Things that make me happy

busy, busy

Saturday Josh put 2 garden beds in for me. This one I'm going to try some Square foot Gardening. Along the front and left edge the squares aren't squares and aren't one foot. So I've planted some marigolds and other flowers that help with bugs, some repel and some attract. Along the fence I will plant sweet corn and sunflowers. Other veggies in this garden will be radishes, carrots, cucumbers, lettuce, cauliflower, rainbow chard, turnips. Can't remember what else. As you can see Josh also installed a sprinkler system for me. (he also fixed the camera. pretty handy, doncha think?) =)
This one has flower seeds all mixed up in it. And I will plant tomatoes along the fence and also plant cantaloupe and pumpkins.

The garage-turned- guestroom turned into a schoolroom/computer repair area on Sunday.

Standing in Josh's work area. He's planning to build a dividing wall. Still looks bare but soon it'll be better. Also, all his stuff is moving off that shelf so I can put up their puzzles, games, books, etc.

The girls helped decorate. They put up all the farm stuff. Beka asked to be in the picture. =)

We've been busy today too. Already this morning I've washed and hung out 3 loads of laundry, washed dishes, started an art project with the girls, changed all 3 girls' wardrobes from winter to spring/summer, gotten irritated because the girls' new "washable" markers aren't so washable, changed stuff around in my kitchen and paid the van registration. I still need to buy shorts for Catie, buy new plastic containers to help contain toys in Beka's room since I moved the bookshelf into the schoolroom, clean off the computer desk and put clothes away in my room. Plus I'll have 3 loads of laundry to fold and put away later. But it's spring and it's beautiful and it's good cleaning weather. =)

next house

just for me to remind me of what I want a little different in the next house

Kitchen

• much much bigger
• Huge island with NOTHING on it
• two ways in/out
• bigger pantry
• BIGGER!!!

Living areas

• open plan living
• built in storage and bookshelves
• no wasted space

Laundry room

• either bigger with lots of shelves and space for folding
• or none because this one is wasted space unless you count it's ability to collect all the don't-know-where-they-should-go-because-they-have-nowhere-to-go things
• this isn't specific to the laundry room but I want hallways that are wider. Everytime I carry in loads of laundry I scrape my hands on the walls. And I have to tilt the basket to get through doorways. (I guess I could go with smaller round -rather than oval-baskets)
  

Linen closets

• in places that make sense not just a huge dump all closet.
  

Craft room

• lighter, brighter
  
• set up with the school room so I don't have to divide the stuff and I can do some of my stuff when they are doing things they don't need help with just supervision.

Bedrooms

• I'm pretty happy with these except that if they were to have bunk beds the fan would be seriously dangerous.

Bathrooms

• A 3 way bathroom for the main bath-1 toilet, 2 sink/mirror, 3 shower, sink

Does it sound like I'm complaining? I'm not really. I like my house. It's just there are things I now know since living in it that I would do differently. We seem to have a bit of wasted space. I don't really want to go bigger overall--just the kitchen and maybe the master bedroom to provide a bit of a parents' retreat--just more useful. And ideally we would have a bit of a granny flat so when parents come over or when missionaries or friends need a place to stay we have some private space for them.

Update

• Went to Fraser Island yesterday. It was nice. very bumpy though. Of course that's kind of assumed when you use the words four wheel driving. =) Our first stop was Lake McKenzie. We rolled the girls pants up and let them walk in the water. Emma and Beka got absolutely soaked. Not really all that surprising I guess. Our next stop was Kingfisher Bay. I managed to find a swimsuit coverup/shirtdress for only $5 so Emma could wear something. She had fallen over in the sand as well and her pants were soaking wet and full of sand. Mom and Dad hadn't seen Kingfisher Bay before so that was nice to have a look around. We then went to Central Station. On our way there Josh noticed that on top of all the 4WD tracks were fresh dingo tracks. After about 5 minutes we came around a bend to see the dingo trotting along in front of us. We tried to get a picture but he went left as we passed a sign telling us to "Keep Right". Guess he can't read. =) As we sat eating lunch at Central Station a magpie flew by and snatched a piece of cheese out of Catie's fingers. Totally freaked her out!! We went on the shortest hike there at Central Station. It is right by Wanggoolba Creek. I mentioned to Mom how nasty the water looked. It seemed to be covered with foam or something. Then we realized that actually it is the clearest water you'll ever see and the "foam" was just the sand bottom. I think Mom got some video of that. You wouldn't believe how clear that water is. As we headed back on the barge we saw a dolphin playing in the water. He wasn't a friendly dolphin as he stayed really far away from the boat not giving us a chance to take his picture or see him really well. =) We finished the day with pizza at the Sauvageot's and then home for showers and bed.
• Today we are going to get photos taken of the girls. One of the girls at church works in a photography studio. She asked if I wanted to bring my girls in for a sitting this week. So after curlers in hair last night we're headed off for photos in a couple hours.
• Mom and Dad are at the Boat Club with Richard and Fay Hadfield having breakfast right this moment. The Boat Club is situated on the boat harbour/marina (obviously) so they should have quite a spectacular view as the sun rises.
  
• After the photos and a quick trip to the library this morning Josh and I are off to Maleny. Our 7th anniversary is next Monday and my birthday is next Thursday. Also Father's Day here in Australia is the first Sunday of September. So we are celebrating all those things plus the fact that we have babysitters living with us at the moment. =) We are going to Lillypilly Country Cottages. We get back Friday sometime.
  
• Beka got up at 6:00 this morning and vomited so I'm hoping and praying that she isn't sick and the other girls don't get it.
  
• The picture doesn't have anything to do with this post except that now I am talking about it. It's a daisy from my garden. (If you click on the picture and see it full sized you'll see drops of dew on the flower. It really is gorgeous) I planted three daisy plants that have grown about 3 times their size and are producing gorgeous flowers. I also recently planted 8 gerberas and 10 snapdragons. Can you tell that I love to plant things? I can't wait until the garden is ready to plant. I'm excited to grow our own veggies and the girls are excited too.
  

So we tried something new...

and it didn't turn out so great. We tried making our own toothpaste. I don't think we'll be using it. Even with a whole packet of sweetener and twice the amount of flavouring called for, it was way too coconutty (from the coconut oil) and salty (from the baking soda). You should have seen the looks on the girls' faces when they tried it. Very funny!!

However, did you see my cute new tablecloth in the picture?? Here's a better picture of that!! =)

And how cute is this?

Friday

wow, yesterday was a very full day. I wasn't sure on Wednesday night that all the plans for Thursday were going to happen. Emma kept saying her head hurt and then just before dinner vomited. As Josh headed out the door to church a little while later I told him to tell Steve that if Emma (and therefore me) was up all night I wouldn't be teaching school and that our guests probably wouldn't want to come over for dinner and catch the flu. However, after a long hot shower Emma was starving and ate all her dinner and asked for more. She slept soundly and hasn't complained since.

So, we all went to school yesterday. Beka went in the pre-prep (preschool) room and Catie and Emma went to prep(kindergarten) with me. It was a good day. two students were absent and one of them was one of the rowdy ones. Thankfully the class had sport in the afternoon and that is taught by a different teacher. I did read some Curious George books to the children after their work was done. They loved him!! It's always nice to share something I love and let someone else fall in love with it too. I might tell their teacher how much they enjoyed it and share my Curious George unit study ideas and all my Curious George books and movies with her.

We came home after school and I set to work making sure the kitchen and bathrooms were tidy and doing the laundry. Josh vacuumed and swept and mopped for me. The Sauvageots and our other guests showed up around 5:30. We had a nice dinner of BBQ pork sandwiches, steamed veggies and baked potatoes. They brought a blueberry cheesecake with them which the adults enjoyed while the kids had a chocolate iceblock. Afterwards the adults had a nice conversation time while the kids enjoyed a video. It's times like that when I appreciate the two living areas in our house and the sliding door that separates them. =)

So today my list looks something like this:

• buy 10 bags of marshmallows (for tonight's youth group bonfire)
• make 3 batches of cinnamon rolls
• go to the grocery store
• drop books off at the library
• wash and hang out 3 loads of laundry
• fold 4 loads of laundry
• get garage to point that Josh just has to move everything out to the shed

Tomorrow morning at 8 is the family breakfast at church. Tomorrow afternoon from 2 -4 is a friend's tupperware party. Tomorrow evening at 7 some ladies are coming over. In between all that Josh and I need to completely empty the garage and pick up a bed from our friends. oh, and the girls need to pack for their sleep over at Grandma's. They've been asking to do that since Tuesday so I'm guessing that won't take long. =)

I can't believe that it's only 5 days until Mom and Dad get here. We're so excited. I have all kinds of projects planned. =) I hope you all have a great weekend!! I'll update with photos soon. TTFN!!

Weekend ramblings

well, I forgot to ask Josh where the batteries are and haven't gotten to the cleaning of his table/workspace in the garage so haven't found them. So, no pictures of a nice clean back patio, the new grass that Gordon, our lovely neighbour, placed around the edges of the patio or the girls "helping" Gordon. I also don't have pictures of the large kookaburra we found dead in the corner of the backyard. not that I would have taken or shown you a picture of that. =) Thankfully, Josh came home to grab something from the garage and willingly spared a couple minutes to bury it.

We went mattress shopping on Saturday to find a single mattress for Beka. She really is too big for the cot/crib but there hasn't been a baby to kick her out of it. =) We suddenly realize after looking at 4 shops then going to the mall for a birthday gift for Josh's brother, Matthew, that it was 12:30. This week we didn't have youth group on Friday night like we normally do. Instead we planned it for 1:00 Saturday afternoon so we could go to some houses of people in our church and do some odd jobs for them. So, rather than take the children home and feed them lunch and put them down for naps as was the plan until we remembered youth group, we came home, grabbed what we needed for youth group, went to church, Josh got out, I drove to Hungry Jack's because we had to eat something and were out of non-frozen bread at home, waited 20 minutes!!! in the drive through, got a meal that I wasn't happy with (why doesn't the mega meal come with two whoppers as an option? who wants to eat a chicken sandwich with dill??? they used to come with two whoppers and whoppers are cheaper!!! Come on, HJ's, give us what we want!!) came back to church, fed the girls, kept three boys to do odd jobs around the church, sent everyone off, forgot to get the nappy wipes and extra nappies/undies/pull-ups before loaning the van to one of the groups, has to send Jake up to his house to get us the spare nappies and wipes we keep there, cleaned Beka up, cleaned Jake up from his "stack" on his bike (riding downhill one handed on a rocky dirt track!), finally got the church windows clean (note to self: all blue liquid cleaner is not window cleaner. also, all-purpose cleaner is not good for windows. it will smear. BADLY!!) served afternoon tea, came home, gave the girls showers, did some last minute bulletin stuff, went to Risser's house for Matthew's birthday, ate, played Taboo, came home, went to bed. (HA, beat that for a run-on sentence.) It was a good day though. Got new shoes for Catie and Emma that 1. they can put on by themselves 2. are cute enough for church and 3. are hardy enough to use anytime they need shoes. spent $90 at Big W!!! stuff adds up so quickly. At least it wasn't all shoes. =) Had a great group of kids come on Saturday to clean people's windows and cars and mow lawns. It was really fun to spend the evening with family. Jenni is home for a couple days before she heads off to Cedarville for 5 years. (Although I think she is planning to come home for a couple weeks at Christmas) Catie watched the football with Grandpa and fell asleep, Emma got in her bed and read herself to sleep. Not sure what happened with Beka but I think Grandpa put her in her bed and she went to sleep. We played through the whole stack of yellow cards for Taboo. Good fun.

Sunday was a good day. Steve preached in James Sunday morning. Before he went to the States we were up to James 3 but he preached an overview of the first two chapters yesterday. Very convicting sermon about making time to be holy. Putting the right things first. Doing and not just hearing. Knowing to do right and doing it. Then we had the Sauvageot's over for lunch. I made beef and vegetable stew and corn muffins. I have found the best recipe for cornbread here.(yesterday I only used about half the sugar and they were still really yummy.) Good thing Trevor and Susan aren't home because I wouldn't have had enough food if they had been. =) We miss them though. Choir was great. We haven't had choir the last couple months because our choir is very small and losing 2 people for 5 months, 2 people for 3 months and 1 for 1 month left us with a bunch of altos and one soprano. (why don't us altos ever get to go on holiday??) Anyway, with Steve, Jennie and Tim back we started choir practice again. I posted one of our songs yesterday. Still have it running through my head.

Well, that's quite a bit of rambling. I guess I really need to find the batteries, hey? Hope your week starts off right!!

p.s. the photo doesn't really have anything to do with this post but I found it quite funny.

p.p.s. Pray for Jennie. She is 36 weeks pregnant with this baby and just found out Thursday that she has gestational diabetes. Thankfully she hasn't had any problems so far and doesn't feel bad because of it and only has 4 weeks or less to go. Still, pray for there to be no complications.

Random

• I took photos today but my batteries died just after the last photo and I'm not sure where the other rechargeables are or any other batteries actually
• I have gorgeous pansies growing in my garden.
  
• The peas are starting to flower. YAY!!
• I went through 3 boxes of stuff today.
  
• The garage is slowly being emptied.
• I washed 4 loads of laundry, including baby stuff for Jennie and sheets and blankets for Mom and Dad's bed.
  
• I partially organized my pantry.
• I partially organized my linen cupboard/cupboard of everything.
• I reorganized my homeschooling stuff.
• The dust is really bothering my allergies.
• I still have piles of stuff around the dining/kitchen area that i'm not sure what I'm going to do with them.
• I have a headache. And I'm sure you do too if you've read this far. =)
• The sun is finally out and I got some clothes dry on the line.
  
• I think I'm going to make something with chocolate in it.
• hmmmm....I've ran out of random thoughts for the moment.

cinnamon rolls

Surely today will be better than yesterday if it starts like this...Right?? Please!!!

Weekend

So, we had a wonderful weekend. We travelled 5 hours to Toowoomba to visit our friends. It was such a relaxing fun weekend. J and I were able to visit Spotlight while Josh and C took the children to a park. We met at a restaurant, Montezuma's, for some wonderful Mexican food for lunch. After a lovely long nap (I woke up at 5 after laying down with Beka at 3) we had a light dinner and settled the children into bed. On Sunday I stayed home with the baby so J didn't have to take him out on a cold rainy day to the markets. We enjoyed lovely homemade scones for lunch made by C and E. Very yummy. After another relaxing restful afternoon (I didn't sleep this time but read a book) we ate a beautiful roast dinner made by J. We (the adults) got talking about our favourite desserts so J made caramel dumplings and lemon sponge pudding after the children went to bed. very nice!! J and I watched Battle of the Choirs and Private Practice. We headed to bed soon after that. I think the boys stayed up until 11 or so enjoying their last bit of WoW time. We got up at 7 Monday morning and headed 2 hours west to Brisbane to pick up the Sauvageot's (well, 5 of them anyway) from the airport. Then it was the 3.5 hour trip home. We extended that into more like a 4 to 4.5 hour trip home with a couple stops to eat, drink and/or use the facilities. =) We stayed at the Sauvageot's for a couple hours and helped them stay awake and eat pizza. Jennie did some unpacking and gave us some gifts. They brought the children some stamps and lip gloss, Josh got a couple t-shirts and I hit the jackpot. I got a Dallas Cowboys t-shirt, an Eeyore t-shirt that Susan sent back for me (thanks Susan, it is so adorable), a 24 pack of mint 3 Musketeers (YUMMY!!) and a gorgeous Willow Tree figurine that I've been wanting but is hard to find here. Thank you so much Sauvageot's!!

My plans are to put this figurine next to a picture of my Grandpa in his navy uniform. Well, if I can get Dad to email it to me. Hint, hint =)

This morning when I went out to check my front garden I found some surprises. This rose bush used to flower like crazy and would have 20 blooms on it at a time. But it hasn't bloomed hardly at all this year. I've been debating whether to just cut it back as I usually do in winter or take it out completely. Maybe it knew that it needed to do something but anyway when I went out there it had a beautiful bloom on it and a couple buds as well. It's kinda hard to see but it's a miniature rose.

and look!!! one of my pansies bloomed!! and it has another bud on the plant. and just so you know those aren't weird white spots but raindrops.

and this is my gorgeous double delight rose. This bush flowers like crazy but it grows like crazy too. I need to cut it back but it just keeps blooming. This bush is about 6 feet away from my front door but you can smell the roses when you walk out the door. mmmm....like raspberries.

Random

• We love our couch. This was yesterday morning. The girls were watching Playschool and Josh was just waking up. =)

• I am such a klutz. I somehow managed to fall over yesterday and roll one ankle, twist that knee and land on the other knee taking the skin off and bruising it. Such a dork!!
• Emma and Beka stayed with my friend Roseanne on Tuesday while we took Catie to Brisbane. From the state of their clothes I could tell they had a marvelous time. I should've taken pictures of their shirts--dirt, glitter, glue, cupcake batter, marker,etc. It all came out though. And they haven't stopped talking about their day and want to go back soon.
• The girls got a package from Grandma Gwen yesterday. Oh the joys as they ripped into it. Activity books, blow up frogs, stamps, stickers, crayons. Thank you Grandma. These will keep the girls occupied on their trip to Toowoomba tomorrow.
• It got down to 9 degrees Celsius here last night. Positively freezing for QLD. =) It is so nice and deliciously chilly. And it was down to 5 in Toowoomba last night. Josh really is going to freeze this weekend. Better pack heaps of long sleeved layers for him.

• I have another 3 blooms on my strawberry plant. And my snowpeas are 10 - 12 inches tall now. They are climbing up the fence nicely. I have one daisy. No roses yet but the bushes are sure growing.
  
• We're heading up to the Sauvageot's to check out the state of their house for their homecoming on Monday. We can't wait to see them. The girls are very excited.
  
• I got my bread maker working again so have been making cinnamon rolls like crazy. But only when there are other people to help eat them. =)
  
• Hmmm....I'm sure we have plenty more random things but I'd better save them for another day.
  
• Unless something extremely interesting happens today I won't be posting again until Tuesday. Have a great weekend and an awesome sparkly 4th of July!!
  

Ready for church and other random stuff

Here's Beka all ready for church yesterday. Isn't she too cute?

We are heading to Brisbane tomorrow with Shane and Marlana to do the US consulate passport/birth certificate thing. That's a 4.5 hour trip there and then the two appointments and then the return trip home. Should be interesting. Then on Friday we are heading to Toowoomba to spend the weekend with our friends, the Caudells. I think Jess and I will get to spend some time at Spotlight so that should be fun. It will be nice to catch up with them. The girls are very excited.

So not sure how much blogging I'll be doing this week. Hope everyone has a great week. =)

Guess what??

we bought a couch!! we bought a couch!!

Now I'm off to tidy the room, move the furniture and then clean under the stuff that never gets moved. YAY!!!

I'll show you pics after it is delivered tomorrow afternoon!!

**think I'm excited?? look at all the exclamation points. =)

HMMMMMM.......

so I use this Method tub + tile cleaner that is eucalyptus and mint. I love it. Everything smells so clean but not chemically clean. Apparently the ants love it too though. This picture was taken five minutes after I cleaned the inside of the tub. Those aren't spots I forgot to clean, those are ants. they come down from the window (which has yellow curtains incidentally which is why some of the tub looks yellow rather than white. at least that's what I figure because my tub actually looks all white in person.) you can see them come down the tile over the edge of the tub and they are all congregating down at the bottom near the little ledge/seat thing. very weird.

**edited to add: If you click on the picture and enlarge it you can definitely see the ants.

More Randomness

So Happy Father's Day to my dad. (not to Josh since our Father's Day isn't until September). loved the pics of you getting wet at Sea World, Dad. If anyone else wants to see them go check out Tanya's blog. I did better with Father's Day than Mother's Day because I am telling Dad Happy Father's Day and I actually had the girls do up little cards for him. However, those cards are still waiting to be mailed. Sorry, Dad. Hopefully this week. And sorry Mom that I forgot Mother's Day. I really do love you and appreciate you!! =)

The girls have been a bit sick this week with colds. We were planning on church this morning but once I heard them do the big hacking cough and saw the snot running from their noses I decided that wouldn't be a wise idea. Josh has been sick this week as well with a UTI so I left them home with him. I told him that after a week of sick kiddies and a sick husband I just needed to leave my house. So I went to Sunday school and church by myself. Wow, it was so nice to listen to the sermon and take notes. The girls are pretty good in church but they can be very distracting. After church I picked up some Hungry Jack's (Burger King) and brought it home. As I turned the corner into our little development I met Josh and the girls just coming home from a walk. We have a school about 5 minutes walk away and Josh takes the girls there and lets them play on the playground. So I picked them up and drove them home.

At this moment, Catie and Emma are supposedly resting in their room but it sounds more like playing. Josh is asleep in our room and Beka is asleep in her room. So I'm enjoying my alone time and sitting here at the computer catching up on blogs and eating ice cream with some of Josh's peanut M&Ms. (shhh, don't tell him. I'll buy him some more.)

Had something exciting happen yesterday. Well, I was excited but you probably won't be. I have been looking for shirts and decided to look in Target yesterday while we were at the mall getting Josh's antibiotics. I found a shirt I loved (surprise #1) and it was on sale from $44.99 down to $18.87 (surprise #2). And then best surprise of all, when I got to the register it was marked down even further to $13.20!! How cool is that? We went to Rivers after that and I got two more shirts which were on sale for $10 each. So I got three shirts for less than the original price of the first shirt!! Very exciting in my life!! =)

There you go, Tanya, I put up another post. Moved your picture down the line a little =). I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Don't forget to call your dad and don't call him collect. =)

Snacks and Rejects

okay, I so had to laugh when I read this on a blog on the Wondertime website today

Like when Birdy spies me grabbing a quick bite of, say, peanut butter spread on a cracker — I mean, she could be pumping her legs on a swing two counties away and her internal "Mama's eating her own private snack" siren would blare — and she beetles over to ask politely, "Oooh, can I have a taste of that?" And of course she can, but I might hold it out towards her with a small, grudging sigh that means, "I daily prepare and feed you twenty trillion meals and still you need a bite of my one cracker the size of a poker chip?"

Does that happen to anyone else? I'll have fed the kids a bazillion things and when I have one little thing to eat they all want to taste it. Today we met my friend Roseanne and 4 of her boys at McDonald's for morning tea. It ended up being breakfast for us because it wasn't even 9 in the morning and it was just easier that way. I got hotcakes and juice for each of the girls. That's three big pancakes each. I had one bacon and egg mcmuffin. And my mcmuffin got cold by the time I buttered, cut and syruped pancakes for 3 little girls. I didn't even finish my food by the time Catie and Emma were done and standing by me saying, "Can I have a little bite of your hamburger thingy?" Of course I gave them a bite but seriously??? They ate more than I did. And still said they were hungry. I think they were actually eyeing off the frozen cokes that the boys were drinking. I distracted them instead with the playground. =)

We did a bit of shopping this morning after our morning tea and taking some food to Daddy at work. One of the shops is named The Reject Shop. Makes you want to shop there doesn't it?? It's all the overstock and stuff big stores couldn't sell and now you can buy cheap. But really, couldn't they have come up with a better name?? And does that make us rejects because we shop there??

JUNE???? already?!?!?!?

well, here in Australia yesterday was the first day of winter. It was actually cool enough that we wore long sleeves to church and didn't roast. Today however is a different matter. We are all wearing shorts and t-shirts, opening windows and doors and turning on the fans. The sun is finally out after 4 straight days of rain. I heard that we had 12 inches of rain over those 4 days. so even though the sun is out I don't think I'll be sending the girls outside. Still very soggy out. BUT I finally got to hang clothes out on the line and think they'll get dry today. so maybe those towels that have been on the line since Wednesday will finally get dry too.

Saturday night we had the young adults come over. That was good fun. Originally we thought maybe Shane and Marlana could come but that didn't work out. I asked Glenys if maybe we could do breakfast as something a little different. However, I forgot how much single childless people treasure their Saturday mornings. =) So we decided to have breakfast for dinner. Which turned out better as I had all day to prepare. So we had pancakes with toppings (ice cream, cream, apple and cinnamon pie filling, chocolate, strawberry and caramel toppings, maple syrup) cinnamon rolls, bacon, mini quiches and fresh fruit salad. It was yummy!! We just sat around and ate and talked then Josh had devotions. One of the couples stayed here until midnight which was really nice to be able to have some one on one time with them. All in all it was a great night but I forgot to take pictures.

This week we have our regular library story and activity time on Tuesday and then on Saturday a bunch (dare I say "gaggle") =) of ladies are coming over for a dessert evening. I'm very excited about this and really looking forward to it. Another thing I'm looking forward to is the group getting back from America. They should have a suitcase packed full of stuff by my mom for me!! I can't wait. I've been trying to remember what books I ordered and sent to mom and what food I asked her to get. It'll be like Christmas. Speaking of Christmas I'm getting in the mood for Christmas, it must be that cooler weather. Hopefully I'll be able to use that to get some of the handmade pressies made.

Well, enough rambling for one day. Hope all is well with you and yours. Have a great week.

photo catch up

So I finally found another camera cord. It only took a minute to find it I guess I should have looked sooner. =) So today you get random photos we've taken over the last couple weeks.
Catie gets out her camera everytime I do. Here she is taking photos of Daddy, Grandpa and Uncle Jason working on the shed roof.
Emma walked into the main room today from the front room looking like this. I couldn't figure out why until I realized some workers were pouring cement across the road and looked like this. She and Catie had been watching them work.
mom, here's those Moses in the bulrushes plants we planted at the end of the laundry line. Josh is taking them out since they are hosting a lizard, several types of spiders and possibly white ants/termites.
He replanted a couple of bushes he moved. Catie and Emma were helping.
And so was Beka. Josh planted some of the moses in the bulrushes plants here. They are growing well again but the bush I think is going to die.

In love

This time it's Josh who is in love. Surprisingly we can be a little picky about food in this household. We don't do canola or soy so we splash out more money on olive, rice bran or sunflower oil and margarine. We don't relish the idea of eating the bleach that you use on your clothes so we use organic unbleached flour and organic raw sugar. We prefer free range organic eggs or actually our favourite eggs are straight from Gwen's chickens. Well, Josh has been complaining for sometime about the fact that we drink "fake" milk. A couple months ago he met a lady that has dairy cows and struck up the conversation of how much he would love to buy "real" milk. Well, she showed up on Monday with 9 litres of non pasteurised, non homogenised milk and Josh LOVES it. (Of course she showed up Monday because I went grocery shopping on Saturday and bought 12 litres of fake milk.) Josh had some of the milk at dinner tonight and the girls asked to try it. It was funny. Catie thought it was delicious and tasted like cream. Emma reckons it tastes like sour cream (which she loves) and Beka said it was "tasty". So I guess from now on we will be buying mostly "real" milk and only I will be drinking the "fake" milk as the other stuff makes me sick. Just one more thing to tick off on our "weird relative list" i.e. Josh and Tamra, they're the ones that homeschool and don't vaccinate and buy milk with bacteria still in it. =) We know you love us!! We love you too.

US

Josh--shed is almost done, had to get up early this morning to go to CPR training, been going to work at 6 or 7 all week, loves spaghetti, doesn't like chicken and rice

Tamra--writing a unit study on curious george, doing some sewing, being a Maria von Trapp except my skirt is out of a sheet not a curtain, can't wait for the garage to be cleared out so I can decorate, loves chicken and rice

Catie--learning something new every day, writing a book about a little bear in a cave, being a great big sister, addicted to playschool, likes chicken and rice, LOVES spaghetti, pretends to like broccoli

Emma--growing out of all her skirts and pants, lengthwise, picked up a "hopgrasser" today, is a speed demon on her new red tricycle, loves spaghetti, LOVES vegetables, doesn't like chicken and rice

Beka--talks so much and so fast you can't understand her, has grown men not related to her under her spell, keeps changing her mind about potty training, is wearing Catie's shirt today, loves spaghetti, doesn't like chicken and rice and will clean out the vegetable bowl