Such a great cookbook for new moms pinching pennies or for large families

Family Feasts for $75 a Week: A Penny-wise Mom Shares Her Recipe for Cutting Hundreds from Your Monthly Food Bill

I have used and kept on hand her "cream of anything mix" for using in my Macaroni and cheese.  Her big biscuits are my FAVORITE--crispy and pillowy soft at the same time.  Her Ethiopian sloppy Joe is a savory spicy delicious way to incorporate Ethiopian taste in our everyday cooking.    But her charts for comparing food prices are wonderful as is the list of seasonal foods to help optimize and budgeting your shopping. 

Why we don't re-evaluate the school option...

Chad and I are destined to be oddballs.  We can't even be normal home schoolers.  Homeschooling is a great option for most people who do it.  For us, we object so fundamentally to the American School System that changing our opinion from year to year as to whether we will or will not home school again never comes up.

I am fundamentally against the ideology, educational goals, and performance-driven methods of the American school system.

Biblical ideology drives our Arbor Academy.  The Biblical idea of man defines the student and the teacher.  The child is made in the image of God, naturally depraved, thus he has innate value but requires moral shaping according to God's ideas.  He is like the tomato shoot that needs a careful cultivation indoors before it is allowed to grow strong in the sun.  The family is the building block of the nation-made up of a man and woman and their children.  The family derives its authority from God himself and willingly gives that authority to the State for their protection.  The State exists to serve the interests of its people and not the other way around.  The State's responsibility is to support the parents authority and jurisdiction within the home and not interfere, not the other way around.   Parents impart family values in the home.   The church supports the parents shaping of children's godly character.  The school expands this understanding of godly character in every subject of the curriculum.    The teacher at home, church and school guides children into the knowledge of God and the fear of Him.  The teacher acknowledges the Holy Spirit's role in teaching the child and bringing him into all knowledge.  The end goal of attaining knowledge is that children know their Creator and glorify Him with their lives.

I got robbed Friday.  A very smart thief stole 2,000 from my bank account by acquiring my personal info.  And this is why teaching godly character  and a knowledge of God at home and school is important.  My highest educational goal is not academic--it is that my children know and love God.  My highest goal is not athleticism or social competence.  These goals are vanity when one considers the meaning of life.

"Great beauty, great strength, and great riches are really and truly of no great use; a right heart exceeds all" (Poor Richard's Almanack, Ben Franklin)

I object to the performance driven methods of the system.  Teaching to the test, focusing on grades and in general jumping through hoops to gain achievements for economic advantage is fake school.  It squelches real learning, curiosity, individuality and makes robots out of children.  There is no time for real learning with this method.  One nation's test scores must beat another nation's--forget the needs of the individual child.  The Running Cattle method of education is a means to the end of general education for all, but is the basest type of education offered to my child.  Waiting for children to advance at their own pace or allowing them to speed along when giftings allow, respects the child.  His own capacity for learning is unhindered by emotionally discouraging test results.   I prefer Holy Spirit driven methods.  He brings the child into the knowledge of all truth.  Ultimately God is forming his image in us that we would reflect Him for His purposes.  I have seen the destruction of a soul that was trained to perform and tried to perform for God... God isn't interested in that, so why would I use those methods in my school?  This is not an excuse for laziness or lack of excellence.  Its a reliance on the Holy Spirit as teacher of the child.

This Christian Ideology, these Bible based educational goals and methods are non-negotiables for our family. But there's one more thing we can't live without--strong family relationships.  The quality time we have with our kids seals the deal.  Looking forward to next year!

A long morning of weeding and gardening rewarded by these turnip beauties!

Her favorite part of gardening!   Harvesting!!

 Ruthlessly pruning...

 The nasturtiums worked!  They are keeping aphids out of the kale.

Broccoli and cabbage will end up in an Asian stir fry this week!

Cherry picking

We were sad when the pipeline cut all our trees down and burned them.

But then a nice neighbor informed us of some trees that needed picking before the racoons ate all the cherries.  So we hopped in a truck and got more cherries than we could imagine.

Guest Post: Z on the urban homestead

 

We just picked are first fruits of the garden. Down blow there is a recipe of how to make spicy quick pickled radish.

My mom blended the radish tops in to salsa.It tasted so good. 

We were bless with two dozen eggs from are chickens ! this is only one dozen eggs.

l

Herbs

Fall fun...Giant Hubbard Squash

Took a calming winter walk at the farm in Chelsea, Michigan

Down a farm road, a generous farmer invited us to take some of his surplus squash off his hands.  We found this mammoth one I couldn't even name.  The farmer insisted it was the sweetest of all he had--more than acorn, butternut, or buttercup.  My mother in law informed me it was a "Hubbard."  

  And yes, it was bigger than my head.

This motherload made 2 13x9's and one large cookie sheet of squash...

 

Ready to cook!  I ended up pureeing the 13x9's for soup, giving away some and having a hefty platter full for dinner with friends!

Ok, so my pink ninja really wanted to dress like her brother.  I was really afraid she would be in tears when she saw all the princesses at the party...so I tried to get her to wear her princess and the pea, but she wasn't interested.

This is Narnia style...

And a woodland nymph...

But as you can see we weren't overloaded with princesses, and Miss Pink Ninja won a trophy which thrilled her little heart!  

Garden Party #4 "The Wind and Waves Obey Him"

We invited two neighbor girls for dinner and our Wind &Waves Garden Party. Wind and Waves is part of our devotional for the Easter Season.

The girls helped set the scene.  Bethan cooked fish and garlic bread, Abigail made apple boats, Aziza found a few water themed toys.  We added to that fishy crackers and pretzel nets.  They love the whale scene. 

This week we also had the opportunity to share with some boys in the neighborhood who joined us for grilled hamburgers.  We told the story of how Jesus also grilled out with friends, but on the beach after he gave his disciples a great miraculous catch of fish!!

My favorite homemade bread...

I find that when I really want to learn a home making skill, its better to go back in time to discover how its done.  I love learning to cook from Julia Child's first episodes and learning to bake bread from my 1940's Betty Crocker Cookbook.  So I thought I share with you the bread recipe I follow with all the helpful steps in photos! This week I made Swedish Rye, Wheat, White and a "Power" bread of my own invention following her "stir in" method.

Meal Plan print out

My favorite meal plan print out... just mark and go.  I usually keep this in a binder, but my sister is so cool that she makes these type of print outs into her own notepads...