Acquire

We had competitive games of Acquire back when I was in high school.  I remember my brother Denny winning too much, but I haven't played with him in years.  He'd probably still beat me.  Anyway, the few times we played with Kylen, he was too young to do well.  He got in the mood to try again during Thanksgiving break and did great!  Having an excellent memory is a huge asset, which isn't my strong point.  I managed to win the first game but completely bombed the second.  This is an excellent educational game for teaching children about stocks, and it's not difficult to learn.

What We've Been Up To

I didn't do an October update, because that month was pretty quiet.  It was mostly filled with the usual activities, primarily school-related.  November, on the other hand, was just the opposite!  We enjoyed several opportunities for getting together with family and friends.  Greg got nine days home for Thanksgiving (using three vacation days), which we loved.  Of course, it went by way too fast. We did things like:

Work on outside Christmas lights . . .

 

Or more correctly, GREG and KYLEN worked on lights.  Kylen has formally been initiated into the "Outside Christmas Lights Crew," and you know, once you're in . . . you're in for life!  Meanwhile, I worked on creating Christmas gifts:

 

 

I've gotten faster at making digital scrapbooks, but they still require a lot of creative energy and need to be spread out over several sessions.  I also made a couple of calendars for family and have other books started that probably won't make it for the holiday season.  They'll be great birthday gifts!

 

We got in plenty of games!

 

 

Greg took advantage of every spare second for his computer projects.  Kylen looked at books and played video games; I read aloud.  It was a great month!  There are a few more posts I'd like to do on November happenings before moving on to December.  :-)

Jesus Video

Touching . . .



http://www.jesusfilm.org/
http://www.jesusfilmmissiontrips.org/

The Fatherless

We just finished listening to a message about caring for orphans that I very much enjoyed.  Click here.  It's titled "God Loves the Fatherless" on 10/6/13.  After selecting the message, click the play button on the screen.  :-)

Vermont ~ Corn Fritters

Kylen LOVED these corn fritters, similar to cornmeal cakes or johnnycakes.  Johnnycakes were originally called "journey cakes," because they were small and easily portable.  I saw a recipe that called for fresh corn scraped from the cob, but I decided to try an easier version with canned cream-style corn.

Corn Fritters

4 cups vegetable oil for deep-frying or enough to pan fry

1 can cream-style corn
1egg
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar

Optional toppings: maple syrup, jam, or powered sugar
 
Heat oil in a medium sized pot on medium-high heat. In a small bowl, mix together the cream-style corn and egg. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. Add the corn mixture to the dry ingredients; mix until just blended.

Drop batter 1/8 cup at a time into the hot oil. Fry until golden brown, turning once if the fritters don't turn over by themselves. Drain fritters on paper towels, and serve with desired toppings.

Happy Veteran's Day!

Kylen was a little creeped out when we were doing Latin and Greek roots this afternoon, and their example of a holiday was Veteran's Day.  It really was quite a coincidence!  We aren't on a schedule with that curriculum and just happened to be learning the Greek word "holos," from which we get "holiday."

Norman Rockwell is one of my favorite painters of Americana.  His ability to capture personality and evoke emotion amazes me.  I decided to look up some of his military pictures and was surprised by how many there were.  I decided to post a few.  We are grateful for our veterans and their families, for the risks they took and the sacrifices they made in order to serve.

 

Captured by Digital Age

Soap, Candy Corn, and Space

What do these three things have in common?  Here's a video that uses candy corn in space to explain how soap works!

Halloween '13

Instead of adding to our costume collection, we decided to get everything out and have a little "fashion show" in the basement.  Kylen came up with a silly mishmash of uncoordinated pieces.  Greg put his costume together as well, although he tried to pick things that matched.  I wore my regular clothes with the addition of a wig.  We are getting fewer trick-or-treaters each year, but my siblings and our friends always stop by.  It's tons of fun getting to see how they dress up.  :-)

 

 

Click here to see Greg's take on last year's Halloween.  :-)

Pumpkins

I wasn't sure we'd carve pumpkins this year, but Greg and Kylen gave the go-ahead.  We had a TERRIBLE time figuring out what to do with them!  All of us kept making suggestions that were rejected by the others.  We finally settled on a chess theme.  After finding silhouettes on the computer, enlarging and printing them out (Greg cringed at the wasted black ink), we used them as a reference for our freehand drawings.  We cut out the bottoms like last year and used white paper to keep from seeing the lights inside through the large holes.  They looked so much better in real life than in the picture!  Naturally, Greg's was the king, mine the queen, and Kylen's the knight.