Garden Week

Last week was our "garden week." Everyday the kids and I did gardening projects or field trips. Our first day, I took the kids up to the MSU Children's Garden. They had a Stories For Sprouts program for 2-4 year olds. They read 2 garden stories and then did a craft.

The boys enjoyed visiting the garden, but since it is so early in the year, there aren't a lot of plants. The boys loved the pond and the maze of bushes.

After walking through the outside garden, we went inside to the butterfly garden. It was so cute- there was a pond, small bridge, lots of vegetation, and little hideouts for kids.

We had a fun day and the boys loved seeing the bees, fish, and butterflies. We plan on going again later in the summer when the outside garden is up and running.

The next day, my dad came down to help us plant our own garden. We've done a garden the last two years. The first year, I weeded it once, and last year I weeded it twice. I'm hoping to better this year. I'm more excited about maintaining it this year, and Jake can be a big help now. I only do a garden for the boys anyway. They LOVE it. Tyler helped me with potatoes and kept saying "I a good worker, Mommy." He loves to help me and this is a great hobby that we all can do together. My dad and I had some disagreements about the layout of my garden, so to pacify him I did it his way.

Our next field trip was to Puddingstone Farm in Parma. They have 3 greenhouses, so I picked up some more plants for the garden and the boys love it because they have horses, goats, sheep, turkeys, chickens, pot-belly pigs, peacocks, rabbits, and ducks. The baby pot belly pigs that were born on Mothers Day were so little and cute! When we went last year, the owner walked us all around and gave us a tour and let the boys pet all the animals. We love going there!

On Friday, I decided to change the layout of my garden since I didn't like the way my Dad did it. So Jake and I dug up everything we had planted on Wednesday, and planted it again. It was a lot of work, but I wanted a place for the boys to be able to dig and there was no room they way my dad planted it.

The boys also have their own little sunflower garden, which if everything goes right should be a sunflower house by the middle of summer. We'll see how it goes. I'm glad to get all 24 of the seedlings out of my bedroom window!Of course, being the library dork that I am, I had lots of gardening stories that I picked up from the library so the boys had fun little stories about gardens to read before bed. I love the library!

Now, I have a nice tan and a nice garden, and something to keep the boys and I busy all summer long!

Firsts and Lasts

First day of soccer:

First soccer game:

Last day of preschool:First lunch as a graduate:

(It's supposed to look like a diploma and a graduation cap.)


First time seeing graduation lunch:

Last time buying diapers- Tyler is 100% potty trained! This is worth posting because I have bought (and changed) diapers for the last five years!

Last Marriage Matters class. I enjoyed the class a lot. They had a wonderful dinner at the beginning of each session, catered in. That was worth it for me right there! I looked foward to not having to cook, and eating a meal uninterrupted with David times four! The sessions were extremely helpful. We didn't do this workshop because we were heading toward divorce, we took it to re-connect. After 2 kids, building a house, and working we needed to start focusing on us. This was just the ticket. I would recommend it to every couple.

First baby chicks at Grandpa Stan's house:

Mothers Day

No sleeping in for me on Mother's Day. We had to up and out the door by 8:00am to have the boys dedicated at church that morning. Out of three services, they had to chose the earliest?? At the service they had the families come up and put together a garden to take home to remind us that we had to nurish our own little "seeds" to help them grow.

It is so nice to have a church now that we enjoy attending and can start getting the boys involved in. We are a little behind-all the other families who were dedicating that day had babies, but better late than never! It was nice to have both my sister and brother there to support us, as well as David's grandparents.

After church we went to my dad's for our usual Sunday dinner. My one request of David for my special day was to get the garden ready to plant so he rotatilled it for me. We spent the rest of the day hanging out with our little family. David went back to work 3 weeks ago and we haven't seen him since! He has been putting in 75 hour work weeks :(

Kiddo update

It's time for a update with the boys-especially since I started this blog as sort of a journal to remember all the fun things they do and say.

Jake's updates:

I've had a hard time deciding which school to enroll Jake in for the fall. We've done round up for Western, a lot of his preschool friends will be in Western schools, and it's got more to offer. However, this means driving him to school everyday-for the next 10 years. Concord hasn't done round up yet, but I did have a parent meeting and it was fun to see all the kids he would be in school with, because I went to school with the parents. Concord is a fine school, but doesn't offer as much as Western. However, we may not get into Western anyway. We'll see what happens, I've got all summer to think it through.

He's been saying some funny things lately: We were shopping yesterday in Kalamazoo after visiting my sister. I was in Express trying on a dress and he said: "Wow, you look like a different girl." So cute. A couple of weeks ago, he was mad at Tyler and said "We're going to put you on sale." Last weekend, my brother asked him if he was his buddy, and he said " yea, even after you die, I will still be your buddy." Not sure where that came from, but oh, well.

His favorite activities/play time are: racing his matchbox cars, dressing up in army or space outfits, playing Lego's, making forts, reading books, swinging, and digging in the garden dirt.

He has mastered the bait and switch with Tyler. If Ty has what he wants, he gets another toy and baits him with it. Ty goes for it, and Jake gets the toy he was after. Pretty genius if you ask me.

His birthday is coming up and he wants a space/astronaut party. I'm excitied because the Target dollar section just had tons of space themed toys, perfect for goodie bags. Yesterday my sister helped me make his rocket invitations. Everything is coming together nicely. I love planning birthday parties, but now that I have to plan 2 parties a year, it gets to be too much. Last year we skipped his party and took him to Michigan Adventure with his cousins. It was a nice break. Now I plan to do a party every other year for the boys. That way I'm not doing a party every six months!

Today I signed him up for soccer through the Y. I didn't know who to contact to go through the school for AYSO or whatever, and I was running out of time. I asked him if he wanted to do soccer or t-ball and he chose soccer. I think he would be better at t-ball, but what do I know, I'm just his mother.

We are dedicating the boys at Westwinds on Mother's day. I've been wanting to do this since they were little. I always thought I wanted them baptized, but I like the idea of dedicating better. Then they get baptized as adults when it has meaning to them. It is nice to have a church we like and are able to do this now.

His preschool teacher gave me some ideas to help him learn more at home since he fights me all the time when it is time to do some "educational" activities. She suggested making it part of our daily routine. I need to be a Supernanny and make a schedule of our day so at 1:30 or whatever, that is our learning time. She also suggested that I tailor it around his interests, so at Target dollar section, I picked up some army guys and we practiced counting them today. It was a success! Now, I have to do some poking around the internet to find some more ideas for learning activites that don't seem boring.

I'm going to have to do Tyler's updates tomorrow. This post is getting to be too long!