Another Great Weekend!

I ended up having another busy, summer weekend! It started off with a bang on Friday - my firstborn son's 5th birthday. We had a good time. I made him (Ethan) some of his favorite meals (like cheeseburgers, which is a big deal when you're allergic to cheese and wheat) and desserts he could actually eat (this child has an allergy list a mile long). It was tricky in the meal department, but I got it taken care of. Then, there was, of course, gift opening time, a few hours of hanging out with friends, and a trip to the park. He enjoyed it.

On Saturday morning, after assembling a pizza for my husband to bake for lunch, I went over to my friend, Crystal's house to help prepare for a birthday party, then hang out for the party she was throwing for two of her children. Everyone had fun! We had probably the best BBQ beef sandwiches I've ever had, yummy pasta salad, potato salad, spinach dip with homemade bread, and fruit galore! I left the party STUFFED. I don't think I ate dinner that night.

Then, on Sunday after lunch I packed up my children again and headed for the mountains to meet up with my parents at a rustic log cabin. They were camping there for the weekend along with some friends of theirs. The road there was one of the roughest roads I've been on and I have seen many a rough road in my day! LOL. Really, I have. This one was steep, rocky, dusty, and definitely not well maintained. It was full of potholes and large rocks. I was proud of my SUV, though, because I didn't even need to put it in 4 wheel drive, although I did have to put the gas down a bit far a couple of times to get over a few big rocks. Once we got there it was nice just relaxing and visiting with my mom, sister (who met us up there, too), dad, and everyone. We went an extra 1 1/2 miles up the rough road to a lake in the mountains. Ethan went in even though he was wearing sweat pants and a t-shirt! Good thing he had an extra outfit in the vehicle. Robby got to feel sand for the very first time when he was set down in it for a little while - that was probably the only time he laughed out loud that day! Madeleine, surprisingly, stayed out of trouble most of the day and enjoyed playing with the other little kids there! I think probably the cutest moment of the day was when Ethan picked a bouquet of pretty wildflowers and instead of giving them to ol' mom, he handed them to a cute little girl his own age. Later he told me, "Mom, that girl that was at the river," (he confused the lake with a river), "had very pretty ponytails." (She was wearing her hair in pigtails). Too cute.

Today has been a day of catch up; laundry, cooking, cleaning, and making cards.

Here are a few pictures from our weekend:

Birthday Boy.

Madeleine stretching in the woods.

The lake.

Ethan standing by the lake at dusk.

Robby and me hanging out in the forest.

Robby enjoyed burying his own feet in the sand before he got too dirty for mommy to allow anymore play in the sand.

Farewell Ruby-the-Goat and More

Today is a good day. Ruby the goat (the one who was always getting her head stuck in the fence) went away to a new home today along with one of her kids. I'm glad I won't have to worry about getting her unstuck everyday now!

Schooling the children has been going very well this week. Ethan is learning how to read and doing a good job of it. He is also getting better and better at writing his letters.

A local gift shop in town is planning on taking a dozen of my handmade greeting cards on consignment. I sure hope they sell well! I'm working on them this week hoping to get them done quickly. Here is one of the ones I made the other day:
I don't know if you can tell the flowers are glittery and there is stitching on a few places on the card, but there are. I really need to work on my photography skills for close up shots like these. I can't decide if the fault lies in me or the camera.

Well, I just thought I'd update everyone before I get back to work on my cards. I probably won't post again until I get the dozen done! I need to get those in the store ASAP! :)

A Sunday Drive on Saturday

Today my family and I got to go out for what I would think of as a little "Sunday drive," only, of course, it was Saturday. What started out as a search for ripe huckleberries turned out being an afternoon of soaking up sunshine, blue skies, and the woods in all its glory. I always enjoy going out and experiencing God's creations. Today I got to enjoy picking wildflowers, taking snapshots of flowers, trees, and other things that inspired me, reminiscing over things I used to study in the woods with my mom & sisters, talking to my husband, and just appreciating my beautiful family. Here are a few of the pictures I took:

Rose hip (I think)

Indian Paintbrush

A tree a beaver felled.

A peaceful brook.

This is a sad one. This was a deer that tried jumping a fence and apparently got it's hind haunches stuck. Ouch! What a bad way to go.

And this is the crazy bouquet I picked today. I don't know the name of every flower in the bunch, but that big yellow one is a wild sunflower, the red ones are Indian Paintbrush, and I have some foxtail in there.

A Cute Question

Ethan recently asked me, "Mom, will there be dirt in heaven?"

"Yeah, probably." I responded, "Why?"

"I like digging holes."

It's funny the things kids worry and wonder about when they think about going to heaven.

Mastitis, Paper Crafts, Etc.

Yesterday evening, after tucking my sweet children into bed I realized I was feeling the soreness I connect with Mastitis. I went and drank a glass of water, but didn't feel up to eating fresh garlic (which has helped in the past) and didn't have cabbage to help with inflammation. It was too late to take a hot shower, so I put hot clothes on the infected area and pumped to try to clear the clogged duct. Although I did a couple of the things I know to do, I still came down with a fever, chills, felt nauseated, and got one of the worst headaches I've ever had. I slept horribly and just knew I was going to have to call my new friend to tell her I wouldn't be able to come over for our little visit. This morning I couldn't walk around without making my head pound worse, so I took 2 Advil and within 20 minutes I felt much better. I took a quick trip to town to check my mail and get some cabbage before deciding I felt up for a visit after all and packed up some paper craft items to play with.

As I was headed over for the little get together I realized I had left the house nearly 30 minutes too soon, so took a little drive to look for wild flowers. I didn't find the Paintbrush flowers I was looking for, but saw some other pretty ones that looked too prickly to pick. After our little detour, I drove the rest of the way to our destination.

Our kids had fun playing outside for about 5 hours on our new friends' swing set, trampoline, and sandbox and eating watermelon, strawberries, kiwis, and Popsicles. While the kids had lots of outdoor fun we enjoyed our relaxing time making 11 cards - mostly birthday invites. It was a lovely afternoon!

Now that I've bored everyone with my mundane life I had best be going. It's past my bedtime! :)

Weekend in a Nutshell

Here is the outline of my past weekend:

Friday:
Big hail storm. We had a hail storm with hail that was about 1 inch in diameter that lasted about 5 minutes. It was probably the loudest storm I've been around. My hubby was able to hear it off in the distance about 10 minutes before it even hit our place! Before the storm hit I noticed a big, beautiful rainbow outside...



I put the kids to bed at the usual time, because last year when I let them stay up for the fireworks they were off schedule for about 10 days. It just wasn't worth it this year. (I do have a slight twinge of regret concerning this. After all... fireworks only come around once a year.)

Saturday:
Robby took his first step!

I had a friend over for lunch and crafts, which was fun.

Sunday:
My kids and I spent the day with my parents and sister who live 1 1/2 hours from here, we did some grocery shopping at my favorite big health food store, went to a used bookstore, and hung out for most of the day. Here are a couple of pictures (the first one is my dad and Robby, and the second is Madeleine climbing a tree.)



Robby took 4 steps in a row after we got home from our visit with my parents. He'll be walking in no time!

Today:
It's my 6th wedding anniversary! How time flies!

I took some pictures earlier of my three cuties and was happily surprised they all smiled at the same time for me! It must be their anniversary gift to me.

Circling Robby

One of the things Robby really likes to do is go around and around and around in circles. Here's a sample of what I'm talking about:

I took a video of it after I saw him learning how to stand on his own. I thought he'll probably forget all about those cute circles when he learns to walk!

Here's one of our young turkeys (we have two) peeking in our window this morning: