Sweeter By The Dozen

We paused during the week's chaos to attend the NJ Group IV field hockey championship game this afternoon. Redheaded Snippet's team is ranked first in the state and third in the nation and has taken the state title for the past 11 years. Straight.

And today, they made it an even dozen.

It was anyone's game for the first 30 minutes which ended with a scoreless tie at half time. But then, our girls pulled themselves together and managed to pull off a 2-0 win against a very formidable opponent.

As an added bonus, the other team was not only talented and skilled, but classy, both on and off the field. There were no shouting matches in the stands, no obscenities screamed at referees, and no obnoxious cheers designed to distract and dishearten the players. And, yes, I've seen all of that happen this season and it's disgraceful. But when people remember this is just a game being played by children and behave themselves it's so much more wonderful!

One of whom I'm just so proud of.
Congratulations, girls!

Just Stepped Out

Mom is having back surgery tomorrow morning, Monday, November 8th. We have great hopes for what the procedure will do for her in the long run but expect her recovery to be long and slow. So, I probably won't be around in blogland for a while as I will be spending as much time as possible helping take care of her. Add field hockey playoffs, Thanksgiving preparations and, hopefully, a visit from Dharma & Co (due in part to both Mom's surgery and Thanksgiving) and my next few weeks are going to be quite the busy ones.

I doubt I'll be back before Thanksgiving, so I'll wish you all a happy and blessed one. Hopefully, I'll be back before Christmas, so I'll save those wishes for later.

Join me, if you will, in praying for Mom tomorrow and in the days to come. And I'll be back in what I hope are just a few, short weeks.

Happy Halloween!

Well, that was one fun-filled weekend and I, for one, am exhausted.

We made fondue, had a fire, made and ate pumpkin scones (with honey--divine!), had a fire, ran ourselves crazy through a corn maze, picked pumpkins, had a fire, had Welsh Rarebit and Witches' Brew for dinner, had a fire, carved pumpkins, put finishing touches on costumes, had a fire, almost hit a deer, had endless cups of tea, had more fire, dressed up and went trick-or-treating, then settled down with beef stew and cider to watch the kids exchange candy in front of yet another fire.

So, first, the pumpkins. Carving them took forever, first of all because Daria's weighed 85 lbs and filled two garbage bags full with its guts and second of all because Man-Cub managed to pick himself the hardest-shelled pumpkin we have ever encountered. It took several blows with a hatchet to get the top off! By the time we were finished, we were too tired to put candles in them and put them outside, let alone get photos. But we did snap this one because of it's sheer genius (no matter what you say, Daria).

It's Chernabog.  I know what you're saying, "Oh, Chernabog, of course, that's right!"  I didn't know who he/it was either until Daria reminded me.

From Disney's Fantasia.  NOW do you remember?  He was one of the scariest images from our childhood so Daria just had to immortalize him on a jack o'lantern.

Next, the costumes.  Sadly, and because I am apparently the worst mother in the history of mothers, I have no photos of Man-Cub in his costume.  I know!  I made the mistake of allowing him to meet up with two of his little friends for trick-or-treating so the entire morning was spent in a flurry of phone calls, text messages and otherwise hysteria over exactly where and when they would be meeting, who would be accompanying them, where they would go and when they would be back.  I never expected that from a trio of boys.  Girl, yes, but boys no.  So by the time The Viking took him out to rendezvous, I was so frazzled I completely forgot to get out the camera!

I can show you what he was and we can all pretend the boy behind the mask is Man-Cub, 'mkay?

That's pretty much what he looked like with one very significant difference: Daria made him a spectacular jet pack out of Styrofoam, cardboard, duct tape and empty soda bottles.  She was up until the wee hours of the night finishing the thing but we didn't get any photos of it either.  Fail.

But, moving on, here is Redheaded Snippet, who went through my stores of costume supplies and decided to wear Daria's old lion costume from when she, Lobelia and two of our cousins did the whole Wizard of Oz thing one Halloween.

Obviously, this is a homemade costume.  Mom made that mane (affectionately known as "the mop") in one evening and never imagined it would be used again some ten years later.  Daria did the brown and white makeup and I did the black so it was very much a team effort.

I decided to be a (rather unimaginative but still fun) witch.  We decided to try to come up with costumes from items we already had and other than the very inexpensive makeup kit we used for Redheaded Snippet (bought for less than $3 at CVS), we succeeded.

You can't really see it, but I'm petting her.  And that wig was ruddy annoying!

Daria, who hates having photos taken but deigned to appear in this one so her spectacular costume could be preserved for posterity, was also a witch, but not just any witch.  She made the perfect Professor Minerva McGonagall.  Again, we accomplished this with things we already had.  I bought her McGonagall's hat for her birthday several years ago.  The wand (a replica of Hermione's) was a gift from Daria to Redheaded Snippet one Christmas.  The cloak is from a Christmas pageant of yore and the rest are pieces from Daria's own wardrobe.  I must say, I was quite envious of her costume.

Redheaded Snippet kept hissing and spitting at Daria and she kept threatening to transfigure her into a mouse in return so I had to get a shot of this.

There are a few more shots floating around on our phones but I haven't been able to figure out how to get them onto the computer.  But once I do, you can be sure I'll post them.  So look for those right around the New Year, ha ha.

Anyway, the children had fun collecting sweets and trading them later, we had fun dressing in cloaks and robes and we all enjoyed the annual Halloween tradition of coming back home after curfew to smell the beef stew that's been simmering in the crock pot all day long!  We put away costumes, washed off makeup, The Viking built a fire and we all sat in front of it eating beef stew and reminiscing about the day and Halloweens past.

Another year of Halloween memories.  And now we look ahead to Thanksgiving...

All Hallows' Eve Eve

It's the night before Halloween! Mischief Night! Cabbage Night as they call it in some parts of the country (New England, I believe?)!

Daria is spending the weekend with us so we can maximize our fun and frivolity and this evening we are making Welsh Rarebit and Witches' Brew (lime punch) and stoking the fire and heating up cider and chocolate and carving pumpkins.

Check out this MASSIVE pumpking Daria got at the grocery store of all places last night!  She was like a kid when she saw it, begging me for it, telling me how awesome it is!  And when I saw the price sticker ($8.99 for a pumpkin that would clearly cost close to $40 at one of those pick-ur-own and pay-by-the-lb places) I agreed as long as she figured out how to get it from the floor into the cart, from the cart to the car, the car into the house and then finally to wherever it was going to be displayed.

I did try to help her hoist it into the cart, but, thankfully, a kind man shopping nearby saw that nonesense and came over to help.  I'm very sorry to all you people who insist that there is very little difference between the sexes but when you need something heavy lifted, you need a man.  They just have more upper body strength and that's all there is to it.  Hmmm...wonder how that happened?  It couldn't have been that someone designed it that way, could it?  But I digress..back to pumpkins...

Everywhere we went in the store, people stopped to gape at or comment on The Great Pumpkin.  We had a hard time fitting the rest of our groceries in the cart (thankfully it wasn't a very big order).  And when it came time to remove Behemoth from the cart and put him into the car, two male employees had to come out to the car with us to do the lifting.

Somehow, we managed to get the thing into the house and onto the dining room table without a male present and are looking forward to carving it and its fellow victims later on.

More to come...

Rendered Incoherent

Colored trees...gorgeous sunshine...reds...oranges...yellows...cool, crisp air...azure sky...fluffy, cottony clouds...crunchy, raspy leaves...apples...PUMPKINS...CIDER...CRACKLING FIRE...WOODSMOKE...!

BELOVED OCTOBER!

A Hot Time in The Old Town Last Night

We live mere minutes from Philadelphia: Philly, The City of Brotherly Love, or as we locals sometimes unaffectionately call it, "Filthadelphia" (though I'm sure with this area's penchant for spelling any word that begins with an F and has anything whatsoever to do with Philadelphia with a PH instead--think Philly Phans, Philly Phun, the Philly Phanatic, the Philly Phlash--I should spell it "Philthadelphia" but that is just a few too many "H"s in one word for me).

We call it Philly. It's shorter and to the point. I don't know any locals who call it Philadelphia, now that I think about it. And with our accent it's usually pronounced more like, "Philwy". Only the "L" is silent. The Philly "L" drop is not quite as pronounced as the Pittsburgh drop, but it's still there. Now you know.

So, why am I droning on about this? Well, as you probably know, Philly is known for, among other things, Ben Franklin! We have the Ben Franklin bridge, Ben Franklin parkway, numerous statues and memorials, his grave, countless impersonators and (I'm getting to my point) The Franklin Institute!

Ah, The Franklin Institute: destination of South Jersey first-grade-class field trips for over thirty years! You get to walk through a HEART! While it's BEATING! For some reason that was (and still is) so eye-poppingly cool!

Apparently, and I discovered this from a Homeschooling website, TFI has a free community night every third Wednesday evening of nearly every month. And yesterday was the third Wednesday of October. So Daria took Man-Cub for a fun-filled, excuse me, phun-philled, not to mention PHREE, evening!

One of the best things about going from South Jersey into Philly is taking the PATCO, which we call the Speedline and is just the train line that connects SJ to Philly. This was always a huge treat when we were kids and my kids feel the same way today. Man-Cub was almost as excited about that as we was about going to the museum.

My part was easy as pie: I dropped them off at the train station and then, three hours later, rode as Mom's passenger to drive in and pick them up. Man-Cub got into the car all breathless and glowing, chattering non-stop about the many wondrous things he got to see and do, despite not being able to see Jupiter and its moons at the Observatory because of the cloudy skies. They had a great time (even though the Cleopatra exhibit we've all been dying to see was stingily closed for the evening) and are even talking about going back next month!

And then, as we were making our way to the bridge, Man-Cub piped up, "I'm HUNGRY!" Daria chimed in, "Yeah, me too...you know, I've never had a Philly cheesesteak..." Mom couldn't believe that Daria had lived 20 minutes away from Philly for 26 years and never had an authentic cheesesteak! Then I timidly added, "I've never had one either!" I've had many cheesesteaks, many great cheesesteaks, but only from South Jersey where, truth be told, the cheesesteaks are just as good as in Philly.

Well, that did it. Mom made a sharp turn to the left and next thing we knew we were on South Street where we had to cleverly turn Man-Cub's attention in different directions a few times to avoid giving him the kind of education no nine-year-old boy should have. There are some...unique shops on South Street. You'll know what I mean if you've been there. Or on St. Mark's Place in the East Village.

Anyway...Mom knows a thing or two about Philly (honestly, she's the best Philly tour guide I've ever seen and an historical trip for both my children is being planned even now) so she took us to her favorite cheesesteak shop.

I know what you're thinking, "Was it Pat's or Geno's? Or even Tony Luke's?"

NO! I'm sorry, but a real, authentic, original cheesesteak does NOT have whiz on it! And that's Cheese Whiz in case you're worried and grossed out. Which you should be even after knowing it's Cheese Whiz! Cheesesteaks have been in existence before Cheese Whiz ever was! You get AMERICAN cheese on a cheesesteak (maybe provolone if you're feeling extra fancy) and it HAS to be on a soft Amoroso's roll and nothing else.

We went to Jim's Steaks a small hole-in-the-wall with its own walls covered with signed photos and napkins of the many stars and other notables who have eaten there. They do make steaks with whiz, but you can choose between that, American or provolone. Man-Cub went purist by ordering a steak sandwich, no cheese, no onions, I went Old School with the American cheesesteak and Daria went fancy with the provolone cheesesteak. We made the cashier's day by handing her $14 worth of Susan B. Anthony coins we'd been lugging around courtesy of the ticket machine at the Speedline (they were gold and made us feel like pirates) and Mom thoroughly impressed Man-Cub by leading us through the back of the shop to the "secret" side door near the service entrance.

I gotta tell ya, there's nothing more Philly than eating a cheesesteak in the car while driving across the Ben Franklin bridge into Jersey. We had a blast. And those cheesesteaks were divine!

Still Learning...

I only have a moment, but this poor blog is feeling the squeeze of my new busier schedule and has been sorely neglected. I managed to get the new festive Halloween colors up last night but haven't had the time or mental acuity to actually get a post out.

We're revamping. I hear good teachers do that regularly so I am no longer fretting about it but it is time-consuming. Well, it was. But now it's actually saving us time.

I've been learning about the way Man-Cub learns. I've also learned a smattering of Latin, Marine Biology, Old Testament History and the beginnings of how to play Chess but most importantly, I'm learning about my child.

He's a GENIUS!

Okay, I just said that because I'm pretty sure you were expecting me to! And, of course, I think he's a genius but then every mother does so I know it doesn't count. But really now, he's pretty spectacularly smart. I think he's smarter than me but I still have the benefit of many years' education and experience to keep an edge over him.

I thought he might be a kinesthetic learner and was overwhelmed by that. Then I discovered he's actually a visual-spatial learner and was overwhelmed by that. But then I spent many days letting him "unschool" (highly recommended for VSLs) while I researched and read and clicked and scrolled. And I found some tips that are actually helping!

I would love to explain in more detail but I do have to get school going today. However, you may notice the time stamp on this post and that we are beginning school at around 12:30 in the afternoon. And still ending at 3:00. Chew on that for a while...

When is the weather going to catch up to the calendar???

It's the first day of October and I am usually running around, gleefully frolicking in abundant Autumnness but, instead, I am too tired and discouraged to care.

My house is going to suck me down into the depths of despair. I need to do a massive clean. I haven't been keeping up with my normal daily or weekly chores and now the realization has hit me that this place is depressingly bad. It smells in here. It stands to reason. I mean, the house has been sealed up all Summer. I usually do have to do an Autumn airing the way many people do a Spring one, but this year seems particularly bad. I blame the dog. And the terrible September we just had that withheld all its fine, dry days in which I usually would have thrown the windows open and instead behaved more like August-lite.

Ugh. We need to open windows, bathe the dog, pull all the furniture out from the walls, sprinkle the carpet, maybe deep clean the carpet, deep clean the upholstery and wipe everything down! And I have no time in which to do it!

How do I enlist the help of my family without a) sounding like a demented shrew and b) expending more energy in getting and keeping them moving than it would take for me to just do it myself?

Where do I start?

The wonders of soup

I only have a moment, but I just wanted to stop in and say hi.

I had a bit of a hiccup (isn't this really spelled, "hiccough"? Why doesn't my spellchecker recognize it?) this week. After a busy weekend spent adjusting to our worship service schedule, I fell behind on laundry and cleaning and must have also fallen behind in giving the children attention and discipline because they were ill-tempered and ill-behaved and in no time at all, I was ill-tempered!

I woke up Tuesday morning (I have a history of bad Tuesdays that goes back to high school: everyone thinks it's Monday as what gets you, but really, it's Tuesday), anyway I woke up Tuesday feeling like the biggest failure that ever failed in the history of failings. My daughter was sulky and sassy, my son was fractious and sullen, no one had any clean clothes or towels, every dish in the house was dirty and I was exhausted! I was not in a good frame of mind!

I made a few quick adjustments to our class schedule and settled down for some decompression time (read: mindless activity on the Internet) while Man-Cub played with his Legos and caught up on a few cartoons. We had breakfast. We had lunch. And then, after the clouds has passed and my blues lifted a little, I turned to the one who always help me dig myself out such a hole, the one whose methods are foolproof:

Good, old Amelia Bedelia. I loved stories about her when I was little! Even then, there was something that entranced me about salvaging one's day, mood, reputation or even job simply by whipping up the perfect dish! I relate to Miss Bedelia so very well: I try so hard to do what's expected of me and most of the time wind up leaving chaos in my wake. But I can cook!

Yesterday was a perfect example. I was feeling as if I'd just been scolded for tying steaks to the beans in the garden, unscrewing the light bulbs and carrying them outside, and hanging an unbaked loaf of bread up near the ceiling and then punching it down onto the floor. So, I made a short list, hied me to the grocery store and I got to cooking.

I made chicken noodle soup. The chicken noodle soup that everyone raves about and asks for. Once again I was amazed at how cheap and easy it is to make ($5 for a whole chicken and another $1.50 for a bag of egg noodles, the rest of the stuff I usually have on hand) and delighted at how excited my family (extended family included) gets over it.

There is something about a pot of something delicious bubbling on the stove that changes my outlook on life. Suddenly, I am capable, grown-up, sensible. Making soup somehow leads to folding laundry, sweeping floors and sloshing around in sudsy water in the sink. By 9:00 last night I had made soup, washed, dried and folded two loads of laundry, washed all the dishes, tidied the downstairs and swept the floors. Ok, I did have help, but it was nice to crawl into bed early last night knowing the house (and family) was back in order. Sure, the teenager was still a little sulky and the nine-year-old had to be spanked for defiantly disobeying his mother, but still not bad for an average Tuesday.

The benefits held over into today. We were able to have a great day in school (even finished early thanks to our first Latin test: 88%!), the house was tidied enough to have a dear friend over for an afternoon visit, and I was on top of things enough to bring leftover soup with crusty bread to Redheaded Snippet's game so we wouldn't miss dinner. Redheaded Snippet's team won their game, and Snippet played her little heart out so she was all pumped and in a good mood and everyone went home happy!

Ah...the return of order and routine. And to think, it all started with a pot of soup...

Learning and learning

We've finished our first week of school together and only one day has ended with me crying on the bathroom floor, clinging to the side of the tub! Sounds dramatic, doesn't it? Oh, it was! See, I was trying to clean the tub, in a desperate attempt to accomplish something, anything, after the horrendous day of school we had had. And much like everything else had gone that day, my efforts were fruitless.

I hate my fiberglass tub surround. It never comes clean! And all I wanted was to be able to walk into a room and have some kind of visual, tangible evidence that I had completed something. But, no.

And it was too much for me to bear. I stopped in the middle of my scrubbing, bent over the side of the tub and burst into tears. I sat like that for who knows how long, sobbing my heart out, venting all my frustration and disappointment.

Oh, it was gloriously dramatic. I'm the type of person who needs a good dose of moderate drama every now and then. I'm not talking major stuff like death, disease, poverty or imprisonment; just temporary, rather mundane things like cakes burning, favorite soup tureens shattering, tubs not coming clean, etc. So when I get the chance to do so without damage to my dignity or sanity, I revel in a little wallowing and gnashing of teeth and then I'm good for a while.

Man-Cub was a little monster yesterday. I wanted to throttle him. I probably should have spanked him but I was way too angry to do so properly. He pulled out every trick in the book and nearly made me crazy. He whined, he cried, he stared over my head and simply shrugged when I asked him questions, he pressed his knees up against his mouth and refused to answer, he bounced all over the place, rummaged in his desk, answered me in robot and cartoon voices, it was like trying to teach Calvin! I was poor Miss Wormwood yesterday!

Fortunately, The Viking was home when we finished school and witnessed my emotional break-down. This meant I got some very excellent hugging and soothing from a man who knows how to do it like no one else and Man-Cub got the tongue-lashing of his life. There's just something about a tongue-lashing from Father. The Viking doesn't yell very often at all, and he didn't yell yesterday. But he spoke with that authority that only Father has. The Viking is a very patient, gentle dad and, in fact, he is usually good cop while I play bad cop. But when he steps in and lays down the law, his voice rings with such authority as to make you cringe in your boots at the majesty before you. And Man-Cub did indeed cringe and cower!

Today, a new day has dawned and the outlook is much brighter. To start with, I made sure to get my bottom to bed quite early last night and managed to get nine solid hours of sleep! This morning, I made myself a good, hearty breakfast (I've found that, being hypoglycemic, I need a breakfast loaded with protein to start my day). There is no game this afternoon (we had one on each of the last two days which makes things so much more rushed and complicated) and I clamped right down on Man-Cub from the beginning.

It was Redheaded Snippet who suggested the method I'm trying today. I bought a few small packs of Bubble Tape at the dollar store over the weekend. My intent was to reward Man-Cub with a pack at the end of each school day if he had behaved himself. But, apparently, this was not enough of an incentive as he managed to lose access to the reward within the first fifteen minutes of class each day.

As per my Snippet's devious suggestion, today I brought a pack down, opened it and set it on the desk in front of Man-Cub. I told him that every time he acted up, I was going to tear off a piece of the gum, however long I wanted, and I was going to keep it for myself. At the end of the day, he could have whatever was left, if there was anything left. I then picked it up, showed him the gum and let him smell it...Mmmmmm, green apple, his favorite! He looked a little unhappy at that idea, but I could see the gears turning.

We're halfway through our day at this point (taking a break for lunch and recess) and I've had to take two lengths of gum. I popped them right into my mouth and have been blowing bubbles with them all through class. Toward the end of Latin, he muttered something unseemly about the material and when I asked him to repeat what he had said he quietly replied, as I have instructed him in the past, "Never mind. It was rude." And then he added, "And I don't want to lose anymore gum." We'll see how long this lasts, but if I have to spend $5 a week on gum to keep order in my classroom, it just might be worth it!

I'm learning that my son just might be a kinesthetic learner. Or he's just a nine-year-old boy who just wants to draw comics all day long. But he does get most interested when he gets to draw, color or use manipulatives such as the paper money he won't stop hounding me about. I think I need to get him some maps and timelines to draw and color and possibly rethink my teaching methods. But isn't that one of the things homeschooling is all about, tailoring lessons to your child's learning style and particular needs?

Well, recess is almost over and I need to get some lunch to fortify myself for an afternoon of Math and Grammar, heaven help us all! Math seems to be our worst subject. Man-Cub is great at it, but quails every day at the prospect of completing 26 problems on his own. Hopefully he'll just get used to it instead of giving me grief about it each and every day for the rest of the entire year...

Here's hoping...

A fresh, new start!

Today was Wits' End Academy's opening day! And as no one is dead or in tears (anymore-we had one incident) I am considering it a success!

Man-Cub is enamored with the idea of our school being like Hogwarts. All I can say is he's got a good imagination. Anyway, in that spirit, I let him put together a Hogwarts "uniform" complete with black pants, white-and-grey-plaid button-down shirt and Redheaded Snippet's robe from her old Hermione Halloween costume. At his request, I wore a black skirt, white shirt and a black robe from my old Hermione Halloween costume. It sounds mad, I know, but you know what? It worked. We both felt more serious about it, somehow.

I made us a pot of tea using the silver tea service (the silver-plated tea set someone gave us) and carried it up on a tray to keep nearby in the classroom. I must admit it was nice to be able to sip a cuppa while going over our lessons.

We began with Psalm 1 and prayer, then the salute to the flag, then we were off to Science!

Don't worry, I am not going to do this every day, but we learned about benthic and sessile creatures, zooplankton and phytoplankton and I was never more glad for Man-Cub's Spongebob obsession! Never did I imagine I would ask the questions, "So, what type of animal is Mr. Krabs, benthic or sessile?" or, "Would you say Plankton is a zooplankton or phytoplankton?" in a classroom setting! Man-Cub was thrilled that he got to use his colored pencils to draw pictures of both characters in his notebooking journal!

Grammar was a bit of a chore as it was all about setting our goals for the year and the difference between short-term and long-term goals! YAWN!

But then! Then, we did Math, which is a subject I've kind of been dreading. I have a long and bloody history with Math and I just know all of my old math teachers would feel somewhat avenged by the knowledge that I am now having to teach the stuff to a squirrelly, little boy who is a lot like me. I can handle addition, subtraction, multiplication and division just fine, but I still have issues with fractions and don't even get me started on measurements!

Surprisingly, Math was the best subject today! He got straight 100s on all his assignments and on his pre-test. His memory astounded me; I think he might have a photographic one! He would complain and complain about having to read from his book, but then when he had to give oral answers to my questions, he would answer almost word for word! What a stinker he's going to be!

History was, sadly, a bust. I was very excited when I first got the curriculum. It came very highly recommended and it's one of the subjects I'm most looking forward to teaching (and learning). Well, they say it's unavoidable for homeschoolers to wind up wasting time and money on curricula that simply don't work or are a lot more stupid or annoying than you could have known and it's already happened. I was actually apologizing to Man-Cub through his lesson today. And I have to find a new curriculum! There is no way he is going to like history if we stay with this one!

My Latin stuff hasn't arrived yet (I keep checking the front porch every 15 minutes to see if the mail's come) so I don't know what that will be like. Man-Cub was very much opposed to the idea of learning Latin at first, but once he realized that most of the spells in Harry Potter are based on Latin, he warmed up to it (he and The Viking are reading through the series at bedtime right now--hence the fascination with all things HP).

Right now, Man-Cub is in his play clothes, lolling on the couch, watching Tom and Jerry. I don't think he can believe that he's doing that at 1:55 on a school day and he's not sick. I'm not sure what to do with myself either, but I've got a few unmade beds that are calling my name.

So far, so good!

Sharpening pencils, filling bookshelves and planning lessons...

We're almost ready!

First, the new-school-year haircut!  The Rocker/Hippie Hair is no more.  He finally got sick of it and what better time than right before a new school year (and a new school) to make such a change?

To refresh your memory: here's my shaggy-headed babe, just prior to getting shorn...

A blurry side view of The Faux-Hawk.  He wants me to buy him gel now.  But it looks just as cute when it's just lying flat.  And as Daria said, "He just looks like a different brand of trouble now."

I've had two shipments of books and other school supplies arrive within the last two days and it was just like Christmas! And I called Daria and told her and she raced right over so we could put together the 600-piece puzzle that is a map of the world. All the pieces that pertain to land are in the shapes of the country or state (or in some cases where they are particularly small, countries or states) they depict! It's pretty darn cool!

There is our classroom. We have always called this room The Library. It used to be an 8 x 12 second bedroom that first Redheaded Snippet slept in and then both children shared when they were young. When The Viking built a second-story addition seven years ago, part of this room got re-purposed into a linen closet and Man-Cub's bedroom closet. The remaining space was too small and not private enough to be a bedroom but too large to simply be a hallway. It was kind of a large landing that wasn't directly at the top of the stairs.

Can you believe I've had this space for over seven years and have never known quite what to do with it?

This is Man-Cub's desk. It struck me, as I was arranging and rearranging furniture in there that this space, about which I have always been at a loss as to its best use, makes quite a satisfactory home classroom! Why did I never see it before? If it weren't for this space, we'd be very cramped and cluttered in our dining room, something both Man-Cub and I would hate with a passion.

This area, which has photographed very poorly, is where I will likely spend most of my school time. Mom is lending me her dry erase board which will go on the wall to the right and I still have to hang my calendar. I promise you it does not look that cave-like and gloomy in real life.

Man-Cub and I are having a bit of fun deciding exactly how we're going to run our school. The big things have already been decided by me and The Viking, of course, but Man-Cub is enjoying having a say in the littler things. He wants me to make a pot of tea every morning and bring it up to our classroom under the tea cozy so we can sip tea throughout our classes. He wants to wear a uniform like Harry Potter's. He very carefully chose his folders, pens, pencils and other supplies today.

I have no problem with the tea idea, or even the HP uniform.  I actually have an old robe from Redheaded Snippet's Hermione Granger costume that fits him and what do I care if it helps him get into the spirit of the thing?

We'll just have to see how excited he is once we've gotten started.

I must be off!  I have curricula to review and lessons to plan!

Whimper

I just thought I'd pop in for a moment to have a bit of a whimpering pity-party for myself. School at Wits' End Academy begins in 6 days and I am beginning to have the slightest bit of trouble breathing correctly.

Are you wondering what the trouble is?

I'm not worried. And that worries me.

This is how deranged and certifiable I am. I am not running around like a crazy person, unable to sleep at night, snapping at husband and children. I am not feeling overwhelmed or about to die. I am not dreading Tuesday at all.

I know there are things I don't have figured out yet, but I'm cool with it. I know we'll work out the kinks as we go along. I've even put off buying all of my supplies because I know I'll need to do it a few times to really know what I'll need.

I'm being all serene and calm and collected and it's starting to worry me.

THIS IS TOTALLY NOT LIKE ME! I DON'T KNOW WHO I AM ANYMORE!

Me? Homeschooling?
Me? Excited about it?
Me? Not freaking out or regretting the decision already?
Me? Not having the entire thing doomed to fail before it even gets off the ground?

What is going on here?

I think maybe I'm a little delusional and maybe not a little power-mad. And maybe I'm just horribly naive.

Or maybe it's totally a God thing and I am a living example of what happens when we step aside and let Him move through us and doesn't that sound self-righteous and irritating!

Ok...ask me in about two weeks...

I have so much to do, I think I'll just sit here a little longer!

It seems nothing motivates me to blog more than having a veritable ton of things to do and a rapidly diminishing amount of time in which to do them.

I have to make sure the entire downstairs is company-ready (and not just any company but Boss company), plan my errands for tomorrow, grocery shop, make myself look charming and lovely and prepare a meal for nine all by 6:00 tomorrow! I think I'll blog!

Oh, yes, and I must finalize all of my curricula choices and get it all ordered!

For, lo, we are indeed home schooling. Now, is it two words: home schooling? Or is it one word: homeschooling? Very few of my spell-checkers recognize it as a single word. I was just wonderin'.

School is supposed to start in little less than two weeks (yes, we can start a day or two later because I am now in charge, but don't let me hear that) and I have yet to order anything. I've been researching!

I have been able to decide that I want to lean more toward a Classical Christian approach so we are doing Latin, Grammar, Spelling, Writing, Penmanship, History, Math, Science, Geography, Art and Music, all with a strong emphasis on Literature. That sounds like a lot but the Grammar, Spelling, Writing and Penmanship will really be kind of rolled together.

We're doing Prima Latina, Shurley English, Veritas Press History, Apologia Science, Handwriting Without Tears for Penmanship and various books for Writing, Geography and Art. I'm handling Music myself (the one area in which I feel rather confident). I'm pretty sure we'll be doing Math-U-See for Math, but I have a few people I need to consult before I decide. And I could really use something a little more structured for Spelling and Writing that isn't so darned expensive and doesn't require 10+ hours of preparation on my part (I'm looking at you, Institute for Excellence in Writing and Spell to Read and Write)! Maybe I'll check ebay...

Anyway, just when I feel I've got things pretty well under control, I think of a whole new slew of things I need to buy or prepare and I think this will never work. And just when I'm ready to throw in the towel, I see a glimmer of hope, or remember some wonderful book or method I can use that the public school would never!

Case in point, I was all set with a certain method for teaching Geography using songs. This method is wildly popular and is very highly recommended. And as the only Geography I can recall is from silly songs I learned as a child and teenager and as Man-Cub has such a great ear and knack for rhythms and memorization, I was all gung-ho on the idea of teaching him through songs.

And then I listened to some of the "songs" in the method.

And my musical background and training suddenly became a hindrance.

There is no question that these songs are a powerful memorization tool. I believe everyone who has said it worked wonders for them. But as a musician, a classically trained musician, I just could not bring myself to buy the CDs or inflict them on myself or my son.

It's true, I'm a snob.

So, bewildered and frustrated, I began to look around online for alternatives.

You'll never guess what I found and I'm SO EXCITED!!!



Don't you see? It's BRILLIANT! I know the quality of the video isn't all that great but the only good one I could find had a rude gesture as a logo in the bottom corner so I couldn't share it.

But wait, there's more:



HA! I'm going to use Animaniacs, of all things, to teach Man-Cub geography! Now, keep your hair on, I'm going to get him a few good maps and geography books, too! But I think Yakko and Wakko will be very effective tools for my nine-year-old boy.

I think I'm more excited about this than anything else...

Okay, this and The Time Chart History of The World I'm ordering. I can't WAIT to look at that thing, it's supposed to be stupendous!

Right, well, I must go mop and sweep and dust and write lists.

Cooking as Therapy

When I was just a lass I encountered a book with just such a title. It fascinated me, probably because I was getting married in a few months and was painfully aware of my complete and utter lack of cooking skills (case in point: at my bridal shower, my uncle gave The Viking a gift of a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter so he wouldn't starve), so I picked it up and read through it. I got a few good recipes out of it which I have since forgotten, but the title stayed with me.

I seem to be indulging in some therapeutic cooking lately. Actually, I've been turning to food to alleviate stress, but the term, "therapeutic cooking," sounds so much more legitimate and respectable, no?

The question of what to do for Man-Cub's schooling in just a few short weeks is tearing ceaselessly around my mind like a rabid squirrel on meth. I cannot. stop. gnawing. It's the first thing I think of when I wake up and the last thing I think of when I go to sleep. It's there in the shower, elsewhere in the bathroom, in the car, while I'm folding laundry, when I'm cooking dinner (which is NOT therapeutic cooking but obligatory cooking and there is a big difference).

I don't think I'm violating Philippians 4:6. I'm not anxious, really. I do trust that God has a perfect plan for Man-Cub. I am perfectly fine with him going to the public school if that is where God wants him, honestly.

I think I'm just making my requests known to God by prayer and supplication. With thanksgiving! I realize I am blessed to have any options open to me. I realize I am blessed merely to have any child, especially this child, this child for whom I fought so hard and suffered so much, to educate. I'm blessed to have a school provided by my government in the first place. I'm blessed to live in a town, district, state and country where my child does not have to pass through a war zone, drug-infested neighborhood or gang territory to get to that school. I'm blessed that I have the freedom to choose to home school if I want to, that I have the intelligence, education and ability to do so.

I am thankful for all those things and so I am thankful for this dilemma.

But I know there is something required of me. I can't just stand here, wringing my hands and praying for God do something. I have time constraints and budget limits and have to make some kind of decision. And soon.

It has always been a desire of mine and The Viking's to be good stewards of what God has given us. And in spite of all we've learned and all God has given us, it has been a challenge. We live frugally and do everything we can think of to use our money wisely, but we still seem to run up a smallish amount of credit card debt every few years or so. And, the older the children get and the tighter the economy gets, things get more and more out of whack.

We are running a credit card balance right now. And we hate it. We don't think it's an example of good stewardship. I can't help but wonder if that isn't the reason God answered, "No," to the question of private school this year. What business do we have asking God for more money for private school when we have unpaid debts? I feel strongly now that we should concentrate on getting the debt paid off before we take on any other financial commitments.

Once private school fell through, I felt peace about it all. I decided I would continue to look for a job so we could pay off our debt and then see about putting my income toward school once the debt was gone. It seemed to be a wise and practical thing to do.

Then the idea of homeschooling popped up. Now, I know there are costs involved (I've been pricing curricula lately), but it's a lot more affordable than private school. It costs a fraction of what private school does. BUT...if I'm home schooling, I can't be working outside of the house and we won't be able to knock our debt out as quickly as we'd like.

So, do I put Man-Cub back in public school and continue to look for a job with the purpose of putting all of my income into paying off our debt and then saving up for school once the debt is paid? Or do I commit to spending my days educating Man-Cub at home, knowing the debt will be paid off, though it will take a lot longer to do so?

Of course, I could put Man-Cub back in school and not find a job and be frustrated all year thinking I could have just been home schooling him anyway. Or, I could, perhaps, find a job the schedule of which I can work around to home school...

And I have to have this decision made sometime in the next three weeks.

This is why I think I've been turning to therapeutic cooking.

Last night, I saw the remains of a quart of blueberries sitting on the counter. The thought occurred to me that if I didn't use them soon, they would go bad. Apparently, sprinkling handfuls of them on my yogurt in the morning hasn't been using them up enough.

The first thing that popped into my head was lemon-blueberry scones. I made them once before and they were wonderful! Dinner was already in the oven so I said to the kids, thinking I'd be hailed the best mom ever, "How do lemon-blueberry scones sound?" They both jumped up for a split-second and then pouted, "Yay--wait! Can't you just make lemon scones and leave the blueberry out?"

"But...I have to use up the blueberries, that's the whole point!"

"No! We want lemon! With lemon GLAZE!"

So I did it. I had one lemon left to juice and zest so I mixed 'em up, glazed 'em good and boy! were they yummy!

I felt like Amelia Bedelia, especially since I just adapted my own (which is actually my sister, Lobelia's) recipe and I can almost never do that.

Then, today, I still had those pesky blueberries sitting on the counter so I decided to make blueberry pancakes for lunch. If I had been able to find my camera, I would have taken pictures to share.

Light, fluffy, golden, with plump bursts of sweet, soft blueberry goodness scattered throughout...they were the best I've ever had! They would be perfect with ice cream! Or maybe left to get stale, then broken up with custard poured over top and baked like a blueberry bread/pancake pudding, or even broken up with cream poured over top!

When I cook like that I feel like I'm accomplishing something, like I'm doing something good for my family, even if it's only fleeting. I feel like I'm taking a problem, a mess, a bunch of ingredients that are worthless on their own, and turning them into something wonderful, like solving a puzzle.

And when a few areas of my life seem to be unsolvable puzzles or untidyable (is that a word?) messes, whipping up something good to eat does me and my sould a world of good. Kind of like making the bed or folding the laundry.

I know that my dilemma will be answered, one way or another, in just a few short weeks. At least this uncertainty can't go on forever. And I am confident that God is in control. I just don't want to screw up my end of it, you know?

And all this therapeutic cooking cannot be good for my waistline!

Praying and Pondering

I can't promise this will be a very well-thought-out post.  I'm very much in the processing phase here so things may be a bit...disjointed.

We've been trying, since before the previous school year ended, to find an alternative to sending Man-Cub to our local public school.  It's a long story, but I don't want him there.  He isn't safe and the administration is completely untrustworthy.  I Do Not Want Him There.

So, we looked around, prayed a lot and chose a school that seemed to be presented to us by God Himself on a silver platter.

We were nervous, but trusting God to work out all the details.

And it all fell through.  I don't know why the process unfolded the way it did over the past few months, with all signs pointing toward yes and then getting a resounding NO at the very last minute, but I do know God is in control and He has reasons I do not need to understand, but just trust.

So now we are faced with sending Man-Cub back to that school we don't want him to go to.  And I am trying hard to trust that this is what God intends.  I am okay with it if that's the case, I just wish I could be sure.

For example, now the idea of home schooling has arisen in my mind.  And I can't help but think perhaps this is the direction God intends for us to move and He had to eliminate the option of private school because He knew I would not seriously consider home schooling any other way.

OR

Perhaps He really does intend for Man-Cub to go back to the public school and to teach me that my trust in Him must outweigh my motherly fears and concerns.

Those gut feelings: are they friend or foe?  Are they nudgings of the Holy Spirit or my own feeble humanity getting in the way of God's plan?

I just wish I knew.

And now I am wondering about home schooling.  Can I do it?  Can I do it?  Without turning Man-Cub into a weirdo?  He's the kind of kid who needs to get used to being around other kids.  He tends to hole up and isolate himself, like me.  I know socialization is such a buzz-word, usually thrown around by people like me who are ignorant of the true ways of home schooling and afraid of what they don't know, but he truly does need it.  How do I provide that for him?


Do I have enough time, with only three weeks left, to get everything together and organized?  Am I biting off more than I can chew?  And should I take seriously the fact that a few people who know and love me have guffawed before they could stop themselves when I mentioned I was considering it?


I always said I would never home school my kids because they would be idiots if I did.  I even said that on this blog!  But, my mother has always said to be careful about what you tell God you won't do because God has a sense of humor and doesn't take kindly to being told what His limits are.


So, home schooling.  Where do I start?  What do I do first?  Is this crazy?  What supplies do I need?  Do I need a specially designated area in my house?  Do I have enough time to prepare?  The questions are endless!


I'll keep you posted...

Sticky Toffee Pudding

I've had a request!  Will you look at that, someone does read this blog besides my sisters!  I'm all flustered now...

Anyway, there's been a request for the recipe for the successful sticky toffee pudding I once made long ago.

Have you had STP yet?  It's divine, truly.  It's my favorite dessert ever; if I go any place that happens to have it (and those places are, sadly, few and far between and often specializing in British or English cuisine) I simply have no choice but to get it.  And it was featured on a recent episode of Best Thing I Ever Ate.

Anyway, here it is, the STP recipe that did NOT end in disaster!

Sticky Toffee Pudding
Ingredients:
-1 cup plus 1 tablespoon flour
-1 teaspoon baking powder
-3/4 cup pitted dates
-1 1/4 cups boiling water
-1 teaspoon baking soda
-1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
-3/4 cup sugar
-1 large egg, lightly beaten
-1 teaspoon vanilla
-1 cup heavy cream

Toffee Sauce:
-1/2 cup unsalted butter
-1/2 cup heavy cream
-1 cup packed light brown sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Put water on to boil.
3. Butter a 10-inch round or square baking dish.
4. Sift the flour and baking powder onto a sheet of waxed paper.
5. Chop the dates fine, then place in a small bowl and add the boiling water and baking soda.  Set aside.
6. In bowl of electric mixer beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add the egg and vanilla, beat until blended.
7. Gradually beat in the flour mixture then add the date mixture and fold until blended with a rubber spatula.  Pour into prepared baking dish.
8. Bake until pudding is set and firm on top, about 35 minutes.  Remove from oven to a wire rack.
(For Toffee Sauce:)
9. Combine the butter, heavy cream and brown sugar in a small heavy saucepan; heat to boiling, stirring constantly.  Boil gently over medium-low heat until mixture is thickened, about 8 minutes.
10. Preheat broiler.  Spoon about 1/3 cup of the sauce over the pudding.  Spread evenly on top.  Place pudding under the broiler until the topping is bubbly, about 1 minute.
11. Serve immediately spooned into dessert bowls.  Drizzle with additional toffee sauce and heavy cream.

Oh me oh my.  I may just have to make some of this tomorrow...

Apparently

There are many women out there who can walk into a room in their house, spot something a bit skew-whiff, and pull a perfectly clever, resourceful and inexpensive solution to the problem right out of their pretty, little, professionally coiffed heads.

These same women then simply cull through their vast and plentiful stores of craft and decorating supplies, gather the necessary items (often serendipitously finding an item or two they didn't even remember they had) and then get to work happily sprucing things up.

A few hours later, voila! the room is completely reborn! They feel accomplished, energized, proud of what they've created! And everyone who sees it raves at their skill, they can't believe they did it themselves! And so cheaply, too!

Apparently, I am not one of those women.

Today is one of those days I wish I had a lot of disposable income.

That's all I'm saying.

Baby, It's Vile Outside (and not very pretty inside, either)

Oh I hate this weather. It's hot, humid, the heat index is about 110 degrees and relief is coming by way of weather in only the lower to mid nineties tomorrow, isn't that refreshing?

I hate wearing summer clothes. Only those who are slim and trim look decently presentable wearing tank tops or shorts. Fat chicks in tanks and shorts look preposterous. At least I do. As someone who likes to be as covered up as possible, I find the dog days of summer to be a clothing nightmare.

I hate my hair in the summer. Because of its length and thickness the only way I'm comfortable in hot weather is with it twisted into a knot on top of my head. And that gives me headaches. So I often just sweep it back into a low ponytail which gets very boring day after day after day.

And let's talk about makeup in the summer. I sweat profusely. I know, so very attractively feminine, yes? I have a constant sweat mustache from June to September and my entire face sweats so much I have to keep tissues or a handkerchief on hand at all times to avoid mopping my face on the front of my shirt. So you can imagine how easy it is to apply makeup and keep it on. I'm either red-faced from being overheated or blotchy from my makeup beading up and running off, showing patches of my red skin underneath.

Most of the time I just throw in the towel. I figure what's the point? I spend my summer days wearing trailer-trash tank tops and capri pants (I don't wear shorts) with my hair twisted into a knot on top of my head with a pencil stuck through it and no makeup covering my sweaty, blotchy, red face. Another reason to hibernate until cooler weather comes through! I just wish my poor husband didn't have to look at me during the summer!

And this is just about the kind of weather during which someone will decide it's a great time to plan some kind of outdoor or otherwise poorly ventilated gathering to invite me to. Which means not only having to endure being out in this kind of weather, but also having to wear clothes that look nice (translation=cover most of my body thereby driving the heat index way up), having to arrange my hair in a respectable manner (translation=down and loose and plastered around my face and neck also driving up the heat index) and having to apply makeup (translation=hopeless) all while behaving pleasantly and as if I'm happy to be there! I think summer gatherings should be banned unless the host/hostess is providing air conditioned options to his/her guests.

Every time I find myself wilting and melting under a tent at an outdoor barbecue in August or gasping through a wedding in an un-air-conditioned church in July, I being planning my revenge parties as a way of coping with my misery.

Revenge parties, you say? Glad you asked, my friend, glad you asked. I swear one of these days I am going to organize a large, outdoor party in the middle of February and invite everyone who has ever invited me to sit in their backyard in the middle of July or August. We'll do it just like a summer cookout: cooking, sitting, eating and talking outdoors the entire time. And I will provide the same kinds of protection against the elements that they provided me: a tent in case it snows and plenty of hot drinks. If those aren't enough and they're still cold, they'll have to fend for themselves. And, of course, I'll have the heat in the house turned off because I don't like paying for the extra gas. It'll be up to the individual guests to make sure they have gloves, hats, mittens and boots. It'll be great!

In the meantime, if you need me, I'll be sealed in my 70-degree house until September.

Scones!

VBS week is officially over and I am worn out and wound tight so I'm decompressing a little by blogging. And my favorite thing to do with my blog when my brain is weary is post recipes. So here's a favorite I made this week. Hope you don't mind.

I made scones last night, two batches of them. I had two small events back to back to which I had to bring a dish. For one I needed a dessert and for the other a brunch dish. And for both I brought scones. That's just one of the things I love about them, they're so versatile!

I make them so often I could almost do it in my sleep (and, now, Redheaded Snippet can make them, too) and this time, I took photos.

I was all set with my ingredients and tools out, ready to get baking when I discovered that my last remaining liquid measuring cup is missing.

I don't know if this happens to you, but in my house, the darnedest things go missing and it just about makes me blow a gasket when they do.  I can understand when the phone, tv remote, or all the pencils in the house go missing; they're things we all use and things that tend to get used and left in odd places.  Well, okay, the tv remote shouldn't be used or left anywhere but very close to the tv, but anyway...

But when things that I know no one uses but me go missing, that makes me nuts.  I keep a ruler in one of the kitchen drawers.  It comes in very handy.  The children don't use rulers.  The Viking has a very manly tape measure and, thus, has no use for a small wooden ruler.  Yet it is constantly missing.

My kitchen tongs.  Okay, yes, once I caught The Viking using them to fish a dead frog out of Man-Cub's aquarium (and believe me I nearly had a coronary over that one--and bleached and scalded those tongs to near melting when he was done), but otherwise, no one else uses them.  And they still go missing on a regular basis.

My sunglasses.  Redheaded Snippet thinks my sunglasses are dorky.  The Viking and Man-Cub would have some serious explaining to do if they had any reason to be borrowing them.  But they disappear.

I know what you're thinking.  The only common denominator in all of these scenarios is me, right?  WRONG!  When it comes to my things, I leave them in the same places whenever I'm done with them.  It's a conspiracy, I tell you!

Anyway, I'm all ready to bake scones when I remember that my last remaining liquid measuring cup has gone missing and, of course, no one has claimed responsibility.  The first two were destroyed by my family and I had kept the last one in a closely guarded place but, alas, they discovered it.  It hasn't turned up anywhere and I have been left with no way to measure any liquids in the house.

This was the first tine I really needed to measure something since the disappearance and I was ready to panic!  I've been less than vigilant about the amount of cream I've put into these scones before and it really makes a difference!  The recipe calls for 1 1/4 cups of cream and it means it!  No more, no less!  What was I to do?

Well, I scrounged through my entire kitchen looking for something, anything, that might help me measure 1 1/4 cups of cream when my eye fell on this item sitting on top of my fridge:

An old egg beater with...surprise...liquid measurements stamped on the side!  Yippee!  I was back in business and feeling like a genius!  So, on to the recipe!

Start with 2 cups flour, 1/3 cup sugar, 1 tablespoon baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon salt. 

Dump 'em all in a large bowl and whisk 'em up to evenly distribute (or use your rubber scraper if you don't feel like washing extra utensils). 

Add the 1 1/4 cups heavy cream to the dry ingredients and stir in just enough to fully incorporate into a sticky, rather dry batter.

It should look like this.  That's it, no eggs, no shortening, no butter.  Just flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and cream.  See?  Easy! 

Now, with your hands, knead the dough ever so gently, just enough to form it into a ball, so not really a proper knead at all but a few soft squeezes to get everything together.

Place the ball on a floured surface (I just put it directly on the island surface; it's engineered quartz and similar to marble in its smoothness and coolness) and gently press it into an 8-inch circle about 3/4 of an inch thick.  I confess, I never pay attention to how thick it is.  And I don't measure the diameter anymore, I just press it out until it looks big enough to cut into 8 wedges.

Cut into 8 wedges.  I've done 16 smaller scones before and you could probably do any number you wanted, but 8 makes 8 good-sized, hearty scones.

Transfer carefully to a parchment-lined cookie sheet (I did two batches yesterday so I used two sheets).  I really dislike working with parchment, but the recipe really doesn't work as well without it (you have to really watch the timing carefully as the bottoms will burn easily without it).

Brush each scone-to-be with milk or cream (I always use cream because I already have it out)...

Sprinkle with cinnamon (totally optional but I always do)...

Sprinkle with sugar (here I'm sifting confectioners sugar, but I usually just sprinkle table sugar on top)...

And bake at 425 degrees for 12-18 minutes.  I always check at 12 minutes and hover closely after that.  They're done when they're set on top but not yet browned.  And watch the bottoms; they'll turn on you if you aren't careful, even with the parchment!

We like these spread with clotted cream, lemon curd, jam (red plum, strawberry or apricot are my faves), or even Nutella, but they're good even with nothing.  And though they are good with a glass of cold milk, nothing is better with them than a cup or two of good, hot, strong tea!

Enjoy!  I'm off to bed!