October Complete

The pirate is out of control, the baby elephant is crying, the witch is cackling,

Cleopatra is pouting and they haven't even had any candy!

This year, we added dressing up to our "pumpkin bars and jack-o-lanterns with friends" tradition.  We started this low-key Halloween tradition after we found out about certain food allergies that one of our little goblins had.  The kids had fun dressing up this year, just like they did back in the days when Mom and Dad weren't so MEAN, and when we let them go trick-or-treating. lol!  Melita enjoyed it all so much and didn't have a clue she was missing out on anything! :)

Okay, I'll call that enough for tonight.

Randy's home tomorrow after being gone for 10 days!  We are so ready to have him back!!!

Have a great weekend everyone,

Alison

september in a BIG nutshell.

August 2013

Here are a handful of the Album Pages I created for August...

Hugs, Alison

June is a song...

...and I love the tune. 

Did we really go straight from June to October?  That's kinda what if feels like... the summers always fly by!  

Here's to a wonderful October (which is nearly half way over too!)

A.

Multitasking And More

Here is a quick post of what we've been up to the last couple weeks. Below Kyla is helping Randy plant the garden. I think this is the corn planting. We all got in on the planting Memorial Day morning and then we went fishing in the afternoon. We've still been having hard frosts in the mornings so we're glad nothing was up yet...

One evening the kids got a ride around the yard on the neighbors horses...

I congratulate myself at times for being able to multitask especially now that I have a new little one to care for. I see that my 2 daughters are also good at multitasking. Here is Kyla holding Lita and playing the piano. Love this...

And Maya holding her little sister as she does a worksheet in school Colter's math book (now that he's done with it). Love this too...

There has been a lot of end of school stuff going on lately. Below is a picture of Colter singing in a little program in his classroom. They sang all the songs they learned through the year and read a little paper they wrote about what they are thankful for. Colter was thankful for lots of things (Melita, his kusins (cousins), mom, dad, dog, cat, hows (house), car, pikup (pickup), nabrs (neighbors), yard, and last but not least, his (other) sisters. :) Here is Colter singing...
Kyla's class went on a fishing field trip. Maya and I came during lunch time and got to see her pull in a little cutthroat. Here she is pulling it in. She didn't stop for lunch at all, as I discovered when I was making her lunch the next day and saw her untouched lunch from the day before. This girl loves to fish...

Maya's class had the neat experience of hatching eggs in their classroom this last month! The little chicks just hatched last week so here is a picture of Maya holding one of the chicks. Can't believe "my baby" is almost done with her first year of school!

We've also enjoyed preps the last 3 weekends. It's something we look forward to all year long. We were so excited to have some company stay with us this last weekend. Sandy...

...and Teresa both stayed with us Saturday night. The kids sure enjoyed having them and so did we! We're excited to see them again tomorrow...

Here is a project I did last week. Try not to be too jealous of our new bench cushions. heehee! This was Randy's idea to use a retired memory foam mattress and make cushions out of it. And what did I do with the leftover material? Make bags of course...

So tomorrow is the last day of school and the first day of summer vacation. It is also the first day of a new year for us! It is a day we always look forward to so much! Right now I realize I'm really multi-tasking as I make cookies and hold a baby at the same time. I'm also updating my blog while washing, ironing and packing clothes, etc., etc...

As I sit here and think back, I remember I was just realizing at this time last year that I was going to be a Mommy again! What a year!!! I wonder what the next year will bring.

Hope all are well and we look forward to seeing many of you these next few weeks!

Love from,
Alison and family

Beginnings

It's that time of year again to start seeds. On May 8th, the gardener planted various tomato, cucumber, yellow squash and cantalope seeds to start...

He covered them and set them on the kitchen table for them to sprout...

After they sprouted, he moved them out to the garage under lights. Last night he moved them to white cups. There coming along nicely...


We woke to completely white frosted ground this morning. Still to early to plant most stuff yet.

The kids had an early out today so we're making PW's Oatmeal Crispies right now as I type (my poor kitchen...) and then we're headed out to plant some pansies.

Dirty Hands make us most happy,

26 of 52: September Garden

We started out September with lots of corn coming out of the garden. Since we have had a garden, we don't remember a year when our corn has done this well. I even got to freeze 16 quart bags...
Here is the gardener bringing in the last of the cuc's and yellow squash. That yellow squash was one of our favorite things this year...
Then I made these refrigerator pickles with cucumbers and onions from our garden and garlic and dill from the neighbors garden. For this recipe go to www.countrykitchenrecipes.blogspot.com.
The neighbors left on a 3 week trip and asked us to "use and give away" the stuff in their garden so that it wouldn't go to waste. We enjoyed more corn, green peppers and LOADS of red ripe tomatoes. When he was showing me around the garden before they left on thier trip, he pointed to a round greenish thing on the ground and said, "That's a cantalope. Be sure to pick it if it freezes and see how it is. I've never tried growing them before."

Sure enough, it froze only a few nights later, so I picked it and placed it on my kitchen counter for about a week. Then one day, Maya and I cut it open...
What a HUGE SURPRISE! I never dreamed we could grow cantalope here! The fruit was juicy and very good. Maybe not as sweet as you would get at the grocery store but very good! Maya took this silly picture of me enjoying a bite!
We did get a couple ripe tomatoes from our garden but these were mostly from the neighbors hot house tomatoes. We enjoyed them SO MUCH!
Just the other evening we brought in the pumpkins and squash because of freezing temps... (7 pumkins and 4 squash)
The potatos and onions have all been removed and stored down in the crawl space in the basement...
And then we have a few green tomatoes. Hence, my plea for green tomato recipes the other day and would you believe there are some recipes! Thanks to those of you who sent these links! Fried Green Tomatos, Green Tomato Relish, Green Tomato and Orange Jam. Anyone else want to try these too...
And the sunflowers did quite well this year. Randy couldn't touch most of the flowers standing on his tip toes...


And that is the conclusion of our garden this year. We look forward to a winter of good things stored away in the root cellar and freezer.

Hosted by Forever in Blue Jeans

52 Weeks is a year long challenge for YOU to be in a picture once a week for 52 weeks. We are always the ones behind the camera, this is YOUR chance to get out in front and be in the pictures with our family. We are glad you are joining this challenge. More importantly your family will really enjoy having you in the picture. Thanks for playing along! Oh, you can just jump in now with 1 of 52, you're not getting off that easy! Now go take a picture!