Trip to the apple orchard

Our Sharp Arrows group went to the apple orchard in September.

We got to try out lots of different varieties of apples.

Will carefully considered which ones he liked best.

They even let us pick a bushel of apples as a group.

Twist and pull. Nothing to it!

These apples didn't fall far from the tree and were smashed.

Plumb tuckered out

You know your baby is tired when he falls asleep in his tracks.

Too cute!

Some results from the garden

I tried to grow some onions. They started out about as big as the tip of my pinkie finger and a couple grew this big. They came in handy when I made my Jack Daniel's sauce.

I took forever for the broccoli to grow. Here's a picture of it still on the plant:

And here it is off the plant:

If you let broccoli keep growing, and don't pick it, the little green part that you eat turns into a bouquet of yellow flowers. Who knew?

Here is one of the few strawberries that made it away from the garden. We didn't have very many this year, mostly thanks to Brighton who would lean over and eat them straight off the plant. They tasted delicious! As I was cleaning out my garden last week, I found, well it was actually Brighton who found, several more strawberries that are growing now. I had forgotten that I had planted plants that grow twice a year. Now there are strawberry runners all over the place. Time to replant for next year.

Did you know the if you let your lettuce keep growing it will look like this:

Wonderful, but not edible, lettuce trees!

Here is a picture of one of the two carrots that grew. (Yes, only two grew even though I planted several. But two is better than none!)

The peas grew and were eaten by the kids before I could cook them.

We had green beans several times for supper.

My tomatoes have done pretty well. I don't have pictures of the finished product, but they are still growing which has surprised me.

We had cucumbers growing out of our ears, even though I only planted two plants.

We still have green bell peppers. I only planted one bell pepper plant and we have had 10 or so peppers with 7 more still growing.

The corn grew, but not that well. Or maybe I should say that we just picked it too late. I was waiting for the right time to cook it and by the time the right time came, the corn was all sticky and nasty when we ate it. The two ears that we picked way too early, or so we thought, turned out great. Now we know to pick earlier next year.

It was a great experience having the garden this year and I can't wait to try it out again next year!

Lucy...and all her many phrases

Lucy is at a really cute stage right now. Well, at least sometimes she's cute. Sometimes she's not. But this is all about her cuteness and if I ever blog again, maybe I'll talk about her non-cuteness. (And for those who think she is always cute, call me sometime so you can listen to her scream in the background.)

One night we came home from Walmart and we were bring in the groceries. Brad had put something in the fridge and reminded me that we needed to get the chicken put up before it went bad. I wasn't really paying any attention to Lucy, but she had opened up the fridge and then asked me, "Mommy, where is the chicken?" Because I wasn't paying attention I just casually muttered, "Huh?" and walked out the door to bring in more bags from the car. When I came back in, Lucy was just shutting the fridge and asked again about the chicken. I was paying a little more attention this time and said something like, "Huh? The chicken? It's in the fridge." and I walked back out the door. As I came back in I saw Lucy standing in the kitchen with the refrigerator door open and I told her to shut the door. She did, which is amazing, and asked, "Mommy, where is the chicken? I looked in the frigerator and it's not in there." "Yes it is, Lucy." and I walked out the door again. As I walk back in she is looking back in the fridge, again, really looking this time and says, "Mommy, I can't find the chicken." As she throws her hands down at her sides and sticks out her lower lip to pout. That's when it hits me, she is looking for a chicken in the fridge. Not the chicken, but A chicken. It took a little while to explain that there wasn't a clucking chicken in the fridge.

Another fun thing Lucy talks about right now is where things "live" at. She asked where to put her jacket one day and I told her to hang it up on the coat rack by the door. She asked, "You mean where my sweater lives?" Which also tells you we don't do a lot of cleaning because sweaters aren't supposed to "live" on coat racks, but in closets. She asked for a spoon one day. I told her to go and get one out. She asked where they were. I said, "Lucy, you know where they are, just go and get one." She said, "Oh, is it where the forks live?"

The other day she said she needed her hands wiped because she was all done with her toaster noodle. (AKA: toaster strudel)

She's just too cute. Sometimes.

Our Garden

We decided to plant a garden this year. We are trying out the "square foot garden" which claims you can grow anything in 6 inches of soil. These pics are a few weeks old. I'll post some new ones when I can.

Welcome to our garden!

Brad worked with the kids to build our boxes. Then we all spent a few hours mixing our soil. We started planting and transplanting several different things. He is a pick of the broccoli, cauliflower, and onions:

Here our the first peas that we planted. They were planted from a seed by Will. He's been the big farmer who whats to plant everything. It's fun to see him get excited when they start to come up.

We planted some bean seeds and one is starting to peek through:

This is a pick of one of our strawberry plants. It's got a flower!

We also transplanted some lettuce:

We have 4 4x4 gardens and on 4x8 that we are planting corn in. We plan on mulching in between the boxes, but until we do, the kids get to plan in the puddles from the rain. Lucy is outside in a dress that isn't supposed to be outside. Guess I'm to busy taking pictures to watch my children.

Isn't she cute? Notice the big girl underwear!

Will came in while I was typing and looked at all the picks. He said, "Those peas are really little. Now they look like vines." He also said he just looked at our corn and that there are little green things all over the place and that I just HAVE to come see. So I'll go check that out and hopefully be back soon with more on our garden!

Brighton's trip to the hospital

Today we took Brighton to the hospital to have surgery done on his man parts. That's what I like to call them. We had to be there bright and early at 5:30, which means we had to leave the house at 4:45. I looked at the clock at least every hour last night because I was sure something would happen and the alarm wouldn't go off and then we'd have to pick a new day to do this all over again. Brighton woke up in a great mood. He was excited to get in the car and go. We go to Women and Children's and they took us on back to the Pediatric pre-op area. Brighton got his own little yellow gown to wear and had a great time being looked in his cage.

We played in the playroom for a bit, and then it was time to take him back. The nurse just held out her arms, he went right to her and sat with her on her hip while she finished talking to us. (That never happens with Brighton. He's the "drop off and hide" kind of baby.) So finally she took him away and we went out to the waiting room to wait.

The surgery was successful and I got to go back when they were just waking him up. He never cried. He talked a bit, drank some juice, threw it up, and dozed for a bit. After we had been in recovery, for a good long time, we got to go home.

He sat in his seat like a big boy, threw up all over everything again, and then fell asleep.

He moaned and slept off and on for about 7 hours and then decided he was all better. Since then he's been up walking, scooting, and acting pretty much like normal. It must be great to be a kid!

Never any time to write

Well, I haven't had a chance to write much in the past few months. I guess with five kids there is always something to do. Brad is on spring break right now, but we aren't going anywhere. Which is just fine with me. He's going to spend all of his time doing college work and I'm going to spend all of my time doing everything I do every other week. Things seem to work better when our routine is the same.

Since I last wrote, Elijah has started playing violin. He really seems to like it and is improving each week. Will took some art lessons and is looking forward to taking more. Briley is just Briley. Lucy is wearing her pull-ups just because. At least she is telling me after she goes to the bathroom that she is pee pee. Brighton is up several times a night, but that should be over in a few weeks. And that's about it.

So, many I'll write again sooner rather than later.

Big Girl Lucy

My baby girl is a big girl now. No, she is not potty trained yet, but she is sleeping in a big girl bed now with her sister. About 7-8 times a night Lucy will get up, run in our room, and yell, "

Briley's bothering me!" I wonder who is really doing the bothering? Although Briley does do her fair share I'm sure.Her is Lucy's pretty crib. (I am so glad I found this picture because I took down the crib, moved it into the boys room, and replaced all the purple and pink bumper pads for reds and blues. Then I realized I didn't have a picture of Lucy's crib.

These pictures remind me of a high school friend who use to go around an say, "You're so pretty when you sleep." I think he got it from a movie. But just look at them.

Don't they just look so pretty? And calm? And quiet? Let me stress the last part. Quiet!

Little Angels!

And here are all of the animals that sleep in the bed where ever they will fit!

Playing at Pride Rock

My boys love to build sets. They like to leave them out for days and have very elaborate stories that go along with them. Here is one of the latest animal sets that they have come up with:

The big stuffed lion is actually Pride Rock (after The Lion King movie) where all the animals live. The animals are all group according to their kinds.

Notice the line of elephants.

And the group of hippos.

Don't forget to check out the primates and giraffes

(which apparently won't stand up of carpet.)

Here we have the pride of lions. They are enjoying their kill.

Did you notice the Zebra's foot in the lion's mouth?

Even the cubs are eating.

This is apparently a carcass that was tossed aside because the lions decide to go after the whole heard of zebras. This is the hyena that is eating his supper.

And here is a poor little leopard that got trampled in the chase.

What are we teaching out kids?

Freckle Face Pancakes and Noodle Necklaces

I am one cool mom! Will had been asking about the pancakes that we had a long time ago with the smiley faces. So I bought the whipped cream and made them again.

Everybody loves these and I only have to cook one for each kid because they are so filling. (Each kid usually eats about 4-5 pancakes whenever we have them. Seriously!)

Notice Will's noodle necklace. He made it in Co-op. He has to wear a necklace everyday. He went shopping with his Paw Paw this summer and got to pick out several pirate necklaces. They eventually all broke. His Paw Paw just sent him some new ones in the mail. He now is always wearing one of them, along with a bead necklace that we can't take off without cutting and he does NOT want it cut off.

It's funny that he doesn't like his long hair because he thinks it makes him look like a girl, but yet he will wear this noodle necklace and thinks it makes him look like a boy!

Brighton

Brighton is at that really fun age where I can set him down and he is happy to crawl and explore for hours. He has also found our corner cabinet that holds all the kids plastic dishes. He loves to pull EVERYTHING out.

I'm always yelling out, "Where's Brighton?!" if he's not under my feet. Trying to keep the house baby proof with four older siblings is a challenge.

He has also started trying to fly. Here he is right before take off:

Life is fun and games all the time-almost!

Will's Experiments

For several weeks now I have opened up my freezer to find hundreds and millions of cups blocking the way to get anything out. Will has decided to perform experiments by freezing water in cups. He is so proud of his ice!

Here is a close-up of his frozen water:

And here is another one, only he stole Brighton's Cheerios

to see what would happen when they were put in the water.

Oh to be a kid again and have your only worry to be if the water would actually freeze or not!

Our Trip to the Science Center

All it did was rain a few weeks before Christmas. We had to get out of the house so we went to a Science museum in Tullahoma. The kids had a wonderful time. We stayed for 3 1/2 hours before I finally pulled them away.

This was a great place for the little kids. They have a whole area of little kids toys.

I could sit in this area and watch Brighton while the other kids ran around and had a great time.

We were the only ones there for the most part.

They all loved the little kitchen area.

I don't know what it is about kitchens that seems to draw kids in.

Brighton loved driving the little boat!

Here is our big expense for the day.

They had an old Dino ride that cost 25 cents.

They got to ride it twice. (I'm cheap!)

Overall it was GREAT!