Back to Life

After Christmas I bought an Amaryllis bulb, which we planted in the pot provided and enjoyed in full bloom around Valentine's Day. After it had died, I put the pot out in the garage. They said you could plant it in your yard for the next season, and I figured I try that and see if grew next spring. Well, this past week, when I went out into the dark garage, I noticed that the bulb was coming back to life. It's had no water and not much light since February, but here the new growth came. I brought the pot back inside and have been watering it again. So, it looks like we'll have more flowers to enjoy in 4-6 weeks. We'll keep you posted...

a Peppy pillow

This is just another demonstration of what "our" cat Peppy puts up with when he comes to visit. Sidnie found him laying on Mom and Dad's bed, so she decided to use him as a pillow. As you can see, Peppy is making no attempt to get away. And Sid is just as happy as can be.

Mother's Day

While Kam and Jordan were at ice skating lessons on the 7th, I went to J C Penny to look around. I had a coupon for $10 off your $25 purchase. I saw some Red shoes and ended up getting them. I wore them on Mother's Day with my $9 little black dress I found for sale at Walmart, of all places. I've never received so many compliments for my shoes before. I really like them, so it was a good purchase.




You have to look past the white legs (we haven't yet hit full on summer) and the squinting eyes, since I was looking into the sun.

"Caught Reading" Award

They started a program called "get caught reading" at the middle school a few weeks ago. The idea is that if a teacher sees you reading, they will turn your name in for a drawing. This is to help students use their time wisely, by reading, instead of talking and goofing off. Since Jordan is always reading, she didn't have to try to "get caught reading." She just always is reading when ever there is a spare moment. So, she was the first big winner chosen. She won $50.00! Many of her teachers told her that they submitted her name and they were excited when she won. No one else has won as much money. The prizes have been split into $25 dollar amounts or gift cards worth $25. Go Jordan!

Belated Easter Skirts

I posted pictures of the pettiskirt that I made Sidnie for Easter, but I never took pictures of the other girls' skirts that I had made them. On Mother's Day I made them all don their Easter skirts for photos.

Kammie
Jordan
Kate
The three girls together.
The girls again with Spencer and a balloon.

Bathtime bubbles

Sidnie had fun in the bath with the bubbles. Kammie helped her to make this wonderful hair piece.

Ice Skating lessons

After Jordan had to drop off the gymnastics team last Fall, she really wanted to take ice skating lessons instead. We signed her up and since a second family member was then half price, we let Kammie sign up as well. Their lessons are on Saturdays and James is usually the one to take them. On the 7th James went to Vilonia, AR about 30 miles away) to help with Tornado clean up. They were wiped out by a Tornado the Monday before all the flooding here in AR happened. So, since I went to their lessons, I took pictures of them on the ice. They've had lots of fun learning to skate.

Kam and J with their skates on and ready for class to begin.

Jordan is in level 4.





Kammie is in level 3.

Flooding

I've gotten behind in writing anything because of the RS lesson I had to teach on the 1st and also the talk I had to prepare and give today in Sacrament meeting. Now that those are over with, I will get caught up on posting pictures and things.

A couple of weeks ago we got lots and lots and lots of rain. One thing I saw said we got 5.57" in a 24 hour period. And the rain was not over at that point. It kept raining and raining and raining. We must have had a flowing "river" in our back yard the Saturday night the 30th. We can tell that because of the way debris settled in the back yard. And we know that the road over from us had water halfway up their mailbox. We also had friends that had water 4 feet in their back yard and front yard and eventually they got at least 4 inches into their entire home. They've been ripping out carpet, wood and tile flooring and so on. They've even had to take out the bottom part of the dry wall and redo that. Another girl in our ward, had the flood waters come as high as half way up her car window, so her car was totaled and she had to get a new one. What a mess!

Water puddles in the back yard.


Out farther in the backyard that becomes swampy often when it rains.
A Robin bathing in the swamp.

Settled debris in the back yard against the playset.
Debris against a tree.

We had just built a bigger "cage" area for Boxer, the turtle we found, the night before all the rain started. His new home was probably in the middle of the flowing river in our back yard Saturday night. We found him burried under grass clippings that was strewn throughout his "cage." We brought him back inside for a few days, while things dried out some.



When I finally let Boxer out again in his new home, he found a way to escape and we haven't seen him since. That makes the kids sad, but the turtle is probably happier to be free.

Sour dough French bread

I've been interested in learning to make sour dough bread for a long time now, but I haven't had the guts to just do it on my own. [I make whole wheat bread all the time, but doing it from a starter without yeast, was intimidating.] I found a lady in our ward who was kind enough to share her starter and knowledge with me. I spent time this past Thursday and Friday going to her house, learning the steps and her tricks of the trade. I made four loaves in all. Here are the results...



It was even yummy too. (Thanks Kitty Walker. You are wonderful.)

Other random yard stuff...

Some stalks that are inthe bamboo family that grew really tall last year. I tried to replant, so they'd grow straight, but we'll see...
I don't know what this plant is, but the purple flowers were pretty...

Our Garden

So far, the vegetable garden is doing well. Last year, we grew some nice broccoli plants, but never got broccoli. We ate our first head of brocolli yesterday for dinner. It was good. The lettuce was pumpled by the hail and rain this past week, but is growing and is close to using. We got the second garden box planted and look forward to zucchini, tomatoes, peppers and basil. We also planted mint. [Very yummy in fresh homemade lemonade.]

Our new garden box...
The head of broccoli we ate for dinner...(since we spent a bunch buying the lumber, dirt, stones for the path in between the two garden boxes, etc. I told James it was our $33 head of broccoli. [If more plants produce, it will reduce the brocolli's value.]
More broccoli to come...
Red potato plants (can't wait for these)...
Lettuce (green leaf on the left, romaine on the right)...

Princess and Peppy

This poor cat puts up with so much from these kids. But he keeps coming back, so he must not mind it all that much. Sidnie had been using Peppy as a pillow, and I went to get the camera. Peppy tried to get away, so Sidnie tackled him for this photo. I didn't get the shot of her carring him. Since she's small, his hind legs were still touching the ground and it was as if he was walking along with her. The other day I looked outside to see her trying to pick him up by his tail and some other spot on his back. Ouch!

Baskin Robbins .31 cent scoop night

Kate arrived home from school on Wednesday, the 27th and informed me it was Baskin Robbins .31 cent scoop night. We've gone in the past, but I wasn't sure I had it in me--especially if it started at 4pm. I was making dinner and had kids to get off to Young Women's. But, I called the store and found out it started at 5pm. We had time. Like in years past, Kammie's friend Ana Grace was here, so she came along as well. We arrived around 4:45pm and started the line. We waited the 15 minutes and were first up to get our cheap scoops. Everyone, but Sidnie got double scoops. [A great pre-dinner snack, huh?] One lady behind us in line asked me which of the children were mine. I think she was shocked when I replied: "All but one."

Anxiously waiting...

Our happy group...

All I want for Christmas...

James left to go to a conference in Chicago on the 26th. Zack has had a loose tooth. While the kids were eating a bed time snack, I asked if I could see how loose his other top tooth was. He let me feel and it was pretty loose. I asked if I could pull it. He said I could, but that it proably wasn't quite ready to come out. I reached in and pulled--out it came. It bled a little bit and he said ouch, but now he's just singing "All I want for my birthday (his adaptation) is my two front teeth." He left his tooth in the tooth pillow and the tooth fairy found it and left him $2.

An empty gap...
His new smile...
Showing the tooth...

Family Easter Egg Hunt

On Easter Sunday we went to church and Kate, Jordan, and I sang with the Ward Choir and had a wonderful time participating in the Easter Cantata. Sidnie fell asleep on James lap(not like her at all). I held her for a while, but since I had to conduct in RS later, I eventually took her to the nursery. (Oops!) They told us she slept most of the time in there as well. That's when I knew that, she must not feel well. I felt her and she was hot. Spencer had been diagnoised with Strep throat three days before, so I knew she had that too. (Thanks to our Dr. friend, she was able to start a prescription right away.) She came home and went right to bed and slept for a long time, while I got her the medicine.) Thus, she did not feel well or participate in the family Easter Egg hunt.

We usually don't have our Easter Egg hunt on the Sabbath, but with the way things went in shopping for Easter dresses, not finding much, and sewing the last skirt all day on Saturday instead, we didn't get to it. (We did go to the city hunt Saturday morning.) Thanks to our Easter bunny helpers [the older girls], it was a success...

Kids on the porch, ready for the search to begin...


Spencer
Zack
Kammie
Jordan
Kate

Zack showing his full basket...
Smiling faces and full baskets, indicating a successful hunt.