Catching Up

The girls decided to share their bugs (or some version of them) with me, and now we're playing catch-up with all the household stuff. Or trying to. We made it to town on Friday, and found most of what we wanted. I was tired of changing the broiler chicks' water 3 times a day so I bought a big 3-gallon font for thirty bucks along with another soaker hose and some garden odds and ends. We were able to spend a half hour with a friend and her sons, and we treated ourselves to Costco pizza and ate it at a nice park with water in which to throw rocks. My kids' favorite activity, I think.

Friday night our brother-in-law came over to "work on" some motorcycle pieces he and Hubby picked up last weekend. It was nice to have him over, but I think they did more talking about the motorcycles-to-be than actual work. By the time we went to bed that night, my throat was getting awfully sore. I woke up several times during the night with extreme throat pain; it felt like I'd swallowed a chain of razor blades, and when I coughed it felt like I was tearing my throat. Ouch! I found some organic soothing throat drops in the cupboard, but after eating one realized that each drop had 100% RDA of Vitamin C, and if I recall, that's not something to O.D. on when pregnant. So I had to limit it to one. It was a long night!

Hubby had to work Saturday and I managed to caretake the kids and animals, but not much else. Thankfully I had some pork roast in the crockpot (Roast Zeke, we called it), so dinner happened after all. Most of the day I spent on the couch. My throat was not nearly so excruciating but my cough was more often. I'm not sure if it was 'being sick' that was the main problem or the lack of sleep. In any case, the laundry, dishes, and bathrooms were not dealt with Saturday either.

Sunday was our 7-year wedding anniversary! I think it's gotten better with age. I spent the first part of the day doing laundry and dishes, and working more on the garden. Water is the most important thing, and instead of broadcast-sprinkling, I try to water only what I want to grow. I have soaker hoses going up and down the garden area, with (some) carpet strips between to keep down weeds. I lay out the hose first, then the carpet strips, THEN I plant along one or both sides of the soaker hose (for seeds). So far we have about 4 rows of carrots (seems like I should have more with all that seed I bought!), including Nantes, Danvers half-long, Purple Haze (looks like fun!), and a Rainbow selection of orange, yellow, and white carrots which all taste a bit different, they say. I planted a partial row of radishes (I don't even like them, but they will grow fast for the kids) and a few rows of beets. I'm not sure I like beets either, but maybe I can figure out a way to prepare them that I can tolerate. I planted the Detroit kind, and an organic heirloom variety of Bull's Blood which has dark red leaves. New Zealand Spinach made it in, and a large packet of Miniature Indian Popcorn. I grew it a couple years ago and loved the tiny ears! They were beautiful and perfect for harvest decorations, and they popped so tiny and tastey! The seed I got this year seemed almost regular-kernel sized, so I'm not sure if it's the same idea or not. I guess we shall see. I exhausted myself trying to lay out the hoses for the corn (and make sure the little drip-holes weren't plugged - most were). After that Hubby and I took the kids to his folks' house and we had a nice dinnerat a restaurant and saw Spiderman 3. The last theatre-movie we went to together was Windtalkers, I think, when our oldest was a baby. It didn't work out so good, with me walking the lobby to keep her quiet most of the time.

I'm sore from the garden-work today, and the wind is blowing like crazy. My tomatoes and cucumbers are starting to flower, and I'm afraid we don't have enough indoor-honeybees to pollinate them well enough... Might have to break out the q-tips if this wind doesn't quit! I thought I'd do some indoor work instead... like replace the baseboards I removed last summer to refloor the place... and of course not all of them are to be found. *sigh* Is it worse to have SOME baseboards in place, or none at all? I thought I should maybe paint the hallway before replacing the baseboards, but the only paint we have enough of is the bright white that the baseboards were done with and I'd rather not. I did start sanding the dining room table we were given, but I probably shouldn't be breathing varnish particles, so I stopped doing that too. I'm hoping hubby can use a torch on it or something to get that varnish off easier. The places where hot pans were placed are varnish-free, so maybe I'll just have to heat up all the pans and put them on the table..?

And for posterity:

Sunday morning I made grumplys for the kids (like pancakes, kinda), and found some of my fresh-ground flour in the coconut oil! I think the coconut oil was $14 for 14 oz. locally. Ouch. I dumped out what I could and figured it wouldn't hurt when frying the grumplys anyway. Little Monkey finally fessed up to the deed. On the third grumply I smelled a definite toasted-garlic aroma, and my mind raced to think of when I might've added garlic to flour for breading something. I finally realized that what was in the coconut oil wasn't flour at all, but some homemade garlic salt a friend had given me! Thankfully coconut oil isn't liquid enough to soak up the powder and I was able to scrape off what was left. I made sure Little Monkey ate grumplys from the early batches...

Sunday evening on the way to drop the kids off at their grandparents (such a rare treat for them!) we passed a field that often has weird and rare livestock in it. My oldest exclaimed that she saw donkeys, and I glanced over enough to ask if the camel was out. Little Monkey inquired about camels and her big sister went on to explain like this: "I love camels. Camels have big mouths, and they drink out of buckets. They are long and have long tails. They have a bump on their back, and sometimes two. They are white, and brown, and light brown. I love camels." I would love to give that description (minus the word 'camel') to a sketch artist and see what they come up with.