Photos of the Day.

Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, arrives the snow.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

The boys were so happy with the arrival of some real snow that they packed snowballs and shovels and cups and threw it into the air over and over, dancing under it as it fell back to earth.

all those greens...

Remember the roots we brought in from the garden a few weeks back and planted in sand? They are going so great - it is very cool to watch. The boys think they can see the fennel growing every day!

The fennel (above) is shooting up nicely, and we should have enough to snip for salads/seasoning soon!


The purple cabbage root we planted is sprouting nice big cabbage leaves.


And the parsley - oh the parsley. It is growing so fast! We have been snipping almost daily to use in stock, soups, salads, and stir fries. And this is from a root! We've been impressed at how much is growing in such a short time from roots we dug up out of our garden only a few weeks ago.



All of our seedlings are doing great - the mustard greens and lettuce mix are the biggest so far and the tomato seedlings are looking good. The boys helped transplant a bunch of the plants into a larger open tray, and have been tracking the plants. 

It has been an interesting project so far and we look forward to reaping the results!

G is four!

Oh, my sweet little boy. G is four! It doesn't seem like it is possible that four years have passed, yet at the same time we are so different now, such a family.

G is such a force - full of so much love and enthusiasm and intense energy. While his brother is exacting and interested in details, assembly, minutiae and facts, G loves rhythm, flow, music, color, texture, scenes, and storyline. It is so interesting to see his unique personality flower as he gets older. Every day he is full of surprises and we love him so much!


After going so long taking care of sick little guys, I finally got sick too. Really sick. The day before Thanksgiving, of course, when we had invited family to a Thanksgiving Day party at our house. Ahem. Needless to say, we had to cancel the Thanksgiving Day/Birthday party. But we of course still had to have a birthday bash for G - but with just us.

I couldn't MOVE - but I hadn't finished all of the party prep nor did I have the cake baked yet, so my husband zipped out and found a bakery that had an extra plain white sheet cake - YAY! He also picked up some balloons and streamers so we could decorate. And some tube icing so we could personalize the blank cake. We already had his gifts. And of course we had tons of love and excitement.


So, while we had a big change of plans and a much (much!) smaller party, we had a lovely time and he had a fun birthday - full of excitement, joy, fun, love, a very proud big brother, and cake! Happy Birthday, sweet boy.

sparkly pinecones.

As G started feeling better he wants to do something! A has been on the couch feeling blech with the cold bug he finally succumbed to, and so it has been just me & G. We decided to do something simple that had a bunch of little steps with breaks in between. It is the most simple craft - but is always fun to do and looks great on a tree or to embellish gift packages.

Last year we picked up a garbage bag full of pine cones at the local tree farm, and I still have a bunch left. So we picked through the bag to select just the right pine cones. G settled on a few of two different types.


We started by painting a base color. This is easiest when the paint is watery - so we mixed acrylic craft paint and water until it was a little runny (2 part acrylic to 1 part water or so - depending on the type of paint you start with) and stirred it in a bowl. G then placed each pine cone in the paint and turned it and brushed over it and coated the whole thing. I held it over the bowl a minute to drip a little excess off, and then we put them on freezer paper to dry. I turned them a few times so that the paint would dry on all sides more evenly.


Next, we put some craft glue in a bowl and G used a paint brush to brush glue on the pine cones. I had bowls of glitter nearby, and as he finished brushing the glue, he then rolled each pine cone in the glitter and put it on a clean sheet of freezer paper to dry.


Once dry, we took a little wire to make a loop at the top and then strung ribbon through it to make a hanger.


We chose a simple red/white color scheme - but you can paint them as many colors as you like - and have a rainbow of glittery pine cones. Super simple and lovely to look at!

If you want to put these outside you might want to coat with a little acrylic varnish.

snow!

After a weekend of middle of the night on-call Physician phone calls and Urgent Care, we woke up today to a winter wonderland. Everything is covered in beautiful fluffy thick snow. The boys were so happy - SNOW SNOW SNOW SNOW! Just right to rejuvenate and excite on a Monday morning. I think it makes us ALL feel better!


So while we have to stay home for a few days, we get a glorious view out of our windows - it may only be a few inches, but that is enough!


Snow usually jump starts our holiday crafting - it inspires and brightens everything and gets the boys excited. And I love shoveling first thing in the morning - the quiet, the cold air, and coming in to a nice hot cup of coffee and warm snuggly little boys. Ahhh. Snow!