a mish-mash: mother's day, scissor beak, pullets (teenage chickens) roosting on goats, garden report

We had a great Mother's Day. First my children made this lovely meal for me.  Then we went to church (where our pastor incorporated LOST into the sermon -- he's very cool) and then to my Mom's for the day.  We brunched and weed-eated and pruned and hedged and raked and swept and roasted hot dogs and came home tired.  This was much better than our previous holiday (Easter) where we swept and cleaned and cooked and ate and ran off to ER to hang out with Dad and Mom.  Dad had driven his van into the house and broken  his van, his chair, his femur, his ankle, the screendoor and his renter's shiny new BBQ.

Our pullets are growing and have discovered a new roost.  The near pullet is sound asleep and doesn't wake up as Alex wanders about.  Alas one of our pullets has scissor beak.  We are still checking, but we doubt that much can be done for her.  When she starts to starve we'll have to put her down.  Just exactly how this works I don't want to think about.  And speaking of impending sorrow, our beloved Joy (13 year-old house-rabbit) has a rapidly growing lump.

On to good news: the asparagus we planted has come up. We have nine raised vegetable beds, all full. Andy is having a great time with baseball; he hits almost every game. I am deep-purging the house (every cupboard, every storage bin, every sock drawer, nothing is safe) in preparation for a big garage sale and to raise money for my van; we've outgrown our station wagon.

We are having a beautiful spring with a just the right mix of rainy days (indoor work gets done) and sunny days (outdoor work).  Some days are a mix of both.

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Birthday Pictures

We had birthday breakfast, complete with German Chocolate cake. (Check out that foam on the latte in the lower right.) Then Jamie started to unwrap his one and only present. 

 
U2 tickets. He had lusted after them but had talked himself out of it in a gallant effort to be thrifty. I bought them months and months ago and had to wait to give them. Such fun.

Then we packed it up and went to the islands for the day.

family pic

photo-shopped by Cherie Barth for maximum coolness.

Christmas cuteness

vacation pictures

We rode the ferry.

We had a beautiful place to stay.

We had kayaks.

We had a water-park.

We had miniature golf (and I got 4 hole-in-ones!).

We had fun.

water

We are hot. Washington is not supposed to be hot. Our only defense is to be wet.

full report later . . . pics to tide you over

planting

On Sunday we planted

spinach
lettuce
peas
radish
beets
cilantro
arugula

calendula
sweetpeas

Here's my sweetpea, carefully planting lettuce.

my peeps

my peeps

their home and my #1 helper

kitty rain coat

family portrait

pics from our sledding day

Christmas Pics

And here is our holiday, in photos.

Christmas Eve eve blessed us with a visit from the Christmas bunnies. They stayed for dinner and then went on to Gma's house for some decorating.














Christmas eve morning, we gathered together with our cousins on my Dad's side and all their littles. We took lots of pictures, ate lots of yummy food, and enjoyed watching the snowballs fly.


























Christmas morning, we opened presents from Santa at home.


And then enjoyed the view on the drive in to my Mom and Dad's for Christmas dinner with my siblings and nieces.



















Chickadee and I ended up staying over to give my folks a hand in the morning, as their regular care-giver had gone home for the holidays. It was a beautiful snowy happy Christmas.

Oh, and presents? I got many nice prezzies, with my favorites being a hilarious Disappearing Civil Liberties Mug, a long dark green robe, and a beautiful pot from Kuhn-Rikon that my dear husband - bless him - got for me.