Whoa!

Sorry it's been so long since I last wrote! I didn't realize that it had been over a week! Well let's see, what did happen this week. It rained, a lot. One rainy day earlier this week the kids and I were sick of being stuck inside the house so we took a drive up to Fremont to the Amish store. It always amazes me what deals I end up getting. This time we got organic granola bars for $.10 a each. There was a big box of mix and match so I picked out all the organic ones. In the freezer they had Oscar Mayer hot dogs for only $.69. I don't eat them but Dan and Alison do. I also got these flatbread sandwich wrap kits for 2/$1. I saw those at Meijer a few days later and they are 2/$5! No way I would spend $2.50 for one, but for $.50, oh yeah.

On one of the nice days we had, the kids and I spent 4.5 hours outside. We've been saving the containers our salad greens comes in and we used those as starter trays for some seeds. Right now we have a spring greens mix and some flower seeds started. We've got a lot more seeds, but a lot of them said that they should be planted when the temps were consistently in the 70s and that just isn't our weather right now. So those will have to wait. We also re-used two pots to grow some basil in. Not sure if I'll leave it in the pots or if I'll transplant it into the ground. Maybe one of each. I'm hoping to grow enough to make some pesto. After we planted, the kids played while I raked some more. I am trying to push the leaves back a bit into our woodsy area to give the kids a little more yard space. I like that there is the little bit of woods for them to explore though so I want to leave it natural. Ian had fun climbing on the wood piles and digging random holes in the yard. Luckily our yard isn't anywhere near pristine or grass covered so the holes just all more character to the yard. I'd actually like to encourage more moss to grow in the yard. It's soft and green, doesn't need mowing and so far grows better than any grass seed we've ever tried (yes, we've tried quite a few over the years and nothing seems to want to grow.

Today Ian put together a 24 piece puzzle all by himself! I'm so proud of him. We got the puzzle out a few weeks ago and some days he'll do it 10 times and other days he'll ignore it. He hadn't played with it in awhile then on Thursday he got it back out again and did it once (with a little help from me, but mostly on his own). He got it out today and started working on it. When he was about half done, he came and got me. He really didn't need help, but I think he just wanted me to be there with him. I did end up telling him one piece didn't belong where he was trying to put it. But that was it. Then later today I took a little nap on the couch (rainy days and sinus meds will do that) and he did the puzzle all on his own. He woke me up when he had about 4 more pieces to put in. I know he redid it because it was moved from the rubbermaid tub lid to another spot on the carpet about 6ft away. I'm so happy for him that he can do it all by himself!

Alison has been playing on her computer a lot during these rainy days. She's found a website that goes along with all the Pony Pals books we've been reading. She has her own virtual horse that she takes care of and can go on trail rides with. There are also educational games that she can play to earn points to buy stuff for her horse. She's also found some sites with bigger kid games on them since she's pretty much outgrown the little kid ones that she started out on. Her favorite games seem to be the ones where she can play fashion designer or room designer. I like that she has a creative outlet that doesn't produce more piles of paper. Speaking of which, she is writing and illustrating a short story about 2 ponies that are friends. It's supposed to be for a writing contest through the Pony Pals site, but I'm not sure she'll get it done in time. It will be a great story no matter what and when she finishes it I'll post it for everybody to read.

I've been working on more stuff for my etsy store. I have 2 dolls that need faces. One is a cloud fairy and the other is a little girl and her pet bunny. I started working on a black cat yesterday. He's going to be really cute, but he's from a pattern book, so I'll either keep him for myself or give him away. Most patterns you can't sell the object without permission, this book doesn't say that you can't, but I'm still not 100% sure about the law. Just to be safe I won't put him in the shop. I will post pics of all the new stuff on the rescued yarns blog though when I get them done. Which reminds me, I probably haven't posted there in awhile either...