We redid the dinning room

We finally got around to redo the dining room. My goal was Thanksgiving. We finished putting the room back together that morning. Although we still have a couple of things we want to touch up now. Here the before and after:

Fun activities with the Family

We went to Stokoe Farm last Saturday. It was cold and sprinkled on and off but we had so much fun.
Caleb riding the sheep train.

Mason in the Pig.

The hay jump

A nature walk

This hay tower had tunnels through it that the boys loved climbing throughI called this the hamster wheel.

Corn maze

We picked green grapes and made grape juice. The boys like eating the grapes instead of helping to pick.

We made camp fires for snake for FHE on night

Carrots from our garden

Caleb made Bread Bear

The boys made up a roller coaster ride. This is Mason on it. It was funny to watch them run around and make noises and get in this container.

We went for a visit to Grandma and Grandpa Silva for a week. They kept us and the kids busy with lots of activities. Here are a few:
The Zoo. The kids liked feeding the birds but were nervous when they landed on their hands.

They also fed the goats

A ride on the Kenosha Trolly

Jelly Belly Factory Tour

Chicago Children's Museum

Climbing on a Spider Web

Playing with water. Mason liked watching it jump

As Caleb pushed buttons the water would make different things happen

September calendar

So we are going to start our daily activities again. Lat year I choose different days to focus on different activities. I'm going to start like that and see how he does. Although this year we are focusing on learning how to write the letters and what they sound like. I have books that go along with most of my days. If you are interested in the books or instructions on how to do anything contact me.

Sept 14 - Make Bread Bears
Sept 15 - Learn Seasons - Summer - do sun prints
Sept 16 - Alphabet books
Sept 17 - Dogs - Make Puppy Paw prints, start an animal book
Sept 18 - Alphabet Chalk

Sept 21 - Make camp fires - http://jas.familyfun.go.com/recipefinder/display?id=40926
Sept 22 - Autumn - Leaf collage
Sept 23 - A is for Alligator
Sept 24 - Rabbit - cotton ball pick up, carrots, bunny hopping
Sept 25 - While we were out walk

Sept 28 - Make Taffy
Sept 29 - Winter - Snowflake bingo
Sept 30 - B is for Banana

August activities

Fun summer days with cousins

I decided to try making my own salsa this summer. I'm pretty impressed at how it turned out. We also did pickles but my pictures didn't turn out very good.

Putting the jars in the water bath.

Our finished product. Pretty yummy!

We hiked in Corbin's Glen one night. Here's Mason doing what he loves, finding rocks and throwing them in the water.

Mike and Caleb walking in the water. Caleb enjoyed looking over the edge of the waterfall

On the hottest day of the summer we went to the spray park. The kids played on the playground before they turned the water on.

Mason was alittle worried of the water at first but after he saw what happened he was running around with Caleb

Our Sunflowers look so cool. Here is one. We have red with orange and some with yellow and all yellow. The colors are great.

Fish hatchery

On one of our hikes we found this chimney. The kids thought it was so funny in the middle of the woods all by itself.

We went camping with friends of ours up to Bristol. All the boys thought it was funny to line up and jump off of this bench.

The next day we went hiking in Grimes Glen. It was so pretty. We walked along the water and were able to go near waterfalls. Unfortunately it wasn't as warm as we wanted. We all still got wet.

Caleb decide to climb this hill.

And this is what happened. Covered in mud!

We found this cool looking lizard near one of the caves.

I'm 5 Times the Man I Used to Be

So, I wanted to post something a little more on the personal side. I have really made it a goal to get into better shape. I was looking for a program and came across the one hundred push ups program. The program is that after six week (at a minimum), you should be able to do one hundred consecutive push ups. I thought that would be cool and I started off. I made the following to show my experience with the program (you can click on it if you can't read it):


You do an exhaustion test, which puts you in a class for a week or two. You have 3 workouts a week. The workout consists of a few sets of push ups finished off with a maxing out.

When I began the program I could only do 10 consecutive push ups (yeah I know it's pitiful but in my defense I haven't done a push up for about 9 years). The blue area is the maximum amount of push ups I have done. The green bars are the total workout (sets plus max). The purple bars are the exhaustion tests that you do every two weeks or so.

I reached the end of the six weeks then tried the final test. I only did 40 which was really lame. It happened that I came down with a cold (the gray area) which lasted for a while. Once I was feeling better I took another exhaustion test and did 50+ consecutive push ups.

When I started I could only do 10 and now I can do 50. That's why I'm 5 times the man I used to be. I would invite anyone who reads this to start the program. I might keep everyone posted when I meet the goal.

Health Care Solved - It's Because We're Rich

It seems like all I hear talked about is how American health care is broken, that is in between reports on Michael Jackson (if you just came out of a coma he died recently). The argument usually goes something like because Americans pay more than Europeans for health care, and are less healthy the American health system is broken. Okay so it's expensive! I get that. So how are we going to fix it?

First, lets find out what is causing the costs to increase and maybe we can fix it. Kenneth Arrow, a Nobel Prize winning economist explained why Americans pay more in these terms:

The basic reason why health costs increased is that health care is a good thing! Because today there is a lot more you can do! Consider all these expenses that are diagnostic. Cat scans, X-rays, MRIs and now the proton-powered whatever-it-is. Something that is the size of a football field, cost $50 million, and has all sorts of diagnostic powers. A lot of these technologies clearly reveal things that would not be revealed otherwise. There's no question about it. Diagnostics have improved. Technology has improved. You know, sending things through your blood stream to help in operations, instead of cutting you open. It's incredible. But these things are costly.

Oh wait. We are paying more because there has been technological change, which is a a good thing, but it is costly. And I thought it was all those evil doctors who want to remove your tonsils because they can get reimbursed more. Well that changes everything.

To contain costs we need to stop innovation, and one way to do that is to make Americans poorer. We could model ourselves off of poorest Africa. That would insure there was no innovation. And that would solve the problem with America's health care system costs. After all we are no healthier given all this innovation so why pursuit it? Plus given the government's operatus modi, we'll have this problem solved in nothing flat.

Berry Picking

We went Cherry, Blueberry, and Raspberry picking last Saturday

Blueberry picking

Mason put as many blueberries as he could grab into his mouth the whole time we were trying to pick

The "Fruit" of our labor

Enjoying a fresh homemade blueberry pie