Category Archives: The Homestead

This has been one heck of a busy month!

It started with our eldest two going on a trip to Oregon for my eldest daughter’s best friends wedding.

Alesia was a bridesmaid in the wedding and they both really enjoyed their 10 days visiting Oregon! Meanwhile, the rest of  us here at home held down the homestead with them away, including caring for all the horses.  Normally Alesia does a lot of the horse chores. LOL So now it was up to me to feed them in the mornings and evenings and Julia fed them their midday ‘snack’. lol

However, in the meantime, the business had to keep going. My helpers were away but our bills weren’t taking any kind of holiday. LOL It was crazy busy and I was glad when they came home!

Just before they left, it was decided that Joshua should/could/would join my father on a trip to Holland, just THREE days after they would return from Oregon. This was quite spur of the moment, but a chance we/he didn’t want to pass up. For those who don’t know, I come from Holland. I’ve always wished we could take our children there but trips for a family of 7 are usually very few, and far apart, and always only in the vehicle. So… since you can’t drive to Europe, it just wasn’t happening any time soon. To know my son had the opportunity to go see my “homeland” was wonderful.

So he came home from Oregon, worked for three days, and off he went again!

Joshua is getting into photography like his mama. His photos from the Netherlands did my heart a world of good.

He brought us all back some goodies!  Some like these here: http://www.jijtrakteert.nl/page14.php

My favorite are the schuimblokjes

They are my absolute fav! I ate both bags of them and barely shared with the kids… they had their own bags of the soft type though and I was nice and kept my fingers out of their bags. lol

Now I’ve moved onto the zwart wit. Sweet and salty. The next best thing to overly sweet foam (schuimeblokjes).

While in Holland, Joshua had a tour of our family Factory. My grandfather started this factory many many years ago.

They began building stairs and doors and then later on went to just building stairs.

Oh I wish I could have gone too. All these photos make me want to go. One day…

But it’s time to head out back to work in the cabin (work studio) so I’ll share some more about our busy month and Joshua’s photos tomorrow. I just have them uploading now and grabbed a few while writing. 🙂

It’s a big world out there!

I’ll share some more tomorrow, but for now, here’s one more.

I was trying to figure out what to blog about today. For some reason the blog prompt hasn’t even been put up yet, but over half the day is gone and I’m soon heading out to pick up my son who is returning from a trip with my father to Holland! I don’t have time to wait! lol

Then my eldest daughter wrote this, and posted it on her facebook. Now I know what to blog! She makes it easy because I’m just going to share HER writing today instead. 😉 It’s much better then I could have done anyways!

Life. Here. Now. Gone.

Life is unpredictable

It’s unexpected yet reliable

Because now…is the past.

– A.C.Willard
http://acwillard.com/

The writing prompt I found in my email today was a biggy, but I’m going to make my answer pretty simple.

Life goes by much too quickly.

That’s probably one of the most important things I’ve learned because through that lesson I’ve learned to treasure each day. I haven’t mastered the art  yet, I still continue to allow myself to get way too busy and the days go by in a blur one to the other, but I am trying. Some days I feel I’m finally starting to figure it out, and then something comes up and things get too busy yet again and I have to start pulling in those reigns again.

Life has been doing that a lot lately and I’m trying, REALLY trying, to remember what’s truly important. That life goes too fast.

Wasn’t it just yesterday that I was busy nursing twins and changing their diapers? Today they are 10.5 years old.

Wasn’t it just the day before yesterday that I was bringing home my first baby?  Today she’s almost 19 years old.

Just a while back, I was learning to walk.

Life goes by much too quickly.

Some have been confused in the past about my name, so I thought I’d try and clear that up.

My real name is Pieternella. However, my parents felt my name might be too difficult to say in English (I was born in Holland) so they called me Peggy. Well… no offense to those named Peggy but I’ve never much cared for it. I feel it just doesn’t suit me. I feel my name, my REAL name, suits me just fine. BUT, Pieternella is so looooonnng to write, so I thought maybe it would be easier for people to write/say Pietra. However, I’m finding Pietra is actually harder for people to say properly then Pieternella. You see, Pieternella is REALLY easy to say, it’s simply pronounced Peter-nella. Easy!

So after all this, I’m wondering if I shouldn’t just stick with Pieternella. Maybe in my emails I could add the pronunciation in brackets so people would know it’s not some weird pronounced name that they’d never be able to say.

Want to know my FULL name? ha! Now that is a REAL mouthful, but I love it. My full name is Pieternella Alida Geertruida. And no, that does NOT include my last name. lol Try and say that three times fast, IF you can figure out how to pronounce it!

I was named after THREE of my aunts. Isn’t that awesome? When my one aunt (my aunt Pieternella, or as we know her, Tante Nel) came for a visit from Holland last  year, she brought me a bracelet that my father had given to her when he was in the army as a young man. What a treasure! It makes me happy to have that little piece of history. 🙂 I love history.

And with that little bit of history, that’s enough rambling or I’ll carry on rambling all night and it’s almost midnight so I really should get to bed soon! I’ve just finished stocking the shop. There’s some nice things there this week, some packages, some custom slots including my favorite this week, a fishy PRR custom dundie slot for children. Aren’t these fabrics adorable?

So come check it out. Everything goes live Friday at 2pm est, that’s 11 am pst (my time).

We hope to see you then! http://hyenacart.com/HomesteadEmporium/

And if I haven’t mentioned it recently, I really DO appreciate your continued support of our family business. YOU are what makes it great. REALLY! You are!

Tomorrow we will be announcing the contest winners. I had hoped to do it today but we were out later then expected and I only had time to get the photos taken, edited and the listings done. I don’t want to rush giving everyone their numbers, so I’m going to go ahead and do it tomorrow when I have a bit more time! So come back tomorrow evening and take a look to see if maybe YOU are one of our winners. 🙂

Wednesday, June 2, 2010 NaBloPoMo writing prompt:
What’s your favorite poem? (And if you don’t have one, why?)

I’ve been thinking on this one ALL day and I can’t come up with one single FAVORITE poem. Why? Because I have this problem with just about everything in life. I don’t often have favorites.

If you ask my what my favorite color is, I couldn’t tell you. I LOVE color, all colors. There are a few greens I don’t like at all, maybe a few mustard type yellows, muddy colors, not a big fan of any of those, but color in general, I love them all. Blues, purples, reds, oranges, yellows… the list goes on and on. Each one for different reasons. Purples are rich, pretty, yellows are bright and cheery, oranges can be so vibrant, reds can be the riches of them all if they are the right shades. See why it’s so hard to choose just one?

Quotes, same thing. I love SO many quotes. I can tell  you what types of quotes I like best. Actually that would probably work for which ‘types’ of poems I like best too. Anything inspirational.

I read a quote today that I loved immediately, for it’s so very true. I want to share it with you:

Being happy doesn’t mean that everything is perfect.
It means that you’ve decided to look beyond the imperfections…
-Unknown

How true is that?

There are a lot of things going on in life here right now and I can choose to be un-happy, or happy regardless. I choose to be happy. Some days it’s just not quite so easy as others. 😉 As long as I keep trying though, I haven’t failed!

Choose to be happy today! You can do it. We’ll do it together!

http://www.nablopomo.com/

I’ve tried to do this a couple of times, and have to admit to failure each time. I would like to succeed. I enjoy writing and I really should have enough to write about. This month they are having writing prompts which I think I’ll try to follow unless I have something else to talk about. And of course the regular biz posts will be scattered in between. So this is a warning to anyone who does not like to read someone nonsensical ramblings on a daily basis, there may be some over the next month, IF I can stick with this!

Today’s prompt is:
When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I feel as though I am truly blessed because I am doing today, what I always wanted to do when I grew up. I always loved children and dreamed of getting married and having at least four. Now here I am with five! I also always loved learning, and loved the idea of teaching BUT, I didn’t like school so much so this kind of squelched any ideas of becoming a teacher one day. However after we had children and we learned about homeschooling I knew I had found the perfect ‘career’.

And, I always liked finding ways to earn some money. Always. If I could earn it creatively, all the better. And, here I am years later with my own business, creatively earning an income for my family while spending my days with my children, teaching them here at home.

My husband and I will celebrate TWENTY years of marriage this year!

So truly, I am today what I always wanted to be when I grew up.

It hasn’t all come easy. To share it so briefly makes it sound so fairy tale like. lol Believe me, the long version is not. ha! BUT, what it is, is my life, and I wouldn’t change any of it for anything and what it is today, has been WELL worth working hard for. 🙂

And with that, back to reality!

Our contest for the free gift certificate ends tonight at midnight, pst! So quick, enter now before it’s too late! Winner will be posted HERE tomorrow before midnight!

Most days, I absolutely LOVE being a work at home mom…

but today, is not one of them. Honestly, 99.9% of the time I truly love what I do. Just the other day though, I made the comment, “The best part of being a wahm is that you can take a break whenever you want, the worst part is that you never TRULY get a break”.

Today, is one of those few days. My grandmother (my Oma) passed away this morning. When I heard the news, all I wanted to do was go take a drive by myself down to the ocean or some other such quiet place and be alone, with my thoughts. Instead, I had to work. I suppose that’s the way it is for most people though, not just wahm’s. Our biz (homesteademporium) is such an important part of our income though, it has been our main income for quite some time now, so taking time off is not an option unless very well planned in advance. Not even a few hours on a day like today, when I have to get the products photographed and listed in the shop for tomorrow. Tonight we have to work on some tax paperwork that needs to be post dated by tomorrow (I know I know, procrastination at it’s best), so today was just not a day when I could take some time off. Even now, I’m typing while I’m waiting for my photos to upload. I just had to write this out though. If I can’t take a break, I can at least write out my thoughts.

My grandmother, well all my grandparents, were in Holland. That is where I was born. We came to Canada when I was just 2 years old. About every 4 years while growing up, I would go back to Holland to visit. I usually stayed with my grandparents on my father’s side (it’s my mom’s mom who died today) but I would also get to go and visit my mom’s family. Either they would come pick me up, or my father would take me there.

I don’t have a ton of memories of being at my grandmothers, but I do have some. For that I am very grateful. I remember one time, I was either 7, or 12, and I had to share a single bed with my aunt who is the same age as my own older sisters. My mom is the eldest of 10 children. This aunt is the youngest sibling. I remember my mom telling me that after she had my eldest sister, her mom had to ask her to give back all her baby things because she was going to need them again. 🙂 How cool would that be? Mother and daughter both having babies. 🙂

I’m randomly rambling here.

Anyways, I remember how much fun it was to share a bed while visiting, with my AUNT! Not a cousin, but an aunt, and to think she was only 5 or 6 years older then me. I thought that was so cool.

I remember sitting at my grandmother’s dinning room table. She spent a LOT of time at that table. A lot of photos of her are at that table. I don’t have enough photos of my grandmother. Speaking of photos, I’m trying to recall if I have any of my grandmother and I together. Sadly, I don’t think I do.

This reminds me that as much as I hate having my photo taken, I really should hand the camera over to someone else once in a while so my children, and my grandchildren, will have more memories of me. Maybe I don’t want them, but they might.

Having all your grandparents far away all your life isn’t a whole lot of fun. I suppose it was neat that I got to travel to Holland so often in my growing up years, but I would have traded that in a minute for having them close by. When I married my husband almost 20 years ago, 3 of his grandparents were still alive and very much a part of his life. He grew up right across the street from his father’s parents and just a 20 minute drive from his mother’s parents. When we married, his grandparents all accepted me into their family with VERY open arms. I feel very blessed to have known each one of them very well and to have been able to spend a fair amount of time with each one while they were still alive.

Grandparents are very special. They are our history. I wish I would of had the opportunity to have introduced my children to my history before each of my grandparents passed away. Sadly, now that opportunity is lost. I mourn not only for my grandmother today, but for the loss of opportunity to see her again, with my children.

And with that, the photos have finished uploading. My husband will be home soon and we’ll need to work on those taxes, so I had better get back to work on those listings.