the late birthday party

 

My happy little man finally had his birthday party.   It was two weeks late, but nonetheless, we had it.  This grump face is just shortly before the party when he was convinced that he wanted to cancel the party.  He's drama. 

 

It was a total low stress, low prep, easy, at home party.  That seems like an oxymoron, but it really was.  He wanted friends to come swim, watch a movie outside, have a few sparklers, eat hotdogs, play hide and go seek, and have a water balloon fight.  Just like that, the party was planned. 

I kept the camera put away most of the evening, but ended up with just a few pictures.

I had just planned on sending home the sparklers and snap-pops, but the kids broke them out of the goodie bags as soon as it was dark.  It ended up being really fun, albeit a tiny bit dangerous.  Did I use the word albeit correctly?  Spell check feels ok about it so I will too.

A few of the kids had never done sparklers before and didn't know sparkler etiquette. 

There were a few close calls with hot, spent sparkler sticks.

We watched How to Train Your Dragon, which Lou just recently watched for the first time.  The dads were especially mesmerized with this movie.

The menu was easy too, Lou's favorites- hot dogs on the grill, watermelon, cheetos, homemade mac and cheese, and cherry limeade.  Instead of cake, he wanted root beer floats.  I don't think he's had a cake at his party since his first birthday maybe. 

This is the least I've written about one of the kids birthday parties, but really we kept it simple.  Like I mentioned, there was a lot of drama concerning the party for Lou.  I'll protect Lou's privacy a little here, but we're back at the therapist office this summer.  He's had tremendous concern that someone would throw up at his party.  It's weird. And frustrating.  And causes his mama to worry.  Now that the party is over, we've started worrying about bible school.  People probably throw up there a lot too. 

dresses for uganda

I was able to participate in something really amazing at my church this week.  About 100 ladies met one evening and after enjoying a nice meal together, we sewed together.  We sewed pillowcase dresses for the little girls at the Rakai Children's village in Uganda.  Our church sends groups there several times a year.  My class at school sponsored one of the students, Lillian, as our Christmas gift to each other this year.  I'm hoping some day to go there myself and meet Lillian. 

There were 32 sewing machines going and then many ladies cutting fabric, ironing, stringing ribbon through, and sizing and sorting dresses.  My cutting partner and I made 7 dresses- we had a system and major flow going.  I don't know the number of the total dresses, but if each machine made even 5 dresses in the evening, that's a bunch of little girls in pretty dresses come August. 

This isn't all of the  dresses.  I think many ladies were keeping theirs at their station to deliver them all at once.  While the goal was quantity, I kept seeing dresses come in with little added special details.   I loved that because it meant that the ladies were concerned with how pretty and special each dress was.  They wanted each little girl to love her dress and think it was the best.  I made a really pretty pink paisley one for Lillian.  I'll just pretend she's the one who gets it.

garden tales

 

We downsized the garden a bit this year.  We're using the smaller upper garden and instead of the larger lower garden (we live on a hill), we have two raised planting boxes.  I always wanted some and when the neighbors next door moved this spring, I jumped on them. 

 

 

 

I have green beans in one box and sweet peas and strawberries in the others.   We have tomatoes in the upper garden. 

 

 

 

There's a little something going on with the green beans.  The edges of the leaves look burnt on the edges.  The new leaves are ok, so I'm not going to worry.  I wonder if they got sun burnt from a mid day watering?  

 

 

The logan berries are two weeks later than they have been in the past three years, but they're here now and Bee and I are devouring them by the bowl full. 

 

 

 

 We planted new strawberries this year.  The others are so buried under the thorns of the logan berries, they are impossible to get to. 

They new ones were not great producers this year, but I think next year they'll be better.

 

 

I can't wait for the tomatoes.  I don't really eat them off season, they're so disappointing from the grocery.  I planted several varieties of heirloom tomatoes. 

 

 

After my plants were coming up, I put newspaper down and then straw on top just like I've done the past few years.  It's my favorite gardening short cut!  Few if any weeds and it helps keep the moisture in the ground.  Here's more about that from two years ago.
 

 

And my favorite flowers are blooming.  It's the best part of the yard!

 

The goal for the garden this year was low maintenance.  Hopefully low maintenance still can be high producing.

Bee's Blog!

That little Bee of mine has decided to start a blog.  My dad mentioned it to me on father's day and I mentioned it to Bee. She got right on it.  You can find her at her new blog, Little Bee.  I'm sure there'll be a bunch of overlap from stuff here, but she will put her own spin on it.

boots

On the way home from visiting my sister at the farm, we stopped and bought boots.  The kids watched the billboards signs for the boot store for over an hour.  We saw 14 signs that last hour before we got there! 

  Bee sort of had a love affair with her old boots, which were cheap ones from Target.  They had gotten all skinned and scuffed and looked pretty yuck.  I was more than happy to buy them real ones. 

Plus it means that Lou will wear something other than sports pants.  Can't wear sports pants with boots. 

Five years ago, the kids had a thing for boots too.

a visit to my sister's

The kids and I went to visit my sister.  She lives on a farm and it was pretty much wonderful for all of us, at least on our end.   Look how happy that pup of ours is to run free.  No leash, no collar, just freedom.   I don't apologize, but here are about 92 pictures. 

The kiddos enjoyed brief moments of peaceful playing!

This creek runs through the woods behind the house.  We hiked over here a few times.  My sister only fell in once.   She's a teacher too and also on summer break, so we were able to go up a few days and just hang out.

There is this park nearby her place where it's set up like a 1920's farm.  You can go and visit the farm and help out with farm chores, gather eggs, milk cows, etc. 

 
We got to bring the horses back in from the field,

get the oats ready,

feed the horses,

and stack hay.

Then we got hot and tried to get out of anymore work.  Here's my mom, sister, Bee and of course, Lou.  I took about 6 pictures and he's doing something like this in every one. 

The kids always enjoy visiting my sister.  

Just so you don't think we're something we're not. 

That loving moment, turned into this.

We had a campfire and enjoyed smores and good company.   That's my sister boyfriend. 

Bee was disappointed that no one had a guitar.  Apparently that's what you do around a fire.

Lou had heard about a 'dirt bike' and pretty much begged until he got a chance to ride it.

Tippy just roamed around and enjoyed himself.  My sister has her little dog and then there are two other farm dogs. 

Lou fell in love with Molly the border collie.  They played soccer together.  They played tag.  They laid and cuddled.   Lou fell in love, and I think Molly did too.

My sister's little dog Harley has been so happy since moving to the farm. 

I guess Tippy's a farm dog at heart.

Lou came home and drew these pictures of the dogs he was missing.  We will be visiting again this summer whether of not we're invited.