Lisa Zahn

Just yesterday afternoon I handed Rose two cardboard boxes after hauling our food home from Buying Club and said, "Do you want this?" She said sure, and right away got to work. Since then, she's made them into this: She started digging through the "big blue box", where we keep all kinds of odds and ends and bits and pieces for her to do creative crafting. And this girl can craft! And create! It's a doll house, and there's even a rooftop playground with a second story swing hanging from it (the dolls just fly up into the swing, or climb down the yarn rope to get to it.) And for my creative endeavor yesterday, I finished knitting my first mitten! After getting some help on the thumb from this mittens tutorial and this page on knitty .com , I was able to finish this up and it looks great! They're made with a nice washable wool from Brown Sheep Co ., which I've had in my stash for years. Now, to just get the other one knitted up... It was a gre...

I often think of blogs as being a modern day version of the "swap shops" that my Grandma used to listen to on the local radio station every morning when I was a kid in the 70s. Do you remember swap shop radio shows? Why were they called "swap shops", I wondered? Upon googling just now, I have learned that they really were about "swapping", or in other words, calling in to buy or sell personal items. So maybe I have the term confused. But what I remember was ladies calling in to the "expert" lady on the radio, exchanging homemaking tips and recipes. Kind of like what women's magazines have always done, but with a two-way conversation that all kinds of people could listen in on over the airwaves. Blogs are really a two-way conversation, with lots of people "eavesdropping" just like on those old radio shows. Not only can you read my blog, but you can make comments on my posts, and I can read your blog and comment on it. And lots ...

ON FAMILY MEETINGS: On Friday night we held our first-ever Zahn Family Meeting. I've always felt that families who hold family meetings are so, well, organized and democratic and all that and we've just never gotten around to them (which speaks to my lack of organization, and probably democratic-ness, too). But on Thursday, after "crabbin' out" at the kids for not helping around the house enough, I decided to call a Family Meeting for the following night. I made the announcement to all, including dear husband, that the meeting would take place at exactly 6:30 p.m. after our Previously Scheduled Family Dinner at exactly 6:00 p.m. Just trying to be organized here... I asked the family members to come up with agenda items. Mine, of course, would be the subject of chores. I also said I would give a Treasurer's Report (a.k.a. "why we haven't paid your allowance since Christmas"). So the appointed hour came and the Meeting commenced. I asked for agenda...