Dismantling chairs

We had a yard sale in May to clean out the garage of random stuff. One thing that didn't sell were the two backless chairs. Not even for a dollar. Fixitman put the boys to work dismantling them into wood pieces for other random uses. They had a blast.

And where was Munchkin during this? When she found out she couldn't go outside, she did the next best thing I guess.

The Sunflower house that wasn't

Well it sounded lovely, romantic and easy in the books...

We dug out a trench in the yard in a sunny spot and planted the seeds. The squirrels then ate more than half of them. I replaced a bunch and the squirrels ate a lot of those too. I improvised a fence from what materials I had on hand in the shed (plastic sheeting and random poles). The plants grew and we had the semblance of walls. As the temporary wall started to fail though, it became prudent to replace it with something better. I thought chicken wire would work well. I was short on chickenwire and improvised on the last corner until I could get to the store.

But we started to lose sunflowers immediately. They'd get knocked over at the base and break. If they were only bent I staked them up hoping to help them survive. I blamed the squirrels (except for the one Munchkin accidentally tackled.) Then we saw the birds sitting on the chicken wire and going after the sunflowers. This is before there are any semblance of blossoms! So squirrels, birds, possibly rabbits for all I know attacked our sunflowers and slowly there were less and less of them.

The sunflowers also stopped growing taller. I guess the early hot weather and not enough water are mostly to blame but the "giant sunflowers" that survived never surpassed 3 feet. We did get a few small blooms. The moonflower vines that were supposed to grow up the sunflowers and make the roof had nothing to grow on in most spots and just tangled up in the grass. When we were down to 3 sunflower plants in just one corner and it was mid June I gave up. I mowed it down except for that corner and tried to protect that corner. The beasties got them in a few days and now all that remains of the sunflower house we attempted are 4 poles hammered into the ground in the yard.

I have a friend who was growing a sunflower/corn house. Hers did about the same as mine. Amusingly the sunflowers that ended up planted next to her house were 10+ feet tall. The ones in the sunflower house? 3 feet. I'm not sure what to tell you but Sunflower houses aren't as easy to grow as they sound.

Mother's Day & Father's Day

Part of me doesn't want to post pictures of myself shortly after waking up but then I feel its only fair since I want to post the pictures of Fixitman shortly after waking up.

Our family tradition has evolved into breakfast in bed made with help by the kids and then eaten with help by the kids. It's more fun than eating it yourself!

So here are a few photos from our two weeks later Mother's Day:

And here are photos from Father's Day:

As you can see, bacon is the key ingredient to a good breakfast in bed. And since it is feeding three hungry kids as well, you need lots of it!

Baseball videos

Short videos of the boys in action at their baseball games this morning.
Trainboy's t-ball hit and run to first.


Dinoguy running to first. Video starts right after he hit it. He runs hard but is called out at the base.

Violin concert

We had a violin concert this month! There's another one next week. The boys have been practicing hard for the concert which includes solo pieces and group performances. I was the accompanist for the group, meaning Fixitman got to run the camera and hold Munchkin at the same time.

The videos aren't great - the sound isn't matched up to the violins and the sound quality isn't totally true. But here they are if you want to hear the boys play their solos. Hopefully next time we can get some of the group pieces recorded too.





Violin has been a wonderful thing for our family. There have been so many positives from having the boys learn. I am so glad we decided to try it out last year!

Hot!

It is hot already! Trainboy asked me today if it was still spring. When I said yes, he said "But spring isn't supposed to be so hot!" Sorry honey. Where we live, it just is. These photos are from the park recently. The kids did play some, but I mostly hid in the shade. Thank goodness its cooler in the shade!

Baseball

Trainboy's first t-ball game.

 Dinoguy's first baseball game.

In orange hat - Dinoguy's coach (me).

Photos all by Fixitman while keeping Munchkin from storming the field.

Baseball has been a really good experience so far. Both boys love it all. They ask when their next practice is, when their next game is and ask to practice more. The parents are all sportsmanlike and polite and things are good so far. I am doing my best but thankfully getting lots of help from other parents.

Wacky Wigglers

This great toy that Dinoguy received for Christmas has been Trainboys' favorite toy of late. He has been up early several mornings, singing to himself and building with them.  Here he built one called "pigtails". You can see it in motion in the video below.

Monday update

Sorry no recent pictures, just haven't been pulling out the camera. Busy decluttering and spring cleaning I guess. (About halfway thru the house on that).

Monday is laundry day. I wish I could do a load a day, but that usually ends up with me forgetting about a load in the wash or dryer and so it's better to just focus on getting it all done on one day. The diapers got sun dried, towels got washed, the clothes have all been washed, though I'm still working on the stained items. Almost everything has been folded and put away too which is half the battle. Hopefully before bed they will all be done.

Today was also strawberry jam making day, and pocket pie making day and chicken stock making day! It was a busy day in the kitchen as well. We made beef stew pocket pies as well as chocolate pocket pies. Yummy! I love making jam. Plus it just tastes better when its homemade. I had a friend over to show her how I do it as well, and we made a batch for her to take home too. Super fun!

I got a phone call that I am going to be coaching Dinoguy's baseball team! That'll be interesting. :) Trainboy will be doing t-ball and Dinoguy is doing coach pitch. It's co-ed thru the YMCA and based on ages, so it should be more cooperative than competitive. Atleast baseball is a sport I know a good amount about, though I've never been a coach!

I have been practicing a song I'm going to be the accompanist for tomorrow as well. I got the music yesterday so working fast to learn it. It is very pretty but there are some big awkward chords in there that my hands are still learning.

Made time to play with Munchkin this morning, have been realizing the past few weeks that she needs specific play time with me just like her brothers! She just can't ask for it with words. I introduced puppets this morning and we played pretend with the dolls as well. She also liked pushing the truck back and forth with her brother. It's fun to introduce her to new games! This weekend I learned she can climb up the slide on the playset in the backyard! It's 3-4 feet off the ground, and is a steep spindly ladder. Gave me a scare at first how fast she got up there, but she just keeps going up after sliding down! So I stand nearby and she loves it.

Dinoguy demonstrated he can get across the whole playset without touching the ground today. He was very proud of his new trick. His wrist is obviously feeling better. Yay! He has discovered the graphic novels (comic books) at the library and is usually absorbed in one when inside. He loves other books too, but is learning all about superheroes from the comics.

Trainboy has been building, playing with the stopwatch and with magnets lately. He is so curious about everything, and does not like my definition of a while ("as long as it takes"). He keeps asking for specifics. But mom, how many minutes in a while? He is getting pretty good at the level 1 readers from the library and learns new words every day. I checked out a few "learn to read" system books but haven't found any that work well for him & I. So we just keep checking out learn to read books on topics he likes. (Star Wars, Fancy Nancy, Truck Town, Berenstain Bears)

Little House on the Prairie

Did you love reading about Laura and Mary when you were younger? I did. I hesitated to start reading them to my boys, thinking the main characters being girls might not make it interesting. They loved it! The stories about living in the wilderness and on a farm and such captured their attention. We quickly read Little House in the Big Woods and started Little House on the Prairie. Then Dinoguy decided I was going to slow and read the whole thing himself. It became comical because he started telling us what was going to happen when I started reading. When we finished that one, I asked if they wanted to read more or stop, and they wanted to keep going. So we started on On the Banks of Plum Creek. (Yes, I skipped Farmer Boy b/c it's about a completely different set of characters, I figured we'd come back to it.) Dinoguy again read the whole thing and seemed to not care if I read it out loud after that because he'd read the whole story himself. I guess I'll have to start hiding the books I'm reading out loud if I want it to be any kind of surprise to him. :D (Really, I'm thrilled by his enthusiastic approach to reading. It's so heartwarming to see him engrossed in books.)

So when I looked up Little House on the Prairie on the internet on a whim and realized it was not that far away (in southeastern Kansas), I became excited and started planning a trip. Of course I wanted to visit all of the sites, and it quickly turned into a month long exodus that was exciting to me, but impractical for our family for a number of reasons. But the Little House on the Prairie site was so near... and I had a friend who lived even closer than me that I could visit as well! So after a lovely visit with my dear friend. (Photos eventually I hope!) we headed home with the detour thru Kansas. (I had originally planned to head to the cabin first before going to my friends' but had such a late start that day that it wasn't feasible. It turned out to be a blessing too, since tornados touched down in that area that day and we would have been possibly caught in that weather!)

So apparently you can look up the Ingalls family in the 1870 census in Missouri. I did, because I love love love looking at censuses. Fascinating glimpses into another world. Yes, if you look at the image, you might notice that Laura is only 3. She simplified all the family moves in her book series. Her memories from the first book are actually from when they moved back to Wisconsin after leaving Kansas. (And they actually went to Kansas from Missouri). Baby Carrie was actually born in Kansas, not in Wisconsin. (Which explains why she seems to stay a baby forever!) 

Anyway, some people did some research and located the actual site the cabin had been built on, and built a replica. You can see the hand dug well (though its covered up). The cabin is SMALL and had low hanging cross beams. But they were careful to build the replica pretty close to what is described in the book, down to the rope latch. This delighted both boys to try out. They also felt I should be able to identify all the old farm tools hanging on the walls. When I couldn't, it was more evidence to them that I don't know everything like I should apparently. They announced to the hostess in the gift shop that their Dad knows more than their Mom.

The site owners have added an old one room school house and post office to the site. The wind was blowing and there were prairie grasses across the street that made it easy for me to imagine Laura running around in them. The gift shop in the more modern farm house had a wonderful hostess who was glad to talk to us and provide the boys with their souvenir hand stamps.(And they had candy for 5 cents! How fun!)

It was a fun place to stop and see. We got to discuss outhouses, which are not mentioned in the series, but something that came to mind while visiting and realizing the cabin was missing that important room. We discussed the map of the family travels, and where Kansas is in relation to Texas. The boys were thrilled to pet some goats on the farm next to the site, and Munchkin was happy to run around free after being in the car. All in all, it encouraged my desire for literary travels and we may choose to go to the Fiddle festival near their Wisconsin home one of these years. How fun would that be for the boys to participate in? If Munchkin's hair doesn't stay red, and turns brown, she could enter the Laura look alike contest too!