29 September 2008
He is sovereign in good times, and in bad. He is always in control, and knows everything that has happened, is happening, and will happen. There is nothing that He does not know and has not planned.
This past Saturday evening, a young lady, was murdered while taking a walk. Her name was Emily Stauffer, she was only fourteen years old. She lived in Edson, Canada with her parents, older brother, and two younger sisters.
It’s hard when someone dies, a loved one, someone near your age, or even a stranger. I never knew Emily, nor did I ever speak to her online. I am crying over this shocking and heartbreaking news, and I can only imagine how difficult it must be for her family.
But God is sovereign, and He will bring them through this trial.
As far as I know, she was a Christian – one who understood God’s sovereignty. I found a post she wrote at the Rebelution Forum that touched me. Below is a part of her second to last post:
I think we can establish that God does in fact know the future and has a plan in store for us -
But the plans of the LORD stand firm forever, the purposes of his heart through all generations. – Psalm 33:11In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps. – Proverbs 16:9
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” – Jeremiah 29:11
These verses – and others – would confirm that God is sovereign; He has a plan for all and knows and determines what will happen.
She saw that God is in control. So must we all.
Please keep this family in your prayers! I know they must be hurting, but I pray that they will trust and lean on Christ!
29 September 2008
For Today . . .
September 29, 2008. It is a bright and cheery, the sun is shining, and the temperature is about 61°F. Looks like it will be a lovely day!
Outside my Window . . .
A lonely humming bird feeder. I haven’t heard any birds this morning, except the one that lives upstairs (Pickles, he’s a cockatiel).
I am thinking . . .
About and praising God for His great wisdom and power: “Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” – 1 Cor. 1:25
From the learning rooms . . .
Working on my adventure novel using the OYAN. I believe I have the synopsis pretty well laid out. A hint: the story occurs during the Civil War.
I am thankful for . . .
Our little bird, Pickles, who is a loving (though right now is screaming upstairs wanting company) little guy. I plan on posting about him sometime, though I’m not sure when.
From the kitchen . . .
Two and a half bushels (100 lbs) of apples, just waiting to be peeled, sliced, and frozen. That is one of the main projects for this week. We will prepare them as pie filling, and the nice thing is that the filling goes well not only with pies, but also cobblers, Minister’s Delight, applesauce, and Dough Boys.
I am reading . . .
For History: The Golden Goblet; For Newberry: Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry; and For Literary Enjoyment: A Tale of Two Cities (second read-through).
I am hoping . . .
To do well on the SAT test, which is this up-coming weekend. Both Breezy and I are going to take it, and we would appreciate your prayers if you think of us – it will be at the local public high school.
I am creating . . .
Recipe cards for Mrs. Novak, labels for homeschool art exhibit at the library that we are doing, and hopefully start a couple things for my up-coming Etsy shop.
I am hearing . . .
The pitter-patter of my fingers on the keyboard. Usually those words are used to describe rain, but that is also what my typing hands sound like. Also, Momma is typing beside me on the other computer, and the clock is ticking in the living room (it is not a very quite clock).
Around the house . . .
Bently sleeping surrounded by blankets on the couch. Most of the time he likes to be completely covered up when he sleeps, but right now he is not.
One of my favorite things . . .
The Bamboo tablet sitting in front of me here at the computer. It is a drawing pad for the computer, used as a mouse. In Adobe Illustrator I used the pen and tablet to create the little images in the headers (chick, hat, camera, apron).
A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week . . .
Preserving apples from local orchard, practicing my violin, making a couple crafts, preparing for the SAT test, taking the SAT test.
Here is a picture thought I am sharing with you . . .
It is of the notebook I made a couple weeks ago. It is very handy to have around, and fits perfectly into an apron pocket!
26 September 2008
Have you ever wanted to have your own personalized stationary? Below are instructions on how to make your own. You can make one or even twenty. It’s all up to you!
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Supplies:
• Envelope – used or new (whatever you may have on hand) that will hold a 4.25″x5.5″ card
• Scrapbook Paper – for envelope and note card
• Card Stock – for note card
• Pencil – for tracing
• Scissors – for cutting
• Glue Stick – for securely gluing sides of envelope
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Envelope:
1. Open envelope by pulling apart each seam.
2. You should end up with a unfolded piece of paper, that may look something like this, similar to a diamond.
3. Make sure opened envelope fits on scrapbook paper.
4. Turn paper over so that when you trace around the envelope it is on the blank side. You can hold the envelope down with your hand or something heavy.
5. I used a pretty rock – painted by my lovely sister – to hold it still while I traced.
6. Trace along edges with a pencil.
7. Cut out scrapbook paper along traced edges.
8. Fold sides inward, making sure the front side of the paper is facing outwards.
9. Once all four sides have been folded in, as the envelope was, it should look something like this.
10. Take the glue stick and glue just along the edge of the of the bottom flap.
11. Fold narrow sides in, and press the bottom flap on top of them. Make sure that no glue went outside of the edge, because if it did, the envelope will not open very easily.
12. There you have it! Your own homemade envelope.
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Card:
13. Cut card stock in half to make an 8″x5.5″ piece.
14. Fold in half to make a 4.25″x5.5″ card.
15. Design the cover of the card in the way you would like it to be. I used punches to cut out different shapes out of white card stock and scrapbook paper. You can also use other embellishments, or just give the card a simple front of just scrapbook paper.
The finished product. I hope you enjoy making your own personal stationary!
If you have any crafts that you would like me to make and post about, please let me know.
I’m always on the lookout for ideas.
24 September 2008
At the Homeschool Post (previously named Home School Blog Awards), Jocelyn has started a meme called Homeschool Memoirs. Each Wednesday, she writes an assignment for us to post about. This week’s assignment is to post photos of your summer.
When we bought our first digtal camera, we began to take 2x more pictures than we had before with our film camera. Than we got another one – a better one – and took even more photos each week.
Now, we that we have a DSLR camera, we take even more than ever before. The nice thing about digital cameras – you can take as many as you want, and it doesn’t cost you anything. That’s the fun part. The un-fun part is when you have 500 pictures to go through every week and delete the ones you don’t need.
But it is all worth it to have all our pictures on the computer where they’re easy to find and look at.
So, below are some pictures from our summer with brief explanations beneath each one. Oh, and at top-right is a picture of a spider web with dew during a foggy morning.
Sewing . . . I began to sew a dress in the above material to make sure a pattern would work right before I used the actual material I wanted the dress made out of. I still have yet to finish the practice, let alone start the real one. Handiwork is very enjoyable to me, and it is nice to see the fruit of my labors.
Corn . . . we shucked corn. What a delightful grain it is! God is so good! He created so many delicious fruits and vegetables (though of the latter I do not enjoy very many)! We also brought in a small crop of strawberries from our strawberry patch.
Dirt . . . I gardened and took care of my sweet little chickens and hens. At this point they still need a lot of care, and I’ll have to weed them again sometime, because the babies are being overgrown with weeds. Hopefully I’ll get it done pretty soon when it gets a little cooler outside.
Mrs. Brown . . . I had the wonderful opportunity to meet the lovely Mrs. Brown at the UC&F conference in August. She was a great encouragement to me, and a godly lady. I would love to be just like her when I am her age, she is just so very sweet. Her love for her Savior and family was very apparent as we visited with her.
Crafts . . . made several. Since I did a weekly post at the HSB Backyard on crafts, I had to make one each week. Here are links to some of the crafts I made: Notebook (pictured above), Little Portrait Book, Whimsical Button Bouquet, and Memories.
Grape Jelly . . . momma made homemade grape jelly. I got to photograph the whole process. Hopefully in the upcoming week I will post about it with step-by-step instructions on how to make “vintage” style grape jelly (meaning, not FDA approved).
Bently . . . our newly acquired little furry friend. Bently Scribbles came to us in August and he is a very good little dog. He is fitting in very well now, though it was a bit difficult at first. You can read more about him here.
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And those are few of the things I have done this summer! Oh, I forgot one . . .
Church Picnics . . . and I leave you with this picture of a beautiful little sweetheart!
24 September 2008
The time has arrived. I have moved my blog to www.simplyvintagegirl.com/blog/ from its previous location at www.homeschooolblogger.com/yesteryear. My blog will still be able to be accessed from there, but its main location will be here.
Here at my new site are:
• Home (main page, linking to my other pages)
• Blog (where you are right now)
• Photography (where I’ll post the larger amount of photos)
Enjoy looking around!
It has taken quite a bit of my time to get this all set up. I enjoyed it, but it is nice to have it finished. Editing this site was the reason why I haven’t been posting lately at my HSB blog.
I would really appreciate it if you’d update your links and buttons to my blog. I have made a couple of new icons for this site which you can link to me with, they are located here.
Now that this is set up, I’ll be posting more regularly. Thank you to all of my readers for your patience! Thank you to Jason, Jocelyn, and Eric – without your help, this wouldn’t have been possible!
God Bless!
20 September 2008
. . . our new little dog.
How we obtained him:
We were at a UC&F conference, and before we left I asked one of our dear friends to keep her eyes open for a mutt puppy. She said she would, and three days later her mother called my momma. There was a three year old Miniature Rat Terrier that needed a home, because his owners were moving to Texas and the place where he was going to live was not working out.
No, he wasn’t a mutt (nor a puppy), but he sure was cute! We talked it over and prayed about it. The next day we went and got him, and brought him home. The rest is history.
A bit more about Bently:
He was quite a change after having a large dog (our sweet 165 lb Charlie who passed away in June), but we have gotten used to him. It was great to get a dog that was already house trained and knew several tricks. He can sit, lay down, roll over, speak, shake, army crawl (swim on carpet), and hug. His hugs are very sweet. When you hold him and he is kind of sitting up, you can ask for a hug and he will lay his head up against you.
This little guy has a lot of personality, which sometimes gets him into trouble.
He is allowed to watch us eat at the dinner table – but at a distance – sitting on a blanket covered (for extra comfort) computer chair.
He is a sweetheart, and cute to watch. He also has separation anxieties – does not like to be alone. If there is a door shut and one of us is on the other side he will cry at the door asking for the door to be opened.
Pickles (our bird) and Bently don’t get along as well as Charlie and Pickles did, but hopefully they’ll grow to appreciate each other.
He sleeps in the sun, on the couch, in the chair, on our laps, and even sleeps well at night. With him being a little dog, we thought he would have a lot more energy, but he is actually quite calm. Of course there are those times in the evening and just before bedtime that he is extremely active and needs to play.
Mr. Cheese:
Sometimes when we’re laying down, he will come and stand on us. Each time he does this we begin singing the last verse of the Farmer and the Dell:
The Cheese stands alone
The Cheese stands alone
Hi-ho the derry-o
The Cheese stands alone
When Daddy comes home he gets extra excited and Daddy will play on the ground with him. Once he asked Bently, “Hey cheese, ya want to stand alone?” I was quite humored by this. His nickname is now Cheese.
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We are very thankful to God for putting this wonderful little guy in our lives. Bently has brought some of the daily joys back into our lives that we had lost after loosing Charlie.
I love how God has showed us just a small portion of His providential ways in this situation. It is so amazing when He shows us His handiwork, and even more amazing that there is so much more that He has not revealed to us at this time!
16 September 2008
Right now I can smell the refreshing and delicious scent of grapes. We are preparing to make jelly, and Momma has been boiling the grapes from our vines out back. Yesterday, Breezy and I picked about ten quarts, which is about all the vines yielded this year.
This has been their best year so far. We have had them for about three years now – Daddy rescued them from a home that was going to be destroyed and replaced by a large building. Now we are able to enjoy the fruits, and they are breathtaking.
Hopefully I’ll be able to get a post up next week about our first jelly-making experience.
Leaving you with a picture of the yummy grapes.
10 September 2008
This year we are taking an adventure. Many a time I have started a novel, and never quite made it to page three. My problem has always been that I think of a great beginning, but then I really don’t know where the story goes after that, usually too many ideas or not enough.
Since Breezy and I would both like to write an adventure novel, we purchased a program that would better help us to plan and complete our novels.
We started the curriculum last week – The One Year Adventure Novel by Daniel Schwabauer.
The author and teacher of the program is entertaining and the lessons have a great soundtrack. There are 72 lessons, and we are to do about three per week. They are not trying, and nor are they frustrating. He simply starts you at the beginning and sets up a few limitations, and uses examples from classic literature and old films. One thing he shows you is that “Boundaries inspire creativity – not hinder it.”
To prove the statement above, here are two assignments:
1. In sixty seconds, write a paragraph about anything you want.
2. In sixty seconds, write a paragraph in which the narrator describes his first blast-off in a rocket ship.
Which was easier? Most likely the one that was more specific and had boundaries in which to write about. In this way, the author gives several boundaries with which to inspire and create a believable story.
So far I am really enjoying it, and it only seems to get more interesting as it goes. I have had a difficult time coming up with the story, but I believe that I may have come up with the synopsis. If you don’t have any ideas as to what your novel will be about, Mr. Schwabauer gives several ideas for the synopsis.
Would you like to write an adventure novel? You can visit the website here, check out a couple sample lessons here, and even request a free DVD with samples here.
Are you using a new curriculum this year? You can post about it on your blog, and sign Mr. Linky here.
8 September 2008
Here is a project I thoroughly enjoyed. With a combination of several different items that are easy to come by, you can come up with a wonderfully attractive little notebook to flip through.
Supplies:
• Tabbed Index Cards – used ten 4″x6″ sized cards
• Scrapbook Paper – for extra beauty
• Two Metal Rings – to bind notebook together
• Tape – double-stick tape or adhesive squares
• Pen – for writing section name on tabs
• Memo Book - one of the dirt cheap ones (same size as index cards – 4″x6″)
• Brads (optional) – for tacking down small frame
• Metal Frame (optional) – found in scrapbooking department, preferably a small size
Directions:
1. Cut out scrapbook paper to fit the front of index card. Take cut-out (to fit metal frame, if desired) printed notebook label and stick to the front with adhesive.
2. Press to make sure it stays.
3. Place metal frame on top of label, and poke holes with a needle or other sharp object (please be very careful).
4. Stick brads through holes to secure frame.
5. Fold back the ends of the brads to make sure they stay put.
6. I added three extra brads to the bottom of the cover of my notebook.
7. For each divider index card, you can leave some blank without any decoration,
8. or you can go ahead and stick scrapbook paper down on each one, and even front and back if you wish.
9. Each of the pages and index cards will need to have holes punched in them so that they can be bound with metal rings. Since all three of us ladies (Mom, Bre and I) were making one, it made it easier to make a template and use it on each of the pages that needed punched. The template was a piece of card stock paper cut out the size of the index cards. Then holes were punched 1.5″ from the edge on both top and bottom (making two holes). In this way, all we had to do was lay the template on the paper, and with a pen or pencil draw a dot in the center of the hole that had been punched out of the template.
10. Take paper with mark from template, and center the dot in the hole punch. Punch hole.
11. Continue to do this with each page, and when you are finished they should all line up just right, with the holes in the exact same place on each page.
12. Unhook metal rings and poke through holes.
13. Label each section on the tab that sticks out from cards.
14. Rip the paper out of the memo book, and cut of the ripply, bumpy edge. Use the hole punch template to punch holes through lined paper in the right spots.
15. Unhook the metal ring and add the lined paper. This will give thickness and room to write in the notebook.
This is of the back and front covers of my little notebook. The tab on the back cover says, The End.
On the covers, I scrapbooked on both the front and the back side of the index card. In each section there are seven sheets of memo paper.
Momma’s is farthest away – Robin’s Egg Blue. Breezy’s is titled – My Book. And as you’ve probably noticed, mine is – simply vintagegirl.
Both Momma’s and Breezy’s tabs are alphabetically labeled, as in A, B, C, D, etc.
The tabs of my notebook are entitled: Notes, Inspirations, Cards, Contacts, Codes, Colours, Blogs, Photographs, Passwords, and The End. I am planning on adding a few more before “The End”, which will say: Scripture, Quotes, Recipes, Important Dates, and Post Ideas.
Hope you enjoy making your own little notebook!
