Wishing For Spring

I often let the boys pick a craft off of the internet to do. Jacob found this particular one. And guess what? I had an ice cream tub full of lids because I have issues with throwing something out that might be useful someday.
I had the boys create their colourful caterpillar without any glue first, then I gave them the go ahead to touch the glue once they were satisfied. Googly eyes and legs added and they were done. (Daniel's is the one on the left, I did the first four legs and then he took over. Tallest caterpillar ever.)
And the best part about this craft? The next day they had a blast ripping all the caps off the leaves and destroying their caterpillars. Good thing I took a picture!

Giant Veggies

God has blessed us with a bountiful harvest this year! 

We had:

 over 30 cucumbers, some of which were gigantic

lots of huge, delicious, crunchy carrots (and more than half are still in the ground)

tomatoes galore, with plants almost 5' high, cherry, beefsteak, and orange

more yellow and green beans than we could readily eat

4 types of lettuce

It has been delicious and amazing. We still have many more carrots and tomatoes to enjoy!

Gardening Our Way

Our front garden, all planted! Parsley came back and 4 Lillies. 

Tomatoes!

New planters... we are trying peas, cukes, and yellow beans
for something new this year.

The boys relaxing with a snack after working so hard.

More or Less

So I have been totally inspired by the zero waste home blog. This family of four makes almost no trash! They collected all their garbage for a year and it all fit in a mason jar, except for their toothbrushes, for which they could find no recyclable or compostable alternative. Amazing. We have been working with being a "minimal waste family," but we think we could do more. So we got rid of our big garbage can. We now have a small can upstairs for disposable diapers (which we try not to use) and an even smaller can under our kitchen sink. This was our first full week and guess what? We didn't need that big old garbage can!
I have also been totally inspired by Dee Williams. She lives in a teeny tiny house and only owns 300 items. That is what inspires me. Her stuff! If she needs or wants something new she has to move something out of her house. I probably have more than 300 things in my kitchen alone! And how much of that is stuff I use once a year or stuff I might someday eventually maybe probably need. So Jeff and I are celebrating our 30th birthdays this year and for our gift we are getting rid of one unnecessary item every day between his birthday and mine. That gives us about five and a half months and we are starting in the kitchen. This is going to be a thoroughly interesting exercise.