Really, I might start doing this again!

Most days I don't feel I was that busy, but I am tired enough to believe I must have. Also, many days, I think if I actually were being paid to be a 'homemaker' my family would be starving. It's probably a good thing I can't get fired from that job!
My awesome garden went a little down hill when my new puppy (he may be a puppy but he is about the size of most full grown dogs) got into my garden, multiple times, and pretty much destroyed many plants. I tried to put up fencing to block him, but then he jumped the fence in a different area. I again tried to block him, thinking the only other place for him to try is so blocked by very large plants, he won't jump because there is no place for him to land... Unless he is not afraid to land directly in the middle of my pumpkin patch. The Jerk!
I still have many and very large tomato plants, however the crop seems to be struggling. First, I kept those plants very well labeled and I am most certain I did not put grape tomatoes in my garden, yet I have very red and ripe looking grape tomatoes on the same stem as large tomatoes. So I am struggling. How could I have expected a great veggie year my first go around?
Also our house is up for sale. So depending on when it sells, my second go around for a veggie garden might not even be a consecutive year! Let's hope that is not the case, because my little girls are loving helping me. Big Girl J has been very involved in helping me in every step. And she loves those little grape tomatoes while she is playing outside. And so does Little Miss O. At least someone will eat them if I can't get enough tomatoes at once to can them.
Speaking of canning, I purchased two boxes of apples and have been (slowly) working on making applesauce. I have already made some plum jam (Christmas presents) and today I made 7, 12oz, jars of grape jelly. I hope to add tomato sauce to this list, of course finishing the apples before that wish comes true would be helpful!

Still figuring this out

I know, it has been yet another month since I last posted. I am mostly posting currently to let you know I have changed my comment settings. I was getting comments that sound like spam with links that I wouldn't even try to click on. I change the comments allowed to only members. I wanted to make sure my family who wants to keep up with me (when I get back around to posting regularly) still can. I also changed the comments to be previewed by me before they will post.
At first the comments were on my cake picture posts, and they were odd, but at least sounded like the person read my blog, but then had a link to plastic surgery sounding link. Then recently the comments were on random post and had nothing to do with the post. So I am fed up. I do not need plastic surgery. You spam people ruin everything. EVERYTHING!

Little O turns 2

Little Miss O has turned two! I know it's hard to believe. My little one is already two, but just wait, in week my next post may say she is turning 16! It is amazing how fast the time goes.
Everyone has hear of the terrible twos, and I think Little Miss O has perfected it. She has been practicing her temper tantrums for months now. Her best fit is the one she throws while I am cooking dinner. She waits for me to open the pantry, stands in the way so I can't close it, then begins to demand animal crackers. Her tantrum involves real tears, that seem to claim I starve her, screaming, I'm sure there are words but I can't understand them, and most importantly the stamping foot, because if you stamp your foot it gets results. If I open the freezer while she is in the kitchen the tantrum is over ice cream rather than animal crackers. No matter the scenario, my two year old has defiantly perfected it. She has also learned to over dramatize when her sister is mean to her. In many case her sister is pulling her hair, because Little Miss O has already done so to her. The real problem is Big Girl J does not pull Little Miss O's hair in the same vicious manner as what is done to her. However, the result seems to be the same, crying, yelling, and foot stomping.
As horrible as I might be making this sound, it really is. Just plain maddening! Lucky for me this is not a constant event. This at best is a once or twice a day happening. Usually resolved with a threat of no chocolate milk with dinner, or taking the number of books we read before bed down a number. Some nights the book count has gone from 4 to 1 and it seems the lesson still isn't learned, because both children throw a fit when I say no more books because they didn't behave earlier!
Alas, the real reason of this blog post, show off the cake! I attempted a topsy turvey cake. I am concerned that my decorations were a bit too big and took away the effect of a purposely slanted cake, so it just looks crooked...

Little Miss O seemed to enjoy her birthday, with minimal crying. I made the bottom tier chocolate with chocolate chips, the most popular by far. The middle was a homemade cherry chip with the lesson learned, this cake is wonderful fresh and does not freeze well. The top was white almond sour cream, I thought was very tasty, but still not as awesome as the chocolate cake!
Wonderful Husband and I had decided when Big Girl J was one, that we don't like to force people to bring gifts, and his dad can be a little overwhelming with gifts for the wrong age range. So we asked for no gifts at the party, just for people to come and have fun.
Grandmama thinks she is an exception to the rule, and likes to torture me, by bringing presents. At least the gifts are either homemade or good educational, needed toys.

For the record, on the no gift policy. My favorite part, now, is that my girls do not expect gifts. They do not open the door for their friends with the words 'where's my gift.' I have been to many birthday parties with bratty little kids. I have also found my least favorite part of the parties we have attended is the forcing of sitting a child down who was happy playing to open presents and having to thank people they don't really know. It makes me glad I don't do that. I understand why people do it, it was in all fairness the way we were raised. I just want my kids to want to have their friends to celebrate with, and be happy with that!

It seems time does fly!

While I look at the summer flying by, I realize that this is just the beginning of 'busy' summers. Big Girl J has had two different vacation bible school weeks, one in June and on at the end of July. She had a week with an afternoon hour of soccer camp. Little Miss O has turned two! Little Miss O and Big Girl J both had two weeks of swim lessons for a half hour each morning, however it seemed the day was shot after that half hour! We have traveled to the zoo, gone to an interactive farm, and many trips to the splash parks.
While I feel this summer has been great, quick and busy, I know that every summer with my growing girls will be different yet equally busy, and with any luck all of the summers will be fun!
One thing my girls have enjoyed this summer is working in the garden with me and eating the fruits and veggies of their labor, (mostly my labor, they just hold the basket!)
Now to catch you up with pictures in case you get bored reading all those words!

My Goal: Post about the birthday, the garden, the plum jam I made, and what ever else I am forgetting!

Momma, Momma, quite common, how does your garden grow?

I am feeling very good about my garden so far. Well most of it. I have had my fair share of salads and given bags of lettuce to a few friends. I planted the lettuce and carrots at the same time in early spring directly in the ground. Both just one packet of seed. They have both done great. However lettuce doesn't like the hot weather, and was going to seed soon. So about two weekends ago we found a great sale on pepper plants at a local nursery. With the thought of canning some salsa with all those tomatoes we purchased 8 to 10 different varieties of peppers. The next day I pulled up the lettuce and planted all the peppers.
One is a chocolate pepper, more on that when I get to taste it.
I was feeling like my tomatoes were growing very slow, and the eggplant, red bell pepper and banana pepper plants hadn't grown at all since they got planted.

 Red Bell Pepper

 Eggplant

Banana Pepper, these really are about the same size they were when they got planted. I did start all of these plants from seed, in the green house corner of my garage. So I am really hoping for these guys to do something big, like the squash, or corn, even the pumpkins.

From left to right, pumpkin plants, squash, and corn, with the tomato plant in front. The corn is about chest high, the squash is more than half as tall, and they are all doing great!, But those tomatoes... So I decided to visit Loveland Hydroponics for some grow food.
Side note, big shout out to the guy who runs that place. It is very friendly to those who don't know what they are doing, like me. He answered every question, requested pictures and is very friendly. He is the reason my garden has gone so well. I am glad I found that shop!
Back to the story, he hooked me up with some grow food. And my big garden helper applied it wonderfully!

See, what a big help! The carrots are in front of her, the patch of peppers to the side with soybean and green beans behind them. There are also red onions next to the carrots. I am very excited about all that my garden is producing! In fact I have baby green beans growing and hope to be eating fresh green beans shortly!

 

Jodie's Race

I recently ran my first 5k. I was able to run most of it. It took me about 40 minutes with roughly 5 to 10 minutes of walking, only when I need a little break. But I never stopped. Even thought I need to use the restroom when the race started and saw a port-a-potty about half way through. But I was concerned if I stopped to potty I might not be able to start running again!
I was quite passionate about running this race due to the cause. Jodie's race is for ovarian cancer awareness. Not a cause I hear much about, so I wanted to help get the word out.
I saw on facebook that there wasn't too much support, and this was my first 5k. When I arrived to see over 2,000 people gathered, I was surprised, to say the least. But it was wonderful, I got an email recently that said they raised over $200,000 from the race and the race teams that did fundraising.
This really gets me stoked for next year. I think I would like to try and get a team together and do some fundraising... But first, I need to find another 5k to keep my exercise motivation going!

Greensburg

One of the many wonderful things that make my children so much better than anyone else's, is there ability to go on road trips without going crazy and taking me with them!
Of course the travel DVD player helps, a lot.
The girls and myself loaded up in Grandmama's car and travel across the not so wild, more boring west into the great belly button of America. Greensburg is where my mom and her family have called home. It is where my grandma was recently buried and where a F5 tornado tried to wipe off the map.
Four years ago the family had planned a Memorial Day weekend get together in Greensburg to bury Grandma's ashes next to her husband. The morning after confirming our plans, we woke to see on the news that a mile wide tornado had just hit the mile wide town.
I didn't feel the same loss as the rest of the family, however the chance to see the house my mom grew up in was no longer an option. Big Girl J was barely two months old when we made that trip. Being able to go into Greensburg and see the devastation was an experience that left me amazed and feeling very insignificant.
This last Memorial Day weekend was Grandma's sister (Aunt Sissy's) 90th birthday. So the families made the travel plans and endured the drive to celebrate with each other. We also got to enjoy the festivities of the Greensburg annual High School Reunion. This included a parade, much smaller than the ones my girls have seen, but it was still enjoyed.

They got lots of candy for such a small parade, but of course there weren't many children fighting for the handfuls!

The next morning Aunt Sissy blessed up with her presence at breakfast. This is the first time she had met Little Miss O, and the played a game of pass the jelly for a while!

Wise Aunt made our family's favorite treat, blarney stones. This is a treat the Aunt Sissy was known for making at all of our family get togethers. A treat that many of us had missed for years, and a treat my girls got to experience for the first time, and then at least five more times that day!

Grandmama did Big Girl J's hair for our BBQ that evening, so Big Girl J wanted to return the favor. She did much better than the time I did my Grandma's hair and decided she needed a trim. I believe that may have been my first realization that once hair was cut simply putting it back would not get you out of trouble!

At the BBQ in a local friend's backyard a town over from Greensburg, we found the world's best swing set. Big Girl J and Little Miss O certainly didn't want to leave, not even for the left over blarney stones!
We survived the trip home, and really had a wonderful time.