We like the electric company

Well last week was quite interesting without the power for 5 days. I was so glad that hubby was smart enough to get a generator so quickly and we did have it set up before we lost our food, however it was odd to walk in a room and turn on the lights and wait then nothing happens. All this week I have marvelled at just how dependent we are on electric.
Before this happened I would have said we would be okay. And, we were it was just hard and if I have my preference I would not go through it again. I have decided we are going to keep emergency cash in the house now. I realised when the electric goes so does the banking system. We also now try to keep our cars filled with gas so that if there is a crisis we at least have that.

Children Make Liars Out of Us

Just over one week ago my ds was watching some of the devastation of hurricane Ike. His beautiful blue eyes turn to me and he says "Mom will we ever have a hurricane here?" "of course not dear we live way to far inland for that to happen." I spoke these words very firmly and sure of myself. I mean we live in central Ohio. Please! What a difference 24 hours makes. My husband and I decided to take a little Sunday afternoon nap. We were awakened by ds coming into the room saying he thought we were going to have a tornado. I chuckled and said that we would be hearing the sirens if that were true. Wow how sure I can be of my self, and how terribly close to the truth my son was. I got up and walked to the living room window. for the next several hours we watched the wind whip up and down the street. Many times I told my son to quickly get away from the window. We prayed for our safety and for that of others. The trees whipped through and tore down trees and power lines. Our lights went out along with all of the neighbors and about 1/3 of our city. I found out the winds reached hurricane strength. We had a rough time but we were so thankful that were are safe and though we had no power for 5 days we know it could have been much worse and that in fact it was many many times worse for those in Texas. It did give us compassion for them.
The next time I start to tell my son that something could not happen here I will think more about it.

I hate being sick

Well, with the return to school comes the return of "The Invasion of the Germs." With that I started with a slight sore throat last week. I though perhaps it was just some drainage and did a few home remidies. It did not work On Thursday I woke up with a head cold and it just got worse throuout the day. I woke up early Friday morning and felt like I was hit with a Mack truck in the head. My Doctor was not in so I went to the "little clinic inside Kroger" and got started on an antibiotic. I don't like to do that but it is so much better than it hitting my lungs and getting a full blown asthma attack or worse.
Last night ds started to cough and today he is very sick. I gave him his medicine and hopefully we will get through this. He is happy because he gets to drink 7 up. We usally don't do pop around here but when we are sick I get it for us.
I am really hoping this post make sense as in order to be able to see straigh I have been taking Nyquil. The day time stuff just doesn't do it. So I am sleepy while I type.
My wondeful dh skippied going to the game to stay home with us today. Poor guy.
I can't wait till I feel better there are so many projects around here I want to finish up. I just can't tackle them until I am better. I am working in ds room and I am excited to get his bedspread and new curtains for his room. He wants to go with Start Wars and I am happy with this. He is 9 and I hope it will last a few years. I think I will get some of those peel on and off stickers for his wall. He should have a great time with those.
Thats what is going on this weekend here. On Monday I will hopefully be able to post about the new weeks deals.
Have a great weekend

Target Saving

Wow I read over at Money Saving Mom about a Target deal. I was running out to the store and decided to work it into my trip. I was able to get $57.00 worth of items for $32.00 I had picked up a few things that were free after coupons as well.
Specific Kellogg items were 4 for $9.00 Plus when you buy four you get a $5.00 Gift card
I ended up with 12 of the special item. Meaning I got 3 five dollar Gift Cards
I now have:
4 boxes of Pop-tarts
4 packs of Keebler cookies
2 boxes of Rice Crispy Treats
2 boxes of Kellogg's Bars
I had coupons for everything but 2 of the cookies and the Kellogg bars. I actually had target coupons and manufactures coupons for the pop-tarts they were $2.25 then .50 cents of for each coupon so after the Gift card These ended up to more than free! I will eat them and I can keep them at work for some of my kids who get hungry.
I also have a certificate to send off 10 Proofs of Purchase and get a check for $10.00 That was one great trip to Target!

Today is the Lord's day

We will have a pretty relaxed day around here today. However, it will be a fun one. I am going to move some boxes for my mom, and hopefully go to the second service at our church. The this evening we have a baptism this will be nice to go to as it is at a friends house and we will be grilling.

I wanted to write about our back to school preperations. Dh was in bad need of clothes this year. He falls into an odd category of clothes, he can fit in some clothes from the regular store, but he really needs ones from the big and tall shop. The shop around her that carries those is not a cheap shop and I have a rough time paying full price for his clothes there. This year God really blessed us with his clothes. At Costco's they carry the size of jeans he needs. They are only 13.00-15.00 dollars. This is a great deal. We went ahead and bought 5 pairs so that he will have all he needs and more. We then went to the big and tall shop. With dh long torrso he really needs the t clothes he only wears a 2XL but at the big and tall shop they sell the 2xlt. I love these shirts. They are all cotton just as dh wants. They are long enought that they stay tucked in and he looks nice in them. I was so happy that they had a little sale. If you bought more than one they were 16.99 instead of 24.99. It kills me to even pay the 16.99 when I am the queen of 5 and less clothes but dh really needed these and they do not go on sales they may my clothes and ds clothes do.
So my dh is ready for his students this year. All he needs now is a good pair of shoes and he will be set.
God bless may every one have a peaceful Lord's Day

I have not updated in so long

Well I have not posted anything to this blog for many months. I have decided to become active with it now.

We are in a busy season here and you know what they say, if you have something you want to get done give it to a busy person. I am not sure why but activitiy seems to breed activity. The opposite also seems true.

We are in the midist of preserving the food we grew this summer. Last night we canned up the lateset batch of tomatoes. Two of the jars did not seal right so I will use them up today.

I have done 2 dozen peach quarts, around 35 quarts total of tomatoes, and 45 quarts of green beans. We also froze about 150 ears of corn. I did not think the corn would be such pain but it really was. Then we only had about 25 meal size bags. Then it clogged the sink and we had to have pumbers out. What a nightmare! I am not sure the corn was worth it. We may give it another try, but I am not sure.

I forgot I have done about 10 quarts of pickles as well.

I love to can. It is very labor intinsive, but along about December when you open a fresh jar of tomatoes and that wonderful aroma hits you it is so worth it. One of the challanges about canning is that the bussiest time for it is hit at the same time as back to school hits. So I was actually happy to find out that my offical return date for work is Sept. 15. This will allow much of the canning to be done before I return.

So this canning is what we have been up to lately. I will post more about the summer and the back to school season soon. It is always interesting when you don't just have a child going back to school but 2 grown ups as well.

Gracereceiver