Limited Gardening

Gardening this year is much simpler than usual. Weeding is not an option this year (health stuff), so planting in pots close to the house is the answer. Most of them hold herbs; parsley, basil and oregano. Stephanie has brought home from school some interesting things too, some of them we have no idea what they are, so they got planted in the front yard, and I will report later what they eventually become.

Also in the front, we have planted in the main bed there some cucumbers, pumpkins and zucchini and it is delightful to watch them sprout and grow. We had earlier planted some nasturtiums and they too are growing in the front.

My Dad brought us up some hostas from his yard and they look beautiful beside the back of the house. After they die back in the fall I will plant them into the beds at the side of the yard that gets lots of shade from the maple tree.

Here is Steve and Stephanie putting in more Columbine. The bed under the kitchen window is going to be full of them and I love their different colors!

Cub Scouts, Legos and Heat

Scott is a busy guy and here he is getting his "Leave No Trace" award at the Pack Meeting last week. For the summer, we have already agreed that he will work on three belt loops/pins in Art, Math and Music. There might be more, but that's a good start. He already has two pins, and when he starts the Webelo program in November, having a few pins to start with will be great.

During the school year, Scott was in the Lego Club and built some pretty impressive things. In fact, all the club members did a wonderful job and the volunteer in charge put their latest creations on display in the school hallway.

Scott and his friend Alex built the ferry and all the cars in it.

Here is the helecopter that he built.

Today Scott got his official summer haircut. It is really short around the sides and a bit longer on top. Sandy noticed that his calic on top is in a circle. When we got outside (very hot this week) Scott mentioned that the breeze really felt good on his head.

We have been going to Sandy for hair cuts since Scott was 3, so he knows her routine quite well, and asks for a particular shampoo each time...tea tree shampoo. It smells good and tingles on the scalp. At least, that's what Scott says.

Boeing Science Alliance and Trojan Horse

Stephanie has been busy at school with many different projects. Here you see the Trojan Horse she drew as part of a poster. We made it a pop up, but in a flat picture, you can't see that. The wheels in the front are elevated and the body of the horse is too. The best part is that she was able to draw the horse and really make it look like a wooden horse!
All year long, Stephanie has taken advantage of the Boeing Science Alliance (which I dubbed the Science Club) and they met after school on Tuesdays and studied things like electricity, various experiments and the last quarter it was the science of magic. This video is her part of the magic show. The best part of this club is that it was FREE! She also came home from them full of excitement of the projects they completed.

Now for an update on her toe! We saw Dr. Moore yesterday and he was really pleased about how it was healing. Thankfully the infection is finally cleared and we saw good toe nail growth. There was also some calcium deposits, but we get to slowly clean those off with some cream. She goes back in two months to make sure that the nail is growing in straight and not curved.

School only has two more weeks, but lots of reading and such still needs to be done. And there are two more piano lessons before summer break.

All Tuckered Out

Yesterday, Saturday, we really did have a work day. The work started around 10 am for Steve and the children and I worked downstairs. The children were to totally and completely clean out their bedrooms!

Scott's first chore was to clear out any clothes he could find on the floor and to put them in the hamper in the bathroom. Next...and this was the big one...he needed to pick up all his Legos. And we meant ALL of them! Yes, he was allowed to keep intact any ongoing projects and those he had finished, but all the others were put in buckets.

After working hard for a couple of hours...Steve was the task master of the upstairs...I called for a break! It lasted for about 20 minutes. Their next break wasn't until I had lunch ready and then they were back to work. By this time, Steve had managed to halfway fill up the big garbage can in the garage and they were also sorting out things for us to put in our garage sale we hope to have next weekend.

At 6pm I called an all-stop! 8 hours of work, even with the breaks, was enough for anyone! Especially on just one task. What is sad is that their floors are still not done and my part of their rooms hasn't even started. I'm targeted to help them go through their clothes to determine what to keep and such. Scott has so many shirts, and he loves them all, but if I didn't wash any for a month, he would still have shirts to wear. :)

Stephanie had a hard time with sorting her horses...what to keep was easy...what to delete...that was hard. She also had probably 3 years worth of school papers to go through. Mind you, this is a girl that always makes her bed and you could always get through her room to the closet and the window...but all her surfaces were covered and the corners and the chair were full. So she too had issues to be dealt with. And no...she is not yet ready either for a clothes review.

Scott was seeing all the beautiful weather outside and really wanted to play...so out he went. But what did he do? He went next door and helped our neighbor, Jim, with his car. Then he helped Steve get some plants we had gathered this past week in the ground. They put the pumpkin, zucchini and cucumber in the front just in front of the porch. There were also some Hen & Chicks to plant up there. There was also a couple of flowers that needed to get into the ground. In the back they planted some coulious (don't know how this is spelled, and neither does spellcheck, but it is the pretty red and green leaves that loves shade) near the snowball bushes in the back. He then helped Steve mow the front lawn.

It was after 8pm when I finally got dinner on the table. And just before putting the chili on, we were waiting for Steve to come back downstairs, noticed that Scott was resting his head. We wore him out!

Their reward? They got to watch a movie while Steve and I went and did the shopping.

M&M's Premiums - Not for me!

In March, I decided that I needed a goal for April. And in light of our lowered finances, I decided that for the entire month of April,that I would not purchase any candy. But to make it really work, I also added that I wasn’t to ask anyone else to buy me any candy either. And I did it!

Let me tell you though, April was not easy! The only people I told this to were my husband, Steve, and Jen, the wonderful lady who owns the candy store here in Monroe, Sweet Indulgence (just in case you wanted to know about her store).

So…that being said, on May 1st, I found myself at Grocery Outlet checking out what they had in the way of better candies. They didn’t have exactly what I wanted, but after not buying any for a month, I really wasn’t being too choosy. I just don’t buy regular candy bars. What they did have were these Premium M&M’s. I thought, cool, I have been meaning to try them, but at $4 for a boxat Fred Meyers, it just wasn’t going to happen. However, at Grocery Outlet, they were $2.50, so I was willing to give them a try. I picked out the Triple Chocolate ones, “truly tempting layers of milk chocolate, white chocolate & dark chocolate”. I decided to save them for my treats when I went Scrapbooking at Ben Franklins on Friday night (on May 2nd).

On Friday, before leaving to go to the National Scrapbooking event, I opened the bag that was inside the pretty box and dumped all the lovely, shiny, purple M&M’s in a small Tupperware dish and just stashed it in my stuff. I was pretty busy at the time getting all my scrappbooking stuff packed, that I didn't bother eating one. It wasn’t until around 10pm when I finally opened them up and had one.

YUCK! I was so majorly disappointed! I thought that maybe they were at Grocery Outlet for a reason…the crunchy outer shell had gone soft! That had never happened to me before and I wanted my crunch with my chocolate! I mean, even when my M&M's had melted, the candy shell always was crunchy! So the chocolate really did stay in my mouth and not in my hands. :)

Then, on Saturday, I was talking to Steve and Stephanie about them and gave them a try and they too did not like them. So Monday morning, I called their 800 number on the box (yep, I kept the box) to complain about the soft shell, only to find out that they are supposed to be that way. I told the customer service representative that I thought they tasted terrible and that M&M’s were supposed to have a candy shell. She is sending me coupons to replace the ones I didn’t like.

But then, what do I do with a dish full of pretty, purple, shiny M&M’s? I made up some cookie dough and instead of putting in 3 cups of regular chocolate chips, I used only 2 cups and dumped in the M&M’s. In the cookies…they tasted great! But I won’t be buying anymore of these “Premium M&M’s", just to put them in cookies!