A little bit of Heaven...

Today my Cosmos bloomed.
I am in heaven.
Searched for in grey and dreary January.
Ordered in cold and snowy February.
Two of these hard to find beauties,
appeared at my door a couple of weeks ago.

Why would anyone mail order a flower?

Well, because it smells like chocolate of course.
Yummy, irresistable dark chocolate.



Want to order your own?
Pay a visit of surf the web
to the Chocolate Flower Farm, in Washington State.
Road trip anyone?

I'm serious!

Sydney was yelling from the back yard yesterday.
Just so you know Sydney and Kate yell for me all the time and now so does Paige. I have decided to ignore them unless they come and politely ask for what they need which obviously they aren't catching onto quite yet.
As my dad would say, "Unrealistic Expectations Susan."
So, Sydney was yelling from the backyard.

"Mom! Mom! Come HERE!"

I continued folding laundry.

"MOM COME HERE RIGHT NOW. I'M BLEEDING!"

I couldn't help myself I laughed out loud as I started walking out the door all to here.

"MOM I'M SERIOUS I REALLY AM BLEEDING."

Sure enough she had skinned her knee.
I held in my laughter while applying to band aids to the cleaned scrape.

Then heard Kate chime in...
with all the sass and knowledge of a 9 and three quarter year old.
"MOM that REALLY doesn't NEED a band aid."

Nope she didn't really need a band aid. But it was nice to be able to fix her up and send her on her way happy and proud of her new "injury".
Wish I could patch everything else up as easily as her knee.

One heck of a weekend....

Heck yes I said heck. Please, please, please don't tell the proper language policewoman, who is nine and lives in my house.

We were busy. We had fun.

Sydney proclaimed three days in a row that,

"This was my best day ever...."

Love that quirky kid. Friday, we had Anna one of Kate's best friends over.

This was "way cool" because Anna's dad Todd has recently married the amazing Lisa (who from now on will be called Lisa L.) and they now live in Temperance, Michigan.

Which is not super far, but it's also not exactly around the corner either.

Kate, Anna, and Paige washed the car.

"We" have decided to call the grey car Larry Boy Junior, Mom.

We like him just as much as Larry Boy, but he is little-r."

Only Sydney could put it like that.

This is great news since we will be turning our leased Larry Boy in and I was afraid we were going to have serious Syd separation anxiety.

Okay back to Friday. I know, I know focus.

Syd came back from a fun day at the pool with her buddy Cami. (Thanks to Lisa K., who is not Lisa L.)

Next thing I knew I heard a lot of laughing and SPLASHING!!!

Good Lord No!

They can't be in THE POOL.
Have you seen my pool???

Oh, for the Love of Pete!

Why?

What on earth possesed them to climb in?

Anna explained that she thought it would be good idea to help us drain the pool so that next time she came over she could swim.

Well, throwing buckets of mucky water is obviously way fun.

Note...When I signed up for motherhood the "job description"
did not include smelling like swamp water.
I figured on scrubbing nasty things,
but that pool was more than I bargained for.
(Before and after photos posted.)

You can see the water here right?

Yep, Paige is mostly naked. You remember two don't you?

Saturday was cousins day. Usually I crop at the library the first Saturday of the month. But due to high gas prices Brandy and I tried creatively figured a way for the cousins from Ypsilanti to see the cousings from Toledo, while also not requiring an overnight visit. Hence a Saturday cousins day.

All of the girl cousins came over to play.

NO BOYS ALLOWED.

(Not really they just didn't want to come.)

FUN, FUN and More FUN.
We also had some serious sunburns on my girls. I mean duh! How could I forget to put on the sunscreen. Well I did, and it's way, way, way to late.

(Lisa Miller, who is not Lisa L. or Lisa K., did give me a bottle of Aloe Vera on Sunday. Thank goodness she has my back.)

Oh but the girls did have fun despite the blisters they would develop than night and next morning. Brandy and Denise scrapbooked, Laura sewed, and I benefitted since Laura made me a bag and Miss Paige a dress.

I accomplised nothing crafty.

We had a great day. Yummy grilled cheese burgers for dinner by chef John we had invited four of our missionaries to stop by to eat too. I heard them say"I didn't know we were coming to a party." Sorry guys no party, just the infamous cousins day.

Paige hates the pool but loves her little bucket.

Only problem we saw with this was...
she loves to stick her head in the bucket too.

Sunday was Sunday. I taught Sunday School and Relief Society and had fun teaching both. The the air conditioning wasn't working in the chapel which did not make it easy for the Rapplings to be quiet during Sacrament meeting.

Soooo, I snuck out with Paige since she was being two
and I was definitely starting to feel a little drowsy.
Good afternoon home.
I love Sundays.

L is for Lettuce.

This was my lettuce at two weeks old. I've been waiting, watching and watering. This week I deemed it tall enough to eat. I love salads. I hear I make a great salads. I can think of all sorts of yummy goodies to put in salads. My favorites, none of which I have on hand right now, garbanzo beans and baby peas. The secret ingredient is always yummy cheese(don't worry that I do have on hand.) One of the many reasons I love salads is I met my future husband while working at a resturant as the "Salad Girl". I refilled lots of condiments, cut a lot of carrots, and tossed a lot of lettuce and mini bagels. Another favorite memory including beautiful lettuces is while growing up I would make the grown ups,(of course I thought I was one) a yummy salad Sunday nights after all the younger kids were in bed. So I guess my parents found a way to make lettuce a privelege. Hmmm, I wonder if I can pull that one on Kate? Yeah, probably not.
Don't you love my little gaurden frog?

I finally finished the package I needed to send for the apron swap I am in.

I decided to decorate the inside of my box, alas no tissue paper so I got busy with my creative lettering. My book for this months Scrapbook Book Club is all on how to create fun lettering. I like that I'm done with my apron swap EARLY and my bookclub homework EARLY. I've always had a tendency to work until the very last minute. All I can say is YEAH ME. Don't worry I'm sure this isn't going to become a habit.

"I just like to SMILE! Smiling's my favorite. ~Buddy "Elf"

This qoute was under the apron, cards, and recipe cards I sent.

It left us speechless.

Quite speechless I tell you and we have not stopped talking of it since. ~"Emma"

This qoute was the one you would open the box and see. It reminded me of well me and I hope the qoutes will make you giggle. ~Susan

I'm back!!!!

I spent my day encouraging this...

and this,

and this.

I think it was officially called "Peru's Popcorn Game" on my field day instructions. Three hours of hilarious parachute mishaps. Lost a lot of my voice by the end of the day. Now I feel like my legs and arms are going to fall off. No real winners or losers just a whole lot of fun.

I have been busy sewing an apron and shorts for Miss Kathryn along with other projects and layouts. Here is the apron. I have to say I learned a lot about sewing around curves.

These are my mother's day gifts. Kate had all of the girls dress alike and they went on a photo safari the Saturday before Mother's day. I love seeing all of the fun they had! Here are a few quick shots of Kate's Mother's Day Coupons. I LOVE them!

Now I promise to stay up to date. When I get behind it is too hard to start again without including all of the fun things I didn't get a chance to record. See you soon!

A tale of eggs and Tulips...

We have had a great but busy week after the show. I'm updating this before I show you the Mother's Day Post tomorrow.
Every morning Paige climbs into bed with me. (Kate is supposedly "watching her" for me when they get up extra early) She sits next to me and has her own little conversation. Mom, Momma, Mommee, Mom, Momma, Mommee, she sings. If I try to roll over, hide my head or show any other avoidance of morning. Paige will climb on my head and yell MOM EHHH, MOM EHHH!!! This will graduate into a full scale screaming tantrum on the floor if I don't talk her down quickly. As Melly says,"Save some of that for later little sister."It took me a few days of Paige kicking and screaming before I figured that tantrum out. She wants EGGS. I keep them hard boiled in the fridge and she only wants the whites. Go figure one kid wants sausage, one salad, and the littlest egg whites.
This weeks accomplishments.
Birds nest discovery last weekend 3 eggs. Checked again on Tuesday and we have FOUR!!! Hard to explain to Paige that she really can't touch them and definitely can't eat them. Robins eggs are so pretty and almost turquoise painted finger in photo mine to show scale.

Science Fair Project on Tornadoes by Kate(She did a great job. That girl has some skills.)Paige and Sydney played together for a long time. When Kate got off the bus they taught her how to roll down the dip in our middle yard. Hilarious.
Henke's over for craft day....FUN, FUN, FUN! When it started raining they kept playing outside. Kate was smart and got everyone mismatched sweaters, jackets, hats etc. Katie Henke and I both made progress on craft projects we'd been putting off.
Planting more seeds in pots and some outside.
Fertilized new growth.
I also transplanted the remaining tomato plants to bigger pots.(Of my original 36 plants only 17 made it through my cats, mice, and other creatures.)
John painted a second coat in the studio.
I signed up for an Apron Swap. I'm so excited.
Laura and I went fabric looking for her apron swap creation.
Macy, Hanna, and Sydney and I went to the Science Fair at school.
I had Skrappaper Friends over for a Friday night Crop.
Jennifer Hayes and my sister Laura came over on Saturday. Lots of work completed on their parts. Some work completed on my end. I personally think my Mother's Day cards Rock! So the Sister Missionaries came over and made two cards each for their mom's. John took the girls all day on an adventure to complete the photography part of a project with Kate. It was heavenly around here.
Oh yeah and John took some rocking photos of flowers and children. I just love how he caught Paige peeking around my leg. I show you his Mother's Day Masterpiece tomorrow.

Oliver...

So I haven't blogged for a while. The girls were in "Oliver",with their favorite director Miss Jone' of Theatre Kidz Inc. Met lots of great, talented kids and I became reacquainted with old friends. Kate had a lot of fun telling people that this was her 14th show. I just can't believe how fast time flies.

By the fourth and final performance, this particular parent was DONE. I was tired. I wanted to not see a green room full of children for a long, long time.(No the room's not green!) I knew what my assingment was for strike, collect and bag all props. Jone' had us all organized. The kids had just finished their final bows, starting to trickle through back stage on their way out to see all of their fans, when a loud noise split the air.

Oh, for the love of a Pete! Not the fire alarm. My first thought was which kid did it? Nice, right! Definitely not looking on the brighter side of things. My second thought was where's Sydney? I went through the theatre. I looked backstage. NO Sydney in sight.

You might ask if I was worried about Kate? No, I knew that Kate would take care of herself. That child of mine has a great sense of self preservation. I was sure I would find her telling the other children her age exactly how to get out of the building. Syd on the other hand likes to cuddle her knees, hide her head and cry. She sits in her room and cries, she sits in the kitchen and cries, it doesn't matter if she's sad, angry, or really mad she just cries. Okay maybe moaning is more appropriate term in some situations. That's just the way Syd rolls.

So me what do I do while this all runs through my head? Well I kept looking for her, in between the seats, behind the curtains, in the green room, no Syd. I had to leave the building without her. I was panicking. Panick attacks aren't fun. I just plain don't like them and I hope that you never have had or have one. At least there was a cause for this one.

I went outside and started looking through the actors. Saw Kate right away, for her this was an adventure. Remember when things like fire drills were fun? Still no Syd. Then the crowd parted and I saw her in the middle of a group of older girls.

Of course Miss Megan who is only a Freshman, a big sister to three wild, fun and crazy brothers, a talented singer, dancer, and actor had her. I got teary eyed. I hugged Syd to me. Relief is such a great feeling. I thanked the girls, I thanked God, I was in a great state of thanks. We heard the fire trucks coming. Everything was fine, no fire. The set strike continued after the building was released for use.

Megan came up to me later and said "Oh, Miss Susan I forgot to tell you what Syd said. She was hiding her head sitting on stage(see I know my girl) and I went to pick her up. She said,Thank you for picking me up. I was scared that I was going to trip on my skirt and fall. Then the fire would lick me and eat me all up." Thank goodness for kindhearted kids like Miss Megan. There is nothing like a little drama to end a great show.

Our workhouse child, waifelike isn't she?

Workhouse child and Fagin's boy Kate was great!

All pictures courtesy of Charlene. I didn't have time to grab my purse on the way out, actually I didn't even bring my camera on Sunday. What a slacker.

Where was Paige? The little monster was home with John since I can't keep her off the stage. A big thanks to John for tending the tyrant while I was gone this weekend.