Little Birdie Secrets

Jump on over to Little Birdie Secrets to check out my giveaway today. This is probably my very favorite crafting blog and they've been featuring giveaways from several different "mompreneurs" all week long.

Spring is here, School is out, and We are Sowing

Spring has finally reached us here in the mountains, and I have been working in the yard all morning. I've planted snapdragon's, pansies, peas, spinach, lettuce, beets, onions, and carrots. In a couple more weeks, I can finally plant everything else.

School got out last Friday, and Dillon is LOVING having "his boys" around all day. I have to admit that I looked forward to school getting out, too, in a way that I never have before.

I've decided that you can't miss the diapers and the sleepless nights until they are gone, and now I have this whole new perspective (and a little more energy). We have some fun activities planned for this summer. Hopefully I'll get around to posting some of them.

As I was planting, the words to this hymn were going through my mind. I once read somewhere about how this song was an answered prayer to a mother who had a child with autism. Reading through the words while thinking of her, and of parenting in general, brought new meaning to the song for me.

We are sowing, daily sowing

Countless seeds of good and ill,

Scattered on the level lowland,

Cast upon the windy hill;

Seeds that sink in rich, brown furrows,

Soft with heaven’s gracious rain;

Seeds that rest upon the surface

Of the dry, unyielding plain;

Seeds that fall amid the stillness

Of the lonely mountain glen;

Seeds cast out in crowded places,

Trodden under foot of men;

Seeds by idle hearts forgotten,

Flung at random on the air;

Seeds by faithful souls remembered,

Sown in tears and love and prayer;

Seeds that lie unchanged, unquickened,

Lifeless on the teeming mold;

Seeds that live and grow and flourish

When the sower’s hand is cold.

By a whisper sow we blessings;

By a breath we scatter strife.

In our words and thoughts and actions

Lie the seeds of death and life.

Thou who knowest all our weakness,

Leave us not to sow alone!

Bid thine angels guard the furrows

Where the precious grain is sown,

Till the fields are crown’d with glory,

Filled with mellow, ripened ears,

Filled with fruit of life eternal

From the seed we sowed in tears.

We went "shopping" in our back lot and found the stumps that are holding our pots this year. I think I'm going to spray paint that top one robin egg blue. One of the stumps has a branch sticking out of it and I'd like to hang something there. Any idea's??

I have to share Todd's experience at the farm store this morning. He went to get some potting soil, and while he was there, I asked him to buy those pots that are hanging from the red ladder in the picture above.

He was carrying one of them around the store (he had to go back again because he missed the memo that I wanted two) when he ran into our neighbor. It's been known to happen in this small town.

Our (cowboy) neighbor looked at him and said, "I can tell just by looking at you that you're "honey doin'."

Todd held it up and said, " Yeah, I don't usually buy stuff like this."

I don't know what their

problem is. If I were a man, I'd buy those pots...

Happy Memorial Day

This morning, we attended a short ceremony at our cemetery. I feel bad that we can't be in Washington to pay tribute to Todd's dad, so this was our next best option.

The American Legion did a 21 gun salute, and then one of them played taps on the bugle. Just as the bugle started, the wind picked up and the flags opened up so you could see them. One of the kids asked, "Did they plan that?" It was a perfect touch.

When we arrived, Brayden was asked to hold the Navy flag throughout the ceremony, which we thought was kind of neat.

Grandpa would have been proud.

Grandpa~

We love you,

we miss you,

and we are doing our best to live

so that we can all be together again.

Yes, it is.

Yes, it's a black widow.

Yes, that's my baseboard (it's behind the fridge...cut me some slack, I wasn't about to clean it before taking the picture).

Yes, it is "the last straw" and we WILL be having our house sprayed today...inside AND out.

We've had a TON of spiders this year...other bugs too.

Last week, when the boys were supposed to be going to sleep, Dillon came into the livingroom and asked, "Mom, do spidows hunt at night?"

I answered, "No, spiders don't hunt at night." (What was I supposed to say? I needed him to go to sleep)

He went back to his room and told "his boys", and I heard them saying "Yes they do! It's in our spider book. Wolf spiders hunt at night." (curse the day I bought the spider book)

Then Dillon came back. "Mom, awe dwown-up's always wight?"

I said, "Yes, buddy. Grown-up's are always right."

And he finally went to bed.

The next night, Dillon came running out of his room saying, "Mom, you awe doe-ing to fweat-out if you woot at my ceiwing." (translation: you are going to freak out if you look at my ceiling...where does he learn this stuff??) "Thewe is a spidow on it."

I decided to use this to my advantage, by telling him that spiders like messy rooms, so if he didn't like it there, he needed to keep his room clean. (like that would've stopped them...)

Instead, he's been sleeping on the floor in OUR bedroom for the past three nights...next to the giant laundry pile...that's probably home to a couple of spiders.

This is kind of fun...

Jon Schmidt has gone and taken two songs that I like, Love Story (Taylor Swift) and Viva la Vida (Coldplay), and put them together...how clever.


But then I'm a sucker for anything with piano in it...

Hoping for a better week!

What a weekend we had!

On Thursday I took Brayden to the doctor because we were supposed to leave town, and he had been having the same symptoms that Caleb had last week with his sinus/ear infection. The doctor looked in his ears and throat and said it was just a virus. It was such a weird thing they had. Each of the boys threw-up once, then they were fine, then they had a low fever, then they were fine, etc. It went on for days. Brayden was acting fine, and since there wasn't any infection, we decided to keep our plans.

We left that night to go to Park City for Todd's annual UAMFT conference. It started out pretty good. We ate at Magelby's (YUM) and sat at a table next to Merrill J. Bateman. Friday the kids and I got some shopping in, before coming back to the hotel where we ALL took a 2 hour nap! Then we went swimming, and met up with Todd for dinner. Brayden did really well, aside from coughing here and there, but I gave him some Mucinex and all was well.

I rented "Marley and Me" (nobody told me she has a miscarriage :o( and we were watching it on the day that our baby would have been due) and when it was almost over, we heard someone puke in the dark.

Ugh.

We fiddled around with the lamp and finally had enough light to see that Brayden was the "winner". Todd headed to the front desk for new sheets, while I got the *lovely* job of cleaning up the mess.

On Saturday, we stayed in the hotel for as long as possible, but we had to check out at 1:00. Brayden coughed ALL morning long. His stomach was fine, but I've never seen a kid cough so much. As soon as we checked out, he threw-up in the van from coughing so hard. We still had four more hours to kill, so I went to Wal-Mart and bought wet wipes to clean him up, and then we went to a playground. Brayden and I sat in the car while Caleb and Dillon played.

I really needed to get into Old Navy to buy Brayden a couple T-shirts without skulls (have you tried to buy a boy's shirt lately??? They ALL have skulls on them). Anyway, I left the boys outside because when you cough in Park City these days you get some pretty crusty looks...
I had only been in the store for 2 minutes when Caleb and Dillon came running into the store screaming, "Mom, Brayden threw-up".

So, the shopping ended (no shirts) and I texted Todd in his meeting and told him we had NOWHERE to go, and he ended up leaving the conference early.

We stopped at Sonic on the way home to get Brayden a Slushee, and because there were tables outside (in case he threw-up again). By this time he had dark circles under his eyes from coughing so much.

When we left, Brayden went to right to sleep so our drive home was quiet, but that night Todd got food poisoning. His chicken sandwich from Sonic was cold (the cheese wasn't even melted) and he knew he shouldn't have eaten it, but we were in a hurry so he did.

Brayden didn't cough near as much yesterday, and he spent a good part of the day sleeping, so I think he's on the mend. I was going to send him to school today because he didn't cough once all morning, until it was time to leave. Then he was hacking his lungs out, so I took him to his class, picked up his homework and brought him home again.

Todd is alive and kicking (with his good ankle).

Next year we are getting flu shots.

A bouquet of "flours" and a visit from Grandma Great!

My dad's birthday is next week, and since he's a Baker, I made him a bouquet of flours. A baker's dozen flours, actually.
I found the logo's online, printed them on a T-shirt transfer, and ironed them onto these little sacks of flour that I made. The "vase" is a flour sifter, and the measuring spoons say "pinch, dash, and smidgen".

I wanted to send it to the florist at the grocery store where he works, and have her deliver it to him in the bakery, but realized he would be out of town. I ended up sending it with my Grandma and Aunt who stopped by on their way through last night.

I wish I had a better picture, but here is the proof that Grandma and Aunt Joyce were here. Their "check engine" light came on, so this morning Todd lifted the hood and the three of them checked that engine.

Todd said it looked like an engine.

We have no idea what was wrong, but they made it home safely today, so I'm grateful for that. I have nothing but good to say about Grandma and Aunt Joyce. I want to be like them in so many ways. They got here last night in time for dinner and homework (Aunt Joyce is a teacher and she sat with my kids through MANY pages of Math and books with really big words).

I'm so glad they stopped by, and I'm so glad we were so conveniently located! They dropped my cousin, Clarissa, off at Jacob Lake (near the Grand Canyon) where she will be working for the summer. We'll be headed off to visit Clarissa (and the Grand Canyon) soon, since we're only four hours away.