absentee blogger

Yes, that is me. I am sorry. I have been crazy busy the last few...umm...months...? My boys started school and I stupidly thought this would give me soooo much free time. Yeah, that didn't happen. I am up by 6 to get my middle schooler (gasp) off to school. As soon as he walks out the door, I have to wake the younger two and listen to them fight as they get ready. I really hate mornings. By the time they are out the door I am exhausted.

I have also been canning. and canning and canning. We had an early freeze this year so I spent an hour and a half outside in a snowstorm picking tomatoes and the rest of the garden produce. Luckily a friend came to help or it would have taken me all day. We picked 16 pumpkins, four watermelons, two cantaloupes and 430 tomatoes. Yes, you read that right. I have 430 tomatoes in various stages of ripeness on my kitchen table. Salsa anyone? I have already done two batches of salsa but neither of them really came out. One was too sweet (it also called for several of my cucumbers), the second called for over a cup of vinegar and that is all you can taste. Sooooo.......this next batch will use the second recipe but cut the vinegar wayyyyyy down.

I canned my peas and carrots together because I didn't have enough of either to bother canning. I got a batch of green beans done and two quarts of tomatoes.

I did end up being a judge for the fair and there was a judges category (whoot) so I entered. I won three blue ribbons! We were up all night judging the hundreds of jars and had to come early the next day to award the ribbons.

The chickens are all molting and the yard looks like a fowl massacre with feathers EVERYWHERE. I wish they didn't do that right before the weather turns freezing cold. Mr Chicken and my chicks are completely clueless as to how to use the cat door we installed on the coop. My older hens are used to it and go in and out several times a day. It is too cold to leave the big door open and it is driving me crazy to have to let them out every morning and catch them every night to put them back in the coop. I hope they figure this out sooner rather than later.

I already gave you the update on the bees. Kind of. I have just gotten scared enough of them that I don't really go out there unless the smoker is fired up and I am in full beekeeper gear. That is just such a pain in the butt that I usually don't get around to it. Plus, my little photographers are not willing to get that close either. It doesn't help that my oldest son is allergic to bee stings.

So there are all of my excuses. I am going to try harder to keep up with this but if I disappear for a while again, I am sorry.

Feeling out the family....

Made a casual remark at a family gathering this weekend to feel out some more family as to retreat preps. Her comment was "I'm not worried." On one hand I can get that because this particular bunch has acreage they tend, a large garden, a bunch of chickens, horses, and are decently situated with in the community so as to not really be bothered by locals. In fact before our retreat thoughts became less about just our 4 and more about long term and wider family they were where I considered going for those reasons. So if those are the reasoning then I will take a sigh of relief and leave them to plan their own way I guess. If however it is more of a not really seeing these signs the way we do then I am unsure what to do. Do I let it go? Do I try to open their eyes? Do I risk freaking her out? I honestly think a lot of why her husband does what he does is because he sees the signs more and is more attuned but this makes talking to her about this plan concerning.

How do you handle this issue? I know we all have people we love and wish to protect. People we want to see safe and healthy with us. How do you try to get them to see your worries are valid and at least raise the thought of preparing?

The death of the drones.

It has been getting very cold lately and the workers threw all of the drones out to die. It's kind of sad seeing them all over the ground outside the hive. I haven't seen drones in a long time so I thought maybe they were all gone. I have also had a lot of problems with yellow jackets and have no idea how to solve that one. I could spray them, but then I run the risk of killing the bees. The yellow jackets are EATING my bees. So, it is kind of a lose/lose situation. Here's hoping I can get it all figured out. I have started feeding the bees again as the snow killed off pretty much everything that was blooming.

The Occupying pish-posh.

Those people drive me batty. I honestly haven't paid a tone of attention to them because their basic message is annoying. It is this whole "I am in a bad place because you made me that way" idea that has our country so screwed up. Do I think that Wall Street and other major entities suck? Sure do. Honestly I think they knew collapse was coming and padded their wallets and did nothing for the little people. I also think that if you refuse to take responsibility for your own mess you are stupid. We have 1 credit card. I pay 2 bills with it and then pay it off 2 weeks later. We have some debt. My car. The house. We actually did something we have never done and bought "toys". We got a loan for that as well. We pay above on all of them. Honestly except for the house (investment we hope, though Nevada sucks) we see them as credit builders so while we pay above the payment we don't rush to pay them off either. We chose our debt. My weekly budget is tight with the extra family in the house right now. We haven't put as much away as we wanted because feeding 7 is very different than 4. However we do not lack, we do not go without. We made choices that have us in the position we are in and we are content with that position. Hubby has been through layoffs. We find a way. We don't blame the man. He worked 2 jobs and I worked another and we rotated child care duties between us. We buckle down and we cut back and we improvise when we have to. We plan for leaner times. We don't expect someone to rescue us. We don't blame other's for our hard times. Yes layoffs happen at horrible times and put people in cruddy situations. Finding another job can be difficult. BUT that mound of credit card debt was a choice. The giant house you should never have bought was a choice. Figure out a new life solution. Get creative. Stop whining and start winning.

So dumbnuts....... SHUT UP. Put all that energy into something useful. Seriously.

One Second After.

So I finished reading "One Second After" by William R. Forstchen today. Hit on quite a few levels. The researcher loved the detail and afterward included to help with my own world building. I loved the concept and that he kept reactions pretty human. Small towns do very much tend to band together in difficulty. I liked that he included the refrence to film and literature even if that got old in some moments because we do tend to compare events around us to what we know, often that is what we have read and watched fictionally in extreme times.

The writer in my loved the depth of charecter. I could see the fear, the violence, the hope, the impact of hard choices. I could smell the unwashed bodies.

The Aunt with the Type 1 diabetic nephew found much to fear. When I first saw that John's daughter was diabetic and the same age about as Nephew I was a little excited. Many said this book was a great research addition so I thought this thread would turn out to be personally helpful. It was not. It was very bleak and very dim. Honestly the devoted Aunt in me instantly wanted to begin hoarding insulin.

This book also made me think. Not just about the world I am building for my own series but about the world as we have it. Yes we are preparing as best we can. Hopefully we can prepare more in the coming while before we really need it so we are much better situated. I plan for that and hope for that daily. My greatest fear is that an EMP situation and other situations like it are ones that really are pretty dang hard to be fully prepared for. The preps are good as is the awareness but honestly how do you totally prepare for any situation?

Really has me thinking on so many levels.

When a fallen hero needs our help....

we stand up and give it. Months ago I shared a blog with you all that a beautiful wife was writing through her grief about her Marine husband being killed in action. She was very raw, very personal, and so very strong. Her story was heartbreaking. It was moving and it really brought home how deeply this war hurts those left behind.

Now she is trying to make sure her husband's greatest wish is still made possible. He was in the process of adopting their eldest daughter when he was killed. He had done all the paper work, had completed the home studies, had submitted the forms but as forms do they were lost. He was going to re-submitt those forms when he got home but failed to return alive. His daughter deserves to know that she is HIS always and forever. She deserves his name and his legacy.

Tj's wife once again posted a beautiful blog on the subject here. To sign the petition she is filling with signatures that are going to her governor please follow the link on her blog or click here. Help Tj and Taylor be father and daughter in every way and help Mary get more peace. She deserves that from all of us.

Research books?

So as I work on my youth series I am also reading some books for research ideas. I have "One Second After" and "Patriots" on the list but figured you guys would have some great ideas. As you guys know my series is going to take place about a generation after the apocalypse. Man made EMP which makes our response to a natural event impossible so we get hit twice. A side effect is going to be that the once hidden paranormal world gets a huge magical boost. My heroine is a cop trying to solve major issues. I may make her more an investigator or private eye. Not sure yet. So I plan to incorporate some survival stuff, paranormal stuff, crime stuff. I am totally looking for good book recommendations to read to get ideas and for research. Let me know your thoughts!!

The OTHER reason October is important to me.

October 15 is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. Many who read the blog know my story. If you are new though I will share my thoughts again.

I have been blessed with 4 babies! They light my life. They are my world. 2 of them I lost during pregnancy. As my health journey has progressed I have learned that often FMS women have difficulty in pregnancy and that my lack of progesterone is not to surprising once you know I have FMS. Yay! I look around me and know so many women who have lost babies. I know their heart break, their fear as they try again. I know the anguish. Last year Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope started the I Am The Face campaign to help raise awareness and remove the silence surrounding pregnancy and infant loss. I eagerly joined that movement. I love Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope. They provide support online and locally to so many who are now facing loss. I also very much want the world to talk to those of us who deal with this. We want to remember our babies. We want to smile about them and cry about them and be free to talk about them and the pregnancy. There were good moments for all of us. So please spread the hope and the word. 1 out of 4 women will face this huge loss. They need our love and our kindness. They need our hugs. They need to be able to talk about it without being hidden away.

Bad sick blogger !

Well went into the week stressed out with family stuff that took us all to Utah. So we all had little sleep. We got through the day. Came home and of course I flared. Stress and I are not friends. Flare means no immune system. So by Wednesday I had the flu. Yay! Party for Lila! My feed is hugely backed up but I am going to read some today. Also going to try to get back to blogging ! Happy Saturday y'all!

October - My favorite month!

In my effort to keep things light I am completely not posting about yet another police impersonator caught locally harassing women or the burglary ring brought down. Going to ignore the shootings and even the big doctor/pharmacy/drug dudes getting brought down for all sorts of crime. Going to pretend for a moment that the multiple undercover units patrolling our area at night are just neighbors. ........ See, it is depressing!

So I am going to talk about October. I love October. Mostly because I love Halloween and am one of those crazy people who decorate inside and out for it. We could go deeper into the beauty of All Hallows but that is part of my Wiccan youth and I am no longer the rebellious type having firmly settled into my Christian upbringing and all. (Though they sure do know their herb lore!) I love the fun of it all. When I was a teen I worked in a haunted mill. I was the casket girl. I would spend time getting my makeup just perfect to match the creepy maniquin in the coffin across the isle and then I would lay there and pop up and scream for each group that entered my room. I loved it. Now I pass that love to my kids. Bug has always loved the creepy and spooky. The kid loves picking something nice for her costume and then creeping it out. She was a corpse bride one year. This year is Zombie Cheerleader!  My Monkey is not sure about the creepy yet but she loves the decorations. She doesn't want to touch the spider but she giggles and calls him her spooky friend. I think we all need to enjoy the fun of it.

What are you/your (grand)kids going to be this year?