4 things, to catch up.

What i've been doing. 

1. Eating and making Amazing bread. (this recipe.) I let it rise a bit too long, so it was mis-shapen and really tall - HOWEVER, i used freshly ground rice flour (like right that min before i put it in the bread) and IT WAS SO GOOD!!!  fresh flour makes SUCH a huge huge difference.  This was a double batch.

 2. practicing for the 2nd annual Flats Challenge! This is Jamie, age 4, to the right - in his night time diaper. amazing.

3.  pineapple orange ice cream! WOW!!  about equal parts frozen orange slices and frozen pineapple chunks + apple juice to sweeten.. throw it all in the vita-mix and serve immediately.  YUMMY.

4. Mollie was REALLY happy about how many sight words she can read!

Garden - its May but it's June!

The garden is getting exciting! It's strange how it is both normal and ahead of schedule due to this strange summer-like spring weather - We've got nearly all our plants in - tomatoes, squash, zucchini, radishes, carrots, lettuce, spinach, peas, green beans, okra, and straw berries! I think all we have left to add is basil and a few sunflowers. I've had to weed the carrots near constantly because of crab grass and Bermuda grass coming back from the roots from last year and from seed - i need to keep up with it or our carrots will get stuck in the roots (happened last year) - I've never grown a lot of this stuff, and we usually grow peppers - this year we decided to grow more things we actually eat! (the newbies are okra, peas, beans & radishes - though I'll admit I have no intention of eating radishes I'm growing those because I read that they help to keep some bugs away) tomorrow we're going to have to get out the hose instead of they trusty 2 gal watering can..(I'm up to 6-7 trips to carry water) I just hope we can stay ahead of the bugs this year - last year we were doing alright but the july heat wave and drought got us - this year with the mild winter in afraid the bugs may be more than we can handle - so far those factors combined ruined our strawberry patch and something was really feasting on the radish leaves when they were young- our lettuce has done fine and the carrots looks great at this point so maybe it will be ok..

Homeschool classroom, disovery bottles, spring planting and more

I like to call this furniture the reuse/recycle look.

 I've been trying less new recipes lately, and just keeping up with the old favorites - in the past week I made 2 loafs of bread and 2 batches of muffins.. and chicken nuggets.  I'm sure there was more than that..  just nothing new to talk about!  So, that is not to say that i didn't have some major projects this weekend! I spent a lot of time reorganizing the home school 'classroom' ... honestly, we haven't used the room for much more than storage in months because it just wasn't toddler-proofed ..  I'm not sure how the reorganization is going to help, but everything on the lower shelves is at least toddler-approved.  If she dumps it all, it will still be a huge mess... we'll see i guess.  Plan B involves a baby gate and putting Annie on the playroom side of the gate - and since many of the dump-able toys from the playroom have been moved to the 'classroom' she won't be able to make as big of a mess..  i hope.  We also cleaned and organized the master bedroom, we removed a recliner and added a twin bed in its place and WOW it looks so much bigger! and now Annie has her own sleeping space to start out the night.  I'm hoping once she does well on the twin bed to move her to her toddler bed in Mollie's room.  baby steps! 

Last week I made these discovery bottles .. so far, the kids loooove them.  I made something like 15 of them i think. The usual, glitter water, oil and water, and some more exotic like marbles in hair gel - they are hypnotic! (pictured to the right, and also above, under the fish tank)  Annie loves to sit in the basket WITH all the bottles and play with them. 

 

 

We went out today to get some supplies for a minor project and ended up finding these shrubs on clearance!  We got 4 forsythia and 2 lilacs - all but 2 of them got planted today.  They looked great for 60-75% off! Usually clearance plants require some babying but these look like they'll do great.  oh and on this topic, we're still battling the weeds in the garden, they are HORRIBLE this year.  And i thinned the radishes today.  Something is eating my strawberry plants BAD. I don't know what it is or how to fight it, so i'm kind of just giving up for now, my lettuce is untouched and about ready to start cutting - it looks spectacular.  Carrots started sprouting in the past few days, they need to hurry up and grow so i can weed around them better.. the weeds are bad.. and Mollie and I must have done a horrible job of spacing out the carrot seeds, they are so close together.  Though i saved some seeds this year, if there are big gaps in our rows i'm just going to fill them in!   

there, now I feel like i've accomplished something.

torture, i mean.. gardening.

top left corner, planted lettuce seeds...

My *organic* garden was overtaken by bermuda grass last year..  well, over the past 2 years.. and probably before the raised bed was even there. .. but this year, i decided it HAS to go.. it takes over everything..  right now it is dormant, and since we live at the northern edge of where it grows, its probably 80% dead.  I HAVE to get it out before it starts growing or we might as well give up.  So.. the past 2 days i've spent a couple of hours with a good old fashioned hoe, digging it up, and pulling all the roots and 'runners' out .. I have to go down to the bottom of our raised bed to get under it and then make sure i get all of the live-looking roots and runners OUT of there or they will regrow.  Yesterday the wind was blowing 30-40mph ... which made it easier to throw to clumps of roots far far away but made everything else a little bit more torturous.  I have to go back today and see what I can accomplish before a cold front comes through tomorrow and it [supposedly] starts raining.  For probably 4 hours work, you can see how far i got..   and how the rest of our garden looks like a lawn.. and how the other gardens don't look like that! Nearly all of them were abandoned last year during a particularly extreme mid summer heat wave..  Plus, last year we were the only organic garden.. no weed spray + super hot summer + water  = extra strong bermuda grass .. I'm also killing a bunch of grubs and overwintering pests as i dig up this mess.   The garden behind ours in the picture is also ours.. It doesn't look like a mess, but it is..  and I can't just dig it up, because it is full of strawberry plants and while they took a serious hit from the drought i think they will come back if i can get the weeds under control..  As soon as i'm done with the bermuda i'm going to move over there and do some good old fashioned hands & knees weed pulling.  The beginning of the season has never been this much work for me before.. it is sounding like a full time job and it better pay off with a bunch of organic produce this summer (and less work next year). Oh and in case you're wondering.. this mess of roots and runners and missouri rocks would be quite the challenge with a tiller too..  nothing i could handle so i'm stuck doing it by hand.