Last Week of July

July is just a busy month! In some ways it's nice to reach the end of a busy season, but July also spells high summer to me and August points toward fall and a new season and new seasons always bring a little bittersweet with them.

As usual, my week began at the flower shop.

Tuesday found me in my front yard enjoying a visit from my friend Christy who came all the way from NYC! Incidentally, I was to have been there this weekend but of course covid changed all that. Instead Christy was at my house.

Wednesday we got together with extended family to celebrate my mom's birthday. Chocolate cake was in order!

Yay for cousin time!

The chocolate cake was quite a treat!

We said hello to Job the donkey.

And we checked out the gardens at Grandma's house.

And we even got a safe selfie.

Thursday I was back at flowers.

And Friday David turned 14!

Two of my monarchs went into chrysalis (and as of today I have 5 in chrysalis!).

Friday evening Drew finally had the chance to graduate high school! Way to go Drew! We are so proud of you!

Drew begins at IUPUI for Business and Education next month!

By Saturday I needed a little alone time and took myself off to Eagle Creek for a hike and some painting.

David had a friend over to celebrate his birthday.

And I took some pictures of my garden, which is finally getting back to capacity after many years of fighting voles.

The side garden looks so pretty right now with all the hydrangeas and the purple phlox and hostas.

And now we are waiting to find out if the kids will go to school this week as planned or if the start of school will be pushed back. Such is life.

Life on the Home Front: The Rest of the Birthday

In which I discuss FIFA, wild ramps, and cherry pie.....

The days run into each other now. We are not constant news watchers so even the news seems relatively the same. Next week will be different when the kids get back to online schooling. Our second week of spring break is going along just fine though.

The weather was cold, but I did convince Drew to tag along down into the woods to see if we could find some ramps (wild garlic) to make a wild garlic butter for Michael's birthday dinner. I wanted him along so he could film me as I demonstrated sustainable ways of harvesting the ramps for my nature videos. Unfortunately the ramps in our woods were too tiny to film, but that didn't stop me from dragging him all the way to the very end of two paths to see if we could find more mature ramps.

In return for going on the walk with me, I let Drew introduce me to the world of FIFA (a soccer x-box game). Since I don't play xbox, nor soccer, the whole process is new to me. I have to watch the ball, watch which player to switch to, switch the player, tackle the ball, shoot the ball, punt the ball, honestly, it's quite overwhelming. And then the part that got me was the constant commentary that is created to match your shots. Things like: "that was uncalculated, what a surprise, his teammates are staring at him now, we expected better......". And then, if you do a really great shot, you can choose if you want a typical or a-typical celebration and then you watch your player do some sort of hilarious crawl across the ground in celebration. I kept getting so distracted by the commentary I couldn't play well. I found the whole thing overwhelming. But I will have to try again.

I baked a cherry pie in the afternoon for Michael's birthday dinner. There were just enough cherries left between the freezer and a random jar of cherries that I always wondered why I had. I also had some thin chuck steaks in the freezer that were intended for Valentine's Day but never used. I labeled them for Michael when this whole thing started. This is where all my reading is coming in handy. "The Long Winter" taught me that mother's secretly stash special things in times of emergencies so that when holidays come around they can pull something out of hiding to make the day special.

As usual, I spent some time painting and working on a few other projects. I also spoke briefly with a friend via FaceTime.

I opened up the grill and got if fired up for dinner and realized it is on the very last legs of its already secondhand life. But I managed to get the little steaks cooked, and I had picked a few leaves of wild garlic and a handful of wild onion so we had the garlic butter and some fresh veggies with baked potatoes. Very delicious!

Drew chose "The Truman Show" as our family movie and we stopped half way to enjoy that amazing cherry pie! yum yum! Then it was off to bed with the expectation of a new month in the morning!

Food Eaten: oatmeal and tea, leftover Indian dishes, crackers and olive tapenade, steak with sweet potato, asparagus, broccoli, and garlic butter; cherry pie.

James Turns 12!

James turned 12 this past weekend!!

Celebrations began with a family hike and picnic at Eagle Creek. Arthur and James share the same birthday weekend so there were two cousins to celebrate! YAY!!!!!

On Sunday Michael's parents arrived to join us for church and the rest of the day. James opened his presents and we all enjoyed his requested carrot cake. 

 Monday we headed to Rachel and Andrew's high school to give Grandpa and Grandma a quick tour and to say goodbye to the high schoolers:

The rest of us headed down to Fountain Square to visit Wildwood Market and walk around the area. We noticed this statue with its surprising resemblance to the Pioneer Woman statue in Grandpa and Grandma's hometown.

And here is the famous fountain of Fountain Square.

Grandpa treated everyone to lunch for James' birthday! What fun!

James was very blessed to have so many of our extended family participate in his birthday celebrations! And now onto the thirteenth year!

Laura's 6th Birthday

Late last month Laura turned 6 years old!

As with most children, she was absolutely excited about her birthday.

She requested blueberry pancakes for breakfast. She's always loved blueberries.

She's also extremely fond of emoji's and had been wanting one of these pillows for a long time!

I found her this antique desk at an auction I went to and she loves it! It sits next to Michael's desk and she has it all filled with her little pens and papers and things. So cute!

Laura wanted to go out to lunch for her birthday so she and I went to Cracker Barrel together.

Two little friends came for some cake and tea in the afternoon. My rule is big parties are only for certain special birthdays (5, 10, 13, 16 years). Somehow birthdays still turn into multiple day events even with that limitation.

The very happy birthday girl.

On Friday another friend was here to play and Grandma came to take Laura to spend the night at her house! Laura was very excited about having her own overnight!

She and Grandma went to see a movie together.

And then they ate dinner at Grandma's house.

And picked some flowers in the garden:

On Sunday cousin John got to come for another birthday celebration (along with half the boys from church, well, it seemed that way.....):

The two cousins had a lot of fun together!!!

John had carefully made a lovely card and was helping Laura to read it.

Then there were presents to open including this lovely dress made by Auntie C!

And then came a very fun present -- pompom makers!

Everyone got in on the action!!!!

And they all got in on the cake action too!

Laura has continued to enjoy the pompom maker very much!

And now birthday time is over and it is on to being 6!

Andrew Turns 13!

A week ago Andrew turned 13! Instead of a typical party, he opted to go paddle boarding with a few friends and have them over for lunch. 

Oh they sure had fun! Two hours of craziness in the water and eventually we made them head for the dock.

Here are the chaperones:

 After lunch they set up in my room for a Minecraft blitz.

Meanwhile we got the cupcakes iced so they could enjoy some cake together. What these pictures don't show are all the other miscellaneous siblings and random neighbor kids who somehow managed to join in at various points.

Middle school boys!

Sunday afternoon we had a cake while Grandma was over.

Yum, yum!!

Monday, Andrew's actual birthday, began with his requested cinnamon rolls. Andrew also requested only monetary gifts, hoping to combine with his savings to purchase an iPod.

 We grabbed Andrew off of online school and took him with us to the Eiteljorg for a school field trip.

The kids just love the stage coach.

And then, that afternoon he went to the Apple store with enough cash for his very own iPod! Yay!

And now I can't imagine my life without Andrew's iPod. It's so easy to find him, ask him to do chores, or invite him to family events on the calendar. Wow. I should have funded this purchase years ago (but of course I'm glad we didn't). Happy Birthday Andrew!