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::a peak at our new door. we'll be staining it this week, and hope to get it installed on saturday.

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::it's raining leaves here.

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it's race week! i am running the 1/2 on sunday. i had a training plan, but never really followed it.
moving on top of an already full life made it extra hard.

however, i'm still getting excited. the weather is going to be awesome...low 50's at the start. i plan to enjoy the day, and be thankful i am able to run.
oh, and i can't wait to see sherri finish! i'll be sure to take pictures.

saturday, we're having a family party for
my two oldest. bre wants a gymnastics cake. i'm going to try to replicate something kind of like this. bryce wants an ice cream cake, so that will be easy.

really hard to believe i'll have one in double digits.

cake idea found here.

another good read...

i loved this article.


How to Raise Boys Who Read
Hint: Not with gross-out books and video-game bribes
The Wall Street Journal

Education was once understood as training for freedom. Not merely the transmission of information, education entailed the formation of manners and taste. Aristotle thought we should be raised "so as both to delight in and to be pained by the things that we ought; this is the right education."

"Plato before him," writes C. S. Lewis, "had said the same. The little human animal will not at first have the right responses. It must be trained to feel pleasure, liking, disgust, and hatred at those things which really are pleasant, likeable, disgusting, and hateful."

This kind of training goes against the grain, and who has time for that? How much easier to meet children where they are....

One obvious problem with the SweetFarts philosophy of education is that it is more suited to producing a generation of barbarians and morons than to raising the sort of men who make good husbands, fathers and professionals. If you keep meeting a boy where he is, he doesn't go very far.

a good read

i thought this was really interesting, and so true.

last week, i went to the grocery store and spent almost $200.
i felt sick to my stomach. so much money sucked out of our bank account. even with my menus carefully planned out, list in-hand, i still spent way more than i anticipated.

i know groceries are a necessity. it's not like i'm getting my nails done. we must have groceries. but still. i'm still spending too much.
driving home, i began to think how nice it would be if I could just take one week off from grocery shopping.

it's not like my cupboards are bare except for the things i'm putting in each week. they are still stocked with rice and beans and cans of soup and pastas and..... there are the odd cuts of meat in my freezer. i have flour. and sugar. and yeast. and butter.
it's just that i often ignore those things in my pantry for what i feel like making that week.
i'm not using what i have.
so my challenge: i'm not going to the grocery store next week (except for milk). i'm going to make do with what i have in my cupboards and freezer. i'm going to get creative. i'm going to do my best to put together some meals with what i have on hand. i'm going to save a little money this week.
sometimes my best meals are the ones created when i think "I have nothing to make for dinner".

anyone brave enough to join me?

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::the beginnings of a fun fort the kids are making.