Math Basics

I've explained to Joey how much easier math is when you have all the basic operations memorized. It's like being able to sight read a large number of words. And the only way to get good at either of these things is practice. (As you can tell, we don't unschool around here... not yet anyway.)

And, not surprisingly, anytime I ask her to practice her math facts she balks.

Until we started playing with these...



You can do this with regular dice, but you'll only get practice with 1 thru 6. These are role playing dice for Dungeons and Dragons. I'm guessing you can get them at comic book shops.

We've come up with a couple of games and I'm sure there are many more to be discovered.

Game 1- Each person takes two dice and, on the count of three, they toss them. As fast as they can, each person shouts out the sum of the dice (or the product or difference, depending on the game). You can make it more difficult by tossing 3 (or 4) dice each.

Game 2- One person rolls two dice where the other person can't see. Then they say, "The sum of these dice is X and the product is XX." The second person then figures out what the two dice are or, to make it slightly more difficult, they figure out the difference between them.

Tricot du Coeur

Back in November, I joined up with Tricot du coeur as both a sponsor and a participant.


(This is a sample of what I'm donating as a sponsor, though I haven't finished what I'm donating as a participant.)

Tricot du coeur is working to make blankets for Victory Junction, which provides a camp environment for kids with chronic medical conditions, such as arthritis, asthma, cancer, epilepsy, hemophilia, immunology deficiencies/HIV, sickle cell disease, spina bifida, gastrointestinal disease, heart disease, kidney disease, liver disease, neurological disease, skin disease, burn survivors, cystic fibrosis, diabetes, autism, craniofacial anomalies, physical disabilities, kids on vents, transverse myelitis.

The kids get to take home the blankets at the end of their time at the camp, so Victory Junction obviously needs many of them. They could use either quilts or afghans (quilted or crocheted). The necessary dimensions are here. They also ask that the blankets be made in bright colors and from yarn that can easily go through the washing machine.

If you want to qualify to win some super prizes, leave a comment over at Tricot du coeur, make one blanket (or 5) and send it to...

Blanket Project
2505 Caralea Valley Drive
Concord, NC, 28027

The shipping due date is March 30th. My guess is that you should include your name and email in the package so they can contact you about the prizes.

A Little Project

Since we keep worm bins in our basement, we save most of our kitchen waste (except meat and dairy) for them. The majority of it goes directly into a huge container that we keep in the fridge until feeding time, but I prefer to do the eggshells differently. It works so much better if I dry them first (which means nothing more than leaving them in their containers and sticking them in the garage) and then crushing them at a later date.

And even if you don't do any type of composting, this might still be a good project for you. Just sprinkle the crushed shells directly around your garden. The calcium they contain is especially helpful for fighting blossom end rot in tomatoes.



Sometimes I crush them with a little flat mallet thingy and other times I toss them in the food processor.

I hadn't done this in a really long time, and recently decided that I ought to, after my life was imperiled by a toppling tower of saved egg cartons.



In case you don't want to count, that's 29 dozen eggs.

This is what it's like to live with the crazy that is me.

Note- I did eventually get around to reusing some of these cartons like Green Bean challenged me in the comments.
Homemade Firestarters

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Related Posts-
Worm Composting (1)- Setting Up the Bed
Worm Composting (2)- Some Other Thoughts
Worm Composting (3)- Harvesting The Castings
Worm Composting (4)- Troubleshooting
Why You Need Worm Poo

My Non-New Year's Resolution

On Steve Pavlina's blog I recently read about the idea of trying something new (like starting a new positive habit or breaking an old negative one) for the entire month of January. The concept is that you use every ounce of willpower you have to keep up this new habit for 30 days. You can tell yourself it's not forever, just this one month.

By the end, the short term change can become a long term one that is easier to keep up.

I'm not really one for New Year's Resolutions, but as I read this article a couple of things kept popping into my head. The first was that I'd like to do yoga every day. The second is that I would like to get back to my morning ritual (tea, candle, short meditation) and have breakfast with the family. At the table. Together.



I know these things seem somewhat incongruous, but really, they are activities that I enjoy and, more importantly, activities that help me feel grounded. They are also things that I used to do regularly, but not so much lately. As my life expands to include more and more activities, I often find myself heading in 5 directions at once. Which really is my natural state and I've learned to be OK with it.

But, if I don't have some sort of solid foundation beneath (and within) me, it's just chaos and I don't really accomplish anything (though I'm still always busy- busily accomplishing nothing). When I do have that grounding, all of my random movements tend to coordinate somehow, to result in something that, ultimately, I knew I was creating, but just wasn't quite aware of at the time.

I don't need to (or like to) logically plan out my actions, I just need to access my intuition. And being grounded helps me with that.

Lately, I've been feeling anything but grounded. I've stopped doing yoga because almost every time I do it, I spend the entire time thinking how many other things I should also be doing. So, I either stop half way through to start a load of laundry and do dishes or I just don't come back to it the next day. It isn't until my lower back starts to hurt and I'm exhausted by the end of every day that I realize that I have to make time for yoga.

Taking the time in the morning to start things, the same way, day after day… well, it just helps. It keeps me from hitting the ground running. It slows me down just a bit, which, I guess, is what I'm after. And doing yoga feels fantastic. It's a moving meditation that I really enjoy. The more often I do it, the easier it is to fall into the simple awareness of the moment.

This is me reaching. This is me balancing. This is me breathing.

This is me.

Cheaper Planting in an AeroGarden

A year ago, Jeff bought me an AeroGarden for Christmas. It's great in the winter, when we can't grow anything outside. When I asked for it, it was with the idea that I could grow herbs cheaper than I could buy them in the grocery store. But, at $24 a kit (7 grow plugs and fertilizer), not to mention the original price of the entire unit ($150), I'm pretty sure we're not getting our money's worth.



Anyway, a week or so ago, Jeff mis-gave (or Joey mis-understood) instructions for adding the fertilizer. She added 6 tablets instead of the necessary 2. We realized what happened the next morning when the herbs were all wilted and sad looking.

So, Joey and I went to the local hydroponics store and bought GroMagnon 9-15-18 at the clerk's suggestion. It came in a 1 lb container for about thirteen bucks. We mixed a weak solution (1/2 teaspoon per gallon) and replaced all the water with it.

However, not all of the herbs survived the ordeal. Thinking of the empty slots and the crazy price of another kit, I decided to use something other than the AeroGarden approved plugs and fertilizer (Gasp!). I took pictures of the process, but really it's hardly worth showing. It's so simple. (As usual, you can click the pictures to see them bigger in Flickr.)

-After growing the first set of herbs that came with the unit, I saved the dome lids and plastic things that hold the sponges.
-I removed and threw out the sponges and old plant/roots (and then washed the plastic things).

-Mixed up the fertilizer solution in a big container clearly marked 'Fertilizer'. (Making sure that I keep this out of the reach of little children.) I now use this to fill the reservoir.
-Cut a piece of pantyhose to fit down in the plastic thing, with an inch or two hanging out over the top.

-Filled with previously expanded coconut fiber. (I already had this stuff for use in my worm bin and was excited to see that they sell it at the hydroponic store.) This stuff needs to be well packed down in there to create a firm base for the plants' roots.

-I made sure that the end of the nylons were tucked over and down under the lip of the plastic thing. Then I put it down in the hole, turning till it sat firmly.

-Poured a bit of water onto it from the top (this is to help speed the capillary action and won't be necessary later)
-Planted a few seeds.
-Covered with the dome.
-Removed dome when seeds sprouted.

Just make sure to use well washed pantyhose that don't have holes in them and to keep any stray coconut fiber from finding its way into the reservoir, as it would probably mess up the pump.

So, I'm sure that the AeroGarden people won't be thrilled that I did this to mine (though I can't possibly be the first person to do this), but like Make Magazine says, "Void Your Waranty".

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Added Update- It did work pretty well, other than the fact that it got sort of moldy. Fashioning an opaque guard would work to block out the light and stop that. I've thought of making one out of plastic (maybe from a cleaned yogurt cup or something similar). Guess I need to give it another try, but I normally only pull this thing out during the winter.

My other bit of advice is to start all the seeds at once, otherwise some of them are too far away from the lights while others are growing right up against them.

Kill Your TV, or at least turn it down

We have been doing NOTHING around here lately. Like, really and truly, nothing. When our family visited on New Year's, Jeff and I cooked from scratch (me- chili, Jeff- Boston Cream Pie) but that's about it.

I won't bore you with the details of the nothingness, but suffice it to say that it has involved way too much TV. I discovered Heroes, a show which I never saw when it aired, but Sean (our oldest) got on DVD for Christmas. I watched the entire 16 1/2 hours of the first season in about 3 days. I am not proud of this fact, but, there it is. (That show is like a soap opera, but with more interesting problems. The characters aren't very well developed, but they're likable.)

So, if your family has been lounging around in front of the TV like ours and you'd like to unstick everybody (or at least help with their reading skills), maybe this little trick will work…

Mute the volume and display the closed captioning. I used to do this all the time when the kids were younger. It works best when they're early readers, though I did start doing it long before Joey could read.

This does one of either two things…
-They become better readers.
-They choose to turn off the TV and do something else.

For my kids, I think it did a little bit of both.

Of course, you could get rid of the TV completely. Which is exactly what Jeff and I have been talking about doing.

Wish us luck if we go that route. We may have a full scale riot on our hands.

Hangover Cure

Anybody feel like this today?



Me, not so much, but there have been days that I would have paid a lot for that recipe.