Busy, busy, busy!

Life has resumed its normal craziness. Once in awhile we get a little break from all the hectic running around but now is not one of those times. Since the kids have started baseball we have been at one practice or another, and now with games starting this week I'm not sure we will ever be home! On Wednesday all 3 kids play at the same time, tell me how I am supposed to do that! Thankfully it is the only time all season that will happen, otherwise we just make it work. My kids have learned so many important life lessons through playing sports so for us it is just something we do, no matter how crazy it makes me! We have been busy with other stuff too. Kaela had a wonderful birthday and baptism. Thank you everyone who came, I always miss my family during these important events but I am thankful for Randy's family and good friends who are always there to support us. We are gearing up for Lyndi's big first birthday bash this weekend. I am so excited to celebrate her big day with everyone, she has been such a blessing to our family. Right after that is Kyle's 12th birthday, he still won't commit as to what he wants to do, I think he has it narrowed down to a Dbacks game or Amazing Jakes, he better decide quick! Darrin is excited to get his cast off this week, hopefully the doc will say his surgery was a success and he is good to go. He ran in his first track meet last week and did great considering he hasn't trained in 3 weeks. It was a 3 school meet and he took 4th in his 100 and 1st in the 4x100. This week he will be adding the 200 to his list of events. It is a fun, crazy time for us but exciting too as we watch our kids grow up and experience new things. We were sitting around the dinner table the other night and I realized that we have a houseful of pre-teen/teenagers. Gone are the the days we had a houseful of little ones. It is a definitely different stage of life for us and it takes a little getting used to but I am looking forward to all the new adventures yet to come!

Lil' Sprouts

In more ways than one, everything is sprouting up. It is exciting to see little green sprouts coming up in the garden, I hope they will eventually grow into veggies we can eat. I haven't killed the tomato plants yet so that's a good sign! Thankfully Randy added drip to the garden so I don't have to remember to water it because honestly I never would, that is probably the last thing on my mind. We have always had a tradition to track the kids growth on the inside of one of our doors. When we sold our first house we actually had to go back and transfer the lines to a pvc pipe we still have out in the garage. When we eventually move again we will have to come up with a better idea but we still love to see how much they have grown. Sunday we lined them all up and took measurements again, Trevor surprised us all by growing 3 inches this past year. Lyndi has also grown that much in just the last few months! I am about to be past up in height by my oldest son, so weird! He is about 1/8 of an inch shorter than me so I expect by next week he will have passed me by. Ryan is the same height at 9 years old that Kyle was at 10 so I am sure he will end up being taller than his brother. One of the neatest things is that when my dad was alive we marked his height on the door, at 6'7" he was just below the top of the door. Being able to visualize him that tall is bittersweet, but it keeps his memory close to our hearts. So everything and everyone is growing up!

How does your garden grow?

Well, I am going to try again. I love the idea of gardening but my knowledge is very limited and I was born with a black thumb! A couple of weeks ago we dug up the old weed & grass infested garden plot and started over. I am attempting the square foot garden method which seems to be a very organized way to plant which my ocd brain very much appreciates. We spent some time on Saturday planting all the seeds along with 4 tomato plants, 2 strawberry plants and Ryan's lima bean plant that he brought home from school. So far it looks pretty but nothing has started sprouting yet so we'll see if I've killed it all already! I am hoping for a great crop, I love the idea of growing our own food and providing somewhat for the family. Of course that only works if your children actually eat vegetables! Wish me luck!


Before



After (we also added fencing to keep the dogs/kids out)