this year...things Mom couldn't easily dream up for her to work on when we come to a blank space. I enjoyed paging through the math puzzles myself before bed...she'll need some help understanding the question, but I know  she can figure out the math once the question is posed correctly.

I am an overplanner of sorts... I was sketching out idea trees at work yesterday during a break about each 'subject' she wants to study this year and what our 'pull out of a hat' type options are for each subject...I can't really turn that stuff off- overplanning etc.. I was trying to work out just what we should be working on as 'every day' stuff and how often the 'electives' should work in...eventually we usually have Esme direct that part herself...I do want to stress the Social Studies/History stuff as a bit more than an 'elective'...a two to three times a week activitiy/lesson sort of thing.  If she is really going to go for Spanish we need to schedule that at least once a week intently or more for practice through the week.  I think she will self-direct on all of the Science as she is interested, and we can throw the Art, P.E. and cooking lessons in wherever they seem appropriate.

Mark said she cooked a scrambled egg sandwich with minimal help (lots of supervision) the other day, and was very proud of herself.  She needed help cracking a tough egg and he pulled the hot pan off the stove and served the egg onto the plate - but she helped wash it in the sink with the brush.  She said the sandwich was good :)

We picked up a few Spanish dual language books while we were at the library.  We read one before bed.  I have been learning French for the past year or more...and now she wants to learn Spanish (her friend is learning Spanish in school).  That means Mom has to learn Spanish...a language I've tried to avoid really diving into over the years (I've done German and French...Latin and Japanese before...modern Greek with her last year). But, I've found her some good online resources and I'm using them, too. I know the fact that Spanish has multiple similar words for the same thing (mono, mico for monkey) is going to be a potential arguing point. 

Getting ready...

Our mammoth 'excavation' kit came today.  Esme is intrigued...asked me many questions about it and the geology kit again.  Also, our reading comprehension workbook.  I had been uncertain whether we needed one, and if this was a good one...but I am pleasantly impressed.  It has short one-page reading assignments with interesting topics and color pictures, and then a few questions or fill in the blanks on the opposite side.

We got our third copy of the nat.geo (see previous post) and Esme unwrapped it expecting something 'new' and said 'What?  Really?  How many of these do we need?'  Ha.

I'm about 3/4 of the way through reading the Martian.  I really want to peek ahead.. but I won't.  I'll probably finish it this weekend.  Esme has a party tomorrow she is going to (movie night and sleepover, really).  She is excited.

Classroom Cleanup and Ideas

A clean magnetic whiteboard (our Christmas Tree never comes down..in fact, she adds stuff to it all the time) and a clean desk area.  I'm assembling a few other things and sorting old stuff out.  She had to help remove all the toys and flotsam from the area, which she claimed 'wasted her energy for playing Frisbee.'  I said it was exercise of it's own kind to go put your stuff away, and we weren't playing Frisbee until later, anyway.  She's actually getting quite good at catching it now....throwing still needs some 'aim'..or attention to destination, as I would think is a better description.  The stuff she likes the best (plus the dictionary and atlas) are on her desk for easy reach.  We did a little dictionary work this morning and she drew a picture from her dream.

We are also planning our next supply order - some of the things from the last post...and one of these days soon I need to go buy paper, paint and dollar-store calculators.  I am forming a few worksheets and ideas for activities and stacking them in our go-to folder, as the thoughts come up.  She had a hard time getting through the 'p's in the dictinoary to find purple, so I included a little 'alphabetical order - what word comes before the other?' sheet format and saved it in our documents file for making new ones as needed.

Esme came up with a pretend 'aquarium' poster we add specimens to as we learn about them... I like it.  We are making a background for it,

 The Aquarium Board with file for info on the fish and creatures.

Her other idea was that we could put a file up on the wall to put our 'ideas' in...she would post ideas to me about things we can do, and I would answer back or ask questions to her in her file.  Those are on the left.  I like her participation :)  

 'Lab Experiments' on her toy rat with food and 'chemicals' (paper cutouts)

We went to town and got our paint, and paper, and dollar-store calculators.  I made us carry folders that have a calculator and a post-it note square in each one, and they say 'Math Spies : Homeschool Math' on them...the point is to go out and have math 'adventures' by adding, subtracting or multiplying things we write down on the notes - like things we see - prices in stores (big reason for the marked kits so the purpose is easy to see)  I put those folders in our library bag.

school bus bit

Tried to do the whole run this morning for practice.  Esme got it after the first few minutes - stopped being upset that it wasn't real school and started getting excited it was practice.  She had to go back and check her calendar in her room to make sure it said 'no school'... it was actually blank on today.  Ha!  I tried to explain it as best I can.  As I told Mark - she gets some things so early and so easily.. things I don't expect her to and then am blown away with (like building bat caves and rail systems in Minecraft) and then I have to explain things three or four times a day like 'no we have to practice so we get this right at the time it happens - which is Tuesday.'  But, she WANTED to understand today.  She felt better knowing that tomorrow is a school day.  She wanted to 'know all the things' and get 'practiced.'  And she finally got that Mom has to do all her own things to get ready for work at the same time as I help her do her things to get ready for school -- which is why we are pressing her so hard to do as much as she can for herself.  Mark did another hair brushing and hair tying back lesson.  I explained how LONG she would be on the bus so she needed both a snack and a bathroom break before she would 'normally' leave.  We even got on shoes and coats and went out to discuss where the bus would come and how she would get on and sit down and stay seated. 

Lots of little things.  Mama and Daddy culture shock... and Esme, as well.  For all her furious notes and drawings and Minecraft creations the past few days I can see she wants to be as ready as she can be.  We hope she isn't going to be too disappointed with the place the teacher starts for everyone... but hopefully it will pick up quickly...

Tomorrow, we all go for the half day, and I have that day off to do it with her.

bits

Put Esme to bed last night fuming mad - got her up for 'just like school' this morning tired and wanting to go back to sleep rather than put on clothes... but she had to help take me to work... and she did.  She nearly crashed about 5 pm saying she was so tired, but it is 7 pm now and she has bursts of energy running around the yard screaming and hollering with the dogs.

We bought school supplies (during which she was quite unhappy she didn't get much choice), and some clothing (again, not much choice, I had decided ahead of time one yellow and one blue tshirt each, and underwear, and tennis shoes).  She tried very hard to get Daddy to buy her some other shoes instead.. but it was not going to fly.  I bought four and a half more yards of cloth for nearly as much money - to make more pants, shorts and dresses in the 'right' colors... it will be used, and it will be the same high quality.  I added up on my calculator and we spent almost exactly as much on the cloth and shoes and clothing as we did on the rest of the supplies.

She did get more choice in the snacks - and was happy about that.  She pointed out several items she wanted and they were not a bad idea.

At home this afternoon she had been writing all over sheet after sheet of paper, alphabet, her name, several words.  She was 'getting ready'.

And she did this in Minecraft - building a forest of letters in her forest of 'brothers and sisters and a Daddy.

Esme's alphabet with corrections from Daddy


Toothbrush festival, new ones and old ones, playground swings and a slide
(Saturday work)


Writing work from Saturday morning.  This was an empty tablet I placed on her desk without mention yesterday after school supply shopping.  She has also been drawing all over her easel in her room and trying to erase the marker with her hands only to wipe it on her knees (luckily it is washable!)

We did some work on brushing her hair herself tonight .. lots of tears.. she is really not liking that idea.  But I got her to take a good stab at it.  We'll give her a few weeks before we make a decision about if she can learn from the other little girls just how important it is.

bits with pictures

It has been a tough few days.. I feel like I've been running an obstacle course to get this school paperwork done, and am getting in the homestretch. Esme's shots are done except for the second MMR - and I have a couple of roads to try to keep her from that one again. The nurse agreed my reasoning was sound for not wanting her to receive a SECOND dose of the only thing she has ever reacted badly to. But, it still requires my doctor (who does not see her for such things anyway so he is reluctant) to create and sign a form for something he does not know. She never went to the hospital with that fever - but it lasted all night and it made me very worried at the time. I might just have to tell them I refuse do it - and provide that in writing myself if he will not.

She did not run a fever with any of the four shots she received yesterday. She is in a wonderful good mood, although she had some dreams about mama not keeping the monsters away from her she told me about - and then she pointed to her arms and asked me to stay home from work and protect her. That was a little heartwrenching - but it did not last long. She got over it after a little bit, and is now leaning against my back watching Muppet Show and has forgotten about it mostly. She saw the backpack we are ordering for her that should be here next week - she is happy about that. We have all the other paperwork done and her folder and gluesticks. I have to repair a few more pieces of clothing.... Loula put a hole in the sleeve of the new pink dress already. *sigh*


snowflake lights



Letting the dogs out...