The days are getting longer and I for one am so thankful. In fact the other day I was working in the yard and Sam came out and asked if he could have something to eat as he was starving. I said sure and asked what time it was, "6:00pm." Oh. The dinner hour always seems to come at the most inopportune times, every day. The sun has been flirting with us, off and on again. It's been chilly, as in the 50's, but it's spectacular gardening weather.
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| They don't look like much, but there's iris, yarrow, peony and lady's mantle in that picture. Just wait, it's going to be gorgeous. |
This is what the front yard looked like when we purchased the house. I don't like Juniper. I think we've pulled over 15 Junipers out of the yard. Well, Balin did. :)
I've been trying to get a few things finished up around the inside of the house, and I think I'm pretty much done on the top floor. We got a buffet for the dining room (can't find a picture) and it looks like it was meant for the space. The living room is looking pretty good and I'm feeling like I can move on.
I have a couple of things I'd like to do in the basement, but I'm hesitant to spend much time or money on the rec room as I want it to be a place where the kids can play and if something gets broken, I don't get annoyed. (like when the kids came in barefoot from the garden with black feet and put them on the white couch....good thing I have slipcovers.)
One of the sunny days occurred last week so I told the kids to grab their journals as we were going to go outside and write. Writing has been one of the most difficult things in this journey of homeschooling. The kids really don't like the school supplied writing curriculum, which is preparing them for Common Core. I decided that I was tired of the battle and we needed a change of scenery in order to find something to write about. We headed down to the State Park in Liberty Lake and I told them, "Go where you'd like, preferably away from one another, and write whatever you'd like for the next 20 minutes." I took the opportunity to sit on a park bench in the sun and close my eyes. It was delightful. What made it even more delightful was when I looked up and saw Perrin wandering through the grassy fields with her notebook in hand writing. Meanwhile Sam had climbed a tree and was busy writing after I suggested creativity might be better a few feet off the ground. Shortly thereafter Sam told Perrin that she should join him in the tree as it was awesome to write there. She climbed up and the two of them worked perfectly side by side and moaned when I said it was time to go. Writing 101 Judy style.
We were gifted with another gorgeous day on Friday so I told the kids to get their work done and after lunch we headed out to the trails down by the Spokane River. It was awesome, or at least Sam and I thought so. Perrin didn't like the uphill and I think it's partly because she needs a new bike with 26" tires. But after watching her go down some pretty big hills, I'm rethinking that plan. It's supposed to be sunny this Friday again so we're headed out to Riverside Park on the North side for some writing and mountain bike time.
Sunday we got a call from our neighbors who said the Emmel's tree had blown down in their yard. The Emmels live in the house pictured above and were the one's who redid the ski condo for us. The tree was a pretty big mess so Sam joined Balin at the Emmels to help clean up the mess. The Emmels are away in Mexico so their son-in-law and 3 boys came to clean up the tree. Perrin had made Ina Gartens Red Velvet Cupcakes all by herself that morning and decided that she would take some down to the boys, a long with some homemade hot chocolate. It was very cool. When we got home I said it was time to start lunch, to which she replied, "Lunch! I just got all the dishes from my cupcakes cleaned up." Yes Perrin. Welcome to the rest of your life.
Sunday night an amazing group of bands came to Spokane so I asked Perrin if she and Alex wanted to join me. They did and I think they had a great time. I had an awesome time. I brought a long a new friend with me, Karly Harden. She and her family live across the lake from us and I met her through a couple of different people. She had wanted to go to the concert too so I invited her and off we went. There were probably 10,000 people at this event and it was amazing. My favorite band by far was David Crowder, to whom I could listen all night long. The girls got pretty worn out by 8:00 so we finished up with Crowder and then headed home. It was a great night and I'm hoping we will be heading to many more concerts in the near future.
Balin is out of town this week in Texas having meetings and conferences of various kinds. His birthday is this weekend and I think he's hoping for a quiet one. Unfortunately I'm probably going to have to rearrange a few social engagements to accommodate him as our weekend is actually pretty full. I think that's one of the difficult things about having Balin travel, he just wants to be home when he's home. I on the other hand am home all the time. So it's something we're going to have to figure out or both of us are going to go crazy. :)
Best sign off and get into bed as tomorrow we've got assessments for school, the fence for the backyard being installed and friends coming over after school. Hopefully there will be a time for a little nap in between it all.
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