I was taught by my grandmother the importance of good table manners. Ok so maybe I didn't see the importance, but the lessons stuck. I can't stand when people chew with their mouths open, and even worse is talking with your mouth full, and burping at the table, or any other bodily functions is a definite no go! Other manners I'm less picky about, but still feel it's important for my children to know, things like asking for items to be passed, instead of reaching across the table, saying please and thank you, and eating with elbows off the table. I became a member of pinterst a while back, and through that stumbled upon a blog that talked about using a piggy to reinforce table manners. The basic gist of it is, who ever uses bad table manners gets the piggy set in front of them, the child with the piggy at the end of the meal is in charge of clearing off the table, washing it down, and rinsing the dishes. Well I don't have a piggy, but we do have a little Yorkie figurine, so it became our table manner mascot. If you have porky yorkie at the end of the meal, you have table clearing duty. If no one gets porky yorkie then everyone is responsible for rinsing their own plates, and whoever has evening dish duty is responsible for wiping down the table. It has worked wonders, within a week we saw huge improvements in table manners. No one likes getting the porky yorkie!
The Porkie Yorkie...dreaded table guest
M looks thrilled about getting it doesn't he?
As I said, no one wants to have the porkie yorkie visit their plate, poor M's brothers watched their manners so they wouldn't get it moved over to them, so he got the job of clearing the table! Of course in our new home, we don't have space for a dining room, or even a kitchen table, but that is no excuse for lack of family meal time, or poor table manners!
First I have to mention how wonderful two of our friends from Akiak have been since we arrived. Julie and Beth have made this transition so much easier! Beth has driven up from Anchorage three times now to help haul us from the airports, and help haul our stuff with her truck, and then again to help us pick up beds! Julie kept her promise and made sure we had not just one six pack but two six packs of Alaska Ale for our first day here, and thanks to her son and daughter-in-law we also have a twin bed frame for E's room, and the Queen size bed for ours! Most of our time, since we have arrived, has been spent trying to get acquainted with our new town, and trying to find furniture for our home.
Of course we also had to put a bit of furniture together, before O arrived I bought a cheap t.v. stand and a computer desk, A helped me build both, and then M wanted to help out with the t.v. stand. I think he figured the quicker we got it done, the quicker he could plop his behind in front of it! We had a bar-b-que for O's 41st birthday (wow hard to believe we are getting that old, where did our 20's go?), poor O had to spend the day picking up beds. Thanks to two friends from Akiak, Julie and Beth, we were able to get beds for everyone in one day!
Julie invited us over for the day last week, and what a wonderful day it was! We spent it up at Big Lake, and the boys all had a blast! Her grandsons are absolutely adorable!
Views from two different angles of the lake
The boys spent more time in the paddle boat then they did actually swimming, they absolutely loved it!
Apparently Julie's grandson loves to pick lily pad flowers. I had never seen one in person and found them to be so beautiful and strange!
Another favorite activity, swimming around on the raft, which happens to have a clear window so they could float and watch life under the water. The water was so clear in the lake you could see the bottom!
W got his first trip in a canoe, A taught him how to paddle it and they enjoyed some time away from the younger kids.
Of course where there are kids, there must be snacks, Julie provided some super yummy juice pops, and Capri suns,and we provided apples, bananas, and some not so healthy koolaid bottles...I was so impressed with all the kids, they behaved very well, and they all had so much fun playing together! It was an amazing day..and to finish the amazing day, we got another amazing beautiful ride home
Yeah, life is pretty sweet right now! I get to stare at mountains everywhere I go! Have I mentioned lately how beautiful Alaska is? Every state has it's beauty, but there is definitely something special here!
So on to news about the new blog. Mostly I will be posting about life with my crew, but I will also be sharing some new things we are trying, and will let you know how well they work for my crew. Take into account, I am in a household of Alpha's, with maybe the exception of D, all my children, every single one of the seven, all want to be leaders. That means they don't take orders well, and they do love to boss each other around. It also means changing behaviors is rather challenging. They are stubborn, but so am I. I love my alpha children, and I know they are all going to do amazing things in life, but it is a challenge raising them. I've been asked a lot recently how I can be so patient. Well I'm not, patience has never been something I am good at, but my stock answer is; "I asked God to give me patience, so he gave me seven strong-willed children!" I do the best I can, and often I don't feel like it's enough. I am always looking for opportunities to teach and guide. On that note, we are starting some new ideas I have picked up recently, and I have already started a few, and am excited to report that the first, the Porky Yorkie, is a huge success. I will post details about it in another separate post. I will also share some favorite recipes that I have created, or found and let you know the families rating on them, as well as how easy or fast they are. In short I'll experiment, and hopefully you will benefit from my failures and success! I am also planning on posting weekly, I would promise to, but my Grandma would say that is a pie crust promise, easily made and easily broken. Instead I will just promise to do my best at keep this sight up to date!
We are officially now members of the Wasilla community. We have all finally arrived safe and sound. Our house is still fairly bare, but we do all have a bed to sleep on now, and a couch to sit on in the living room. Of course there is a long way to go, to making this house home, but my family is here, and that's the most important first step! I'm sure you are all dying to see photos of the house.. and silly me, I took a ton, and none of the outside structure..outside yard, the view from our back porch.. all there, but the outside of the house..I'll have to post that one up later...
We'll start with the downstairs, this is of course our living room, the first floor has the kitchen, living room, J's bedroom, and office space, which will hold my doll collection...yeah they can finally come out of the closet!
It's small in the matter of cabinet space, and there is only one drawer.. but do you all see what I see...Yep you guessed it a GAS STOVE!!! Oh yeah, and there's a dishwasher too... Notice the chinese take out cartons.. oh yeah we can order delivery again!
One full bathroom downstairs, J has officially declared this bathroom off limits to any boys under the age of 18, unless they are a guest. She told the boys, if they use it, they clean it.. they have happily been trotting upstairs to use that bathroom LOL!
J's room this was taken before the room was repainted, it is now white. She plans on going with a white and black theme, and I have found some awesome photos that will look great in here! I can't wait to show you all these rooms after we get them decorated and furniture in them!
The office, it's a tiny room, no closet. but it's perfect for me to use for my doll display!
No M, we want to go upstairs for the tour, not slide down the stairs...that's your new favorite method of transportation!
This would be M and D's room.. in the process of being repainted, I haven't taken a photo since the landlord finished painting it.. it was really pink before...
See around the door.. yeah I meant it really really pink! They have two full size closets, each of the rooms have huge closets, except for W's room...he's not too unhappy, he hates hanging up clothes!
Our bedroom is right across from D and M's room, the door to the left of the photo leads into the upstairs bath, and those wonderful closet doors are all Mine! O has his own closet in the room!
Our new bed thanks to Julie Kelly's son and daughter-in-law, we are sleeping on a wonderful queen size bed, with the best mattress I've slept on in two years, my back is really thanking them.. oh and this was before our pillows arrived...
W's room, he has a room with a view, out his windows are a terrific view of the mountains...but of course in exchange for this view.. he has a smaller bedroom, and no closet
A's room...it was going to be M's room so we left it green, because M begged us to. After a few nights of M and D being in separate rooms they decided they would rather share a room. Now that it's A's room that will have to be painted white, since he too wants a black and white bedroom...
E's room.. not a very good shot of the room.. but a great shot of the color purple it was, it's now white.
A view from our back porch.. some days you see more of the mountains then others, this day they were somewhat fuzzy.
Finally our backyard, Landlord is going to get someone out to brush hog it, but the kids were thrilled when they found moose poop in it! I just love all the trees around our property!
So that concludes the tour for now....and I will tell you more about what I plan to do with this blog, as well as what we have been up to the last couple of weeks in the next post..Thanks for stopping by!
