Swinging Silas - WEEEEEE HAWWWWWW!

Hi Everyone!  We had a wonderful day today!  We re-set Silas's new swing from Nonna and Bwa Bwa and away he went.  What a great swing they got us!
The kids rode their bikes on Canaan Street, we had lunch at the beach, and went swimming.
Taking a nap always makes me happy!  Guess what I got to do today?  SNOOZE!  So did Silas.  Which is why I am writing this at 9:18 and Silas is sitting next to me...he's not tired because he slept for two hours!  He says, "Mama, don't type that in!"  I said, "Why?" He said, "Because it's weird, creepy."
G'night!

A Splash!

Silas's birthday was a splash!  He had a big pool with big bouncy balls, squirters, and a slip 'n slide.  We also did tie-dye.  What fun we had!  The weather was good too!  It started storming around 2:00 which gave us plenty of time to play and plenty of time to clean up.  We only had a few things left behind: a dress, a pair of Crocs, and a swimsuit.  Silas has been enjoying his gifts from his friends and says, "Thank you!"

Party Prep!

We've been preparing for Silas's party for tomorrow.   Will write more tomorrow after the big day!

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Today was not one of my most productive days, nor was it one of the kids' most fun days.  I went for a walk at 5:30 am with my good friend Kathleen.  Took a shower and then started to not feel so swell.  By 10:00, I had drool coming from my mouth and was about to tip over with exhaustion.  Instead of finishing up the attaching of the binding of the quilt I was working on, I stopped mid-way.  I interested the kids in watching a Netflix show while I took a nap.  I woke two hours (holy smokes, the kids have been watching the tube for 2 hrs!) later realizing I had slept through the alarm I had set.  I still didn't feel any better.  Lark ended up making lunch for both she and Silas while I rested on the couch.  After their lunch, I started to come around.  So, in my pajamas, (I seem to do all sorts of activities in my pjs) I rode around on the lawn mower with the kids to finish up what we started days before.
My parents came by in late evening to help us hook up Silas's new birthday swing from Jamie's parents.        He turned 5 today!  It figures I'd be sick - I was sick when I had him too!  Sympathy pains?
What a blast!!!  It's rated for 110 pounds, but I tried it anyway.
We ended the evening with an ice cream cake for Silas and construction of this small wind-up car puzzle that Si got in the mail from his Great Aunt Barbara and Great Uncle Tony.  
Tomorrow, I'm hoping to feel tip-top and have energy to get ready for Sir Silas's party.  The guest list is the size of a large classroom roster!  Let the fun begin!

Thirty-five spanks and a pinch to grow an inch...

We celebrated Jamie's thirty-fifth birthday today.  We had yummy kabobs, rice, pie, and cupcakes.  Yum!  

The rest of our day was interesting.  My brother's girlfriend, Hilary, brought us to get the car inspected and then we all went to pick strawberries.  We both picked eleven pounds!  We were only off by a few tenths of an ounce.  Hilary also helped (and taught me how) frost cupcakes (the fancy way).  WHAT FUN!  

The not so fun parts of our day were going to get gas and going to the DUMP.  P-U!

I wonder when the weather will change?  It's been awfully stormy here!  Lark and I got rained out for mowing again.  Here's hoping for bursts of sunshine tomorrow...

Photo ops

Here are a few pictures from our summer fun...

 Balloons on Shea's birthday

Making M&M cookies

 Silas's cleaned up room

 A visit at the park

 Peek-a-boo

 Making burritos for dinner

Out of gas...

I'm running on fumes at this point.  We've had a very busy day.  We ran some errands, had piano lessons and did some yard work.  Lark and I attempted to mow the lawn. We got about a third of the way through and ran out of gas.  Oh well.  I guess we'll save it for tomorrow.
Sputter....chugggggg...putttttttt.................yawn...

Three's Company

Today we spent the day with Addibear. I had a four-year-old, five-year-old, and eight-year old - three's company!
We went to Riverside Park and collected rocks and played in the river, we had a snack, played on the sea-saw and then decided it was much too hot to be outside.  We drove home and had a yummy lunch. The kids played and then we went to visit Aunt Barbie and Grammy Allen.  The kids enjoyed visiting, seeing the animals, and collecting eggs.
The Canaan Town Library is holding their annual reading program. We got our materials for summer reading.  Check out the Canaan Town Library's site here:http://www.canaanlibrary.org
Storms have been coming and going for a few days now.  We had intended to go to the beach for dinner, but a storm prevented us from having pizza on the grill with Nonna, Bwa Bwa, and Uncle Chris.  The kids and I took a quick dip though and then headed to Grafton for pizza.  A good time was had by all!
Lastly, Jamie and I cleaned out our bureaus.  Two contractor bags later and we can now easily shut the drawers in our dressers.  Look for our much-loved clothing at Listen!
 

Weather permitting...

We had oodles of rain showers, thunderstorms, sunny skies, and gloomy skies today.  It got to the point when I said to Jamie, "There's a storm coming over the hill and it will be here in five minutes" and five minutes later WHAM! Lark even did a little weather predicting herself...she's pretty good at it too!

Even though the weather was turbulent, we still managed to get outside.  We planted the last of the tomato plants and harvested our first mesclin lettuce of the season.  The peas and beans are coming up quickly and climbing!  This year we have a green bean house for the kids.  We used blue well piping to make a hoop house and draped pea fencing over the top.  It looks like fun!  I only wish we had built it tall enough for adults.  Alas, little Silas tuckered out from the rain and we took cover in the house.

We took a trip to Center Harbor today.  I needed more black fabric, white fabric, and some more colors for the Swoon quilt.  If you haven't been to Keepsake Quilting, you should go!  It's pretty neat!  I especially like the sale room. You can check them out online at Keepsake Quilting

My favorite moment from the day?  We are in the checkout line at the grocery store and Silas belts out, "Hey sexy lady!" to the store clerk.  Oi!

As for in-house projects, we are still sifting through a sea of toys. Tonight the kids and I went through five baskets.  An half-hour later we had a large contractor bag full and THERE'S STILL MORE TO GO!  I had this brainstorm today about managing toys.  What if we put a Shaker peg rack up and a few large LLBEAN tote bags for HANGING toy storage?  I'm going to figure this out.  I'll let you know what I come up with.

Here's a recipe you might like too! This was our breakfast this morning.
Dr. Jukosky's Zucchini Muffins
2 c. all purpose flour
2 c. sugar
1/3 t. salt
1 t. baking soda
2 t. ground cinnamon
3 egg whites
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 c. applesauce
2 c. grated zucchini
2 t. vanilla extract
1 8 oz. can of crushed pineapple (drained)
1 c. shredded coconut
Preheat ove to 350 degrees.  Grease muffin tins.
Cream butter and sugar, add eggs one at a time, add oil, applesauce, zucchini, vanilla, pineapple
Combine flour, salt, baking soda in a separate bowl.
Pour dry ingredients into wet ingredients.  Stir until combined.
Pour into muffin tins.
Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar and bake for 25 minutes.

Enjoy!

It's contagious!

I WAS looking forward to a relaxing Saturday with Jamie home, but Lark had other plans for us!  Apparently she liked the outcome of Silas's room and wanted the same for hers.  We overhauled her bedroom today and it looks fantastic!  She's a crafting nut!  Her desk was covered in scraps of papers donned with dried glue, glitter, and stickers.  She reminds me of my sister Kate (shhh). Kate's room was always a mess.  She was always drawing or playing...always too busy to pick up.  Do you know, she even raised chickens in her bedroom? How the heck did they get past the threshold let alone my mother!  Upon Lark's descent into slumber she said, "My bedroom is like a hotel room now!" Better than a chicken coop, I guess.
You may think all I do is clean, but I don't.  We went to the dump and the library today too. I took a nap and then we went to the beach for dinner and a canoe ride.  We took my brother's dog Echo with us.  I think we should have named her Fish instead of Echo.  All she wanted to do was swim.  In fact, she went off for laps and we completely forgot about her until we saw her sitting on the dock at the next beach over.
On my list of things to do this summer is to work on a new quilt for our queen-sized bed.  The pattern is called Swoon. You can take a look at it here .  I made the first quilt on our bed eight years ago when Lark was a newborn and we were living in El Nathan.  It's time for a change or at least an addition to the repertoire.  It's up the the attic I go.  Until tomorrow...

Pajamas until 2 pm!

You heard correctly! I was in my pajamas until 2:00 pm today.  Not because I was sleeping in, though. I was getting covered in dust bunnies....
Today we hoed out Silas's room.  We culled books, sifted through linens, prepared hand-me-downs for my nephew Zach, and gathered toys from down under the bed.  Once the room was emptied we moved the furniture.  Silas has been asking for a bed by the window for months.  We didn't think we could do it with the closet door, but we tried, and it fit! We now have one happy boy!
Lark was delighted with the progress we made in Silas's room so she gathered gently worn clothes for my niece Ania and pulled books from her bookshelf to give the younger cousins.
We went to the Solstice Festival in Norwich, VT with Jamie's parents and brought along Addibear.  We ate a picnic dinner, made homemade bread and streamers.  Welcome summer!

It's bumper to bumper traffic here....

Well, we did it! We collected all the Matchbox cars, lined them up bumper to bumper, measured them and counted them.  Want to hear how many cars?  Lark's estimate was 100.  Think again! 185!  HOLY SMOKES!  Thank goodness they are small!  When lined up, the cars measured 46 feet long!  Now that's a line-up!  The point was to purge, right? Right! We were able to send 13 to the junkyard.  Some needed paint jobs, others needed rubber, some needed wheels...I'm sure some of them would have even been worthy of antique license plates!

The seedlings and I spent the rest of the morning running around to piano lessons, the post office, and the gas station before we finally landed at cousin Theresa's for lunch!  Here's a snippet from the visit: "Ailia, what are you growing in that garden?" I said.
"Chicken poop, " Ailia said.
LOL!

We ended our day at a friend's house.  We gathered to say goodbye to the Feeley family as they are moving to Maine.  We are happy for them, but sad for us!  Thank goodness they are only two hours away.

Today was the first of 66 glorious days of summer vacation.  I've enjoyed the beginning.  I wonder what tomorrow will bring?

Ahh. Summer Vacation Begins!

It's 10:00 pm and the seedlings are nestled under their cozy blankets dreaming of what's to come on their first day of vacation.  Meanwhile, Petunia's up half the night trying to figure out what to do first! There are so many options!

Every summer, during the first few days, we spend hours upon hours reclaiming our house.  During the school year things get thrown in baskets, cubbies, filing cabinets (or not), etc. until they can be sorted at a later date.  Our basement becomes the big, black hole where misplaced items are placed in limbo. In addition, toys from the playroom, much like the rest of the items in the house, migrate.  I kind of imagine it like Toy Story, though I know that what happens in the movie is not real.  The toys do not come to life and move about the house.  Instead, little people, much like the Advance Transit, move them from place to place.

Silas's room currently houses a basket that is heaped so high that the toys above the basket are actually taller than the basket is deep.  Do you know what I mean?

It's time to purge!
TASK 1:
Silas has an enormous amount of Matchbox cars many of which are inherited from his dad and two uncles. In trade for peeing in the potty, Silas got a Matchbox car.  It worked! He trained very quickly and as you might guess, the cars piled up.  I can't tell you how many, because we haven't actually counted them!  So, guess what we're doing tomorrow?  Yep, that's right! Counting cars!  This came up at the dinner table tonight.  Both Silas and Larkin thought it would be grand to find all the cars, line them up, count them, and see how long they are when you set them bumper to bumper.  Lark's estimation is that the total length of cars will be as long as our quarter-mile driveway.  Then, we'll have to decide on a reasonable number of cars to keep.

After we thin the used car lot, we'll go to piano lessons, bake M&M cookies and head to a goodbye cookout for friends who are moving to Maine.  It sounds like a great plan.  It's time for Petunia to nestle into her bed and call it a night.  G'night!