Outside

Each year we get a live tree and decorate it on Christmas Eve. For the last two years, the day after Christmas my favorite woodsman wants to hack it to pieces as soon as possible. First, he takes the branches off:
Then he chops it into two large pieces to be used for Easter. This year, he got carried away. I think I kept him waiting too long. It wasn't until after New Year that he got to it. It ended up being completely OBLITERATED. Nothing left but a few tiny wood chips.
We had so much putting straw on a local strawberry field, the kids put themselves to sleep with the after-fatigue:
OK, I don't really know why they were pretending to sleep. The work was fun, but good and the fellowship was priceless. I am not sure what they were looking for, but I liked this one too...I've been sick. A small cold that is attacking my throat and keeping me down. But I want it to go away.

Days going by...

Last weekend my youngest had another birthday. This is just too much for me. Look at her glowing at her homemade ladybug ice cream cake.

And this is some of her friends playing chain tag at her party. The weather here has been hot on the weekends. I think it's 85 today. We spent the morning walking along the beach.

This flower is one of thousands, if not millions of them growing in the dunes at the beach. Amazing, huh?

This is an afternoon shot at the top of a 10-15 foot dune cliff recently. They had so much fun and the breeze at that spot was swift!

Of course, I took my knitting to the beach.

More knitting to come soon.
I am going to skip some of the hot weather and go to the LYS.

Happy Easter!

And it was!
It was WARM weather and bright skies and a perfect day for celebrating the resurrection.The daffodils bloomed:

The Clivia were in seasonThe Easter Story was told. The myriad of kids here told the story admirably. They get the point. And the candy. They get the candy. :-)

Do you like this:
It makes me smirk. I clearly have issues.

I also have cake. Ree's Carrot cake. Yum. Just for Easter....as if we needed more decadence.
Hope yours was blessed.

The Party is Here!

I've mentioned it before, but I'll say it again....I love it when we babysit large groups of kids. It is so fun to have several family groups here at one time. It is like a party: the Food, the GAMES, the TRAMPOLINE and the sleepovers can't be beat, or so my kids tell me. All my normal rules are relaxed and we get to have so much more play time. And this time I even relaxed the food rules quite a bit (shocker!). I am usually the food Nazi (no junk food for you! *growl*).

I wrote down a few of the numbers of visitors, but I got overwhelmed by figuring them out: suffice it to say that there were A LOT.

Yes, we've had lots of extra kids here really consistently for the last two weeks, but with enough breaks for us to get work done, in between. It's been a good life.

If you are reading this and you are a mom who shared your kids with us over the last couple of weeks, THANK YOU for giving us an OTS (opportunity to serve). We love it, and are glad. Using some restraint, I left my camera mostly alone, keeping the privacy of your kids (mostly) intact.

Among other things, we watched Emergency with some of the kids:

Does he give any other "Lost" watchers the chills?

And this:

Do you have kids who collect cat's tails and then explode them ALL OVER the backyard? Our neighbors must have been quite annoyed? Was the the guests fault? No. Mine own son. Our backyard looked like it had snowed.

This is a pic of the flowers from my sweet DH, and I pass it on to the mothers who shared their kids. Thanks. I needed the break from the routine.

Oh, and photos of the impulsive cast-on from the other day:

I had it 25% finished and tried it on. Too tight. Frogged.

Books and Dirt

This series by Jennifer Chiaverini is a fun read. It begins about 8 books ago. Some books are set in the past (like arriving in America 200 years ago and also in the underground railroad) and some are set all over the country. But all of them revolve around quilts and quilt-making and have certain core set of characters. I am so inspired by all the quilt making in the books that I even bought some stuff, but haven't really gotten in to it, yet...

I also just finished reading "The Bronze Bow" by Elizabeth George Speare to the kids for part of our Ancient Rome for history. It was very good, but not as good as I had hoped. Those high hopes seem to make even good thing seem...well, disappointing.

I have also been reading "The Narrated Bible" which is written in timeline formation. I really like it.

I also read the kids "The Children's Story Bible" by Vos. It's wonderful. Do you read that one, too?
Here's some pictures of how the bikes look after the ride:
the first one is the bag that hangs down from my husband's seat, the next is his bike, from the handlebars down...

The last is the #1's dirt.

Alternative Entertainment:

Who needs the Superbowl when you have a soggy steep trail going from the local mountains to the sea??? We don't!
A good friend and I dropped off the 8 kids and two dads at the trail head and said goodbye. This is what they did:

Nine miles to the sea. Trees and hills and many, many new pools.
They got a little wet.

And a little muddy! They even found a bit of sunshine.

Meanwhile, Danielle's car broke down and we were 2 hours (?) late in picking them up. They were cold and hungry and very, very wet. And happy.
I am thrilled the Giants won, but sad that I didn't get to knit at all.
Do I sound a little smug? I hope not. I do love having something outdoors to do, even if we have bad weather....
And I hope everyone who watched the game had a great time, too!

Not enough weather, we gotta make more

Ok, most people in Southern California are hiding inside because of the torrential rain we have been receiving. My kids and their cousins didn't think there was enough rain. We've got the dryer going quite often because they want to be out in it and need more dry clothes every couple of hours.

I got out the camera catch the fun. I keep seeing them in the trampoline so..... I went with a smile on my face and found:

They didn't think the rain was enough.

They had to make more. I let them. I smiled.

It was one of my good parenting moments.

Donna from Quiet Life asks questions every Friday on her blog. Last Friday she asked a question about laughter. How many times a day do I laugh? Hmm. Well, I know I need to laugh more. Somehow I veer toward the more serious things of life and I think I need to lighten up a little.

So yesterday, I paid attention to the laughter. I was surprised.

I laughed all the time.

I am so encouraged. Thank you Donna for asking the question.

This is my progress on Lady Eleanor. This stole is still going on: I just can't give up!
The first picture is without flash, inside at night. The colors are more true. The second photo is with the flash which makes it more clear, but the colors look more saturated than they really are.



My mom is trying to get me to read War and Peace. Tolstoy. I've always wanted to read him, but been daunted by the reputation this title has. Looooooonnnnnnnnggg. Anybody want to do it with me?