five finds friday

This week in numbers.  

(Even though numbers are NOT my thing.)

3.5 hours at a testing facility for kids and school testing.

1 broken motor mount on my Yukon.

5 hours spent driving kids to cross country, soccer and errands on Tuesday afternoon.

10 kids at my house on Wednesday.

22 baked potatoes for a group dinner.

19 chocolate chip cookies stolen and devoured by Ryder.

funny

Our pup Talluah is a funny one.

She adores sleeping curled up on a pillow.  Preferably above someone’s head.

And I know I share a lot of photos of this dog sleeping – but it’s what she does a lot.

And – she even sleeps perched behind Ryder.

fashionable 

This week’s fashion comes to you on a two year old.

This little t-shirt was worn by every Keigley kid except Riley.  

And now her little man is wearing it.

It’s too adorable!

flavorful

When the days are long – and aren’t so many of them? – I like to be on my A game and have something waiting in the crock pot.

This week, however, the crock pot was sitting on the shelf and I let some of my kids eat Taco Bell.  (gasp) Taco Bell is SO gross to me.  But – apparently, my children feel differently. Whatever. I can’t win at everything.

Anyway, no way is this post going to sing Taco Bell’s praises.  

Let’s get back to the crock pot.

Zuppa Toscana.

This is a great and super duper easy option.

faithful

As one of the books in our stacks, I try to have a personal thinking sort of book in the stack for each of us.  I guess you could call them self-help or religious or something.  I don’t care for any of those phrases or categories.  They just don’t fit the topic as well as I would like.

In the past year or so I’ve read God Has a Name and Nothing to Prove.  I’m trying to read Uninvited.  I’ve finished The Road Back to You and For the Love and Of Mess & Moxie.  Parenting and The Life You’ve Always Wanted.

What I’m looking for are some new suggestions.  For me, yes.  But especially for the kids.  The teenagers primarily, although I’d love suggestions for Piper and Otto too.  Does those even exist?  Bergen is reading Irresistible Revolution and London liked God Has a Name.  None of them really loved This Changes Everything.

Is there a book you have loved – or your kids have loved?  A book that stretched the way you thought – or, perhaps better for teens – solidified some clearer thinking for you?

I’d love those titles!

feels

Two different people sent this bit of information my way this week.

It’s about a school in Kentucky that is just beginning.

The Wendell Berry Farm School.

I heart Wendell Berry.  (Remember when me and my friends drove to Kentucky to hear him speak?) His words in his novel Hannah Coulter have worked their way into my every day thinking.

The program is designed for juniors and seniors in college and will be tuition free.  I’m not at the point of having any students who could attend such a program.  And, truthfully, I may never have any children interested in farming or sustainable agriculture.  But I might.

Moe importantly, I’m just thankful to know that such a program exists.  That such ideals are being played out in real life and that there is a chance farming and agriculture can earn the respect and admiration they have long deserved.  

As a former farm kid who forgot for a while why farming mattered, it’s a hope to see the educational world giving it a new voice.

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