Hello my dear friends.  I hope you are having a wonderful beginning of spring (if we can call it that).  We have had an interesting start of our first spring here in VT (that is Vermont for my wonderful German people and "Hallo Ihr lieben in Deutschland.  Ich vermisse Euch alle."). Ha, I still can type in German.  Actually it is code for "I don't believe there is spring in this state".  No, just kidding.  Really, it has been a wonderful month.  Tom has been so busy with all the things around the house.  There is not a whole lot to report.  Basically things are normal, normal and normal (if you count living without running water normal).  Logan and I are very busy with school.  We have some catching up in to do in some of the subjects.  But I am confidant that we will be finished at some point.  I still haven't gotten used to the fact that it is only Logan really who is doing school with me on a regular basis. 

Natasha is quite independent and she is taking some on-line classes and she really enjoys that.  She is pretty much on her own with her other studies.  She is preparing to work on a thesis in history and still enjoys studying about homeopathic remedies for the home and family.  She went to a job fair here and actually found something which interests her.  One of the museums is looking for an Intern to help with their tours and explainations of the history.  She loved doing that in CT and would like to continue it.  The only thing is now she would get payed for doing something she likes.  It is right up her alley: this museum deals with historical machines and I think guns also.  It is so her :).

We are studying flight :)

So on most days it is Logan and myself.  I must say, I can't get used to the lack of stress in this situation.  I now only have one grade level to contend with and to keep "entertained".  On most days I find myself thinking, "Boy this is the life."  Logan is actually getting to the point where I don't have to help him with everything (yeahhhh) and he is starting to think of things to study on his own.  He recently, while studying the history of Acadia (Canada), decided to write a small story which he is illustrating and all.  We are on chapter 9 or so.  So at the end I will bring the whole story to Staples ( I will have to charter a plane and find one near here) and make a hard bound copy of it.  I am so excited about that because I could not get him to write before this year.  I am so happy about that.  We are going to have evaluations coming up soon.  I am a little nervous about that since I don't really know what the state expects.  But I am hoping and praying that we did a good job this year.  We are not done by all means, because building a house and schooling is rather difficult.  I am happy with the things we have done, over all.

Sean is doing really quite well.  He is still working for his boss.  He is eager to leave but is willing to wait until an opportunity is upon him.  He has been busy driving around to all the barns in the area and introducing himself.  He has had some good introductions and that is a good way to get his name out there.  He actually got the call from someone and went and trimmed that horse.  It seemed to be happy when Sean was finished with him.  He went down to CT this weekend to do my friend Julie's minnies and Tasha went with him.  They got to stay with Grandma and Grandpa over Saturday night.  His truck is doing well but we have all these tires lying around now.  He as at least 3 sets of tires for his truck.

Our wood for the winter is all gone.

  Well, I guess I have a couple of pairs of shoes so his truck needs a couple of sets of tires.  It's just that my shoes fit into my closet (well, I don't have one yet but stay with me here).


Tom is doing well.  He is looking to do something for work so we are looking around for different things.  There are a few possibilities for him.  His latest project was making maple sugar.  That took a while.  Of course we still don't have an oven hooked up, so he had to use an outside oven.  It actually worked really well.  He finished this project yesterday and of course we all had to sample the finished work.  Tom, however, had to continually monitor the process of the maple sugar so throughout the day he was "testing".

Sugar, sugar!!!!

Yummmmm!  Wait the spoon won't come out!

  Yes, well.  We went for a walk after things were done.  I walked, he bounced all over the place.  At one point I thought he was going right into one of the spring pools because he was bouncing around it.  When we got back, he crashed.  Went right to sleep but it was not a bad crash (in regard to corn syrup).  So he woke up refreshed.  But he kept mentioning that he could still taste the sugar.  Very funny.  The sugar is quite firm, rather like solid molasses.  It is actually quite good.  The kids enjoyed scraping the pot. 

Maple sugar/molasses

Me, myself and I are all doing well.  We spent a wonderful weekend at a women's retreat here in Keene.  I got to spend the weekend with my friend Lisa, who invited me, and Nichole P. and other women.  That was a real treat and God really was there.  I loved it.  I am looking forward to the real spring, whenever that shows up.  Although today I am rather bright again (recall the bright T-shirt from an earlier blog). 

The house is coming slowly.  It really is a process that requires such patience on my part.  If a contractor had built it, we would be done, but what is the fun in that?  Tom has been focussing on outside chores, such as building cold frames.  These are like little greenhouses and allow us to put our plants in them when the weather is still a little too cold.

So, like anything Tom does, we now have 19 of them!!  Yes, 19.  They look pretty cool.  Also he moved our generator up so he doesn't have to kill himself when he has to turn it on and off.  He built a little hut for it to muffle the sound.  It's pretty cool.  No, we still don't have any running water, or bathroom.  First we have to have the floors, so Tom has to come up with something ingenious to cut our wood into boards.  He is working on that with Logan.  Top secret!!  I'm kidding but if you ask I may have to put you into the shed until the thing is built, which can be anywhere from a week to a year, depending.  Life is great, isn't it.

Strawberries!

The generator, people!

Our army of cold frames!

Tom and I were having a discussion (we usually have that when we are "alone" in the basement) and I told him that I don't like to think outside the box.  Riotous laughter followed.  I don't know why.  He reminded me of the whole praying for adventure thing.  Why does he keep on bringing that up??  Is it my fault we are living in the sticks without water etc??  Really, I ask you.  I'm playing around, really.  No, no we don't have the whole running water thing.  Really, I think it is overrated!  Okay, okay I will try to be serious.  If you can't laugh at yourself laugh at other people (Tim Hawkins quote).  This family is blessed with a lot of togetherness.  Last night, Tom and I were trying to have a "private" discussion.  We mentioned something and Sean was discussing with us why he had to know what we were talking about.  So much for privacy!  A house without walls what I wanted.  Well, I sure got it.  Tom and I were in stitches because eagle ears was listening.  Very funny! 

I hope you are all doing well.  I leave you with a picture of our dog, now healthy again and sunbathing today in the yard.  We miss you and hope you are well.

  And also I will leave you with a comedy thing from Tim Hawkins.  He cracks me up!