Gardens!!

Finally the weather has been nice enough to get outside and putter around in the yard!  This is what we have been up to!

I have a small plot in the backyard that would be ideal for a garden, but it needed some work.  For instance, there was a rather large rock that needed to be moved, and I needed to relocate a couple of shrubs.  The shrubs were easy enough, but the rock took a little work. Thank goodness he isn't a quitter!

You may remember in one of my last posts, I mentioned that I snagged some wooden pallets!  I wasn't really sure what I was going to do with them, but I put as many in the car as I could get in the back.  I had seen some ideas on Pinterest that offered tutorials on using the pallets as garden boxes, but that wasn't going to solve my dog problem.  I stared at the pallets for a bit before I finally decided that maybe they would be better used as a fence to create the garden area rather than go buy chicken wire to surround the garden boxes.  We bought some hinges and a couple of latches where the gate goes. 

 

 

 

It isn't the most beautiful fence I have seen, but it only cost about $20 to make, and it functions quit nicely. I am pretty happy! Once I get everything planted and it starts to fill in, I will post some better pics. 

 

And, lastly, wanted to post pics of these mugs just because!

Happy Gardening!!

Spring Break!!

The boys have been on Spring Break this week, and we have tried our best to make it as fun as possible without breaking the bank.  Originally we were going to try and take them on a day trip to the mountains to hike.  But, when we asked the boys what they wanted to do, they were pretty content with staying home and doing the simple things. I love that they are content with the basics and what made it really fun is that Lyndon managed to take off the entire week.  I am not sure, but I would guess that anything would have been fine as long as Dad was there!

One of Luke's creations.  Lyndon decided they needed to shoot ARMY men off of it. 

I basically had three kids home for Spring Break this year.

The boys requested the following: picnic, ride bikes to get ice cream, the library, play at the park, buy something (anything), watch a movie and go out to eat.  Easy enough, and we were more than happy to work with them.  So, on Wednesday, we packed a picnic, rode our bikes to the park to play, then rode our bikes to get frozen yogurt.  Then we went to Target bought the family sleeping bags, headed to Barnes & Noble and ate dinner out. We managed to get it all in before the weather turned nasty. Winning!

Originally, we thought about camping out in the backyard; however, this Texas girl wasn't sleeping out in the cold (not to mention it started raining during the night).  So, we decided to camp out and watch a movie in the family room.  I will tell you that it was one of the best times we have had and one of the worst night's sleep I have ever experienced.  Do you see where Luke started out?  He didn't stay there long.  Somehow he managed to weasel his way into my sleeping bag and pretty much slept on top of me.  I had to take Advil the next day for the back, neck and hip pain.  They loved it, though, so I can't complain too much! 

We also managed to find the old-fashioned Jiffy Pop!  We had to work with it a bit as I have a glass-top stove, a no no according to the directions.  We figured it out, and the boys were pretty pumped!

Happy Spring Break to you!!

Easter 2013!

I am a few days behind on Easter pics, but here they are!!

Yes, I attempted to make dye out of natural ingredients this year!  No, it didn't work very well, but I really think that if the boys had left them alone to soak, it would have been fine.  They were just too excited.  I ended up using just a drop of food coloring to enhance the color, but I was pretty impressed with the idea of using stuff from the kitchen!

The letter from the Easter Bunny...a little dramatic, but the boys insisted on writing a letter the night before to the Easter Bunny asking for goodies.  I tried to explain that the Easter Bunny doesn't work like Santa.  They weren't buying it.  I think they forgot all about their request when they got high on sugar!

 

We made Logan count to 20 after the egg hunt started to give the younger folks a chance to get a few before he joined in.  It is kind of a "no mercy" egg hunt with these guys! 

 

This guy wanted no part of the group pic.  He was really focused on the two eggs he got before the

race started. 

 

I have a feeling that he will dominate the hunt next year!

 

The race to eat every last drop of candy begins! I thought we put money in the majority of the eggs, but they still managed to find a lot of candy.  That I know of, no one puked, so I consider that a win!

I hope your Easter was a blessed one!