The day I became a farmer . . . .

. . . . was yesterday! :)

Yesterday Sam and I went and picked out some poultry to raise. We bought eight chickens, two ducks and two turkeys. The chickens are for eggs, the ducks are for fun and the turkeys....you can probably guess what they are for! We may get more later on, but for now we wanted to start small-ish and see how it goes. Sam wanted to add geese and guinea fowl and his dad suggested peacocks (!) which Sam thought was a smashing idea. Oh, dear. I can just imagine having peacocks running around on our property!

The kids are so excited about the babies. They have already learned how to hold them properly and they have spent all day today 'checking' on them. Actually, to be perfectly honest, I am too. I'll use any excuse to go out and hold those little balls of fluff!

Aren't they the CUTEST things? Seriously.

And when I was talking about how cute they are, I really was talking about the birds. But it's okay if you think my kids are cute too. :)

By the way, in this last picture Henry is holding a turkey, Jonah is holding a duck and Bridget has a chicken.

Cowboy Henry

In the last few months Henry has become obsessed with everything cowboy. He is rarely seen without his cowboy boots. He only wears shoes when I insist he does and then he is NOT happy about it. The boots he has now are actually just about worn through--and he has only had them since November!

The boots are just the beginning, however. I found cute cowboy hats for the boys a while back, so of course Henry added that to his repertoire. When he chooses his clothes every single morning, Henry picks a button-up shirt (because that's what cowboys wear, don't ya know) and jeans.

Recently Henry found a pair of chaps that I had made him years ago for a Halloween costume. Even though they are quite a bit too small, they have been added to 'the outfit' and he puts those on as soon as he comes home from school in the afternoon. To top off the entire ensemble, Henry likes to have a bandanna tied around his face.

Realizing that every good cowboy needs a horse dog, Henry has recently commissioned Elmer for the job. We don't have a leash for Elmer as he hasn't needed one in years, so Henry holds onto Elmer's collar and takes him for walks up and down our street. Yesterday, Henry found a bungee cord and walked Elmer around on it. I went out to the garage to get something and found Elmer with a bungee cord attached to his collar and the other end wrapped around the door handle. When I asked Henry why Elmer was tied up, he said "We were just playing a game, Mommy. He had to go to jail."

Chicken Flakes

Raisin Bran is my favorite 'healthy' cereal. (I'm actually a super big fan of Captain Crunch with Crunch Berries, but I rarely buy it because I'll eat it for every breakfast, lunch and dinner until it's gone. I can polish off a box in about two days...)

Anyway, I haven't bought Raisin Bran in a while, and I picked some up at the grocery store yesterday. I thought the boys might like it and I put it out for breakfast this morning. Henry and Bridget were already eating by the time Jonah finally made it to the table. You should have heard his excitement when he came running up to the table and saw what we were eating:"I LOVE THOSE!! Those are Chicken Flakes, right? Yeah, Chicken Flakes. Those are my favorite...I really love 'em! Thanks, Mom!"

I was laughing too hard to correct him. :)

Thursday

On Valentine's Day I made the kids little tiny heart-shaped pancakes with a fabulous homemade blueberry syrup to top them off. A little bit of whipped cream would have been a beautiful finish, but I didn't have any (and didn't really think of that until just now!).

I think it's safe to say that they liked the blueberry syrup.

Henry the vampire....

I may have started something though. Henry and Jonah have asked for heart-shaped pancakes every morning since then!

My awesome brother sent me flowers last week. Aren't they pretty? When I called to thank him for sending them, he told me he just thought I sounded like I needed some flowers when we had talked on the phone earlier in the week. I have the sweetest brother in the world. :) I'm so thankful to have him as a part of my life.

The Daffodil Fields

Despite feeling spectacularly cruddy yesterday (and having a teething one-year-old), I went ahead with plans I had made to visit the daffodil fields near our town. I met up with my wonderful mother-in-law first and she shared a 30% off coupon at Kohl's with me, so that was a great start to the day. We made a few other quick stops and then headed to the daffodil fields. I am SO glad that we went! This is a beautiful place, filled with acres and acres of my very favorite flower. God's glory shines in each lovely blossom.

Here's me and my babies:

Here, if you look carefully, you can see Bridget was crossing her arms and walking away from me to tell me "No, thank you Mommy. I'd rather not have my picture taken right now."

There are two lakes on the 1000-acre property, with fun wooden bridges crossing parts of them. The boys LOVED the bridges and had fun playing on/near the exceptionally high one that had a very scary drop-off on the other side. Henry is flirting with the not-quite-as-high edge in this picture...

and Jonah is having fun thowing things into the safer LOW edge of the lake.

There is a replica of an old log cabin on the property and the kids enjoyed playing on the porch. Henry seemed to fit right in with his cowboy gear. I got a great photo of Grammy with Jonah near the cabin:

And Grammy with the lovely Bridget:

I had to zoom pretty far to get this next shot, so I'm not surprised at how fuzzy it came out. I still think it's a sweet picture, though! This was the first picture I took of them in the daffodils when we got there and the boys were SO excited! Henry had so much fun there that he asked if we could have his next birthday party there. :) I'm sure he'd be disappointed if we showed up in May and all the daffodils were gone!

The property is hilly and covered in trees and almost everywhere you look there are beautiful daffodils blooming! The people that manage the property let visitors in for free and ask only that visitors not disturb the flowers. So we could walk all among the flowers and it was just so peaceful!
This was my last shot on the way out--I took it while we were driving! I just LOVE how the sun was making each little flower seem to GLOW!

I forgot to mention....Daffodils have always been my favorite flower, so I used them as the main flower in my wedding bouquets. So now they have an even more special meaning for me! :)

Wouldn't want to leave Bridget out...

I guess she's not going to say it, so I'll help her out...

Happy Valentine's Day! :)

And one from Jonah...

A Valentine's message from Henry...

Jonah turned four!!!!

Four years ago, when our little Samuel Jonah entered the world I knew that he was something special. All babies are special, of course, but this one was different. He captured my heart from the moment I first saw him and we've always shared a sweet bond. This child arrived on his due date, seems to always have time to snuggle with his mommy, has love for everyone he knows and is maybe the funniest kid I've ever met. Most of our parenting stories revolve around the antics of this little guy and the things that come out of his mouth. :)

Last Saturday we had the pleasure of throwing a birthday party for Jonah. Jonah has a MAJOR sweet tooth, so we indulged him by starting the day out with donuts served on his special birthday plate. As you can see, he was thrilled.

Jonah's very favorite book is "We're Going on a Bear Hunt," so we themed the party around that. Sam took all the teddy bears we own (and we own a surprising amount!) and 'hid' them out in our forest. The kids all sat on the trampoline and listened to the story, then went out on their own bear hunt. Here is most of the crew with what they found:

After that we roasted hotdogs over the bonfire and then made s'mores. Even though we had chairs set up all over the place, Jonah preferred to sit here to enjoy his lunch and s'more:

After lunch we served the Spiderman cake that Jonah had asked for. I had trouble getting the candles to light, but Jonah patiently waited and then blew them all out!
Jonah opened all his gifts on the trampoline--that was fun!

Bridget slept through most of the party, but she joined us near the end. She spent some time on the trampoline and then found her favorite person in the world for some quality time. Here is Bridget with Granddad.

And last, but certainly not least, here is Jonah with his 'birthday buddy' Hailie. We met her at the library a few months ago, and Hailie shares Jonah's exact birthday. She was out of town that day, so she came over the day before to exchange gifts and play. This is Jonah's best friend!

A fun Valentine's giveaway...

Sarah's giving away a great chocolate-themed package for Valentine's Day. Head over to her blog and leave a comment for your chance to win too!

Happy Groundhog Day!

Ten years ago today, life as I knew it changed in a dramatic way.

Sam and I were dating at the time. We had met almost six months prior to that day and what began as friendship had grown into something much more.

On that day, Sam had invited me to go skiing. We were living in Bozeman, MT and the local ski hill was only about 15 minutes away. I met him at his house and we headed out. It was a beautiful day for skiing. There was fresh powder from the night before and the sun was shining, but I remember being so irritated with Sam because he was acting so funny. I couldn't quite figure out what was going on with him (and he certainly wasn't telling me), but he was at times quiet and other times almost snappy with me. Not the jovial Sam that I was used to being around, for sure! We ended up leaving early and not skiing quite the full day, which was unusual for us.

We got back to Sam's house and sat on the couch together. I think Sam might have turned the tv on to a basketball game or something. I was getting ready to leave since there was clearly something bothering Sam. He asked me to stay a while longer and I reluctantly agreed. (I never could say no to the guy--still can't!) We talked a few minutes more and then Sam got kind of serious. He started talking about how long we had known each other (which was not long) so I thought he was probably breaking up with me. My panic quickly changed to joy when he went into how he realized how much he loved me and then asked if I wanted to marry him!

I couldn't believe my ears! He wasn't holding a ring, but he said, "If you say yes, there is a ring upstairs waiting for you!"

That whole day, what I had thought was irritation was actually nerves. It is one of the VERY few times I have actually seen Sam truly nervous about anything at all.

He told me later that he had planned on proposing while we were on the ski hill. Different scenarios had played out in his mind, including asking me while we were on a lift, but he was worried that I would be so excited that I would drop the ring and we'd never see it again. I'm honestly surprised that he knew me so well already at that point in our relationship, because I do tend to be clumsy like that!

We were married in July of that year, so we'll celebrate our 10th anniversary this summer. Our little family has changed a lot since that day!