Some Pics of the House

Since Melanie asked so nicely LOL

Here is our front porch, with Caleb and Samuel working on a pail of beans:



Here is our kitchen. It is eat in, long enough to fit our big table that seats 8. (notice that's not 9 or 10 - that's more because we don't have 10 chairs than that we can't fit 10 LOL)



Here is the back room that we gave to the boys for their toy room. It is officially the family room, where we play games or read, and the boys have all their puzzles, games, legos, and toys. The walk in fireplace is cool. There is a wood stove in it that seems big enough to have had big kettles on. The room was originally detached from the back of the house, so I guess it was some sort of summer kitchen.


Now we get to the category "What Were They Thinking???" LOL

Our living room is papered with a mural:


Very rustic, bucolic. Appropriate, I guess, since it is a farm scene. But the other 3 walls have a paper that is like fake grass cloth lol.

Here is a really bad un-plan:

I'm pretty sure the toilet came after the dryer LOL Our plan is to move the toilet so I can actually get the dryer door all the way open.

Here is a pic of one of the two lovely lavender sinks in my upstairs bathroom. Why lavender? Not sure, since the paper is blue stripes, and the trim is painted turquoise. Oh, and the tub and toilet are mauve. Bleh! lol


And the best for last, a little tropical vacation with every bath:

Why yes, that is a mural of Figi on the wall above the tub! Note that the material is not actually waterproof, so there is no reason at all to have that there. Other than atmosphere, of course LOL


As we do renovations and redecorate, I'll take pics - you know, when it looks better in here LOL

More Fun Pics of Summer

Here are some pictures from around our yard:

Inside our barn, where we store bicycles and the lawn tractor



This is a cool picture inside the back of the barn. It was in low light, so the shutter speed was slow. Caleb was walking when I took it, and it came out looking like his ghost! You can just see his one sneaker.



Another pic of Tigger


Aimee had asked a few questions about him. He stays in the barn, he is not allowed in the house. There was another cat that had come by a few times, but he has not been back since we got Tigger. The boys go out to play with him every morning.


Caleb



Jacob getting ready to head out and mow the lawn...LOL



More cute shots of Jacob





Aimee asked for more pics of my lilies. Here are a bunch of them:



And a close up; I was hoping to capture the blue at the tips of the petals. Really cool!



I love this one, one of our sunflowers



This is cool - one day we saw this across the street. No idea where he took off from or where he landed.




Finally, last Wednesday was Levi's birthday. I made him a Thomas cake. Ugh, it took me 3 hours to decorate, because I didn't have the right decorating tips for the brand of icing tubes I bought. I had to do it all with toothpicks. Levi was thrilled with it, so I'm glad it worked out.


Here he is opening his favorite present - money! LOL


He said, "Hooray! Now I have money! Now I can go out and buy something!" First on his list was a bag of M&Ms LOL

He really enjoyed his birthday. 4 is a nice age for birthdays, it is easy to please them LOL.

Fun Summer Pics

I have a bunch of pics I took this month, just the boys having fun. We went to a pool picnic on Saturday, and the boys had a blast. I baked zucchini bread for the first time ever. We grew some zucchini in our garden, and they are living up to their reputation LOL. TOO MANY! It took me all evening to chop up the ones I had so far, but I had to because they were starting to go bad. I made 3 different kinds, one regular but with a brown sugar topping, one with raisins, and one with chocolate chips. They were a big hit! Phew lol. Even Samuel, who hates veggies in all forms, loved it. I made 6 loaves all together, but I have enough zucchini left over to make 12 more lol.

My yummy bread:


Enjoying some juice:


In the pool:
Jacob wasn't afraid at all


Caleb


Noah jumping in


One of my favorites, Samuel jumping into the deep end. Just 2 years ago he was scared to get in the water at all.


Micah enjoying a soda


Troyer

He requested this haircut. He thinks it looks like David Hasselhoff's hair. Hmm. Well. Yeah. LOL


I have more pics, but I'll save them for another post

A Few New Things

A few weeks ago we got a kitten for the barn. It took a while for him to warm up to the boys, but now when they go out to visit him he likes to come out and play. The boys named him Tigger.









The weather has cooled off a bit, so that it is nice to be outside. The humidity has dropped to comfortable levels, too. Here are Micah and Caleb riding bikes in the driveway. Just today Micah came in to say he has learned to ride the bike without training wheels! At 6, he's the youngest yet to master that.




Finally, just last week I had something strange pop up in my flower beds. Tall olive green spikes with buds on the ends, but no leaves whatsoever. It was very odd looking. They have since bloomed into these:





I looked them up, and they go by many names: Suprise Lilies, Magic Lilies, Naked Ladies (I can't wait to see how many hits I get on this post from people googling THAT lol), and my favorite, Resurrection Lilies. They did have leaves, back in the Spring, but they had since died back. I had been disappointed that whatever it was had not flowered, but just shrugged my shoulders and waited to see what else would come up. What a wonderful surprise! They smell really nice too. They do look funny, though, with no leaves.

What Happened to Summer???

Holy cow, here it is August 4th, and we are starting school today! Well, we are supposed to be, anyway. The boys have a friend visiting for the week from our old church. It is going to be hard to get them to do any work when they want to play.

Last month was full from beginning to end with camp and swimming and VBS. Micah just finished up a week at day camp at the Y. The theme was zoo week, and he loved it. They brought up the "Zoomobile" full of animals, right to the camp. He talked all week about that. He got to swim each day, and on Friday they went to a pool park that had slides and a sprinkler section, as well as smaller pools for the younger kids.

The kids did two different VBSs this year. The first one was Power Lab, offered by MIL's church. I thought it was really neat; the theme was science, and it was about how God is in charge of everything, and gives us the power to do anything. They had really catchy songs as well. The second one was at our church, and was Castles and Crowns. It was medieval themed, and it was about how we can be adopted into God's family to become princes and princesses. They had some cool crafts, and the skits were really funny. In both groups the teen helpers did a great job. I was really impressed.

So now that swimming and camp and VBS are over (and our gas budget has been wiped out for the year!) it's time to start back up with school. We'll be starting slowly, with review and fun stuff. Come September, it's time to really get down to work!

Inedible Fruit

Wow, you guys are good! I believe the "weed" with orange pods is indeed a Chinese Lantern plant, or husk tomato. I like the term Chinese lantern, because that is exactly what the pods look like. I've checked inside a few of them, and most have a very tiny fruit inside, and many are shriveled, so I doubt we'll be harvesting any.

The white-flowering shrub looks to be a black chokeberry. Mine is much bigger than described on the sites I found online, but I think my bush is pretty old. It is supposed to get pretty black/purplish berries in the fall, but the ones on my bush have already shriveled and dried. Again, I think it's because it's a pretty old bush. Apparently you can make jams from the berries, but they don't taste good right off the bush.

At least I have some veggies in my garden coming up. I saw some pea pods on a few plants, and I have some green tomatoes. I saw one flower on my watermelon plant, so I don't know if it'll grow and ripen in time to eat this year. We planted a lot of other seeds, but most were more than a few years old, so we didn't know if any of them would grow. Next year we'll be able to plan more in advance and hopefully do a better job!

Success! and Thanks

To those of you who suggested Sweet William for the white flower, thank you! It is indeed a dianthus barbatus. I found a picture online that is identical to my plant. I also was able to identify my pink flower. It is a dianthus armeria, called Deptford Pink. Woohoo, I love solving a mystery!

Ok, now that that felt so good, let's do it again ;-)

Here is a bush that flowered behind my north-facing chimney, it is mostly shade there. It bloomed at the end of May. I'm thinking it might be a kind of honeysuckle?





And this is a plant that spread like crazy once it came up, so very weedy. I guess it is a kind of ground cover since it spread so easily, but it is tall, over a foot high. The white flowers have fused petals, and grow beneath the leaves. It grew in a very shady corner, it gets almost no direct sun. It started flowering in early June, and it is still getting new flowers even while the seeds on the older plants are ripening.







After about a month, they developed these pods, which are turning a cool orange color:



When you pull open a pod, there is one seed inside:



So, flower detectives, what do you think?

More Mystery Flowers

I have some more pictures of flowers from my yard that I can't figure out. Maybe some of you can find out what the names are?

Here is the first one:





I only have the one plant, it grows in mostly shade, and it bloomed in early June.

And here is one I have blooming now:



and a close up of one bloom




Any help would be appreciated!

The Prize Peanut

Well, our first round of campers is half way through their week away. Unfortunately it has been in the low 70s and rained half the time. I hope they are having a good time anyway. We go to pick them up Sunday, so I'll get the report then.

Now I have some pictures from the Pathfinder Fair that Troyer and Noah went to last month.

Here is the group marching in the line-up. They actually have 16 members in the group, but only 8 were able to go to the Fair.




They participated in some competitions, which as a group they did pretty well. Two firsts, two seconds, and 2 thirds. After the events, for fun they do a Peanut Drop. Since the Fair is held at a school that is next to a small airstrip, the organizers arrange to have a small plane fly overhead and drop peanuts into a field. Some of the peanuts are marked, and if you pick one of those up, you can turn it in at the prize table and pick a prize. There is one *special* peanut, out of the thousands that are dropped, which is worth a free week of summer camp. Both boys were begging to go home early, each year they have been there they haven't been able to find any prize peanuts, so they didn't want to bother again. Well, I made them stay and look. Troyer was so funny, he headed out in the opposite direction of most of the other kids. There he was wandering around at the edge where few other people were. I kind of laughed to myself. Noah went right into the thick of the crowd, but he was unlucky and didn't find any again this year. Next thing I know I see Troyer walking towards me with an adult following. I jokingly said, "Don't tell me you won the week of camp?!" and laughed. Guess what? He did! Woohoo! with 4 kids going up to that camp this year, winning a free week was a big help for us.

The Winning Peanut

Driving Lessons

Troyer is only 13, but he had his first driving lessons yesterday! No no, not in a car, on the riding mower! Now, it was pretty exciting for Troyer, but even more exciting for his father and me. He will finally be able to mow the lawn! Woohoo! The first tangible benefit of having a boy! (not that 13 yo girls can't mow - I did a few times when I was 13). He had some fun, but little does he know what lies ahead for him... mwaahaahaahaa

A Busy Month

I know it's been a long time since I've updated here. Sorry about that. Some of it was because I was feeling a bit depressed for a while. I was looking forward to warmer spring weather, and a cold May didn't cut it for me. Also, the adrenaline from moving wore off and I was left with a lot more to do but a lot less energy. And of course, the Cold That Wouldn't End. Ugh. I'm suspecting that I may have some allergy issues here. I didn't consider that at first because I have never suffered allergies before.

Aside from all that, May is the end of our school year, so things get hectic for me there, too. A brief recap for May: Troyer and Noah attended the Pathfinder Fair, where all the groups around our Conference meet to compete in skill games, and also have some fun. I'll try to post a separate post about that. Next Troyer and Caleb have been taking Spanish classes for 6 weeks. I have to drive everyone about 20 miles each Tuesday to drop those two off for an hour. The rest of us hang out for the hour trying not to get too bored, then we all drive home again. Troyer really enjoyed the classes, at least. I took all of the boys to the zoo on Friday before Memorial Day. Instead of driving all the way in, we drove to a Metro station and took the train/subway. The boys loved that. We had a great day, and the weather was perfect; but whew, was I tired by the time we got back! At least when we park there, we start and end at the bottom of the hill. On the Metro, you start at the top. Ugh the walk back up at the end of the day is HARD! LOL The oldest 5 boys also went along on a field trip with the local Adventist school to tour the battlefields in Gettysburg. The weather finally had turned warm and sunny, so they had a good time on that trip as well. Add in 2 doctor's appointments and a dentist appt, plus school evaluations (read: grading Mom on how well she can gather all the year's papers etc and present them to the evaluator) AND dressing all of us up in church clothes on a non-church day so we can sit for a directory portrait, and Wheww! I'm glad to see the end of this month! Yeah!

One picture, though I have more to upload later: All the boys plus two of their friends who, along with their mom and dad, came along with us to the zoo:



I admit to some photoshopping on there, but it came out great!

Another Birthday Party

On Tuesday Micah turned 6! We were going to celebrate that day, but he woke up and got into trouble before anyone else even woke up, so I made him delay a day, conditional on his behaving the next day! Luckily he did not copy Caleb's 7th birthday, where he had to wait over 2 weeks before he could have his birthday, and we were able to celebrate yesterday. We went to Walmart and picked out a cake and some soda, and when we got home I made pizza. I let him open presents first, so they had something to do while I cooked. He got Star Wars legos, a clone trooper figure, and a movie.








I'ts been stinking cold here this past week. It went down below 40 several times overnight. Back when we had a warm spell (even hot one day!) Chris turned off the heat. We'd used a lot of oil in just the two months we've been here, so I didn't really complain. I figured it wouldn't get that cold, and even if it did, it would warm up enough during the day to make up for it. Well, when it only gets up into the 50s, that doesn't warm the house back up again. Ugh, it is soooo cold in here! Not good for all of us who are trying to kick this cold thing for good. Poor Jacob, he had finally had a few days without his nose running, but yesterday he had a fever and his nose was running again. Waaah. I'd like spring to come back and stay this time!

While it was warm, Troyer and Caleb worked on a project out back:



They built a tree fort out of boards and old doors they found in the barn. It started out with a rope ladder, but that broke, so now it has an old ladder they found. The fort has 4 levels, so room for everyone! Noah spent a week reading books up there. :-)

Mystery Plant

Can you help me identify this plant? It is small, low to the ground. It is kind of like a crocus, except it just came up in mid April. All my crocuses had already come up and finished before these bloomed. I really like them, but I have no idea what they are. Do you?









In other news, I have been sick. Ugh, SICK. I got the flu last week (and somehow managed to not pass it on to anyone else in the house!) and caught a cold on top of that. I am still trying to defeat the cold. I have a nagging cough that keeps me up at night, which makes me very tired during the day; plus my left ear filled with fluid and won't drain. Luckily it is not infected, so it doesn't hurt, but it is very hard to hear with that ear. While I have been sick, the house has gone waaay downhill. The boys can barely manage to behave themselves without drawing blood when I am not on top of them; nevermind taking over some chores for me. Chris did some dinners, which helped, but didn't clean up after them. I also fell more than a week behind on laundry. The drawers were literally empty of clothes. oops. I am happy to report that I am feeling well enough to catch up, but it will take a while!

We're Free!

Last week, Chris and I went to the closing on our old house, got our check and got outta there! WOOHOO!!!! Who'd have thought that we would be able to sell our house so quickly, in today's market? We certainly didn't. Our buyers had already tried to bid on another house similar to ours and lost to someone else, so they were eager to grab ours. Luckily we were eager to get rid of it! LOL Inspections went well, conditions agreed to rather easily, and they requested to move up closing by a month. No problem! So now we are free of a very heavy weight - namely, a second mortgage payment to find money for. We had saved some money aside for that expense for 3 or 4 months, but since we closed so quickly we ended up not even paying one month of double payments. We are planning to use that money to pay down the mortgage on this house so the payment is approaching reasonable. I suppose that for a lot of people out there, what we pay now is already reasonable, but it is twice our old payment, so too much of a shock to the budget at this point. Reammortizing will bring the payment closer to that of our old house. So we are one-house owners once again - Whew!