another update on what we've been up to

once again i have put off blogging for awhile...damn facebook is just so much easier for updating and so addictive! so what have we been doing?...

well, i've been getting the garden going again...it's looking good (even with my failed attempts at transplanting, i feel good about what i've learned from it) with the radishes, lettuce, and spinach coming in. as well as the oregano, thyme, and strawberries from last year filling out again. i've made a lot of changes in how the garden is organized this year. one thing i decided was that i would not try to do corn again (not this year anyway)...it just takes up too much space in square foot gardening. also, i let the strawberries take over one of the 4x4 areas...it was intent on doing it anyway so i just let it. so hoping for lots more strawberries this year. right now they are covered with flowers with little green strawberries popping out the centers. i'm putting in more tomatoes this year too. i started them from seeds saved years ago from an organic heirloom tomato. we'll see how well they continue to grow and if they transplant well, fingers crossed!!

garden pix (most of these were taken 2 weeks ago)

sometimes about all i can do is rely on my pictures to help me remember what all we've done lately and lately i haven't been taking so many pictures....sooooo, i'm having to really think!!

we spent easter with family and friends, lots of good food and easter eggs!! my mom went all out with making special homemade treats for the kids. all of my sisters were there too! it's been since christmas that we were all together. we went to ren's house later for more food and fun. the kids decorated eggs and had an egg hunt where they found lots of plastic eggs filled with candy!! we were really glad for the beautiful day!

easter 2009 pix:

we had a blast at the sofh talent show this year! silas and colin did a little skit, while samuel showed everyone how he uses his drawing software. there was a lot of talent to go around!! as you'll see in the pix slideshow =). after everyone had shared their skills, we went outside for some fun in the sun on the playground.

sofh talent show pix:

the next day, jess calls and asks if we want to go up the mountain and the kids can ride in the back of the truck...and i said "when they get up, i'll ask 'em, but i sure want to go." and so did the kids!! a lot of the flowers were just starting to come out and it was sunny and green. the kids really enjoyed getting bumped around in the back of the truck. jess is some kinda wild drivin' woman! we stopped at one spot and found a really beautiful falls that we climbed all over. we had a really amazing day!

mountaintop pix:

last monday, the kids got a really great surprise from our friends, the traaseths. they got an early birthday present that was just exactly the amount needed to get a new 500 G hard drive for our computer. this computer was given to us by some friends back in 2004, it had an 18 G hard drive then and it was fine for a very long time, but we updated it last fall with an 80 G drive (which my brother-in-law, doug, found and gave to us for free...and installed it too, of course) so we could finally have enough memory to run WoW (which samuel bought with the money he made selling his comic at L&L). but with the most recent WoW patch, we did not even have enough memory to open it to play anymore. this came the day after i renewed their subscription and they couldn't even play!! they were so bummed. so when kelly said she'd like to give them an early gift of being able to get the hard drive we were saving for, it was a welcome surprise!! we had it ordered, received, and installed all by wednesday night (thanks a million doug!). the kids are happily leveling up again!! and i'm getting fringe benefits of a faster computer too, especially when uploading pix to flickr!!! thanks guys!!

wednesday afternoon the kids and i went driving around. we were on lots of windy roads and silas became car sick, as he often does. he could not wait until we got home to stop, so we pulled into the gray fossil museum. we had been wanting to go there for some time but have just never gone out there. i'm glad we finally did. it is a very, very cool place to visit...and that was just the free part that we went to. basically, a few years back they were working on putting a road through and came upon these fossils. the find was so extraordinary that all work on the road was rerouted so they could preserve the site, continue to dig, and a museum was erected. what they found there was so amazing, a miocene site with fossils that date back over 4 million years with an entire ecosystem of plants and animals...even the extinct red panda that shouldn't even be found in north america...which proves the theories about giant connected land masses from europe and asia. it turned out to be a really cool day!

gray fossil museum pix (i took these with my phone)

we've been watching a lot of movies every monday with the redbox free movies on monday SMS messages. here are just a few that we've seen lately, seven pounds, the secret life of bees, marley & me, bottle shock, the water horse, henry poole is here, & slumdog millionaire. that's all i can think of right now. the code lets you get a free movie every monday. you can pass it around to all your friends and they can get free movies too. one thing we figured out is that you can get more than one movie by simply using a different debit or credit card when "paying". it means you have to pick a movie, put in the code, and check out for each movie. basically you can't just fill up your cart with movies and get them all free, you have to do a different transaction for each one using a different card. make sense? we usually only get 3 movies since we generally don't have time to watch them all before they have to be back the next day before 9 pm. if you keep them longer than 1 day, you will automatically be charged $1 each. which still isn't a bad deal...we've only had to take them back later a few times. still, $3 for 3 movies for 2 days is a bargain. oh yeah, we've also been watching "freaks & geeks" from netflix.

we went to ren's house thursday night just for a casual hanging out and eating. it was really nice to just relax and talk...and did i mention eating??? yeah, that too! didn't take my camera, but it was a nice day for it if i had. the kids spent a lot of time on the trampoline (as usual) and hanging out with jared (not so usual) who gave the boys lots of tips on WoW and other cool gaming sites. went home tired and happy.

friday i spent cleaning!! it was sooo needed! i did laundry (used the clothesline again after a long winter's break), cleaned the bathrooms, swept and vacuumed, took a bunch of recycling to the drop off site behind kroger's, and made 2 big pots of lentil soup. as i was finishing the upstairs bathroom, "ghost whisperer" came on and i asked the kids to turn it up so i could here it. when i came down i sat and watched it with the kids. we just started watching this again after trying when it first came out and it was too scary for sadie. while we were watching it, sadie asked if i would call daddy and ask him to bring home some ice cream. i told her he would probably like the surprise of her calling him instead of me. so she did and it was really cute listening to her talk on the phone with him. her voice just totally changes. it's too sweet. so he brought home ice cream AND some movies he'd borrowed from a friend at work, van helsing, and 50 first dates. both of which we'd seen before but it was a nice surprise still. i fell asleep within the first half hour of van helsing (not an unusual occurrence actually). so i went up to bed and fell right back to sleep...only to get woken up a few hours later by people screaming on the corner. it was 3 am people!!

saturday, we went to perry's for guthrie's 9th birthday party! it was an all day super delicious celebration! there was lots of jumping on the trampoline, water gun and balloon fights, snacks, and cake & ice cream early in the day. then later we had more food AND music!! we also celebrated doug's (not my BIL) birthday which was the next day, he got a plate of cookies, but he shared them! it was a wonderful day...lots of playing, hiking, eating, and singing (and listening to others play guitar). got in about 1 am...slept hard. got up in the morning to water the garden...

party pix:

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