He’s walking!!!

That’s right, Josiah is finally walking! He took his first official steps last night (two weeks behind Logan, right on schedule! ). He is the latest of our kids to walk (Sam was walking before 10 months; he was the earliest), but that may be due to the fact that I did NOT encourage him – he can be little as long as he likes

Of course, here is the only picture we got of the grand event:

For the last week, his favorite game has been to stand up beside me, not holding on to anything, and then to lunge forward and fall on me. So last night I kept scooting an extra foot or so away when he would stand up, so he had to take a step to reach me. This was great fun, which led of course to the “come to Daddy!” “walk to Mommy!” moment in every parent-of-a-new-walker’s life, and he took two or three good steps, to the loud applause of his parents and siblings

*sniff* – No more cute crawling babies for me!

What a sweetie!

Not only did Peter watch the other four kids so Hannah and I could go pick blueberries this morning (I found a great organic nursery in Shell Lake) but he also made lunch (and grilled steak for supper, too!) and planted the trees I bought! What a great guy!

This now brings our fruit-bearing plant total up to: Three apple trees, two pear trees (no sign of any partriges so far ), one plum tree, two mulberry trees, three cherry bushes, three kiwi bushes, three blueberry bushes, two cranberry bushes, and a whole bunch of strawberry plants.

Of course it was only after I bought the four new trees that I thought, “Oh, dear - I’m going to have to harvest, wash, cut up, and can and/or freeze all of the produce from all of these fruit bearing plants. This is going to be a lot of work!!!”

Hopefully by the time they’re all bearing fruit Sam will be able to do his school by self-study, and teach the girls as well (yeah, right) :)

Catherine Morland?

 

Take the Quiz here!

Not who I would have guessed (I would have taken me for more of an Elinor Dashwood type).

Let me know who you turn out to be!

Kiwi!!!!

Just a short (but sweet!) entry – my kiwi vines, which I planted about two years ago, finally have fruit! It’s not ripe yet, but it’s there!!! There are not enough exclamation points for my excitement!!!!

And don’t get me started about my blueberry bush

Jessica – by request

Last Thursday Jessica was pouting because there were no blog entries just about her (once upon a time she was excited just to get mentioned, now she needs her own whole entry!) so here you go, Jess, just ’cause we love you:

The Top 10 9 Reasons We Love Jessica

(sorry, the babes are going to wake up soon and I’m running out of time)

#1 – she actually likes our kids, and comes to visit even when she’s not babysitting! When she would come home from college for the weekend, she would call and ask if she could come over and see the kids. She has also planned for all of them to be part of her wedding (Sam as a junior groomsman, Hannah and Naomi as junior bridesmaids, Elaina as flower girl, and Josiah as ring bearer – presuming he can walk by then )

#2 – she has stayed overnight with the kids when I go to the hospital for every baby, and claimed it as her right when someone else threatened to watch the kids while I had Josiah!

#3 – she’s not afraid to tell us what *really* happened while she was watching them

#4 – she bought them a slip-n-slide, just because she saw it and thought it would be cool

#5 – she “camped” with them in a tent in the backyard (this was all her idea) and didn’t cry, even when they woke up at 6am (after not falling asleep until after 2)

#6 – she buys them movies, because she’s sick of watching the ones we have (I don’t think we’ve had to buy a single Veggie Tales DVD, thanks to her!)

#7 – she paints the girls’ fingernails (and Sam’s, much to Peter’s chagrin) and does other girly stuff that they wouldn’t otherwise get to do (I am so not a girly girl!)

#8 – because she walked in last week and the first thing she said was, “Are you making homemade sauerkraut?” (which I was, and was astonished to have her recognize. Who else would see a wooden mallet and a shredded cabbage and deduce that? She knows me too well!)

#9 – Just because she’s Jessica! There’s no one else like her, and we miss her like crazy when she’s not around.

We love you Jessica! We’re so excited about your wedding, and we get dibs on babysitting when you start having kids of your own!

Sky Pictures

Here are some pictures of the unbelievable clouds we had one morning last week, when there was a thunderstorm coming in. It looked as if you were underwater, or under a thick, fleecy blanket with patches of light showing through:

Naomi Cuteness

From the girl who brought you “calipittars” (which of course turn into butterflies):

She was talking with Elaina, who was completely besotted with Brody, a friend’s dog we had been watching for the weekend (every time she got up from her naps and saw him, she would shout, “Brody!” with two-year-old glee). Brody had gone home the night before while they were in bed, and when Elaina saw Shaggy she cried out “Brody!” thinking he was nearby (the dogs were pretty good buddys). Naomi corrected her, saying, “No, that’s Shaggy. He’s a golden retriever. Brody is a labradog.”

Garden of Weedin’

Earlier this week, I decided to move an old, mouldering hay bale from over by the chicken coop into the garden, and slowly work it in to the composter. It was wrapped in plastic, and as I loaded it onto the wagon, I saw something move inside. It turned out to be a little snake, and there was also a lizard, which looked exactly like the snake, but with legs (I just looked it up, and it looks like it’s a Prairie Racerunner lizard – gotta love the internet!) So now I need to be careful, there’s a serpent in my garden of weedin’ ;) Let’s just hope it doesn’t start talking to me . . .

I did spend most of the day Sunday in the garden, however, and didn’t see any sign of it (I was on the other end of the garden, however, so I wasn’t really expecting to).

I hadn’t done any weeding in the vegetable garden for at least two weeks, and it showed:

This is actually the path between the garden beds; the semi-bare part you see on the left is where I pulled out my broccoli plants the day before. Obviously, I had my work cut out for me. I was out there for about two hours in the morning, and cleared out most of what you see here (up to the volunteer sunflower in the left side of the path, which I left there – free chicken feed!). It had rained the night before, so it was easier to pull the weeds (a bit muddy, though). It was nice to be able to do one thing for any length of time (Peter was watching the kids inside).

I kept hearing a bird as I worked, and I knew I should know what it was, but just couldn’t place it. About a half hour later, I saw it – a pilleated woodpecker was perched on the side of the telephone pole on the border of our property. Cool!

Then Peter called me in for lunch (he had the grilled cheese sandwiches all ready – what a sweetie!) and I stayed in until two, cleaning up lunch and doing some other kitchen stuff (“baking” my sprouted wheat bread and having a second go at making lacto-fermented dill pickles – yes, I am certifiably weird)

Then back out to tackle more weeds. When all was said and done, I had gotten half of the path, one whole bed, and two half beds done – not too bad! And all without getting another sunburn! Now there’s only about eight more hours of work left!

*But* I did get a compliment from non-effusive Peter: “It looks pretty good. The vegetables are ahead of the weeds, anyway.” High praise indeed! My heart sang with joy.

Now if I can only get him to like the chickens . . .

Peas on Earth, Good Will to Men

Ok, cheesy, I know, but it fits the theme of this post . . .

Because Saturday morning I got up to feed the chickens, and as I was dumping the non-chicken-worthy kitchen scraps into the composter, I noticed that the peas needed picking. With my little helper Naomi by my side, I set to work. I also decided to pull out half of the plants (after I had removed their yummy bounty, of course!) because I had planted them on either side of my tomato plants, and the tomatoes were beginning to look a little starved for light.

Two hours and two ice cream buckets full later (including our first four tomatoes! and our first two cucumbers! and the last of our broccoli (I pulled those plants out, too, after seeing white butterflies hovering around them – sure sign that there will soon be cabbage worms in my broccoli (aka the caterpillars of the white butterflies (Naomi calls them “callapitters”) which I vowed last year I would not deal with ever again if I could help it!!! (Ok, way too many parentheses here, I think I need at least three more to wrap this up correctly))) it was time for lunch, and after lunch, time for phase two of the harvest: putting it up for the winter!

All of the little ones, and the ones from the bush pea plants I’d put in the raised bed out back, I blanched and froze pod and all for stir fries and such. The more full-bodied ones from the tall vines in the vegetable garden I shelled (in the back yard while watching the kids play on the new slip-n-slide Jessica got for them (“it was only $7 at K-mart!”) Oh, Jessica!)

(Oh, I forgot to mention – obviously my back is feeling much better. After a day or two of taking it easy, I came to the realization that what was hurting my back was actually sitting too much and getting stiff; if I walked around and worked with it, it loosened up and didn’t hurt so much. So all my babying it was actually counter-productive! I guess my body doesn’t take well to inactivity – that shouldn’t surprise me.)

After the kids had gone to bed (and a little before-dark weeding) I came in and watched The Nativity Story, which I’d gotten from the library (there’s the other half of this post’s title!) At first, I was not impressed. It isn’t very “hollywood” in that the special effects are minimal, the actors aren’t super-beautiful stars, etc. But on second thought, I liked it. It brought the events more into real life. Mary was poor, the Romans were nasty, Joseph was a real man, and baby Jesus wasn’t born with a golden halo for all to see. Which makes it all even more miraculous.

Of course, they did change a few things (like the maji arrived the same night Jesus was born, and the holy family had to leave for Egypt that same night as well) but overall it was fairly true to the story.

So you all forgive me now for the corny title, right?

Mommy the Cave Troll

Ugh, I must have lifted something wrong when we got back on Sunday, because my back is all out of whack again! This has happened to me before (when I was moving 16×16x2 inch concrete pavers, six weeks after having Elaina – have I mentioned my Wonder Woman complex?) Yesterday I couldn’t even stand up straight. Today has been better, but I still get twinges of pain, especially when I try to get up from sitting too long (say, putzing on the computer )

So I’ve been shuffling around the house, bent forward, grumpy and tired (I’ve been taking it easy, babying my back, and when I’m not active enough I don’t sleep well – not generally a problem!) and basically looking like a cave troll. I feel bad, because I can’t pick up the babies as much as I’d like (although I still do need to pick them up quite a bit – when Peter’s gone at work, no one else can get them into their cribs for naps, or lift Josiah onto the changing table)

Oh, and did I mention I got a sunburn last week weeding the garden? It’s peeling now.

Apparently, for the kids’ sake at least, I need to be more careful with myself. Grumpy, broken Momma is not so fun!

(Yes, I’ll stop whining now . . .)