Character Enhancement

Well, the first day of some restriction at the computer was not too bad...partly because the girls had other activities in the afternoon. After supper, when I took the 2 younger ones to the YMCA for swim lesssons, Lydia was playing a little bit on a site that is O.K. However, the restriction box pops up alot during it (because of all the advertising) and she got frustrated. When I got home she was not happy about it. She was even having problems with facebook and the flair page. Anyway, I got that smoothed over. then later she was doing research for homework and it was restricting sites again and she was MAD. I turned off the program so she could just do homework. When I came back later she was doing something else and not homework. So I had her turn it off. Some of her issues have to do with a friend from church that has unlimited access to the computer (as far as I know) and when she goes over there they play alot on it. I really feel that time should be limited with it and that other activities should be going on. She just gets locked in to playing on it and kinda zones out.
All in all, I glad that we are doing this for now....I think that it will teach some self-control and maybe patience too!!!

restrictions

Well, we love having the internet at the house although the children would love to have other computers with connections so that they wouldn't have to share!!! We are going to stick to our guns and just have 1 home computer plugged-in to the internet connections. This last weekend, however, we encountered our first attack of some sort of virus or malware. It was VERY frustrating and I was annoyed with the tactic used to get us to click on the box (said it was a virus scan or something). Anyway, we called Jeff and he got us on a good malware program and we found 9 of those stinkin' bugs!!! ARGH!!! So, after that got cleaned up I set about using the free filtering program and will hope to control what sites are being visited and what items actually show up on web pages. It is a little frustrating now but hopefully our list of approved sites will get built up and the kids will be back to using the computer with ease. Elias wanted to add You Tube as an approved site but I said that I wanted to keep that under parental control because there is stuff there that shouldn't be visited (in our opinion). So for now....that particular site will only be allowed when we (the parents) know about it!

Productive weekend

Had a really beautiful weekend. The weather cleared out and warmed up (for which I'm very grateful). Husband and I along with our son spent Saturday doing some outdoor repair work. Our basement cellar entrance was in really bad shape after many years of service. Although we didn't fix the actual door...we did completely replace the framework for it. The old boards were in sad shape and had some insect damage. We used some of the pressure treated lumber that was removed from a deck on the other side of the house and framed it in. It is not perfect but at least it is sealed up better. Today we are cleaning out the rest of the junk (from before we moved in) that is in the cellar. Tomorrow is the city will be picking up the junk for free...so we are making good use of that service!!! The next step will be to add some plastic (i.e. can't rust) storage shelves down there to house the paint cans, caulk and other items that can't freeze but need a remote storage area. After that I want to put down some sort of plastic flooring squares (like you see in YMCA locker room areas) and make it a little nicer. There is occasion for us to be down there when there is a tornado warning and the place is pretty gross!! I'm hoping to at least get a corner decent enough to hunker down in as well as maybe setting up some emergency type items down there (like a crank style radio and flashlight and maybe a latern or something). I don't want to go all out but it definitely needs some attention.

We also cleaned out the garden beds and filled in some siding on the house that is in disrepair. Next year we are hoping to embark on siding the house...one side at a time. And we will probably fix/replace windows as we go along. We hope that if we approach it in this manner that it will be not so expensive and if we don't get it all done in a year...then it will not look so bad in the process of repair.

The girls had fun playing outside during all this work time. We had made a makeshift fort out back by using one of our old aluminum boats upside-down for the roof and a ladder in the corner. They like climbing up there and sitting on top (which husband doesn't like but is o.k. with) and then pretending they are explorers or something. Ahh... the creative life of children!

A fun "found" item was our carrots in the garden. I had really given up on them ever producing (they were planted too close together) but found that we had about a dozen of them grow big enough to eat. So, we will be making a potato soup with them!!!