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Monday, April 19, 2010

Blooming Trees

This year the magnolia tree by the front deck bloomed a couple of weeks later than usual, but when it finally did, it was lovely. I say “was” because the flowers are pretty much gone already. Most of the blossoms turned brown so I suspect they got a little frosted, then the wind beat them up and took them away. It was pretty while it lasted. This photo was taken a week ago when the buds were just starting to bloom.

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Out back, the ornamental cherry tree bloomed late last week. The butterflies love this tree. 4-19-10 010

Today while Bradley and I were outside, the breeze would shower us with cherry blossoms. Made me smile.

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Saturday, April 17, 2010

It’s a Whole New World…

When your perspective becomes vertical rather than horizontal,

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and then you discover the big window.

This is  Bradley’s new favorite spot now that he’s pulling himself up to stand and can see beyond the confines of the living room.

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So many interesting things to discover!

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Little Diggers – April

There is a children’s gardening program at a local nursery, and I was able to sign up Wyatt, Garett, and Grace to go. They loved helping their mom with her big garden last summer, so I thought they might enjoy gardening with lots of other kids, too. They liked the idea when I asked them, and were very excited to go today.

It was a little cloudy and temps were a brisk 40-something with a fairly good breeze, but they had a great time! Here they are at the entrance to the garden:

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Today they sowed seeds for carrots and radishes. Stephanie is showing Grace how to spread the tiny seeds. (Stephanie is the Little Diggers coordinator.)

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Next up, they planted seed potatoes. Wyatt has his fists together – this is how they told them to measure the distance needed between each potato.

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Onion sets came next.

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Lastly they planted broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and kohlrabi plants.

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After all the planting, they got a tour of the greenhouses and were encouraged to touch and smell all of the plants. Before we left, each of the kids was given a packet of seeds. Then we headed to the greenhouses where they each picked out a pack of flowers to take home.

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It was so much fun that we all look forward to going again next month when they’ll plant more of their garden. During the summer they’ll take care of the plants and then will get to harvest the fruits of their labors as they’re ready.

I think it’s just awesome that they’re learning to garden at home and at Little Diggers. Their enthusiasm was so catching that after I delivered them to their Grandma, I spent a few hours working on my own garden. Today I prepped the raised beds. Tomorrow I plant. Stay tuned…

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Thursday, April 08, 2010

Projects

Bradley’s beginning to have some semblance of a napping/eating schedule finally, and on good days I sometimes have a little time to do some crafting on weekdays. Usually my “power-crafting” time comes on weekends.

Here are a few things I’ve been working on lately:

A four-patch pieced quilt top. This one goes to www.quiltsforkids.com and I’ll post more when I finally am able to finish it. I need a walking foot for my sewing machine and am having trouble finding one…

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A friendly greeting on the front door. This photo shows it done in vinyl, which lasted about one afternoon. I’ve traced it and am going to paint it on. More on that when it’s finished, too.3-30-10 029

Some soldered pendants I made as gifts. Two of them are for the PIF I posted about a year ago January. Internet friends Dawn and Sharon each got one. The others will be off to their new owners shortly, and guess what? I’ll post more about that another time, too!

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Next up is a sneak peek at the scrapbook I’m working on for our niece, Hannah, for graduation. These pages are from her Junior Prom. (Grace thought she looked like Belle from Beauty & the Beast!)

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Lastly, Grace and I made a new decorated bowling ball to put outside. She and I worked on it over the weekend when they stayed at the end of March, then I finished it over that next week. Right now it’s sitting on the wooden shelf on the front porch:

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It has silver/clear/iridescent flat marbles and really shines bright in the sunlight! There are a few more “blank” bowling balls in the garage, so, yes, I’ll post another day about how I do these.

So I guess I am getting a thing or two done around here even though it sometimes seems that all I do is feed and rock the baby (not complaining!).  In fact, at the moment, there are two babies here and they’re both being so good while I write this post. Bradley is “discovering” the CD rack and the 2 1/2 month-old girl is kicking her feet and smiling sweetly while she hiccups away. :o)  Time for me to go play!

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Monday, April 05, 2010

She’s Employed!

jess Since the beginning of February, Jessica has been working a temporary full-time job in the office at Tabitha Health Care Services. She got the job through ASI, an employment agency, so she knew when she started that it would be just a 4-6 week stint. We didn’t know why the 4-6 weeks, but figured someone was out on maternity or medical leave of some kind. She was happy to get out of the fast food biz for at least a few weeks, and really clicked with the other people in the office.

Turns out the job was open, and after she worked there just two days, one of the other staff brought her an application and told her to apply for the permanent position. She did just that.

Lots of HR hoops to jump through, and they extended the ASI contract, but finally today they offered her the permanent full-time job. Yea! It’s such a great environment for her, with wonderful people and a stable company. We’re very happy for her!

Saturday, April 03, 2010

Preparing

Last weekend I had the kids here for a couple of days and we dyed some eggs to get ready for Easter.

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Each got their own bowl of eggs and cups of dye.

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3-30-10 067 They really wanted to display them, so we piled the beautiful eggs in a basket to put on the table. I forgot to put them in the frig before I went to bed, so these eggs were decoration only…

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Bradley watched all the fun, listening and learning for next year!