What in the world have I been up to?

Well… that’s a loaded question right now.  But I’ll just start with bullet points.  

- Alex’s 16th birthday.  He wanted to do a hike “to the top” of Mt Rainier but he settled for a good long day hike with The Man and my dad and a few other guys.  While he was gone I got together a dessert of the requested boring plain cheesecake.  (I got some chocolate syrup just in case anyone was with me.)

It was nice to love on him a bit.  He’s going through a trying time (as most teens do) and so to celebrate him was super special to all of us.

- Next up was Cyan’s 11th birthday.  Her party is a whole other post, and was absolutely LOVELY… but it ended badly.  That night, Logan, Cyan and I ended up with the stomach flu!  Two days later it had run it’s course through the entire family.  It took us a full week to really recover and I still shudder when I hear one of the kids gets up to use the potty in the middle of the night.

- Alex is off for his yearly visit with his family in Florida.  He will be back just in time for school to start (co-op that is) in September. 

- We are building a playhouse in the back.  We have been promising the kids this playhouse since we moved in, but something always seemed to get in the way!  This year, there were no such excuses and so Don and I have been learning about construction with the help of the handy dandy internet and a few friends who know more than us.  I can now tell you how to plum and square a deck, what a rat seal and a plate are, and how to pitch a roof.  It is shaping up fast and I am excited to share that with you guys soon!

- The garden is booming and also starting to show signs of summer weather… although we have had next to no summer weather to speak of.  But even with the very cool (low 70s at the highest) temps daily, my spinach and lettuce bolted, my peas are now finishing their last harvest and will be pulled out, second runs of kale and other brassicas are being planted and onions are curing as I type this.

 

- Our eatable landscape project is officially off the ground!  We have eaten tons (ie: 5 or so cups worth) of blueberries off our brand new bushes that will make up our blueberry hedge out front, our raspberries are starting to send up runners making next years harvest more hopeful than this years, and our apple trees are starting to look like they may be stable enough to actually keep apples till fall!  It’s exciting to see it all take shape, esp with the larger projects like the playhouse filling in the gaps in our back yard. 

- Cyan went to girls camp!  This was the first time she has been away from us for more than a day so it was a VERY exciting time and more than a little nerve wracking for both of us.  She did great though!  Came home with tons of stories and a nice dark tan. 

- I join the committee for Faith and Family Homelessness.  Being a formerly homeless mama myself, this project holds a dear place in my heart.  I am excited to see how the project takes shape over the next few months.

- I also joined the Praise Team at my church.  I can’t even tell you how much it fills up my heart and soul to be there singing praises with my friends on the team. 

- The baby is getting so big. Growing like a weed before my eyes. He has officially started learning new words and signs every day which he uses constantly to express what he wants. This is far superior to the phase of constant screeching he has been in for the past two months.  

- And last but not least, I am teaching a Poetry & Language Mechanics class at Co-op this year.  I am writing a really fun curriculum, inspired by my blogging friend Sarah Small.  Writing a 28 lesson class is turning out to be a fun challenge.  We are starting out with basics of language and going all the way through form poetry with limerick, haiku and mirror poetry.  It should be a wonderful time!

Each of these projects could easily be a whole blog post, but between them all, I don’t have the time to write one!  lol!    It’s fun and happy time in our house, although very busy.  I hope to find time to write more soon, but if I don’t… you know where I am!