Pretty, Happy, Funny, Real

Pretty~ Bumbly

The lilacs are phasing out (*sniff) but the Rhodo's are popping open and the azalea is looking more pink by the minute!  Yay!

Happy~ Homespun

My (second) very own, home spun yarn!  I got the roving at a farmers' market but had to borrow the wheel from a friend since the wheel I own hates me and won't work.  It is a nice pretty little wheel to look at, but not a very handy one to actually USE.  My friends' wheel though?  BUTTER.

The fiber is alpaca with some sparkle acrylic added in.  I still have to ply it, which I think I will do with a silk thread in order to get a bit more for my bang (and strengthen up the yarn since Alpaca doesn't really hold together well, so I am told.)    I can't wait to figure out what to do with it.  I have a limited supply, but perhaps a cowl could work?  Something entirely frivolous.

Spinning with roving is SO much more simple than spinning with wool you have washed and carded yourself, letmetellyou.  Well done roving is the way to go!  I have a week or so left with the wheel, at which time I will try and finish up the lesser quality handwashed/carded stuff I did but I know it won't be nearly as pretty (or as fun.)

I wish I had this wheel-but you spinners out there know how much one of these babies cost and, well, that ain't happening any time soon!

Funny~ The Dandelion head and the Punk Rocker

She has dandelion hair, she does!



Judah, while giving a long awaited (and less frequent now) glimpse of his cyclops brow, also sports a very trendy dandelion earring.






What is NOT funny is the amount of dandelions in our YARD.  The yard that was mowed on Saturday.

Real~ Exploded bread

I made Parmesan pesto bread and it exploded in the oven.  But the taste?  Ahhhhhhhhh.....sublime.

Red Tulip

We had a lone tulip bulb tucked in between pine trees and driftwood...and that is just pathetic for a Dutch girl.  I had better plant more (I must!  It is my duty!) but in the meantime, that single solitary bloom was absolutely thrilling to watch.

My Farm Boy (that would be Andrew) would give me almost HOURLY reports on its' status from the moment he found it.  When it finally opened, he asked if I would take a picture.

He must have forgotten for a moment who his Mama is.

Sneak Peek: Mother's Day Photo Session

A few pictures from a photo session I had a week or so ago...

Those two shots above were two out of like, oh, 15 pictures that all looked something like this:

Four year olds can be challenging to photograph!  Hilarious, but challenging.

About this time, Little Mister got cranky.  So Mama had to hold him.  Mama's make everything better.







And then he conked out.

It was fun to do some real photography again.  It has been a while.

May things

 May is a wonderful month, isn't it?  Everything is beautiful in May; after a season of white and then brown, any color at all is beautiful-even just the fresh green of grass. I have fully convinced myself that blooming lilacs are my very own birthday present from God.

I took these pictures before last weeks' big frost, knowing I would probably not get to enjoy them afterwards.  BUT- while the frost did wreck havoc, it didn't wreck TOTAL RUIN and I have been able to enjoy plenty of lilacs in every room.  Even a few PURPLE ones from friends!  Happy, happy girl am I.

After the lilacs finish blooming, I have some serious trimming back to do.  My bushes have been neglected for years and have grown so massive and so invasive.  I hope to cut them back to two manageable bushes and trade with friends a few white baby plants for a few purple baby plants.  Someday I hope to have the whole gamut of lilac colors here at Hopestead.

The apple trees looks SO wonderful too, which is laughable because Matt was SURE I killed them  the last time I pruned them.  I don't know how the apples will be, but the blossoms were GORGEOUS and lush.

My parsley over wintered, my perennials are looking lively, I just planted six rhubarb plants (oh yes I did- SIX of them!) and this very day I had a new plot dug for an asparagus bed.  I planted two red raspberry bushes, a few blueberry bushes and a thornless blackberry back behind the tree house last month.  I am trying to figure out a good place to put an orchard and grape arbor.  All these things make me ridiculously happy.

One thing I love about Matt is that he has said (and truly MEANS) I can do WHATEVER I want to the place- and I am truly happy to making these little changes because I feel like I am making MY mark on the place.  This place has been marked by Newmans for generations and had Newman blood running through it and so it can often feel like it belongs to THEM.  I am an outsider, you know...married in.  But with every perennial I plant, I feel as though it is becoming a place of my own, a place where I BELONG, a place that I have made.

I know how ridiculous this sounds.  Planting asparagus and pruning apple trees shouldn't evoke such sentimentality, but it does for me.   Call me crazy.  I am.

 But I think it is a good crazy.

WeekEnding

Tomorrow I am getting up early and going yard-saling at a huge annual community yard sale with my sister (and hopefully, Mom!), stopping by a church that has an annual perennial sale which I NEVER miss(perennials for pittance!), then a college graduation party in the afternoon and church communion bread baking in the evening.  On Sunday, we are having a church picnic after church so I need to figure out what to make for that too.

And somewhere, in the cracks and crevices of the weekend, I must eek out time to prepare garden beds and contend with our weed issues.  And, clearly, they ARE issues.

What are your plans for the weekend?  Whatever they may be, I hope yours is a happy one!

Pretty.Happy.Birthday

I woke up yesterday another year older.   And though the day didn't go *quite* as planned, I have to say, it was a pretty swell birthday.

{pretty}

 Birthday scones on the special birthday plate.  With kiwi and fresh pineapple because I love them.  And bacon, for the same.

{happy}

 Corynn stitched me up a leaflet of poems about Mothers.  Dripping with sap- just the way I like it.  The girl knows me.

 I got FOUR envelopes in the mail.  FOR ME.  And not a bill among them.  I love, love, love receiving mail so I totally count this as a (four) present(s).


{funny}

 My eyes are incredibly alien-like which can, admittedly, make for a funny picture.  Not so funny in real life though.  (Ps.  Those earrings I am wearing was the first Christmas gift I ever received from Matt...back when he bought me jewelry!  They came in an inscribed heart jewelry box  which I was CERTAIN held an engagement ring.  But alas.  I had to wait almost a whole year before that!) 


I didn't know until about 1:00 in the afternoon whether we would be able to go out to dinner or not.  When I found out, I emptied the refridge of all its' leftovers and made a first rate, pathetic looking meal for the children to eat with the babysitter.  I felt kinda bad.

And then I ate this... and I felt bad again.



But when I got home, they all RAVED over supper.  It was SOOOOOO good, said they, and I once again thanked God for giving me such easy-to-please, happy-go-lucky children. 


{real}

I made my own cheesecake because Matt had work he had to do the night before.  My birthdays' eve was a bad night in general and I was in a melancholy mood and not feeling at all like making my own cake- so I threw it all together and only after it was too late did I remember that cheesecake really can't be THROWN together.  Hence a cheesecake with white cream cheese flecks in it, most noticeable in the chocolate layer.  It didn't look professional but it still tastes pretty good.  (Can cheesecake taste bad?)

We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner which is, as it turns out, a Texas-sized RIP OFF...(but nothing beats their rolls and honey butter!) and outside the restaurant was a beautiful flowering tree.  I don't really like this picture all that much for a number of reasons, but I post it here anyway because it takes an awful lot for Matt to stand by a tree IN FRONT OF PEOPLE and have his picture taken and I'd hate for him to have done it for nothing.  So, for the moment, I will disregard the fact that my head is bigger than my body and three times as big as Matt, the fact that my hair is (as usual) wonky and that Matt looks like he hates his life and instead I will focus on the fact that:  We got a picture together!  In a public place!  With PEOPLE around us!!

Four Eyes (or Sixteen)

We just got back from the optometrist and spent way too much on glasses. 

But QUALITY costs.

Overexposed

These pictures are all super blown-out and over-exposed, but you know what?  I love them anyway. I don't know why.  Because Judah is just a big 'ol HOSS and can push tractors weighed down by brother and sisters?  In his skivvies no less?!  Because that is JUST the face Little Addie Mae gives when she is happily surprised at something?   Because Andrew and Corynn bear those very same expressions every day?  Because those purple/pink flowers are the first posies to bloom in my flower circle?  Because those wisps of white crowning a pale little bud of a girl?  Probably all of the above.

 How was your Mother's Day weekend?

I spent my Mother's Day gathering armload after arm load of not-quite-opened lilacs into the house and into vases to spread around the house.  I've been looking so forward to lilacs which I haven't enjoyed in ever so long (last years' were zapped by a late frost before they even came close to blossoming) and whose smell happens to be one of my most favorites.  Tonight is supposed to be a killing frost which makes me so sad!  Tonight I will gather all the tarps and blankets I can find and try to cover the lilacs and apple blossoms up but just in case, I have plenty of vases scattered around the house. It is snowing at this very minute. 

Snow in May.  Ridiculous.

And as I plucked baby flowers to save them from a cruel fate...I pondered.

After the last few weeks and all the anxiety of not knowing what was wrong with me  (and assuming the WORST, naturally), I spent my Mothers' Day a bit more reflective than in previous years.  Being a mother is such a joy and such a gift- but with that gift and that joy there is a deep commitment and responsibility that is...dare I say it?... daunting.  As I was considering (what I deemed to be) imminent death, all I could focus on were all the things I SHOULD have done.  I felt gripping fear as I considered "Have I done enough to train my children to love the Lord?  Have I been a good witness to them, a good testament of Christ?  Have I prepared them for life without me but with Christ?  Has my life helped or hindered the gospel in my childrens' lives?"  It is scary to know that there is only so much time to do what you are meant to.  Oil lamps aren't always at the ready.  Sometimes we just get lazy.  Sometimes we just get tired.  Sometimes, the schoolwork or the housework or the yardwork or the ANYTHING gets more attention than the most important things.

When you are a mother, every single day is a gift, but also an obligation.  And knowing that I am put in charge of God's children and have only so much time to do what needs to be done, adds a certain fervor to the equation.  May God grant us mothers unending love and compassion to fulfill our calling, eyes open and grateful hearts for the love and blessings that the Lord has poured out for us,  also wisdom overflowing and a zeal to live for Him and to do His work. 

That is, after all, why we are here.

No other success in life-not being president, or being wealthy, or going to college, or anything else- comes up to the success of man and woman who can feel that they have done their duty and that their children and grandchildren rise up and call them blessed.  

                                                                    ~~Theodore Roosevelt