Garden Prep

Someday, I will have a huge sunny spot where I can have my whole vegetable garden in one place. Right now, the only spot that sort of qualifies is my front yard but, since we hope to sell this house sometime in the not-to-distant future, I haven't dug it all up yet, since I suppose the next owner might not be quite so keen on having such a large and visible garden. So, I make do with what I have and slowly expand each year in ways that I hope will not only increase my yield but also add to the beauty and value of our home.

Last year, I put in a brand new bed across the entire front of the lawn, three feet by seventy feet. It housed my tomatoes, cucumbers, peas, lettuce, kale, chard and basil. Half of the bed I removed sod and dug up and the other half I did in a modified "lasagna" fashion - laying down newspaper, then old leaves, some wood ash and covering with a mix of purchased manure and topsoil. It worked so well that I plan to start all my new gardens in the same way. During the winter (since we hardly had any snow) whenever we cleaned out our woodstove I dumped the ashes on the gardens. As we started garden prep earlier this week, this is what the front garden looked like. You can see the contrast between the lasagna bed on the left and the dug bed on the right.

We started with three trash cans full of old manure scraped from the paddock at our friends' house where our horses live. I spread one can over the entire dug side of the front bed. Here's what it looked like after that! Ahhh, much better.

Then, Clara helped me measure off for a new watering system, aka jugs in the ground. I plant my tomatoes close, every 2 feet, trying to make the most of a small space and reduce weed growth at the same time. We marked off every four feet, in between where the tomatoes will be so that there will be a milk jug for every two plants.

We buried our milk jugs (which I had previously poked full of holes) and put sticks in them so they'll be easy to find this summer after I've built up the soil some more and our plants are getting tall and bushy!

This is what it looked like when we were done. Clara was having a blast making birthday cakes!

Then, I started on the new bed that is going in front of the house and joining up with my existing garden on the side of the house. First, I put down 3 layers of newspaper, hosing as I went, to kill the grass and block weed growth. Here, you can see I had started on the second step: a layer of old leaves from last fall.

Once all the newspaper was covered with several inches of leaves, I used my remaining two garbage cans of manure to cover the entire bed. When I came back to take pictures, I found this little guy crawling happily across the new bed. Isn't he stunning?!

Here's a peek at the new bed. I had to work around some existing daffodils that are coming up but it turned out pretty well. After this I also took 80 lbs of topsoil and spread it over the top of the bed so I can go ahead and plant here within the next couple of weeks. I know some lettuce will be going in here and probably some cucumbers - I need to get cracking on my garden plan!

Welcome, 2012!

To welcome in the new year we played some soccer...

Carried the ball quite a bit...

Studied our shadows...

Chased a train...

Looked at the moon...

Practiced our balance...

 And saw some incredible clouds!

 

We are so blessed and looking forward to another year full of God's overwhelming grace! Welcome, 2012!

Our Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas together this year! We spent a lot of time thinking about ways to keep the focus on Jesus and, for the most part, I think we succeeded. We had a glorious time celebrating our Savior's birth and spending time with family. The day started when Clara woke up and came to snuggle in bed for awhile. Then, we told her there was something waiting for her under the tree. This is what she found:

It was the baby Jesus from our Nativity scene, all wrapped up. Clara unwrapped him and was SO excited when she discovered who it was! We talked about how God sent us the most special gift of all and Jesus was that special gift. Then, since Jesus was here, we started celebrating! Clara and I put candles on Jesus' birthday cake.

Luke and Clara fed Sadie the treats from Sadie's little stocking - even the dogs get to celebrate in our house!

Clara was so excited to open stockings! We were waiting for everyone to be ready, but Clara kept going in and checking on them, waiting on the couch. So cute!

We finally opened stockings, which were a big hit. Clara helped everyone open theirs. She loved reaching down into hers and finding all sorts of treasures! These little wooden tea bags from Grammie were a big hit. :)

Then, it was time to eat! We sang Happy Birthday to Jesus and blew out the candles together - so fun! This is not something we did in my family growing up and I loved it! It is definitely a tradition that is here to stay. (In this picture you can also see our cinnamon rolls and bowls of fruit salad, which is my family's traditional Christmas breakfast.)

Clara thoroughly enjoyed her birthday cake for breakfast. :) While we were eating we also read the Christmas story both from Clara's Bible and my Bible.

When I was looking for Clara to get her ready for church, I found her back on the couch, studying the gifts from her stocking. :)

We headed to church and had an absolutely wonderful time celebrating Christ's birth with our church family. Several members shared some of their favorite things about Christmas with some sharing very profound thoughts, others special memories. When I asked Clara what her favorite thing about Christmas was, she said, "Go tell it on the mountain!"

After church we had a quick, snacky lunch and Clara went down for a nap. The rest of us got out all the snacks we had made the day before - homemade cheese crackers, triscuits, cheese ball, carrot sticks, homemade ranch dressing, french bread, olive tapenade and assorted cookies and treats. We set them on Clara's little blue table in the living room. Then, Luke and I brought out all the presents. This was what awaited Clara when she woke from her nap:

But the first thing she noticed when we came in the living room was the blue table. She gasped and said in a surprised voice, "Mommy!! What we do to this WHOLE table!" The sight of all those munchies just blew her over! She was excited to see the presents too, but still spent several minutes at the blue table munching before she headed over to investigate the tree. :) She did a great job handing out presents to everyone and thoroughly enjoyed helping each person open their gifts.

Here she is opening one for her and baby Joy, from Gramma.

 

 

Matching hats! It was so nice to just linger over our gift opening. Each time someone (particularly Clara) opened something, we took time to enjoy it right then and there. Clara was especially good at slowing down and appreciating each gift as it came, while I noticed several times that the rest of us, perhaps out of habit, were quick to move on - "Okay, who's next? What present shall we open now?" I hope Clara never picks up this habit but always takes time to savor and enjoy, although I know this is easier with one child and several adults than with many children and few adults.

One of the gifts we took the longest time enjoying was Owl Babies. Clara wanted to read it as soon as she opened and then wanted to read it 3 or 4 more times before she was ready to do anything else. It was an instant hit and has been a favorite ever since! She loves the story "bout their lost mommy" and lights up every time we come to the page when the Mother Owl comes back.

I saved her biggest gift for last because I knew this one she would want to take lots of time playing with, and my guess was correct. Grammie sent Thomas the Tank Engine and a set of wooden tracks. Clara was so excited! She played with the trains and tracks every day at Gramma's house when we were there in October, so I knew she would love these. We are looking forward to years of fun with this wonderful gift! Thank you, Grammie!

We spent the rest of the day munching, relaxing, playing and snuggling.

After Clara went to bed, Mommy and Daddy played for a long time with her new fabric squares, sent by Gramma. We had a blast with them! Daada was laughing at us the whole time. :)

It was a wonderful day throughout which we felt completely blessed and overwhelmed at the greatness of God's gift to us. Thank you Jesus, and Happy Birthday!!! We can't wait to celebrate again next year!

Clara and the Holy Family

As soon as we got out our Nativity set today, Clara became a wee bit obsessed. She carried Jesus and Mary (along with other assorted members) around with her all day.

 

In case you can't tell, that's Mary in her left hand and baby Jesus, two sheep and Baby Joy in her right arm.

Clara and Jesus had some intense conversations throughout the day. She told him his birthday is coming. I'm not sure what she was telling him here. (Note Mary close by.)

Several other members of the Nativity joined in on the couch. I came and read Alfie and Annie Rose to all of them.

Although this picture is blurry, I love how it shows the care and tenderness with which she handled baby Jesus all day.

Jesus, Mary and the sheep joined us for lunch. She tried to share her soup with them but I told her they could just watch her eat and she had to pretend to share, no really give soup to them.

I did let her "share" her muffin with the Holy Family after her nap, though. After all, she said they were hungry.

This was our compromise for her wanting to carry them all around the house and me worrying about them getting dropped and broken. She has to carry their basket with two hands and be very gentle. She did a great job today! We'll see how it goes for the next month...

The rest of our day

The past few days when it's come time to do my daily photo I've had a problem - not that there are so many great photos to choose from, but they're all so different. Clara does so many things every day these days and I want to remember and record all her little quirks. So here are some more photos from the rest of our day. (To see the one I chose for our daily picture, see Terrific Twos.)

Tea time. Clara made and presented us all with "special treats" (you can see mine on the arm of the green chair) which she said were "chocolate cake."

Feeding her dollies.

"Snuggling" with Baby Joy.

more snuggling...

Matching girls: blue wool pants (made from the same sweater!), pink jackets, red hats knit by Gramma.

More snuggling... this particular spot is one of her favorites lately (with me snuggling at the other end with Lucy).

"Curling up" with Sadie.

 

Looking through the NRS catalogue to "see what I like."

When Mommy is sick...

Clara shares snacks with her dollies,

 Sips tea with her pinkie finger pointed and a french twist in her hair,

Rocks her dolls while rocking a super-cool hairstyle,

Reads "Jesus Loves Me" to Baby Joy,

And texts Daddy for help! Watch out, texting driver on the loose at my house!

Thankfully, we are all on the mend and feeling much better! We'd still like Daddy around more, though! Missing a weekend of shoeing for the holidays means the whole week before is crazy trying to make it up and we've barely seen him all week. Can't wait for our time together down south!