Memorial Day Weekend

I've been making a list of "to do" dreams for a long time. This weekend we finally stopped dreaming and decided to just jump into it.

1. Backyard picnic table. Yay! We celebrated with a bar-b-q and a weekend campout.  

          












 This is how we roll when it comes to camping. The kids had a blast sleeping in the tent for 3 days.

2. Painted front door.

3. And shutters.
We've lived in our home for 6 1/2 years and I've always been sad about the color of the door and shutters. I think they were once the same color (a dark green), but the sun really took its toll on the shutters and it was just so drab. Well...not anymore!  Definitely bright and perky - a bit brighter than I was anticipating, but oh well, its fun.

We finished off the weekend with a family bike ride to Subway for dinner. Hard work does pay off!

Still on the list:  painted kitchen table and chairs, laminate flooring and kitchen cabinets. Oh, and curtains, light fixtures, window seats, working bathtub faucet, painted bedroom, headboard, shelves, etc. We'll get there eventually. :)

Our 3 bears garden

It wasn't on our list of things to do....

but look what we did last week!

It started when one neighbor said he had a trailer full of extra compost and would we like any. Another neighbor had extra top soil sitting in their driveway and we could have it. Well, someone should do something with all this free stuff! We have always wanted to make a garden - some day - when we had extra money or time. We hadn't planned to do it this year, but away we went - with a huge load of hesitation. The more reading and researching we did, the more intimidated we were.

Finally we just went with simple and cheap. I got some moving boxes from my neighbors that had just moved in, and laid them down as a weed blocker/grass killer/soil enhancer. Then we bought cinder blocks to build our raised garden beds.

Mama Bear, Papa Bear and Baby Bear gardens. :)

Our friends with the free dirt were just one street away - an easy walk. But I took that walk about 10 times with a heavy wheel barrow full of dirt. Hard work! My forearms were burrrrning.

So, the garden's not perfect or fancy or even flat, but its ours. We went with the kids to the garden center and picked out some seeds and some starter plants. We picked out: 3 kinds of tomatoes, yellow squash, zucchini, orange bell pepper, broccoli, cauliflower, cantaloupe, carrots, basil, cilantro, parsley and strawberries.

Its a learning process, but I'm excited to see what grows this summer. The kids are excited too!

Mother's Day 2013

I've really got some great kids!

I had a very nice Mother's day. Brian tried something new for breakfast and I must admit I think it is my new favorite thing - Banana bread french toast with buttermilk syrup! Yum! French toast has always been my favorite, but made out of banana bread is pretty much fantastic. 

The kids showered me with hugs and presents and cards and it was wonderful. 

Sometimes I use Mother's Day as an excuse to not be a mother for the day. But this year I noticed that I really don't mind. I didn't mind helping in the kitchen, or changing a dirty diaper or stopping an argument. So, that was a nice realization.

I bought myself a new outfit for Mother's Day - complete with shoes. I haven't bought myself any clothes for a long time (like probably a couple of years), so it was kind of a big deal. I thought it was really cute, but it was out of my comfort zone a little with a belt and tucked in shirt - but I decided to just go for it. 

This is the best pic I have of it, so use your imagination. I got a lot of compliments at church, so that's a good sign. And a lot of people were looking at me because I completely forgot that I was supposed to say the opening prayer. I sat in my seat after the hymn looking at something or helping the kids or something. Then the guy behind me taps me on the shoulder and says, "You're supposed to say the prayer." I started to stand up with hands over my surprised face, just as the bishopric counselor stood up to pray in my place. He saw me. I sat back down. He motioned for me to go ahead and come up. I scrambled over the kids at my feet and walked up red-faced to the pulpit. Ugh!

Ashby really wanted to give me snapdragons for mother's day to put in planters on our front porch. I also received some flowers at church to plant. I was excited to make the porch look pretty and planted the flowers on Monday. I used fresh dirt, and miracle grow and even had Levi help me. I was pretty proud of myself for not procrastinating. But on Tuesday everything was already dead! I am so disappointed and confused about what I could have done wrong. :(

Spinjitzu Master Ashby and his Ninjago birthday party

 My birthday was fun!

We played games. We popped balloons with ninja stars.
And we played "Sensei Says" using ninja moves. I got a turn to be the sensei.

 We did ninja training. I was the first ninja to go on the obstacle course. There was lasers, a tire that you had to jump on, climbing up or over slides, balance beam and spinjitzu at the end.

 Dillon came to my party. Ronnie came to my party and Eric and Ry Ry and of course Levi and Paige and Me! There were four friends that didn't come. They missed a cool party.

We played Ninja dodgeball on the trampoline.  We had to dodge all the balls that were thrown at us.

I had the coolest cake. It was yummy. It was a ninjago cake with lots of frosting.

When I blew out the candles I wished that I could have a motor scooter. My wish didn't come true.

 We made skeletons for the skeleton army of Ninjago. We made them with white pretzels and marshmallows.

 Mom and Dad made swords for all the kids to fight.
My favorite part was popping balloons with ninja stars. And the obstacle course.

Everyone got Hershey's candy bars with a Ninjago wrapper on it to take home.

I got a skateboard for my birthday! I'm excited to learn how to ride my skateboard. I'm pretty good already, but I'm going to practice to get better.