Happy Birthday to Me!

It's my birthday today and despite how much I don't want to keep adding the numbers, I wouldn't want to give any of it all up, so I guess I'll keep moving forward!

I ate ice cream today - twice. So that was good.
I don't think it counts on your birthday.

I will be back soon with tales of what we did in Maine (which was AWESOME).

But for now...this is what we found when we got back...and it was AWESOME, too!

That whole "growing food from a seed" thing is TRUE!

Hope you had a great day, even if it wasn't a double-ice-cream type for you!

Garden Update

Much to my amazement, pretty much everything that Tater planted a couple of months back is growing.

Not dead. Alive.

I am feeling guilty that I said that he had inherited a black thumb. I was wrong. So very wrong.

The sandbox garden, after several weeks of severe flooding, bounced back and is thriving. Even the basil that I thought was being eaten by some kind of critters has gotten very tall and is getting flowers. I didn't know basil could even have flowers.

Weird.

We also have a HUGE vine going on the cucumber plant. And a bunch of flowers, which I guess means eventually there will be a bunch of cucumbers. I am not sure how baby cucumbers will feel about laying on the deck...may need to build them little beds or something.

Our carrots and herbs are also growing like crazy. We weren't sure what the carrots were going to look like when they were ready to go, so we picked one to check. They are super tiny, but really and truly carrots! So in a couple of weeks, we may be ready to harvest. Unless the bunnies find their way up onto the deck.

Stay back bunnies!

Then we have the Topsy Turvy Tomato thing, which isn't going so great. I keep forgetting to water it, and the hole in the top is apparently too small to catch enough rain. Since Tater can't reach to water it, this one is totally on me. So, not all that surprising that it isn't going well. But it isn't dead yet - and there are three tomatoes on there. So there is still hope.

Finally, there is this vine.

I can't remember what it is supposed to be. Something viney, with flowers. This is truly the biggest thing I/we have ever managed to grow from seeds. Pretty amazing. No flowers yet, but hopefully soon. We have had to repeatedly pull the vines off of the little tree and wrap them around the post so that they will climb, but it seems to be going well now.

Of course, we are leaving on vacation in a few days, so there is no telling what is going to go down while we are away. Hopefully we won't come back to a bunch of brown shriveled deadness.

Because Tater WILL make me start all over again.

The Toad Abode

Things have been busy around here, what with so many episodes of iCarly to watch and so little time!

The kids actually did an art camp last week through Kidzart. They did a similar program last year at AC Moore - but this year the program was held by DARC. They actually had the same instructor (Mr. Steve) from last year - which they were happy about.

During the week, my mom took each kid for a special event. Sprout went to a concert at the Mann Music Center where she saw a 14-year-old violinist play. She apparently hummed along to Vivaldi's Four Seasons - probably something she remembers from Little Einsteins. See, TV can be good for you!!

Tater went to Tyler Arboretum to participate in one of their kids programs. The kids have been to lots of these programs and they always enjoy them. This time he got to make a "Toad Abode", which is a house for a toad (clearly) that we tucked into the garden. I have never seen any toads in our garden, so this may be vacant housing for quite some time, but he did a fabulous job and it looks very festive out there.

The Toad Abode is a flower pot that is decorated and flipped over, with the edge propped up on a rock to let the theoretical toad crawl under it. Apparently toads aren't fearful of houses teetering on the edge of a rock. Brave toads.

Tater's Toad Abode is beautifully decorated with mosaic stones, which are stuck on with what he called "mask". I wish I could tell you what that is - it looks like a groutish substance. But this could easily be done with hot glue, or just paints. Any decorating technique that is weather-resistant, since the toads are most likely going to be seeking their abode outdoors.

Unless you have indoor toads and then you probably have different housing arrangements for them anyway.

This seems like a good opportunity to give you a brief tour of the other decorations in our garden. Because I am sure you want to know. So here we go...

This is our turtle. He was our first piece of statuary. Just one little whimsical touch. Next to him is a big rock that Sprout stole from a jetty at the beach (shhhh...).

Over there on the right is a little puppy who was added to memorialize Mike's grandmother. She died when Sprout was about 4 and was the first person that Sprout knew who passed away. We didn't take her to the service, but she wanted to do something to remember Gram so we put this puppy in our garden and then stood and held hands and said a little something about Gram being in heaven and how much she loved dogs (which may or may not actually be true...but it made me sob at the time).

This is a bird. I just thought he was cute. No good story.

Just a bird.








This little bunny was to remember my Nana. Because since we did it for Gram, we now have a tradition of commemorating the passing of our loved ones with lawn statuary. I don't think we did any kind of ceremony for Nana's bunny. But the kids helped pick him out and I think of her whenever I see him. Hi, Nana - I miss you.

This one just makes me laugh. Because this is totally my gardening philosophy. I don't know what anything is. I am getting better, but not good.

There is also a little parrot out at the far edge of our lawn (I was too lazy to walk over there - bare feet + grass doesn't make me happy), and then another bird and the mushroom in Tater's sandbox garden.

I guess at some point we passed the tasteful whimsical touch.
But this is more fun.