Baby Hummingbirds

They are absolutely adorable!  Their nest is tiny!  I'm pretty sure it's growing as the babies do!  Their beaks used to be short and nothing hummingbird-y, but they're growing and looking like hummingbirds!  I love it!

Spring Again!

Pumpkin Patch

Pumpkin Patch.

With a big camera.

And no (awake) littles.

Fun Times.

Quailings!

They are the absolute CUTEST things!  I love them!  And the proud parents who strut around!  LOVE!

Baby Ladybug

They look just like the pictures in books!  And it was fast!!

Tulips

I love tulips!  I never knew there were so many varieties until we moved into this house and they all started to bloom!

She's Here!

"K" is here!  Now we're home and getting used to being a family of 7!

Fall

It was early.  I was up to pick up our basket.  As I walked out the door I saw the grass frosted over.  It was so pretty, I had to go back for my camera.  I'm not a big fan of the colder weather, or the rain.  Or especially the snow that I know is coming.  But I love the frost.  And I love the leaves changing colors.   And I loves pumpkins and cute scarecrows.  And I'm so excited to have time to hang pictures and paint my kitchen, without feeling like I need to be outside pulling weeds.

Curious...

We have a young boy who is currently LOVING Curious George.  So we've been reading A LOT of them.  But after reading so many, I've come upon a ... curiosity...  for lack of a better word.  When the "Man with the Yellow Hat" knows the propensity of his Monkey to find trouble when left to himself, Why does he leave the monkey alone so often?

How Our Garden Grows

Once we fixed the watering problem, it grows extremely well.  Especially the zucchini.  Let me know if you need some (and live close.  Because I don't think it'd make it being shipped)!

Here we have our Artichokes, then peppers (bell and jalepeno), then beets, cucumbers that are barely getting started, green onions that are being almost completely covered by 2 of our zucchini plants, then carrots (the only ones that are growing from planting entire packets!), then the corn (that is taller than I am in a lot of places!) and last a struggling butternut squash and a small pumpkin plant that is in no way small!

On the other side we have watermelon, then cantaloupe, tomatoes (19 plants with a lot of green tomatoes.  Any ideas on how to make them turn red?), green beans, then more zucchini followed by more corn.  Then we have a couple of volunteer winter squash (we're guessing pumpkins) and more zucchini (also volunteer).

More Friends

Are you tired of deer pictures yet?  I'm not, so I'll keep posting them.  A cute fawn!

2 Bucks!  At the same time!

And a family of quail (N calls the babies quailings!).  I love our backyard!  I love our fun friends!  (Until one of them eats our garden.  Or our fruit trees.  Then we're definitely NOT friends!)

In Our Backyard

Not quite up to the moose my uncle gets, but still pretty cool.  Until he (or one of the others {we've seen 2 different does}) goes near the garden.  Then it's definitely NOT cool!

Can You Guess?

We just got back from our camping trip.  Can you guess where we went?

Luckily...

If you had seen this (or your phone camera had, since I had to stick my hand up high and hope for the best), wouldn't you think they were dead?  2 unmoving chicks and an unhatched egg?

Luckily, I was WRONG!  "N" asked me to climb up to check again, because she thought she heard chirping.  She was right!  2 nice healthy chicks!  Yippee!

In Our Tree

ROBIN'S EGGS!  So much fun!

Also, I have a 365 blog, where I try to post a picture a day (or a picture for every day, because usually I post for a bunch of days on one day).  Anywho...  It's only been going for a year and five months now. But it has 5000 more views than this blog, which I've had for 5 years +.  And there are hardly any comments (on either blog, for that matter) so I have no idea who's looking at the other blog and it's kind of weirding me out, just a little.

And in the spirit of full disclosure, the robins eggs hatched, well, just two of them.  And now the sweet little babies are dead and the other egg is just sitting there.  And I don't know what to do about the babies or the nest or anything.    Do I leave it alone?  Do I throw it away?  So if you have any ideas, please let me know!

April?

I think the weather didn't realize that it's APRIL.  April SHOWERS not April SNOWS.

Dinner Conversation

Some things to know:
1) we use tickets to reward our kiddos.  They use the tickets to "buy" privileges (computer time, movies, etc)
2) we've been working on talking nicely and not complaining
3) we had rolls with dinner

Here's how it went down:

N: We forgot to put the jam on the table!
M: No, we didn't forget.  We're not going to have jam tonight.
N: Oh.  Okay.  I'll just enjoy my roll all my itself.
M: What a great response, N!  You can have a ticket for that!
N: {smiles}
A: Can I have a ticket, too?
D: {chuckling} No, just N.  You didn't say the nice thing.
A (carefully thinking, trying to remember what N had said): We forgot to put the ...
M/D: {laughter (lots of it)}
A (with a twinkle in his eyes): Can I have a ticket because I told two jokes?
M/D: {tears running down the cheeks laughter}

He didn't get the ticket.  But I was tempted to give him one...

And completely unrelated, we did our egg dying in mason jars this year.  It was great!  Also, some of the colors got a double tablet and we will definitely be repeating that!  The colors were gorgeous!

Spring Has Sprung

These crocus flowers prove it.  They pushed their way through a pile of dirt.  But not the whole thing.  Just a bit of their petals made it.  "N" noticed a little bit of purple showing, so we dug around to find the leaves.  When we found them, they were yellow.  But they're greening up now and looking so happy.  I love bulbs!

A Post

Sometimes I get online and want to waste spend some time reading blogs.  And then I'm disappointed because no one has posted.  And then I realize that I, too, have not posted.  And then I think to myself: "Self, if you're not going to post, then you can't blame other people for not posting."  And so I find something to do that I should have been doing anyway.  And then at some future time I sit down to write a post, but find that I have nothing witty or inspiring to say, and so I ramble.  But I have posted.  And that was the plan.  And look!  I even have a picture.  

This rhino was just looking so RHINO-ish, that I had to take his picture.

When "A" saw this bear on the roof of their enclosure (doesn't that so much better than "cage"?  Even though they're the same thing!) he ("A") wanted to know if bears could jump.  I told him that we'd have to watch and see.  We never saw it jump.

Pinterest: In Action!

You're on Pinterest, right?  If not, you should be.  It's a great place for keeping ideas that you find online.  The next step, though, is putting the ideas to use.  Here are some of the ideas I've pinned and actually tried (not including food.  That will be it's own post.  Someday.)

Ribbon Flower Clips - Super easy and cute!  I only wish I knew where it ran off to...

Ghost I Spy Bag - Loved it!  My kiddos, not so much.  It went into the halloween box, though, because I'm determined that one day, one of my kiddos will enjoy it.

2 Ingredient Fudge - Yummy!  And it works with a lot of different combinations!  Definitely not as good as the real thing, but a great trick in a pinch!

Dry Erase on Deep Freezer - INSPIRED!!!  It works!  I love it!  I can't say enough good things about it!  The only down side is that the marker leaves a bit of residue on the freezer, but I think it would wipe off with a bit of window cleaner.  I just haven't tried because I don't want to erase my whole freezer and write it all again.


Jello Playdough - Not good.  You're welcome to try it, but it DID NOT beat my favorite Vanilla playdough.

Velcro Sticks - I made mine with tiny velcro dots (because I ordered close to a million of them and didn't want to buy the regular size dots) and popsicle sticks.  They're fun, but I think they'd be easier for the kiddos if you used tongue depressors and larger dots (like the instructions say.  LOL!)

Measure it! - Hasn't been a favorite activity of the kiddos.  But it was easy to put together.

Button Snake - I have to admit I didn't make this one, but received one as part of a busy bag exchange. The kiddos love it.  I love that it can span a lot of ages - beginning at age 1.

Sidewalk Paint - Easy to put together and a nice change from chalk.

Simple Knots - I loved them!  They were super cute and easy!

Playdough and Craft Stick Number Line - "N" enjoyed having this part of her school.  I put numbers on one side of the sticks and the alphabet on the other.  She got to choose which one she lined up!

There you are!  Some of what I've pinned and my thoughts.  It's nice to see that I actually have tried some of the ideas.