Pictures as Promised!

 Acorn Squash - ONE PLANT!!!

 My little squash :)

 Our tiny little berry patch

 Our Blackberry Patch

 Herb Bed

 Sunflowers

 Dill

 Okra

 Beans

 Pumpkins

 Watermelon

 Tomatoes

 Grapes

 Hawaiian Tomatoes

 Carrots

 Corn

 More Tomatoes

 Eversons Berry Pickin Basket :)

 Something... we're not really sure...

 Another something we're not really sure what it is

 dweeb and nerd

 petunia and daisy

 condor and (not pictured) Dwibet?

 Dinner

 potatoes that we accidentaly planted and carrots

berries from our patch

It's GROWING!!!

We just got back from vacation. when we got home it was dark and late so we all went to bed, the next morning we got up and took a venture outside to check on our garden and guess what?! It EXPLODED! Does anyone know when Okra is ready to pick?! We had a few bright red tomatoes, a great big watermelon, our grapes have taken off, we have a dozen or so ears of corn, our squash plant has completely taken over our front garden bed, it's crazy!!! I'll post pictures soon! WOOHOO!

Success! Well, sort of...

Soooo, life has been a little busy around here. Corn is just about ready to silk, no luck on the radishes and the dag nabbin chickens ate all the lettuce, kolrabi, broccoli, cauliflower, beans, and peas! We still have tomatoes coming in and some promising vines of watermelon and cantalope. We also have some beautiful blackberry, raspberry, blueberry and strawberry plants. the strawberries and raspberries are producing a handful every day. I also found a wild black berry vine growing in a corner of our front yard! One squash plant made it and is taking over a huge bed in the front yard. We have mint and basil growing in our flower bed as well. I know the harvest will be slim this year but it is really cool to see all of this growing all around our house! And as much as I loath the chickens when I'm trying to take a nap and they wont shut up it's pretty cool to see them wandering our yard as well.

Got screens put in our windows, a leaky drainage pipe fixed, one half of a storage shelf built in our garage and a few other little things that have been needing to be fixed but hadn't had time to fix them. Still trying to find the time to locate my sanity as it has recently run away. I look forward to watching my beautiful little seeds sprout and see what we come up with to store for this fall! I will keep you posted!

Bees... Oh this may be a long summer

I had every intention of getting outside today (supposed to be 75) and getting some yardwork/planting done. I wasn't out there for more than 2 minutes when, after asking her to go water the grapes, Lillian came running to me with a terrified look on her face saying she saw a big bee and could I finish watering for her. I rolled my eyes and finished the job, then 5 minutes after that right when I was about to start working on my herb beds I asked her to go turn on the water, she took off running and screamed all of a sudden, she had ran in to a bee and it 'touched her face' She was beside herself, crying, unable to move and apparently could no longer function. So we all had to end up coming inside... So much for my productive day...

Dear Bees,
  Can you please find it in your tiny little hearts to fly AROUND Lillian the rest of the summer. I and my garden would greatly appreciate it.
Thank You

Oh the joys of Spring!

This weekend has been a truly wonderful one. Score one for the Farmers Almanac for predicting the snow we got here in Idaho last week!!! However, it is full steam ahead as of this past Saturday! winds are still a bit chilly but its perfect weather for putting some seeds in the ground! Saturday and Sunday my wonderful husband and amazing children all pitched in to get a massive list of things finished! Here are a few:

-Find a wonderful new home for our family dog. (She was too big and too energetic for my little ones!)
-Fix 3 flat bike tires (Daves project)
-move all of my plant starts outside
-dig out strawberry and raspberry beds
-dig holes for grapevines
-plant 50 strawberry starts
-plant 20 raspberry canes
-plant 6 grapevines
-put raised beds in final location (Poor Dave has moved them at least 3 times)
-dig out grass in vegetable beds (another SUPER fun project for Dave)
-Lay out, dig and back fill herb beds
-replace doorknob and deadbolt for back door that spontaneously stopped working
-take our children plus one friend to the circus
-have a wonderful hot dog roast in our fire pit followed, of course, by s'mores
-rake front yard after it was de-thatched and aerated (you would not believe the amount of dead stuff!)
-plant seeds for our summertime sunflower house
-go to homedepot to get sprinklers, hoses and a file for Daves pulaski (our most used tool by far! Poor Dave)

That is all I can remember and not including all of our regular chores! I was such a busy crazy weekend! We had homemade waffles, a hot dog roast, played outside, watched movies, ran errands... It was fabulous! Exhausting! but fabulous :) The weather report says all week will be this nice and I cannot wait to get back outside and continue my spring time preparation! The kids have all been very helpful in getting things done. I have been very proud of them.

This coming weekend we will be hosting a Mothers Day BBQ as well as a family planting/gardening day! My sister and her husband and 6 children will be coming over to help us finish up what we haven't been able to finish over this next week. They will also, hopefully, be taking 6 chickens off our hands to use for their own family. It has been tedious and sometimes I have wondered what we were thinking to get chickens but I am glad now that we are able to give some to family as well as have several here that the kids love to play with and have become a common sight in our backyard.

I look forward to this summer when our garden is in full bloom, our flowers and vegetables have sprouted, our trees are full of leaves and wonderful shade and our lawn is green and soft for the many little feet that will be running across it! Oh how I love Spring and the tiny glimpse we get of new beginnings and fresh starts.

Now I must go put some aloevera from my plant on the windowsill on my recently sunburned shoulders. And while I do I will be hoping for that same sunburn to stay on my shoulders for the next several months as we spend more and more time outside in our beautiful yard, bursting with life.

Take 5... Years

So I've come up with a new plan... I may write a book about it someday. it's my 5 year plan. I know it's not a new concept but what to do with those 5 years might be. I have thought that it would be a wonderfully helpful and enlightening way to spend my 5 years by taking 1 year for 5 different subjects and learning as much as I can about those things. for example... My first year will be learning about gardening, cooking, parenting and sewing. I have a basic knowledge in all of those subjects but I would love to be better at all of them.

After my 5 years I will have a fantastic base of knowledge to pull from in whatever profession I choose to go with, or in all of them! it will give me a head start and a confidence I wouldnt have if I were to just jump in. I'm excited about it so we'll see how it all goes. I plan to study at night before bed or maybe occasionally during the day if I have a spare moment or two. I also want to try one project per week to test out my new found knowledge.

I am so looking forward to spending these next 5 years with my beautiful family, watching them grow, playing with them, spending some much needed time together. After 5 years they will all be in school and I will have the time necessary to put in to practice any skills I would like to impliment in to my life. So that's my plan, we'll see how it goes! Of course I will write about my adventures too :)

Let the craziness begin!

It has been a few days since I last posted. My living room has been overrun by my mass of sewing crap, we had to move the baby chicks outside to the garage, I was told they would be stinky free for at least a week... uuuuuh huh, didn't even last a day. My greenhouse is turning in to a jungle and Im begining to worry what will happen to my office/makeshift garden since I apparently cant plant outside until the last part of April at the earliest!

Between the sewing bomb, jungle in my office, 14 putride chicks, 1 shaggy dog in desperate need of a bath and a haircut, one bird in a cage that hasnt seen a human face in days, 1 hamster that likes to stay hidden and makes me worry he died, a flock of quail that have begun visiting my front yard every day and a flock of birds that have been here since we moved in I feel like I am living in this little bubble inside my quiet subdivision. If only people knew what kind of craziness went on behind these walls, i would probably be kicked out! And I didn't even count my own kids!!!

Speaking of kids, our numbers are going to jump a whopping 4 people sometime around June! Baby number 7 for me, my oldest daughter who is currently in Arkansas will be coming back to live here. Dave's 2 girls will be coming sometime this summer one possibly to stay. Holy Moly! This house is going to need to be renamed the asylum... We accept pets and people here.

I am truly excited though, I've always dreamed of a busy crazy home filled with laughter, wet footprints all over the house from summertime sprinklers, dirt under fingernails from working in our garden, and even stinky hands from playing with the dog and the occasional 'treasure' (i.e. bugs, snails, frogs, etc) brought inside to show off.

I regularly daydream about watching my children climbing in and out of the sunflower house with books, pillows and play dishes, watching the chickens wander around the yard lazily pecking away at various bugs and worms (hopefully none are recently aquired 'pets') cooking a light yummy dinner mostly from our garden and serving it on the picnic table outside that is canopied by wisteria and hanging jars filled with flickering candles that glow and twinkle as the sun sets.

It's funny though because this was never the life I intended. I was a clothing designer (still dabble) and traveled to New York, Indianapolis and several other cities, my label was growing and gaining attention then things all came grinding to a halt. I loved my life but it was extremely stressful and I never got to be with my family, 100% with my family. Even if I was sitting with them my mind was on work. It was exciting, fun and terrifying all at the same time.

I gradually slowed down, listing my pieces on Etsy. I found out in November that I was expecting a baby and everything started to change. I wanted to slow everything down, actually I wanted to put everything on hold and concentrate 100% on my family. I can design any time I want, in 2 years, 5 years, 10 years, but my children only get one shot at a fantastic childhood, I feel like I am being selfish to spend all of my time on a career that can wait and put them off with a childhood that has a time limit.

So here I go in to full blown stay at home mom mode and I couldnt be happier. I was laying in bed with Dave the other night and told him my desires and needs to stay home full time without the stress of a job always weighing on my mind, I ended up in tears and he kind of just looked at me like I was crazy then, being his wonderful self said, 'then don't work. Sew when you want to sew, and spend all the time you want with the kids, or relaxing, read a book, sit on the couch. As long as you're happy that's all I'm concerned about' Oh my angel of a man. Since that night I have felt so much better. so much lighter. I feel like I have TIME to do all of the things with the kids that I have been wanting desperately to do.

So this will serve as my journal and ocassional venting method. I hope that it helps to get some of the craziness going on in my head to calm down at least enough to let the dust settle for a moment or two!