Wellll... for us Saturdays and Sundays are busy. See, my husband does this thing called work. In fact, he has two jobs. He is a pastor of a church, and he works another job to help pay the bills. That leaves very little time for blowing a whole day on "nothing" but "family time".
We have family time, but it is all of us working together to get ready for the week ahead. Saturdays usually finds me doing piano lessons. My husband and one of the older children are out on visitation. By the time they get back around lunch time, piano lessons are finished, and hopefully some cleaning done. Saturdays are our usual cleaning days during school weeks. Thankfully, now that things are not so busy, we can work on it Fridays so that helps free up Saturdays. Well, there's the rub, because now that the weather is springy, there is a whole new category of "things to do."
Outdoor work, for example. Usually we have gardens to weed, the flower beds at church to weed, the church to clean, and the grounds for church and parsonage to mow and keep up as best we can. At any rate, God created six days for work, and one for rest.
But I digress....
Back to last weekend. Friday we had tea with my friend and her daughter. All the boys played outside. Saturday we had spring cleaning at the church in the morning, followed by a barbeque. Then the deacon and his wife and our family did our yearly trek to a popular farm and bought flowers for the flower boxes and walkway at church. I also got some stuff for our Memorial garden and vegetable garden. It was our plan to plant the church flowers when we got back, but we were scared off by torrential rains, thunderstorms, and a tornado warning. Weren't we wimpy? Before going to bed I made a huge crockpot full of spanish rice, and a cherry pie.
Sunday was the usual. We had sunday School, morning service, and our monthly fellowship dinner. Monday was a "blah" day for me, but I managed to wade my way through all the laundry, did the usual meal planning and grocery list making for the week, and supervised chores and what little schoolwork there was to do.
Today was a beautiful day! 70's, a nice breeze, and just perfect for being outside. It has been a productive day, and a very enjoyable one. This morning after breakfast and morning chores were done I hung out the laundry. Then we tackled a bunch of things on our outdoor "to do" list. Benjamin was a wonderful help to me today! His schoolwork for this term is completed, so he has been very eager to help with the garden. This morning he pulled the grass up around the fruit trees down to the soil, with Josiah's help. Then they spread manure around the bottoms, and mulched. The girls watered the trees well.
Then I went on to put in the flowers in the memorial garden. I put in a new lavendar bush. It is small now, but is supposed to grow to be about 3 feet wide. Here are some pics. The first one has the lavendar plant to the right of the pic.
The "blank" area to the top left of the garden is where I planted the gladiolas the other day. I hope they come up! They will be so pretty there as an accent flower.
Here is a center shot of the garden. I think it came out very pretty!
I had that all tidied up for about.. oh 5 hours when we got a load of wood delivered. He dumped it right next to the garden, barely missing my new lavendar plant. Elizabeth measured and she said the wood was about an inch from the plant. Yikes!
After I was done with the Memorial Garden we started planting in the big veggie garden. So far we have 12 tomato plants, 12 pepper plants, and four rows of peas. Next will be corn, then the green beans, Benjamin's watermelons, and then whatever I have room for. I have discovered that I bought way too many seeds for the size of our garden. Hopefully the ones I don't use will hold over until next year.
For lunch we had an impromptu picnic outside. Isaac had fallen asleep in the stroller and slept a really long time. I ate next to the stroller, but the kids ate in their tree house. I am rather proud of that tree house as my oldest designed and built it pretty much himself. Jerusha's spot of choice was in one of the swings.
I was pleased to see the little herb container I started in the kitchen sprouting up. I planted the seeds about two weeks ago. Here they are growing nicely:
I just love watching a Daddy with a baby! My favorite pics of Dale is when he is napping with the baby. Just melts my heart! In this pic only one of them is napping.
I have finished all the immediate sewing list for this summer. The girls helped by making their slips. I used a simple A-ling type pattern from McCalls Ruffle and Lace series. I had to alter the pattern up to fit the girls, as the sizing only went up to an 8. The twins are in about 12's. The "Need it NOW!" being caught up, I have been working on a block for the fancy quilt I have been gradually making over the last couple years. This is just the center block for the Carpenter's Wheel. I am awaiting directions to complete the block from a friend online. Then there is only one block left, and I can start piecing the top! I can't wait!
This evening Elizabeth and I went for a 45 minute walk, then I went for a short bike ride with all the older children.
The rest of this week is packed. I am hoping to finish the planting by this weekend. Also, Dale has been working on repainting the flag pole. He also fixed the weed whacker so I can get some trimmming done after mowing later this week. Saturday will be our annual May birthday bash. I was going to do an "end of the year" recital for school, but decided that due to the lack of attendence, we'd just skip it and enjoy the day.
Whew... there is the update for the last couple days. Is anyone else as tired as I am? Goodnight and God bless!
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