Very busy summer...

It seems as though every summer is busy. The time just flies by. Every weekend we have at least two hockey games. Jonathan and Brianna are playing in an off season league. Both teams are doing remarkably well. Jonathan's team is first in his division and Brianna's team is second in her division. They are both having a very fun time.

Natalie is riding four days out of seven at the barn. We have had three horse shows so far with at least one more before the county fair. The next show is this Saturday. Carolyn did have the sewing class. She is just along for the ride until the fair. Add all this to children spending time with friends and it adds up to a lot of time on the run.

In seven days we will all be working and attending the VBS program at our church. Needless to say, my garden is not getting the attention that it needs from me. Apparently the deer are giving it good attention. I am starting to rethink the whole idea of gardening with the persistent deer problem that we have here.

This week will be full of VBS preparation, visiting with friends, preparing for the next horse show, and all the daily activities like laundry, grocery shopping and preparing meals.

As things settle down more toward the fall, I hope to blog more consistently.

Our busy day at home...yesterday...

Finally, we had a day at home. Natalie agreed to take a day off from the barn. She did watch some instructional horse training videos. Figures, right? Teasingly, I told her it was her classroom day. LOL!

I made crockpot sloppy Joe's for dinner, and then I put together the bread dough. Here is the finished bread.

Brianna always wants to make cookies, so she whipped these up using a cake mix. They are very good by the way.

While we were baking, I set to work planting tomato seeds. I have 20 peat pellets of sauce tomatoes, and 17 peat pellets of my very favorite slicing tomato, Trophy. A friend of mine had asked me to grow some seedlings for her. I am certainly not planting 37 tomato plants. Although I have done close to that before.

I thought you might like to look at the grow light set up I have in my basement. The lights are courtesy of my friend, Amy. She no longer needed them. I am thrilled to have them.

These are the celery seeds that I planted over a month ago.

And, these are the pepper plants that I planted last week from seeds I saved from last year. I realized one thing about saving seeds. I should also save the seed packets so I remember the planting instructions. I was thrilled to have them germinate.

It was a busy day, but we accomplished a lot.

New to us show clothes...

Natalie got these field boots and jacket at a local tack sale. She bought them with her own money. We are almost ready for her first show season.

Happy 15th Birthday, Jonathan

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Regaining strength...

I started with a cold on Sunday, March 15th. As the week progressed I never felt horrible, yet I have not had a day when I could say I was starting to feel better. I have been doing my "cold regiment", but I think I just need to ride this one out. Needless to say, I have been using my blogging time to rest. I hope to be back tomorrow to tell you about some yummy cinnamon rolls that we made on Saturday.

Going to rest now...

A quick Saturday update...

Today we actually slept in a little. There was no early morning hockey game. Brianna, my sweetie, was up at the same time that I was. She was very anxious to make blueberry pancakes for breakfast. I implored her to please wait until mama had her coffee. She obliged me one cup of coffee with cream and sugar. After a quick shower, we had a lovely breakfast of blueberry pancakes. Brianna did all the measuring and mixing. She even flipped them off the gridle. She tried to spoon the batter on the gridle, but after about two she pleaded for a little help. I must say that these pancakes were delicious.

After completing morning chores, Natalie, Carolyn and I headed out for the farmer's market. I needed some honey desperately. I also picked up a peck of Empire apples and a dozen brown eggs. From there we headed to the library. Natalie has been reading the Redwall Series, and I had to request two more books for her. They had come in, and we went to get them. I picked up some cash at the bank, and we headed to the thrift stores. At the third store we hit the jackpot, I got a pair of jeans for Brianna for $1.29 and jeans and denim capris for Natalie for $8.78. Natalie tried on several pairs of jeans and was quite exhausted by noon, so we headed home. I am making a commitment to spend cash on all local purchases. I was happy to get three pairs of pants for $10. It certainly is more work to thrift shop, but it is very rewarding as well.

Blessings...