Needing Cold Water

 My sister has been sending screenshots to the family group chat. Screenshots of posts from my Mom's blog. Back when she was in the throes of raising and homeschooling 8 young children. Those are precious memories, and I'd like to fill my blog in with more of the same, for my kids to reminisce over as adults.

Here is a scene from my life, while in the throes of raising and homeschooling 7 young children.

My Man has a tradition of taking the kids out early on Saturday mornings for breakfast. It has evolved through the years, but for the past couple years, they take turns. Today was Sweetie's turn, so she was up quite early. She had a wonderful day, but by the time bedtime rolled around, very exhausted! After dinner, I sent her to start her bath, which her older sister had run for her. She started having an emotional breakdown because she had to use the hall bathroom. I helped her calm down. Then she had an emotional breakdown because the water was too hot. I felt the water as she was stepping into the bath, crying "I need cold! I need it cold!" It wasn't overly hot, but I turned the cold on and she immediately put her hand in the running water.

"AAUUGHH!!!" she screamed. I can just imagine a cartoon strip with the character screaming, with their hair all standing on end! It's exactly what she sounded like! She instantly turned the water off and started swishing the "cold" water in to the "hot" water. There was still a tiny stream coming from the faucet because it always does that after it's turned off. So she started pushing and pushing on the knob until the stream stopped a couple seconds later.

"That's how much I needed, Mama. That's enough cold now."

(The water was on for possibly one full second.)

Milking

I've been a pretty busy woman. I mean, always, but especially the past couple weeks. We started milking (meaning Son and My Man). It takes a lot of work for Mom to keep all of the equipment clean; jars and lids, milk pail, filtering funnel, cloths for cleaning her udder. We have a Dexter, which is a dual purpose breed, so we aren't getting as much milk as a dairy breed would give us. But we still get between a gallon to a gallon and a half per milking, and that's 2-3 gallons daily to handle. I guess she's giving a bit more than that, but they are keeping a certain amount out for bottle feeding her calf. We are sharing milk so far with my brother-in-law's family, and with dear friends who have shared with us several times in the past. We still have way more milk than we need. Milking began on monthly grocery day, and we don't have an extra fridge. So we've been having to move milk fast.

I think I've decided that if I make a batch of mozzarella each day, we'll probably keep pace. I tested how the homemade mozzarella freezes, and it does fine. Son wants to make butter and whipped cream, so I've begun skimming the cream before cheese-making. We bought an "antique" countertop butter churn around the time we had to stop milking last time (because she'd gotten a bad wound on her udder and couldn't handle the milking). My Man and Son used it for the first time a few evenings ago and it worked quite well. That night, we ended up with a big slab of butter, a quart of buttermilk, and 2 mozzarella wheels. That consolidated 2 gallons of milk plus some additional cream from an earlier cheese making session. I may attempt converting the whey into whey powder, but we'll see how it goes. It's supposed to be pretty easy, but... I've been a pretty busy woman.

Monthly Groceries Day

 Yesterday was a busy day.

 I started on 3 hours of sleep, and didn't eat anything until 3:00 pm (except two slices of canned peaches). My Man took Punkin and Sweetie out for breakfast. He also took Son, Sissy and Honey out to Walmart and Ace (we had a broken toilet seat that needed replaced). And then he took the big girls to the library. He and I (and Little Guy) visited the local secondhand stores, looking for Corelle dinner plates. And My Man was looking for something else, but I don't recall what it was. Neither of us were successful. Then Little Guy and I went for our monthly grocery orders. That took longer than usual for various reasons. I also visited Goodwill, but still no luck finding dinner plates. I picked up Burger King for my super late lunch. Once home, our wonderful children unloaded everything and helped me put away, but we only got the perishables put away this time. Then My Man left once more, this time going to visit some out-of-state friends who were staying with their family, other friends of ours. He did take Sissy and Honey, but I stayed home and started tackling meat preparation tasks. I cooked and froze 30 lbs of ground beef, separated and froze about 12-13 lbs of raw ground beef into meal-sized portions (about 2.5lbs), seasoned, formed and froze around 7 lbs hamburger patties, chopped/sliced and froze 25 lbs of chicken. I also put a 10 lb roll of ground beef into the freezer, and a 5 lb package of chicken in the fridge to deal with later, because it was getting late. Other things that I did during that time, were to unload and reload the dishwasher, give Punkin a bath, put Precious down for bed, nurse Little Guy more than once, and take the sleeping Sweetie up to her bed. I had Son complete some other tasks for me, and he also watched some episodes of History in the Dark and took a shower. Honey also bathed after they returned. It was very nice to go to bed, although late.

 And while writing this post, I see that Little Guy (who was pretty cranky with the events of yesterday) is truly mobile now! He's enjoying rolling and scooting along to get whatever he wants to play with next. Super cute! He's a very happy little guy!

Braids

 I've been fixing Honey, Punkin and Sweetie's hair in braids to keep it out of the grasp of Little Guy. And Precious gets upper pigtails. Punkin and Sweetie aren't very happy about this, but I told them it's temporary. They have been losing hair to their little brother like crazy. And he's been getting hair in his mouth sometimes. And I've NEVER had so much hair in the vacuum cleaner before. So braids it is.

She Looked At My Face

 I see all these memes about "what made my toddler cry this week" or "reasons my 4yo had an emotional break down this week". They include things such as "he looked at me!" Or "because her banana was yellow".

Now I have six children, and for the first time ever, my fourth child nearing 4, was crying and kicking her sister. In distress, she cried "She looked at my face!! 😭😭😭"

Also, Son had the thought that I should add to my blog posts things such as "My Son bought a bike that he can do skids on." He has been pretty aware of the importance of this accomplishment for the last few days.

Through the Rough Patch...?

Sometimes you are traveling down the road of life and it seems like there are annoying bumps and potholes here and there. You try to avoid them, but sometimes you hit one. And so much of the road seems to be covered in "washboard". Maybe you complain more than you should. You wish you could always be on a nice, smooth stretch, but it rarely happens.

Then you really do hit a rough patch. Jagged rocks are scattered everywhere, and yet the potholes make their appearance too. You can avoid the sharpest rocks, but you must be paying close attention. You can't avoid everything, though. Before, you thought you were going slow. Now you are just creeping along, painstakingly picking your way through the obstacles.

Once you've made it through with a minimum of damage, you are on the washboard again. You notice a couple juts and a pothole. They make you happy, because after what you just experienced, this is easy!

My analogy is rather stronger than what I'm actually feeling, I have to admit. I'm thinking more of somewhere between the washboard and the rough patch I described. But still.

I went to get groceries this afternoon. Most of the shelves had been refilled! I was so thankful! I certainly took that for granted before. I would complain about our circumstances and the prices, and how hard it can sometimes be to feed a family of 7 plus the occasional company. Then mass hysteria showed up. In fear, shoppers cleared the shelves. Confused, I looked around at our meager options and counted my blessings when God provided a staple or two on the shelves. We managed to scrape by. We didn't go hungry, but we didn't always like what we were eating. And then today, things were almost back to normal! Besides all the social distancing signs. And the tape marking where people should wait to go into the store if the temporary hysteria-induced capacity was reached. And all the people wearing face-masks. And the one-way-aisle directives.

But the shelves were almost full. I even saw toilet paper! (I didn't need any, so I didn't buy any.)

I think we're through the worst of it for now, and I'm thankful for that!

Can't Wear Anything

I always wear long skirts, but my girls have pants and they prefer them. There are some occasions when they aren't allowed to wear pants.

Honey: Can I wear pants today?

Me: Do you have clean pants?

Honey: I can't find any.

Me: You can't wear dirty pants, so if you don't have clean pants, then I guess you can't wear pants. It's not my fault you don't have clean pants if you took them all off the wrong way with the underwear stuck on them, and you won't turn them right side out so I can wash them.

Honey goes off pouting.

A few minutes later, I hear her walking down the hall crying and hollering.

Honey: I'm NOT wearing a dress today, so if I can't wear pants, I guess I can't wear ANYTHING today. Waaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!!!!

I considered saying "You'll probably get pretty cold if you don't wear anything." But I decided instead to pretend I didn't hear her. A little while later, I told her "You're still in your pajamas?!! You better go get dressed in a hurry!" and she did.