Weekend Review: Growing!

This is what our garden looked like at the end of May. 

For some reason I didn't take a picture of it after we planted everything, but really the only plates that you could see where the tomatoes.  Everything else we started from seeds!

And this is what it looked like this weekend...actually the tomato plants are bigger now even!

I am happy to say we have lots of tomatoes growing and I can't wait for that first one I pick!  I love a garden fresh tomato with a little salt on it.

My peas are not doing well...something is eating them and I am not sure what and the beans are okay.

And the zucchini is a lot bigger then I thought it was going to be...so I think next year we will not do as many.

Check out this lettuce...yummy!

The girls have loved watching the garden grow.  They check on it every morning and then fill up their watering cans to water it...so cute!

Our first crop of beans we picked this weekend and Mara pretty much ate all of them!

What is in your garden?

hello snow!

hello snowy monday...

  i am trying to be positive about all of this white stuff!

goodbye mid 40's outside and beautiful sun shine

hello winter coat...again

goodbye light spring coat...i want you to come back soon!

hello to another week of...

thinking of the right church and school for our family

waiting on a very important call...for the hubby

goodbye to my bootcamp class

hello spring...please come early, i  we need you so badly!

 (picture taken last march...when we had a very early spring)

what are you saying...

hello and goodbye

to this week?

ps:  this was one of my all time favorite target commercials a few years ago!

around the house...

we were home a lot this weekend...playing and working!

lots of coloring and then using lots of tape to hang up artwork in their kitchen

lots of laundry for me...i don't think it ever stops around here!

and some creative time too...

trying to make some cute headbands for the girls...not going as well as i want

we had a great weekend, but again it went way.too.fast!  we had date night on friday...and went to a very yummy restaurant, Muffuletta.  it was so good and what a great atmosphere, they have an outdoor patio and i can't wait to go back when the weather is nice again!

and we had dinner at friend's house...so much fun!  the kiddos played so well together and we were able to catch up on life!

and today i am thankful the lazy days we can have as a family.  none of us got out of our pj's on sunday.  i don't know if i ever really got a lot done, but it was great just to do nothing!

mara watching the packers-vikes game...and yes, the packers killed them!!!!
how was your weekend?

a simple gift giving idea

this is what we woke up to on saturday morning.  the snow angles came over night and it was a a winter wonderland just like that! 

crazy that it was just 68 a few days ago here, but that is MN weather for ya! 
today i am thankful for the seasons we have.  not that i love the winter around here, but i love the change of seasons...there is just something about watching nature do it's thing that is just so beautiful!

the winter weather has me in the mood for the holidays now and i just read a wonderful blog post on gift giving and we are adapting the idea this year with the girls.  I am finding it harder to buy gifts this year for them, which i didn't think would be the case.  but, they either want so much or they have no idea what they want.  so these simple ideas are taken from the simple mom blog...check out her blog, it has some great ideas.  and will go into more details on this simple gift giving philosophy....

Our new gift giving philosophy....

• something they WANT
• something they NEED
• something to WEAR
• something to READ

Two additional things that we are adding for this year are, but the list could go on and simple mom has a lot of other great buckets, find them here.

• something to WATCH
• something to CREATE

I was trying to finish the girls' Christmas list and then i started putting things in these buckets and it just came together so easy and quick.  I love it!  In our house the WANT bucket will be their Santa gifts or something that was really high up on their 'want' list. 


does your family have any gift giving traditions?  i would love to hear them, because if there is one thing i am big on it is traditions!
happy monday!

new learnings

i have served my civil duty for the past 2 weeks.

the experience has been amazing, even if it took me away from my day to day life and overnight from my family.  it was truly a life learning experience and a difficult one at times.

i have learned a lot about the law, the judicial system and grown as a person.  the case that i was on was a criminal case, a homicide that took place 33 years ago.  it was a difficult case for many reasons...the biggest, the age of the case and some very important evidence was missing from the case.  with the evidence in front of us...it was just not enough to come up with a guilty verdict.  

one my biggest learnings...is you have to check your emotions at the door for any case.  it is difficult, when there is a homicide, but the law is not based on emotions, but the facts of the case.  looking at just the facts and evidence and taking all of your emotions out of it, was really hard to do.  but, at the end of the day we are talking about a person's life at hands...and if there are just not enough facts and evidence to send a person to jail, then that is the facts.  once you take all of the emotion out of it...the decision is pretty simple.

and now that i am back home, the girls and i played all day outside in the leaves on friday.  it was a beautiful fall day...maybe one of the last around here, but i hope now.  it is great to be back to 'normal'...if there is such a thing!

happy monday!