A garden Update

This is Alex's favorite dress.  I think it's hilarious and adorable.  While I cringe at the 90'sness of it, I'm glad she would rather wear this than something sleeveless and super short.

The garden is killing me.  Perhaps it's a mix of the garden, my bike and the heat.  I've set some goals for the summer and I've been doing really great, but I'm about dead from heat and exhaustion when the day is through.
Monday, Wednesday and Friday the girls and I head to the garden.  When I'm feeling crazy we bike (not because it's far, but because I'm always completely OUT of energy after a morning of gardening and it take 3 times as long to pull the kids home.)  We try to get there before 9am and are usually pushing 1pm. by the time we leave.
The main focus of garden time is weeding, although our peas started to produce about the same time they started to die from the heat, and so we have got to do some harvesting!  All winter I dreamed about planting peas so Alex and Heidi could pick, pod and feast on the delicious fresh peas.  I can tell you that the reality of it was better than all my dreams, although didn't last as long as I had hoped.
Using a hoe is exhausting. I've found that I can hoe all the weeds in a row in a matter of minutes but then I'm dead and useless for another 20.  Then the weeds grow back with thicker roots that are more difficult to pull and so I'm stuck hoeing which for me isn't a sustainable plan.  Most days I try to sit and scoot down 2 rows that are in emergency mode and then walk down a row or 2 that just need a few pulled to look good.  It's a cycle though and I can never stay on top of it.
The raspberry bushes are producing and so Alex is quite content to go from the peas to the raspberries picking to her hearts content the whole time.  I make her take a handful or 2 into grandma for each one she picks for herself- which she has actually been doing!  Heidi is content to stay inside petting the cats and ordering her Great Grandma around.

She was thrilled that I was taking this picture.  "It's like it's my garden and I'm standing in front of it" she said.

Friday's are watering days and thus become long and hard.  We use a well that pumps the water through a pipe and then into a series of mini ditches.  We then direct the water down each row by blocking off all other rows and forcing the water to go where it is needed.  The water then needs to sit in the rows for a bit so it can soak into the ground enough that we can wait another week to water.  Unfortunately we didn't do the greatest jobs on our rows.  The first row ditches are way to wide and shallow, so we are either flooding the plants or starving them.  The potatoes rows are wide AND deep and so they take the longest to finish.  It is hard and exhausting to shovel the rows open and closed and walk up and down the garden fixing broken patches and making sure the water is going where it should.  The kids LOVE watering day and are usually soaked and covered in mud by the end.  In a few weeks when the plants are bigger and we let them wander down the all the rows, they will enjoy it much more.
  This week we planted another row of tomatoes and a row of peppers- both sweet and hot.  We planted 2 rows of bush beans and then 3 or 4 rows of green beans in between the corn.  This way the beans can use the corn as trellises.  I also planted 2 cucumber plants amongst the corn for the same purpose.  The morning glory wasn't kept in check and has been strangling the potatoes.  My legs aches long and hard after 2 days spent squatting, ripping the the devil vines from among the plants.  I pulled up a dead potato plant to find a score of baby potatoes!  It was nice to find such a reward under something I had given up on.

Tuesday and Thursday are bike days.  The kid love being pulled around in the trailer and refer to my bike as their horse.  Last week we made a day of riding up the rivertrail and visiting all the parks between our house and Archie's.  The trailer acts as a parachute and so I was plenty exhausted after the 6 mile round trip adventure.  Each play ground was a castle that had been overtaken by dragons.  The children had to go and catch the dragons before we could move on to the next playground.  It was fantastic and I think it will become a tradition.
 This week a friend with a bike trailer and similar aged kids joined me and we extended the distance by riding to the library for story time and lunch and then riding up the hill to Kate's for swimming lessons! After the kids enjoyed lessons, we went to the grocery store for soft serve, and then the dollar store to reward good behavior.  On the way home we stopped by a park with a little stream running through a tiny forest.  It was a great end to a day.

It tickles my heartstrings to watch her pick raspberries in that hat and dress.  My little pioneer girl.  Oh and that hazy sky in the background, just about all of Utah is on fire.

Our new schedule makes the days go quickly and doesn't leave much time or energy for spontaneity, but it is very fulfilling.  I feel good with the exercise I'm getting, and the quality time that the kids are getting with me, and the outdoors.  Hot July is almost here and I don't know if either the garden or I are going to survive it.  I hope the girls look back on this summer with fond memories of time spent with their Great Grandma, and in the garden and on the bike with their mother.

Saturday was hilarious because it was the one day of the week where we had planned nothing but driving, and it turned out to be the day in which we did the most.

I returned from loading the car to find the kids and discovered how to climb on top of the carousel horse.

Two seconds later Heidi was done sharing and tried to push Alex off.

They were sent to the backyard to get ALL of their wiggles out for the rest of the day, because it was at least 7 hours of driving to get back home, and that didn't include making any stops.

I love Wyoming for it's randomly places Teepees.

Grandpa had found a petrified log out in the hills someplace and naturally placed it in his garden.

Before we could leave we had to go to Grandpa's farm to see the animals.  But first we stopped so he could fill our car up with gas, and then we had to go to the town's new museum (which was actually REALLY cool and I want to go back soon).  Then we drove by the new high school swimming pool and the construction site where they have found 2000 year old fire pits the day before.

Once we got to the farm we had to see the cow with 3 legs, and get a close up to the 1 leg that Grandpa had to cut off (He's a Veterinarian).

Then everyone got to ride the big beautiful brown horse.

Kate got to show off her cowgirl skills.

Annie practiced some more bareback riding.

The kids threw rocks and chased cats.

And everyone got turns "driving" the old tractor.

Heidi flat out refused to get off.

Then everyone sat in the other tractor until Grandpa turned the noisy thing on.  At that point the older kids bailed and brave Heidi got to drive it around the yard.

Then of course we pulled out the 4-wheeler.

Everyone took a spin with Grandpa.

Archie adopted a few new Grandma's and Grandpa's on the trip.

Kate even showed off a bit.

The kids could have stayed there forever, and Grandpa wanted us to, but we were already 3 hours behind "schedule" by that point and really had to be going.

So we said our goodbye's to grandpa and the farm and headed South.

I wanted a picture of everyone in front of the sign, but settled for Kate and the van.

Thermopolis, the site of the worlds largest mineral hot spring, was where we had planned on swimming the evening before.  When we drove by we just couldn't help but stop!

So we took a break (after having left Worland a whopping 30 minutes before), and went swimming.  The entire place, pools, slides, everything was just below hot tub temps, and it was wonderful!  The kids LOVED it and were pretty brave at going down the slide alone, even Heidi the little nut!

After swimming we stopped by this old A&W for lunch and ordered on phones.  It was already a fantastic day and only 2pm!  This is also about when our Husbands called excitedly, wondering where we were.  Learning that we were 30 minutes into a 9 hour trip and it was 2, they Immediately lost their enthusiasm.  Grandpa couldn't believe it either and tried to convince us to turn back and spend another night when he called to check up.

Hudson has a population of 435.  I'm skeptical.

The rest of the journey was uneventful.  Except for kids dying to get out of the car.

Kate trying hard to "hold" all the kids in our photo recreation.

The highlight of the rest of the journey was Farson. Population 313, although I can't imagine where all the people are hiding.  They really do have giant delicious ice cream cones at this shop, (which as far as I can tell makes up the entire town) and we each got a huge scoop and spent an hour getting it all over our faces.

Here we have Kate and the kids on our 2010 journey.  I'm not sure she is going to be able to recreate this picture the next time we drive through Farson together.

We pulled into Provo just after 11, making for a long day- PACKED with fun!

Montana- Friday

Friday came too soon, because that was the day we were set to leave.

We spent the morning packing up and then walking the farm, enjoying everything for the last time.

It had been such a wonderful week, it was hard to think of leaving.

The trip really was perfect.

We had reached Montana in the spring while everything was green and before it got too hot.  The weeds hadn't grown more than a few inches and the mosquitos were few and far between.

We stopped at the fire pit to have a pretend fire.

And then Alex and Archie ran off on a mission.

The night before Heidi had been a bit too bossy with Sammy and he had bitten her in on the cheek.  That evening she was quite upset with Sammy, but by morning they were best friends again.

We finished up the morning "fishing" in the creek.

Alex and Heidi started playing mother and daughter (which Alex always uses the silliest accent for, as though she is in Gone with the Wind or something).

They even tried to sneak up on the horse.

Heidi enjoyed the last few minutes of Grandma time.

Alex said goodbye to her sheep friends.

And I think Heidi was even able to drop one last egg before we left.
The plan was to drive to Worland, Wyoming and spend the night with my Grandparents.  We tried to stop at the airplane graveyard in Greybull, but it was closed, so we had a sprinkler adventure at a rest stop instead.  Then we saw a yardsale with toys from our past so we had to stop.  I got a sweet old metal Tonka truck for $3, and Kate snagged 20 vintage hot wheels and a fisher Price house for about $10.  I kept thinking that in Utah these things would have sold for 3x as much and I swore to one day drive my way through Wyoming garagesaleing the entire way.

We made it to Worland 2 hours later than planned and so we decided to skip swimming in Thermopolis that night and just stick around home.  Grandpa prepared the best meal ever, as always, and I was over the moon that my children wern't scared of him.  Quite the opposite they couldn't get enough of him and Heidi insisted on eating dinner in his lap.

That night I did take Kate and the kids on a drive towards Tensleep to find some fossils.  My Dad knew of a spot just off the side of the road which was a goldmine for Cephilopod dinosaur fossils.  We found it and were able to collect a handfull in 10 minutes or so, and then headed home.  Tyler call while we were on our way and couldn't believe we were LEAVING the house at 8pm.  Yes, our vacation destroyed the kids sleep schedules.

On the way back the kids rocked out to our dance party mix in their sunglasses and it was the best part of the day.

The girls were treated to chocolate icecream and strawberries just before their 10 pm bedtime and it warmed my heart to see Alex seek out a blanket, drag it over to Grandpa and then climb onto his lap.  Within minutes Heidi had joined her and I couldnt' have been happier.

Montana-Thursday

Thursday night Mom cooked a fantastic dutch oven meal, which paired with Kate's dutch oven bread, was FANTASTIC!

The kids made themselves completely at home in the fort.

And we spent most of the day lounging around, eating good food, and burning sticks.

I hope Ashes turns into Sammy someday.

While we were setting up dinner, Mooters came to visit the kids.  And the kids weren't scared at all!

He kept nuzzling Archie who seemed to enjoy it.

And stuck around the truck while they played.  At least until they got the ropes out and then he split!

Alex practiced loving horses,

and the big kids practiced trying to lift Heidi onto tall things.