7 Quick Takes! A Recap of Life in the Tiny House This Week! Tiny House Before and Afters, Minimalism Meltdown and A Little Math Humor!

1. Three years

Last month officially marked three years of us living in our tiny cottage in the woods. The kitchen is almost finished. Waiting on hubby to finish up a few minor details. Then post for it will be going up. This time of year always makes me curious to go back and look at what it used to look like around here. Are you ready to be blown away?

Here is a before and after and a couple of during photos.

This is now our dining/living

This is now the kitchen/bath

Before we started to rebuild

Before and after

After the front porch was finished

 I'm planning a room by room tour with before and after pics for everyone. There will also be videos, because some of the rooms are hard to take pictures of. A typical issue with really small houses. :)

 Looking back I can't believe we lived here through most of the renovation...or that we did almost all of it ourselves. Many prayers went up during this process. This house was a God given blessing that required a lot of elbow grease and lots of literal blood, sweat and tears. 

2. Oh the Anxiety!

 Nothing strikes more fear in a homeschooling mom/bloggers heart than a computer technology fail! Our computer has been stricken with viruses twice this year. This is the second total wipe and start over. Praise the Lord for the invention of expansion storage to save all of the school stuff and blogging/vlogging media.



The patient seems to have survived. This post is being typed on it.


3. Pumpkin carving and the great pumpkin walk!

 We went to a local pumpkin walk. They let kids come and carve pumpkins during the day, and then in the evening you get to walk through all the lighted pumpkins that are lined out through a field. The cool part to this is the fact that you get to walk through some Native American mounds that you typically have to walk around the perimeter. They had over 250 pumpkins carved and all aglow along the path. It was really neat to see. (I forgot my phone at home. No pictures.)
The funny part was hearing Anna shout "Pumpkins!!!" every 5 feet! That didn't get old after about 50 pumpkins. Nope, not at all.

We also carved pumpkins over the weekend. I did get to take pictures of that!




 4. Cinnamon sweet potato bites

 A new kid friendly post went up on the blog this week. Cinnamon sweet potato bites.
My kids love them. However, a friend told me she tried it but swapped out the sweet potato for butter nut squash. (Something I had also considered trying) Apparently it didn't going over too well. She said one of her children ran to spit it out. Guess I will be crossing that off of the 'recipes to try' list. Thanks for saving me the time S. :)

5. The season of excess has begun!

We all went out to run some errands over the weekend. We went into Menard's to pick up some items for the house and the office. Menard's is already all decked out for Christmas. Not that I am against getting a jump start on holiday shopping. (Some years I try to be finished by Thanksgiving.) I do have to say though that I will never stop being shocked by the excess and even the sheer size of the items that they sell for Christmas. What benefit will anyone ever have from a caterpillar that is over 6 feet long?

*Sigh* **Deep breaths**

My minimalism is showing.

They also had a HUGE gorilla that we thought for sure Anna would love. She is crazy for Curious George. Nope! She CRIED and wouldn't take her suspicious glare off of it until we left the aisle!



6. Odd but delicious

 Last winter our friend Sarah fed us lunch. Sarah has this knack for taking a few simple ingredients and turning it into something absolutely amazing! We decided that we are never quite sure if it is the food or the company that makes the meal so great. Probably both!
 She served us this delicious chicken noodle soup, but it had Ramen noodles(not the seasoning packet) in it. (Hers were the gluten free kind).  She said she had them and just tossed them in.

 Alex has mentioned this soup off and on since January. He has even asked for it to be on the monthly meal plan. I kind of put it off, just because it is simple and we basically always have the ingredients on hand. I think we had it once in the spring.
This week our co-op  was cancelled due to so many people being sick. Well, it turned out to be a blessing. The oldest three came down with something. Cough and cold symptoms with a low grade temp. Nothing major.

It was the perfect day for a pot of soup! I tossed our typical chicken and noodle basics in the pot, but stopped just short of putting the typical egg noddles in. I grabbed some Ramen noodles and tossed those in instead.
It can seem like an odd combination, but it goes over big with the kids. Sarah probably has no idea what she started last winter.

I made 4Qrts of soup and there wasn't a drop left by mid afternoon! Alex is already asking me to make more.

7. Say Perpendicular!

  The weather was so beautiful the last part of this week. It was really hard for some of us all of us to stay focused. We tried to power through and this is where we ended up... In fits of giggles over math terminology. We closed the books and went out to play shortly after I filmed this video. Obviously their brains were done for the day.

Hope you have a beautiful and blessed weekend!

~Lyndsay

Cinnamon Sweet Potato Bites Recipe (Paleo and Gluten Free)

A weather front moved through over the weekend. It appears to have brought fall with it. The wind has shifted. The weather has changed. Yep, winter is on its way. Slowly, but, surely.

 Seems like a good day to tell you about one of our kid friendly, healthy and gluten free (Paleo) recipes. The kids love these Cinnamon Sweet Potato Bites! With the weather cooling and most of the fall crops coming in. It is the perfect time of year to snag some delicious sweet potatoes on sale, or at the farmers market.
 We originally had this recipe at a cousins house. The one who made us try the cabbage soup. Yum! She is quite the chef. :) She made these as a side for one of our girls nights a couple of Octobers ago.

 These are super quick and easy to whip up!

We were at the office for a few minutes this morning. When we came home it was chilly but BEAUTIFUL outside. The kids opted to play outside for a little bit before returning to their school work for the day. (One of the many bonuses of homeschooling.) 

When it was time to make lunch, these were ready in less than 20 minutes. I did not intentionally time it. However, I also had some bacon in the oven with a timer set for 20 minutes. The potatoes were done by the time the bacon came out of the oven.

 Lunch in under 20 minutes?

Yes, please!


This recipe is so simple. It almost doesn't need an ingredient list and instructions. I'm a nice person though. So, here you go. ;)

Cinnamon Sweet Potato Bites

Ingredients

Sweet Potatoes, diced (Use as many as you want. I had 4 or 5 small ones on hand)
Oil  (You can use butter, olive oil, coconut oil)
Ground Cinnamon (I'm not giving you measurements. Seriously, this is just one of those recipes.)
Salt 
 

Wash and dice the sweet potatoes.

 Pre-heat oil in pan. Cook the potatoes over medium to high heat. Moving them around frequently. You cant them golden brown on all sides.

They are done when they look like this. Sprinkle on the cinnamon and salt, to taste.  

We prefer a little more cinnamon than most. It's really up to you.

These are a hit with kids. You could even put a tiny bit of honey on the side for dipping. They are still getting the health benefits from the sweet potatoes as well as the honey. 

They tend to go over fairly well with kids.

You can find another kid friendly recipe here.

 Enjoy!

~Lyndsay

7 Quick Takes! A Recap of Life in the Tiny House This Week! New Stove, Grandma's Are Magic and Why My Life is Like a Lauren Child Book!

 Welcome!

It's Friday! Woohoo! 

Oh wait, I'm a homeschooling mother to 4 kids, and I work from home.

 Why should I be excited for Friday?

 Oh, that's right!

 It's the day I fill you in on all the happenings going on here in tiny house homeschool world!

1. It's alive!!

The last few parts came in for Precious this week. Well, at least the last few to get her up and running. The amount of pride on Alex's face when it started up was priceless. She still needs a bit of work. Shortly after this picture was taken she started to leak from somewhere else.

 

Why do I get the feeling that this is the beginning to the never ending saga of keeping Precious running? I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. It's over 50 years old and  appears to have never been rebuilt until now.

2. Addison finally learned to ride her bike! 




We have been working off and on with Addison for a very long time, to teach her to ride her bike. She had some serious fears of falling off and or it going too fast. She was right on the verge of getting it, but was still afraid. Then Grandma came for a visit last Saturday. BOOM! Addison is riding her bike. Grandma apparently had that little bit of magic that gave her that final little nudge. It took Grandma five minutes to accomplish, what Dustin and I had been working on for months. Good job Grandma!
You can watch her if you would like. We took a video! It was a BIG deal. ;)

3. Out with the old. In with the new!

 Last week I shared with you about my oven dying.  I have been watching that oven die a slow and painful (for me) death since shortly after purchasing it. My frugal ways would not allow me to just go out and buy a new one. Despite the anxiety it produced while using it, day in and day out. When it did finally die I was just a bit relieved.
Then it hit me, I had to buy a new one. If you know me, and I mean really know me. I detest big purchases. Ever since we started our journey to become debt free, and even before that actually. The idea of making a large purchase makes my stomach churn. We finished our debt snowball in May of this year. We are officially debt free now! Also, apparently my buyers anxiety has went away as well. At least to an extent. (I will never be that person who loves to spend and shop without a purpose or without a need. It also helps that we strive to live on the minimalist side.)
I have never had more fun picking out an appliance. This was my first, big, post-debt purchase. It also was a zero compromise purchase. I got everything I could ever want in a stove, plus more...and it was still in the budget! Praise the Lord!
It's a self cleaning, five burner, convection oven. I think it might actually be smarter than I am. It has so many buttons and settings. I'm a bake, temp, broil kind of girl. This should be interesting.




 

















4. Taco
We have three local libraries that we frequent. They are linked together, so there is no confusion as to what book gets returned to where. *big deep sigh*
One location in particular is Anna's favorite. It has a kitchen! This child loves to play kitchen.She will spend hours bringing me random items and telling me what she made.

This is a taco!



5. The end of a season.

Emma's last cross country meet was last weekend. Her best time yet, 8:22 minute mile I'm so proud, and also so stinking happy that cross country has ended! We had zero appointments this week and have thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it.
I'm currently mentally blocking out the fact that basketball starts in two weeks. I will continue to live in blissful loose schedule land until the mass text for sign ups is sent out. 

He can't wait for ball to start!

Speaking of the end of a season. Now that cross country has ended and Addison is better, our schedule has been so open and free. We got a ton done this week! School, cleaning organizing. I had momentarily forgotten what it was like to be busy at home.
We also finally found the time to continue the twice yearly tiny house deep clean, organize and purge.  It was a good week!





6. Goofing off
We have been cutting back on eating out. Imagine the children's surprise when we grabbed them Mcd's this week. They were so happy they expressed it with cheeseburger smiles!





7. I will never, not ever, own a cat!

Sometime about a week and a half ago. This little kitty showed up on our front porch. I am typically not a cat fan. We get strays from time to time. Between the dog, the kids and the fact that we do not feed them, they go away fairly quickly. (It probably also has something to do with the blossoming coyote population. I wasn't joking when I told you we live in the woods.) 
We did the same thing with this little gal. We ignored her and expected her to head along her merry way. Nope. first she buddies up to the day. (So much for her guard dog capabilities.) 
Then the kids started petting her, and kicking around ideas for her name. I was still quite certain she was not staying.
Fast forward to this week. The cat had been absent for about a day. We assumed she had moved on. Then I get this picture from my husband.

 It appears that she managed to hitch a ride on one of our vehicles and ended up at our work. She got inside and must have spent the night in the garage. He found her on top of an ambulance engine, first thing in the morning.
The next thing I know, I have stopped everything I am doing and loaded up the kids to go get her. We are half way there before I realized "Crap. Now we own a cat!" It appears I am getting soft in my old age.
She now has a homemade cat house on the front porch, and the kids have been slipping her scraps of food. I pretend not to notice.

Yes, we own a cat now. Her name is Hobo.
(My life is starting to feel like a Lauren Child book. I will never, not ever, own a cat. Oh, wait, never mind.)

She sits right outside the window next to my desk and watches me type. As if she secretly knows I will someday like her. *facepalm*

 Happy Friday!

 ~Lyndsay

7 Quick Takes, A Recap of Life in the Tiny House This Week! The Great Trash Can Debate, Toxic Tomatoes and Why I Hate Technology

 It's Friday! 

That means it is 7 Quick Takes day! The day every week that I entertain you with the happenings of our life in the tiny house this week. There are almost no pictures this week. 

Read on to find out why.



1. Technology fail

  Anna got her hands on my phone  this week. Typically this wouldn't be an issue. However, she has recently discovered how to 'clean' things with baby wipes. She is not supposed to play with the wipes or my phone.
I left the room for a couple minutes and returned to her squeezing wipe juice onto my screen and wiping it. I took it from her and dried the screen. Didn't really think much about it. Two minutes later my phone started acting completely possessed by demons. The screen became striped (think original nintendo screen), tinted green and would randomly blink black, red and green.
I had about 2000 pictures that were not backed up. Plus as much as I hate to admit it, my life is in my phone. Phone numbers, calendar of events, schedule, school schedule, all of the links I use and even some of my writing. *Sigh* I was a little lost without it.
I'm also very frugal and do not like to have to replace my phone, even though we do have insurance on them. I dislike change and that especially includes technology.
After freaking out, slightly hyperventilating and doing all of the usual things to fix it. I said a prayer over it and put it into a bag of rice for about twelve hours. It helped some. At least enough to remove the images and some important info. Then I put it back on rice for another entire day.
Amazingly it is now fixed! No more crazy screen and it is right back to normal. Praise the Lord!
 I had already decided I would just live without a new phone and use the old back up one we keep on hand.

*That is why there are basically zero pictures from the week. 


2. Rotten tomatoes

We visit our beloved local farm stand often.  The owner of the stand is named Tricia. We love Tricia.
Last week were gifted some tomatoes from a lady at homeschool co-op. We also visited Tricia on the same day that we received the tomatoes from co-op. 
Somewhere in the mix of the influx of tomatoes and the craziness of co-op day... (Co-op day is SO CRAZY!)  tomato was lost in the shuffle. I of course was oblivious to this until yesterday (the next week's co-op day.) It was late afternoon and we were at cross country practice. I kept smelling something strange. Addison was hanging in the car with me and helped to hunt down the smell. It wasn't the baby, I checked her twice. It wasn't a lost sippy cup, or a stray fast food bag.  Nope, none of the usual offenders. Plus we had just cleaned out the van earlier in the week.

It was this lost tomato. 

 Since I'm pretty sure most of the people we socialize with outside of homeschooling already find us strange, un-socialized and slightly weird...I decided to wait until after we got home to deal with it. They already stopped practice last week to watch Anna screaming and watch me throw a carseat out of the van and peel out of the parking lot in my haste to get Anna to the Dr said. They didn't need to see me removing toxic waste from my mini van also. 


It was organic, but I still felt it wouldn't have gone over very well.



3. Lots and lots of painting!  

Dustin finished putting up the wainscotting over the weekend. I also started painting. It is looking really good! I still have hours of painting to do this coming weekend. Dustin is also putting the final coat of grout on the backsplash. It is coming together. We can not wait for it to be finished and I can not wait to make a post about it for you all to see!


4. We walked in circles all week

In the process of finishing the kitchen and making space for some really neat shelving. (AHH!!! I'm so excited about the shelving!)  We moved the trash can out of the kitchen. I am a firm believer that there are two types of people in the world. Those who strongly believe trash cans should not be in the kitchen, and those who don't really care. Dustin is one of those people who really feels strongly about it. I, being the person who does most of the cooking, prefer to have it in the kitchen. It has been a frequent topic of conversation at our house for the last 15+ years.
Well, Dustin finally won the discussion and the trash can has been moved to the utility room. Mainly out of lack of space for it in the kitchen, because of the shelving! EEK THE SHELVING!!! **Can you tell I'm excited?**

The trash can had stayed in basically the same place since we moved in three years ago. It has maybe moved three feet as the kitchen has been renovated and finished. Now it was a good 10-12 feet in the opposite direction.
I am not even joking when I tell you that most of us walked in circles half the week, looking bewildered and carrying an arm load of trash. Emma and I especially struggled. We are the main cleaners and chefs in the house. There was even a moment where someone (it was me) threw an egg yolk and shell in the general direction of where the trash can used to be.
I am positive that I took no less than 1000 extra steps a day trying to find that darn trash can all week!

5. One of the reasons why I love being married to a diesel/mechanic technician

We recently opened a new business location in our new town. It is going well and Dustin is so much happier working for himself again. It is also nice having him closer to home. He used to over a two hour commute each day. Now he is less than ten minutes away.
My favorite perk of him being so close by, I can have him look at my van any time it starts to make weird noises or do strange things. Which is what happened yesterday. He is so great. He stops everything he is doing to take a look.
 

If he happens to ask though, my favorite perking is seeing him more and having lunch with him a couple times a week. ;)

6. Handicrafts

 Our homeschool has a strong Charlotte Mason approach. Part of that is every child learning a handicrafts. The kids each pick a few to try each year. They also have to complete a project from each topic they choose.
The girls are easy. They love to bake, sew, crochet etc. We are even trying pottery this fall!
 Alex is a little more difficult to find a thing for him. I am requiring that he work on cooking. He is also helping his Dad with Precious. We are still looking for another couple of things for him to try.
That being said, Alex has done a very good job at coming up with ideas that he wants to include in the handicraft that are definitely in fact not a handicraft. Such as, Minecraft, Xbox, etc.
We'll find one for him.

7. At least he is still proud to be married

It has been a long standing joke in our house that Dustin can not remember birthdays or anniversaries. He is usually good to remember the month the child was born, or at least the season. I guess I can't blame him, there are a lot of them. I even get a little tripped up sometimes.
He doesn't post much on social media but posted this. I think it was so sweet. I'm so glad he still loves me enough to post it on social media..but I couldn't help but laugh.

Either way, he's still a keeper.

Happy Friday!

~Lyndsay

7 Quick Takes, A Recap of Life in The Tiny House This Week! Tooth Fairy Fail, Shockingly Accurate Emoji's and Meet Precious

 It's Friday! 

That means it is 7 Quick Takes day! The day every week that I entertain you with the happenings of our life in the tiny house this week. 

It might be funny (It tends to be funny), entertaining or down right bizarre! But that's why you keep coming back to read it..because no one wants to read about boring. 

The scary part? All of it is true. Yes. Our lives really are this ridiculous, goofy and weird. Every. Single. Day.

Welcome to our tiny little part of the world. Pull up a chair, but wipe it off first...because it is probably sticky...Everything is always sticky.



1. Tooth Fairy Fail

I have never been great with the whole tooth fairy thing. My children are convinced that she is a busy, frazzled, unorganized, disheveled and forgetful little fairy. She tends to forget their tooth for a night or two. She sometimes neglects to collect their teeth and she even sometimes makes an appearance after they have gotten up in the morning.

I told you I was bad at this. Really, really bad. That being said, this is about Addison, age 6.

She has managed to LOSE two teeth. Not lose in the 'Yay! I lost my tooth!'kind of way.

No. No. We are talking 'Mom, My mouth feels funny. I was picking and eating apples and now there is this weird space.'

AND

While eating popcorn this week 'Mom, I lost my tooth. But I think I ate it.'

Yes. She has lost/eaten two teeth in the matter of a two month period!  
(I have considered googling the possible dietary repercussions, but I'm not sure I want to know.)

The tooth eating situation has made the fairy visits a bit more complicated. Addison resorted to making teeth out of paper. The fairy remembered the paper the first time. The second time, not so much. I told her the tooth fairy emailed me and told her to just hang onto it for the next time around. She efficient like that. 
Yes, our tooth fairy has an email address. She is a busy little thing and is sometimes up to three days behind on her email and tooth pick up. I told you I was bad at this! 

Also, for those who are curious. Our fairy is old school. She pays out $1 per tooth. Anyone who tells my children differently are subject to inflicted injury.  Seriously people, who ever came up with the idea of paying $5-20 per tooth?! 

2. First Week of School


 

School started at the tiny house this week. This year we have a 6th, 4th and 1st grader. Plus a fun filled and spunky toddler. So she has to be kept busy, organized and on schedule.
The first week went well. Everyone was very worn out by our last day.(They are currently still sleeping while I type this at 8:15 am)  This year's school curriculum has seen a lot if changes. Good changes, but a lot of new things to adjust to. They all handled it well and have been rising to the challenge. We are all excited to see how much we learn and grow this year.  
I know that a lot of families take the super relaxed, sleep until 10, do school in your pajamas route. That was us at one point in time, but now there are just too many kids in older grades to be so relaxed.

Everyone is up, dressed, morning chores, and breakfast by 7:45. School starts at 8. There's a lot to learn this year. Structure is necessary.
That being said. We still have a lot of fun!
We do fun science experiments, go on field trips and laugh a lot. Structure doesn't necessarily mean strict.

Here are a couple of pictures from our first week. The big excitement was for Addison. She earned an A+ on her first ever spelling test.

3. County Fair



We have lived in our new town for almost 3 years now. We love our new town. This was the first time we went to the County Fair.
We all enjoyed it. Dustin goes for the food. Funnel cakes, steak sandwiches, lemonade, elephant ears, Italian sausages, pizza, French fries...you get the idea. It was a real treat for the kids and the husband.

I fell in love with the barns and exhibits. It was laid out well. At least compared to our old town. I was quite impressed. (We bled green for 4H when I was a kid. So, my fun version of the fair is the exact opposite of my husband.)

The kids convinced us to let them ride some rides. The oldest three are adventurous and love anything that spins. They went on this at least twice.

 

 They played some games...which I was a bit disappointed by. Apparently you win a prize every time, even if you suck. Yep, that's what our world has come to. It's sad. Basically it worked like this, pay $3-5 and they hand you a fidget spinner. Rant over.




Anna rode a pony ride and walked with me through all of the exhibit buildings. Plus it took me a little while but I found my happy place. The rabbit and poultry barn!



Over all, we really like our new county Fair. I Definitely see us attending again in the future.

4. Park Day

We went to the park with some friends one afternoon this week. We visited the biggest park in our town. We hadn't been there in a while. We tend to be park hoppers.
The oldest kids ran off to be wild and free and we played with the littles and chatted for a while. It was good for the kids and the moms. The only thing missing was some iced coffee.

* The older boys couldn't be troubled by standing still for pictures. They were far too busy for that.*

5. Fun Science

Have you ever microwaved Ivory Soap?!

It is so much fun!
 It is of course a science experiment and there is actual science behind it. However, the best part is what actually happens when you do microwave it.
You can find the science behind it here.
You can also read about the happy accident that created Ivory Soap, here.
Here are the pictures from our experiment.
The kids really enjoyed this one!

 

If you homeschool or even if you don't....you should consider giving this a try!

 











6. A Shockingly Accurate Emoji

Poor Addison. She has had a bit of a rough summer. She caught some strange 'Scarlet fever like' virus along with poison ivy. Lots of meds including steroids.
She managed to get poison ivy two other times. Bad enough for meds. She is a tad bit allergic to poison ivy.
Last month I noticed she had picked up a fungus on her thumb nails. We've been treating that.
Two weeks ago I found one really swollen lymph node on her neck. Apparently she had three very large lymph nodes. Yet another trip to the Dr to find out she has 'Cat Scratch Fever'. Yes. Not only did they make a song about it, but it is actually a real thing. More medicines and a new med for her fingernail.

She is tired of all this and so am I. She has however enjoyed picking out the Band-aids to cover her finger nail. Her most recent choice was themed Emojis.

As much as I do not get into all of the recent fads. This one pretty much sums up how we feel right now.


I am officially in the market for an Addison sized germ bubble.


7. His Precious

A couple weeks ago this conversation took place between Dustin and I.




*He never did reply back with the cost to fix it.*
 
Of course you can imagine that this rather interesting  and slightly frightening creation is now parked in the office garage.
Alex and Dustin are starting work on it tomorrow.
It has since been dubbed 'Precious' and it has stuck. Even the toddler is saying it. The kids are not up to date on why it is funny, but have played along. We have shown them the short video clips, but have decided that it just doesn't do it justice.




A Lord of the Rings binge watch is scheduled for the first rainy weekend in September.

Raising them right. ;)

For those of you who understand why this is funny. I have included the clip. Just because. It made me a little sad to realize that there is now an entire generation of kids who know nothing about this. Not because we are that into Lord of The Rings, but because it mad me feel SO OLD!

Happy Friday!

~Lyndsay