Three Things

First, for those of you who have been eagerly awaiting the answers to the questions in last Wednesday's post, I apologize. Deciding at the last minute to go camping kinda threw my schedule off. As a keen observer noticed, the pictures were taken in one "heck of a garage," owned by "a great hunter" and, truly, "a great man." In fact, this garage is the meeting place for the Young Adults of Bismarck. We were listening to a great talk by a great priest and having some great fellowship time. in a garage. surrounded by deer antlers. How great is that? (Incidentally, the owner of this garage also provided the venison for our supper last night -- we were inaugurating the school year with a pioneer meal, since our curriculum this year is based on the Little House series of books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Thanks much, J! It was delicious!)

Second, we started our school year yesterday -- yes, Labor Day. I know it's a national holiday and all, but, really, it couldn't have been better. Daddy joined us for Mass and brunch, which was wonderful in itself, but the readings also struck me as very appropriate for a beginning-of-the-school-year Mass -- the Psalm response, especially, echoed in my ears all day and became my prayer for our year -- "Give success to the work of our hands, Lord."

Finally, today was our first full day of school. Among other things we studied density and made butter, which we ate on homemade bread with our soup this evening. I had to share pictures of all the shaking and smacking going on!

All that work for the little butter we ended up with ...
the kids decided they'd rather go to Sam's Club.

Even The Baby helped!

the finished products

Delicious!
("Better than the stuff from the store, Mom!")

But they'd still rather buy it than spend a whole afternoon shaking jars!