Is this some kind of sign?!?

So anyway, I'm mixing up this little powdered bit of flavoring into my glass of water because I wanted juice but was out and was too lazy to make tea right then, and I stir it all up and walk away for a min. and when I came back it looked like this.

I had to take a picture to show the husband because I just knew he wouldn't believe me and it really kind of freaked me out. Am I the only one who thinks this looks like a skull?? Is that not weird?? This is my drink, that I just stired up and the foam forms this pattern randomly?? WTH?

Today's little bit of Joy

So I'm in the laundry room, switching laundry, it's right before bedtime and the husband is in the bathroom with the kids presumably getting teeth brushed. Now my son, Phinneas will be 2 in Jan. We are kind of sort of potty training. He regularly takes his diaper off when he has to go. He regularly sneaks/climbs into the bath tub and goes...... Yes, that's right, the bath tub. (he will ocassionally go on the potty for my daughter, but is currently refusing to do it for me. ) Anyway, he was running around with no diaper because I hadn't gotten around to tackling him to strap a new one on yet and they're all in the bathroom and then my husband comes into the laundry room carrying his pants.
And I look at him kinda funny and say, problem? So he says, I got peed on. Apparently he was using the bathroom and phinny seeing daddy and wanting to be a big boy, deciding to stand there and pee too. Except that he's short and can't reach the potty standing up... Sooo, he peed all over daddy's leg.
Now I thought this was hilarious, vince, not so much. But I was laughing so hard I almost fell over.
So there's a little bit of joy for the day, and I personally consider today's episode a step in the direction of potty training!

Come and join the spin a-long

I am hosting a mystery fiber spin a-long! It's a surprise but I can tell you that all batts will have the same fiber content, they are sparkly and wonderful, and there will be a surprise at the end for one lucky person! If you've bought from my shop before you can get your first batt free (just pay shipping) but everyone is welcome to join in. There are listing to join in my etsy shop www.punkjordane.etsy.com

On another note:
I am finally getting around to posting picutres of all my buns. The links to the pages are in my links section. As of now I've got all of my French pictured.

Kids are so amazing

So anyway, last night I put a roast and veggies and such in the crock pot, when Maggie (6) asked me what I was making I told her that it was a roast and we'd eat it tomorrow, and she asked, Ooh, the one with the gravy mommy? So I said sure, I'll do the gravy for it too.
Fast forward to today, did not feel like doing anything. I'm getting ready to carve up the roast and feed everyone and she reminds me about the gravy... and I said in my best whiny kid voice, do I have toooo? and she looks at me and smiles and says, I can do it mommy! So I figured what the heck? She's watched me cook enough times. I got her out what she needed and set her up at the stove and stood by watching as my magical beautiful daughter proceded to show me how it's done. she put butter in and once it was melted started with her little handfulls of flour until she thought it looked right, she remembered how to brown the flour/butter and then started added the juicy stuff from the roast and stirring and before I knew it she had made a wonderful gravy for the roast all on her own! This kid never fails to amaze me. and all I can think is, this is why I teach my children. This is what it's all about. These little things, which are huge accomplishments. I am so thankful for the opportunity to stay at home with my monsters, to take things at our own pace and explore everything and anything that interests us. To have a husband who supports (and usually encourages) us. My children inspire me to try new things and re visit old. They keep me motivated and filled with wonder, They inspire my creativity, and re affirm my lust for life.

A few of my favorite things ( 3 in particular)

This post is an ode to some of my favorite things to eat.
#1 is Rouge River Blue, it's a cheese, and not just any cheese, it's quite possibly the best cheese in the world. I spend most of my summer longing for it and when it starts to get cold I start pestering the wonderful man at the cheese counter about when it will come in. It is a seasonal cheese and despite my best efforts to stock up I have to go months without it every year but it is totally worth the wait, I would rather eat this cheese with bread and honey or a good oil than almost anything else on earth. I never get sick of it, I just love it more.
#2 is Mo's Bacon Bar from Vosges, Salty and Sweet and everything you could ever expect a candy bar to be I don't eat alot of candy but this is definitly one of my go to chocolates. Note: Their D'oliva bar is a tie, it is equally awesome!
#3 is Chuao's Firecracker Bar This is the single best chocolate experience of my life. There's just nothing like it and there's no describing it. It is a taste explosion. Amazing.
Anyway, that's it for today, happy holidays!

She fought the bowl and the bowl won

I have a few rabbits that dig in their food bowls, eat their food bowls, dump their food bowls, or do a combination of the three. I have tried different bowl, feeders, and crocks at different heights and positions and nothing has made this better. I didn't realize how bad it had gotten until I sheared in Nov. and saw that a few of the worst for it were looking a little skinny. So with renewed determination I started looking for a way to stop this, because not only is it costing me money in wasted feed but it is starting to hurt my bunny babies.

I tried to do some research on the internet for a solution but no one seemed to have one. The only helpful tidbit I could find was to get something that was less wide and taller than the feeders and crocks that I had. So yesterday I was in Petsmart, picking out some new toys and a concrete perch for my little lovebirds and in the ferret section there was this neat little crock that attached to the side of the cage. It holds 10 oz. of feed and is skinnier and taller by far than any of my feeders. So I bought two of them just to give it a try with my two most difficult rabbits. Mr. Blue (a french), who has eaten his plastic food bowls that attach to the side of the cage so that he can better dig the feed out and waste his feed and Wonderbunny (a german hybrid) who eats a few bites and then tears her metal j-feeder off of the cage and attacks it every single night no matter how I try to attach it. I brought the feeders home and attached them to the cages, filled them with food, and left them overnight. This morning I went out to check because I figured if these bowls could make it through one night with those two they should last forever with the rest of them and I am happy to report that I have two angry bunnies and two intact feed bowls! No feed spilled either! The way that they are shaped they can't get their feet in there to dig and they attach well enough that they can't pull them off.

I am thrilled. Wonderbunny was so angry that she demolished her cardboard box (I put smallish boxes in for them to eat/play/snuggle in) So ha! I will not be outsmarted by cute fuzzy critters of any sort!

On another note, people suck.

While at petsmart I brought this home

Why, you might ask? Surely not because I needed or wanted another cat! No, it's because some low life peice of crap dumped her out in the dirt lot next to petsmart and it was freezing and she was scared and I am a sucker. This is her in the pocket of the robe that I wear to take care of the bunnies when I am too lazy to put on real clothes and it's cold. She stayed in there the whole time I was out with them and does not like to be away from us. She's a tiny little thing, not old enough to be weaned but she's eating well and I think that she will be okay. What kind of person does this crap?!? I am so angry, what makes someone think that it is okay to drop a pet (that was probably born due to their lack of responsibility in the first place) out in the cold, feet from a busy road to fend for itself. This time of year we always end up with a few extras, I do my best to get them to the vet and get them fixed and find them homes, though there's been quite few cats that have stayed permanantly because we couldn't find them a good place.

Please everyone fix your pets. EVERY pet should be fixed if you aren't a breeder. No excuses. By not fixing your pets you are creating generations of possible unwanted or mistreated animals. Barc is possibly the best pet related program on the face of the earth. Barc helps people who can't afford it to get thier pets fixed. No residency restrictions, no hoops to jump through, just the help that you need. The impact that they are making in reducing the number of stray and unwanted pets is amazing. If you are thinking of making a donation during the holidays please consider Barc

We're reading!!

Today was an amazing breakthrough, my daughter, who recently turned six is learning to read. We're homeschooling of course and technically she would have been in kindergarten this year. We've been working on writing and letter sounds and such for a while now and being a beginning homeschooler I have had my worries about how we were doing in general (made worse my certain members of the husbands family's lack of support) and I haven't been pushing too hard because I figured it would all click when she was ready. I've found that when we start to have a hard time with something it's helpful to switch to another method and with her reluctance to try to sound out words in books (she seemed really intimidated by the thought) I decided to let her work through it on the computer. We started playing the games on starfall and today she started doing the little reading "books" on there and she totally got it! So after computer time was over she still wanted to practice so I got out one of the I can read books (level 1) that I had gotten a few months ago and she just started sounding out the words and putting the sentances together and it was magic! We've done it, we've learned to read, all on our own with no excessive amounts of homework or "boyfriends" or early morning hour long bus rides! I am thrilled and so is she, I just can't wait to show the husband when he gets home from work!
AND that's not the only breakthrough that we've had today! My son phinneas (who will be two Jan. 23rd) went on the potty! We've been trying for a few weeks and he wanted nothing to do with it, absolutly refusing to even go near the potty and I was getting really fustrated so we decided to switch back to cloth diapers since I got a bunch of nice pocket diapers at cotton babies a while back and they are still to big for little Cassius and I just got some really wonderful diaper inserts from Purple ducks on etsy. So anyway I put him in the cloth diapers and then he decided to take it off and I asked him if he needed to go potty and first he shook his head no but then he nodded so we ran in there and I put him on it and he went!
What a day, I will admit, sometimes having four kids this young and the business and everything else going on it's hard. The bad days are really bad, but then there are the really good days like this when everything is working and I'm getting the house clean and fleeces washed and kids taught and it all comes together and it's like, wow, what a sense of accomplishment!
Now here's hoping that tomorrow goes smoothly, we will be making pies and anything else that we can make ahead for thanksgiving since the husband will be at work all day and I will be cooking and handling the kids all day by myself. I can't remember a thanksgiving that I didn't have some sort of meltdown and that's even with the husband helping But I love being able to have his mom and whoever else shows up over and serving this giant meal that I made from scratch and all that.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!