I haven't felt much like posting lately. For one thing, we've been busy. Since we made the major transition to homeschooling, my life of course got more complicated.
I do love being home with the kids in the morning, and working in the afternoon. While the kids do their thing, I can often get housework like a load of laundry and some cleaning done. This was actually harder when I worked three days a week 8:30-2:30. Mornings were taken up with getting the kids off to school and getting ready for work. Then after work I certainly didn't feel like doing housework. This left my two days off and weekends for housework. Well, I didn't always feel like doing housework on my only days off, and weekends are usually packed with family stuff. So, my house suffered and so did my pride, self-confidence, and feelings about my home environment.
Now, I'm still working basically the same amount of hours but because I'm home in the mornings I can get at least small bits of housework done on a daily basis and I'm so happy about that. This means I'm busier than ever! Especially since the kids are now homeschooling and we have work to do, and places like orchestra and "Y" day to drive to, etc. I really am trying to "do it all", aren't I?
Well, I wish it was less stressful sometimes, but for the most part I am very happy this way. I love my job, but I was looking for something to put my focus back on my home. I will probably always be this way! The home is the most important sphere in my life. It's the Center. I love Home. It really is where the Heart is, and as a woman who cares about that, I really consider it my job to make my home a place with Heart. I love having the kids home more, as that has certainly managed to help me focus on my home again.
The other thing I have really been focusing my reading and attention on lately is the Economy. And that certainly relates to the home. I read this blog, The Automatic Earth, daily. Not sure if I should. It's depressing. The bloggers link to all kinds of financial news each day and give brief comments about how badly everything is going. I really know very little about economic matters, and it's hard for me not to just follow the opinions of those who I'm reading because I don't know any better. So, yesterday I did ask my friend Louis, who is an Economics Professor, to read the blog and give me some perspective on it. He actually thinks it's GREAT that the Fed is buying up loans from banks in danger, and that it's NO PROBLEM that the Fed just keeps printing more paper money. That's a very different perspective than that of The Automatic Earth bloggers. I'll be interested to hear what he has to say about their reports and opinions. I suspect I'll fall somewhere in the middle of their doomsday proclamations and Louis' cheerful opinions.
Meanwhile, whatever happens to the nation's banks, I know our pocketbooks are already being stretched. The organic and local food market (which we primarily shop) has seen less price changes than the conventional supermarkets (probably because organic food was already priced more realistically), but there are still massive price leaps all around. The price of wheat has tripled in the last few months. Whoa! That totally missed me until I had to buy some.
Then I guess part of the reason is a wheat shortage in the US. WHAT???! Aren't we the nation that, for right or wrong, feeds the world? Well, I guess it is because we feed the world, sort of. Because the value of the dollar has fallen so much, it's now cheaper for foreign countries to export our wheat than grow it themselves. According to the article linked above, this could change when a new crop can be harvested, but since so much of our land is now going to ethanol producing corn, I have my doubts.
When our basic foodstuffs double and triple in price in a matter of a few months, and we're already being stretched by high gas prices, outrageous inflation in health insurance costs, and our now-deflated homes give us no equity, this sucks! Combine that with banks losing money left and right, the value of the dollar falling and falling, and more, it feels like we're in for some really hard times.
My hope comes from the fact that I have always been interested in getting "back to basics". I'm reading lots of bloggers who espouse gardening, home food preservation, and home cooking. And I love this stuff! This summer, if we're not interning at an organic farm as we (kind of) hope to, we plan to double or triple our garden space. We'll grow root crops we can store for months like potatoes and beets and try our hand at onions and garlic even (garlic will have to wait till fall planting for next year's harvest, though). We'll also add to the one sour cherry and three apple trees and 4x4' strawberry bed we already have with planting raspberry bushes we can get from our neighbor, and blueberry and other fruiting bushes we'll buy at the nursery. We'll be sure to care for our grapevine better this year and harvest the (hopefully) abundant grapes for jam and juice we can put up in jars.
Sharon at Causabon's Book is doing a whole series of posts on food storage and cooking with staple foods, which I'm reading carefully and enjoying immensely. If you're at all interested in the topic, I encourage you to read her blog. She's extremely thorough and easy to read.
Well, that's all for now. Perhaps I'll do a series on feeding a family organic, local and healthy foods on a tight budget! Gotta find the time...
I do love being home with the kids in the morning, and working in the afternoon. While the kids do their thing, I can often get housework like a load of laundry and some cleaning done. This was actually harder when I worked three days a week 8:30-2:30. Mornings were taken up with getting the kids off to school and getting ready for work. Then after work I certainly didn't feel like doing housework. This left my two days off and weekends for housework. Well, I didn't always feel like doing housework on my only days off, and weekends are usually packed with family stuff. So, my house suffered and so did my pride, self-confidence, and feelings about my home environment.
Now, I'm still working basically the same amount of hours but because I'm home in the mornings I can get at least small bits of housework done on a daily basis and I'm so happy about that. This means I'm busier than ever! Especially since the kids are now homeschooling and we have work to do, and places like orchestra and "Y" day to drive to, etc. I really am trying to "do it all", aren't I?
Well, I wish it was less stressful sometimes, but for the most part I am very happy this way. I love my job, but I was looking for something to put my focus back on my home. I will probably always be this way! The home is the most important sphere in my life. It's the Center. I love Home. It really is where the Heart is, and as a woman who cares about that, I really consider it my job to make my home a place with Heart. I love having the kids home more, as that has certainly managed to help me focus on my home again.
The other thing I have really been focusing my reading and attention on lately is the Economy. And that certainly relates to the home. I read this blog, The Automatic Earth, daily. Not sure if I should. It's depressing. The bloggers link to all kinds of financial news each day and give brief comments about how badly everything is going. I really know very little about economic matters, and it's hard for me not to just follow the opinions of those who I'm reading because I don't know any better. So, yesterday I did ask my friend Louis, who is an Economics Professor, to read the blog and give me some perspective on it. He actually thinks it's GREAT that the Fed is buying up loans from banks in danger, and that it's NO PROBLEM that the Fed just keeps printing more paper money. That's a very different perspective than that of The Automatic Earth bloggers. I'll be interested to hear what he has to say about their reports and opinions. I suspect I'll fall somewhere in the middle of their doomsday proclamations and Louis' cheerful opinions.
Meanwhile, whatever happens to the nation's banks, I know our pocketbooks are already being stretched. The organic and local food market (which we primarily shop) has seen less price changes than the conventional supermarkets (probably because organic food was already priced more realistically), but there are still massive price leaps all around. The price of wheat has tripled in the last few months. Whoa! That totally missed me until I had to buy some.
Then I guess part of the reason is a wheat shortage in the US. WHAT???! Aren't we the nation that, for right or wrong, feeds the world? Well, I guess it is because we feed the world, sort of. Because the value of the dollar has fallen so much, it's now cheaper for foreign countries to export our wheat than grow it themselves. According to the article linked above, this could change when a new crop can be harvested, but since so much of our land is now going to ethanol producing corn, I have my doubts.
When our basic foodstuffs double and triple in price in a matter of a few months, and we're already being stretched by high gas prices, outrageous inflation in health insurance costs, and our now-deflated homes give us no equity, this sucks! Combine that with banks losing money left and right, the value of the dollar falling and falling, and more, it feels like we're in for some really hard times.
My hope comes from the fact that I have always been interested in getting "back to basics". I'm reading lots of bloggers who espouse gardening, home food preservation, and home cooking. And I love this stuff! This summer, if we're not interning at an organic farm as we (kind of) hope to, we plan to double or triple our garden space. We'll grow root crops we can store for months like potatoes and beets and try our hand at onions and garlic even (garlic will have to wait till fall planting for next year's harvest, though). We'll also add to the one sour cherry and three apple trees and 4x4' strawberry bed we already have with planting raspberry bushes we can get from our neighbor, and blueberry and other fruiting bushes we'll buy at the nursery. We'll be sure to care for our grapevine better this year and harvest the (hopefully) abundant grapes for jam and juice we can put up in jars.
Sharon at Causabon's Book is doing a whole series of posts on food storage and cooking with staple foods, which I'm reading carefully and enjoying immensely. If you're at all interested in the topic, I encourage you to read her blog. She's extremely thorough and easy to read.
Well, that's all for now. Perhaps I'll do a series on feeding a family organic, local and healthy foods on a tight budget! Gotta find the time...
Comments
I am in the same boat as you in many ways. Some of my costs have been offset by having my 2 oldest children move out(!)it was quite an adjustment for me in many ways but the money part was easiest. We intend to garden much more this summer and I would love to have some fruit trees.
One thing I always continue to come back to is that no matter how bad it seems for us, we actually have so much. We own our home, have 2 cars, food, heat, medical care, indoor plumbing all these things are normal to us. We are fortunate in so many ways. The media does a number on me at times and makes me think I need more and more and that what I have is just not enough (but it really is). For me, not spending money is easier with an attitude adjustment. The tightwad gazette books have a lot of great ideas and some philosophy, they are a bit dated but you could get them at the library or super cheap used.
As a former homeschooling Mom, don't forget to give yourself breaks, it is very important!
And we don't buy much consumer goods (well, relatively) or want to buy much. It's just that when basics like food and fuel get so expensive then we really have to do a double take and make some serious decisions about what to give up (the second car? the gym memberships?), etc. This is not fun.
Also, who knows how far this will go. Hopefully, not much further!