Oh, You are just a stay at home mom?

 A post came across my Facebook page today that kind of pushed my buttons. I have heard a thousand times how lucky I was to be a “stay at home mom and not have to go to work”. It was a far cry from “not go to work”. I didn’t have to go OUT to work until the kids were either in bed or just about ready for bed. We owed the local bar, the Corner Tavern. Many evenings hubby would call and say, “I am busy, I need help, call a sitter” and off I would go. Sometimes till closing time which was 2 a.m. And I had to get up with the four girls around 7. All of this after a very busy day at home. I made most all of my daughters and mine clothes, usually sewing at nap time or in the evening after the girls were in bed. We had a big garden and I did a lot of canning. Was a bit OCD back then, too. Thought I had to have a house as clean as the Brady Bunch. Except I had no Alice. One benefit of that was I stayed thin. Many a day I ate a peanut butter sandwich while I vacuumed. Don’t get me wrong. It was nice to be able to be with the girls when they were little. And I wouldn’t change that for anything. Besides, I didn’t realize how busy I was till years later. You know the old saying “You do what you have to do”. We sold the corner when the girls got involved with school activates and our regular bartender had kids and needed the same time off for the same reasons. And about that same time we gave up coaching little league softball. Yes, we did that, too, during the summer. Very busy life. After we sold the Corner and hubby went to work for REM, a residential home for the mentally handicapped, I thought life would be slower. But I was wrong. I took on around 8–10 daycare kids to make up for the difference in income. Now you talk about busy. Had most kids from 7:30-5:00, 5 days a week. And then people would say, “you just babysit?” Never sat on a baby in my life was my usual response. And now? Daycare experience would make a coupe two or three posts. Will save that for another time when I am on my soap box. For now, I am loving retirement.

If you want to read the article that put me on my soapbox you can read it by following this link;

4BoysMother- Melissa Fenton, Writer

Have a good day and take care,

Rose

No homework?? WOW! Just a thought.

Hope all of you had a good weekend. It was the last weekend before School starts. Today is the first day of school for most the schools in our area of Iowa. By the end of the week, school will be in session in the whole state. A lot of kids will be happy to get back into a routine and to see friends they haven’t seen during the summer. And most parents will be glad, too.

Most colleges started the fall semester, too. We have grandsons returning and a granddaughter just starting her college days. Where has the time gone? Not only the summer but the years. Seems like only yesterday they were all in elementary school. In a couple of years our youngest grandchild, our baby, will be in college, too.

We spent the weekend with one of our daughters and her family. All but one of their kids were able to join us for dinner on Sunday. It was nice to spend time with them and catching up on their lives. Anyway, I was catching up with social media this morning while having my coffee and came across this article. I thought it was something a lot of teachers should read. I know a lot of parents and students will like the idea. After all the kids spend a lot of time in school each day, seven hours usually and that isn’t counting travel time, and homework can be overkill. Definitely something to think about.

We are having beautiful fall like weather. Hope you are, too. Enjoy.

Rose

Second-grade teacher's unique homework policy goes viral

"But How Do They Learn To Read?"

This came across my screen this morning. I found it to be a very interesting article. Decided to share it with you. Just click on the link below the picture.

"But How Do They Learn To Read? 

Rainy August morning, love it or leave it.

Good morning. It is a rainy day here in my little corner of the world. A nice beautiful rain. I have my coffee, my morning music, life is good. I love when the weather starts getting fall like. Autumn is my favorite time of the year. I would guess we will have some hot days yet before it is officially fall. But the next 10 day sure sounds like fall. Highs in the lower 70’s and lowers in the upper 50”s. I think it would be nice to live somewhere with those temps year round. Wonder where that might be?

Another thing about rainy days for me, I get motivated. I don’t know if it is the cooler weather that comes with rain or what, but I get very ambitious. I have a friend who is the exact opposite, she gets moody and depressed. She thinks I am crazy and I in return thinks she is. To each their own.

I will enjoy the rain while it falls then I think I will dust our bedroom and do the bedding. Oh, and defrost the freezer.

Hope you are able to enjoy your day, too.

Rose

View out my sunroom this morning.,

Perfect weather for Corn not so much for humans.

Has it been hot where you are? It has been awful here in Iowa. And where from 100 to 110 heat index. Sounds like it has been this hot almost all over our country. I guess it is to be expected for July but that doesn’t mean we have to like it.  Today has been pretty nice. We are going to have a few days break before it heats back up. Anyway, we had some bushes that needed trimmed to make lawn mowing easier and cut back on some of the weed eating.  We couldn’t believe how tall the corn had gotten in the past week. This heat and humidity is just what corn likes. We have been getting a half an inch to an inch of rain every 10 days or so. Perfect weather for corn. I would say the farmer who owns the corn will be having a bumper crop again this year.

I decided to take a picture of the field with my hubby in front of it for height reference. He is 5’8”. Of course he claims he is 5’10’’. Can’t convince him two back surgeries and aging has taken a couple of inches from him. Oh well. But getting him to be serious for pictures is almost impossible. When we did a family picture and pictures at two granddaughters’ weddings, I “preached” to him for days to be serious. Or as serious as possible for him. Never a dull moment with him. Got to love him.

Stay cool, if you can.

Rose

First Dutch Elm, now Emerald Ash Borer

Emerald Ash Borer has been found in our area of Iowa. Over time all the ash trees will be gone. Years ago (1969) another disease got all our trees. We had only lived in our house about three years when the Dutch Elm took all our trees. Our whole town was hit hard. I am guessing just about 85% of the trees in town were Elm. The shady yard that was a draw for us to this house was gone. Every tree on our property was an Elm. Over the years, little by little, I replanted 12 plus trees. Twelve are still here and only two of them are ash. When my shade disappeared I took advantage of the all the sun and got busy planting perennials that loved sun. I was new at gardening and didn’t even consider what would happen when all my trees grew. Besides that was years down the road. I couldn’t afford big trees so the ones I planted were mere sticks. Well those “sticks” grew and I had to do something with all my sun loving perennials. I moved them to the lone sunny area in our yard. When you plants too many trees, you find plants that you can grow in the shade. For me that was Begonias and Hostas. I have Hostas around the house. I love their easy care but I needed something that blooms all summer and is easy to care for. To the rescue Begonias.

My sunny perennial garden.

Some of my Begonias.

Some of my Begonias

I hope your days are full of sunshine and flowers, too.

Rose

Finland's way of stopping bullying with great success.

Here it is almost the middle of July. School will be starting soon. Where has the summer gone? Stopped in our local Walmart and was greeting by shelves of back to school things, backpacks, notebooks, pencils, folders, crayons and on and on. All the usual things needed for a great school year.

Came across this article and I think it is one everyone; students, teacher, parents should read and think about. I was teased as a kid because I was so skinny. Olive Oil, you know Popeye’s honey, was the name I was called the most. It was a different time and I just ignored it or was not with it enough to know it was a form of bullying. Anyway it is different in this day and age. Everything is more complicated now. And it seems a lot of people, not all, are either not caring enough or afraid to get involved. I am thinking afraid of speaking up for fear of being the next target. Maybe all of our schools should check out Finland’s way of dealing with it.

                Finland is really good at stopping bullying. Here's how they're doing it.


Something to think about.

Take care,
Rose