Sleeping photos

I LOVE love sleeping photos of the kids.   I got this shot the other night of Abby sleeping.  I run in with the camera, take the pic with the flash and high tail it out of there before anyone wakes up!!

Another favorite.  She was nursing her baby to sleep. 

 I was nursing Olivia at the time so this came natural to her.

Garden Post # 8 Cooking with gas now!!!

We are making some real progress on the garden now. 

I have no idea what spurred these plants to grow, but they are growing like crazy now!

*Note my mother brought us the plants in the yellow tub that is why they are so much larger. 

One of them is a white pumpkin!

Perks of the job! Special post for Papa.

Not my job-too many "job perks" to list.  har har har.  BUT-My husband brought home this 10 pound bag of FRESH scallops from work the other day!!  He works in at a Yacht Yard and one of their clients brought in scallops right off the boat.  A little olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper and a side of asparagus.  yummy!  We were so excited to eat these I forgot to take a picture of the plated meal.   Papa-we have about 5 pounds in the freezer waiting for you!! 

Can I please have one of these????

Hint Hint to my husband, sure would love one for Mother's day!

If the kitty turns out to be a girl-I would name her Thistle.  Isn't that cute! 

The girls also had a blast visiting with the kitties.

And they loved seeing the cows too!  I am also buying their milk now. 

Harris Family Farm 

A beautiful, clean farm!  I know that sounds crazy, but I have seen some milk farms and they can be so gross.  AND I grew up on a farm-keeping one clean is a lot of work!

Lunch idea

I have seen this lunch idea done 100 times on several blogs-so I have no idea who the original creator is, but thought it would be a fun lunch for the girls one day.  When they approached the table for lunch at first they had no idea what to make of it and looked at me like I had lost my mind.  I should have taken an after picture-there was nothing left!

I used:  strawberries, raisins, hummus, crackers and cheese string cut into small pieces.

Cousins!

Happy Monday!  Thought I would share this cute picture from our walk in the woods. 

Olivia loves her cousins.

Garden Post #7 Success!

Ok, well not a TON of success, but some and we will take it.  We have spinach and lettuce coming up in the outdoor garden.

Plants growing in the sunroom.  The large shoots on the left are pumpkins and the small ones are Abby's flowers (cosmos)

A little success inside on the heating pads.  Basically we have one cuke, some basil and one zuke coming up!  Pretty sad. 

Bird House Craft

Thanks for the great craft idea Nana S.  Abby had a good time painting her bird house and spending time with her cousins.  BTW only $1 at Joanne's for the bird houses.  I thought they all looked cute sitting in the windowsill.

Close up of Nana's birdhouse-she got all fancy!

Two more book slings, check and check!

I zipped up two more book slings over the weekend.  Abby helped pick out the fabric, going with lots of colors and lots of sparkle!   These are for a birthday party this coming weekend for twins.  I don't think they will have the "out of the box" wow factor, but I think once they hang them in their rooms they will love them.

If you enlarge the pic you can see all the silver sparkles

Garden Post # 6.

We finally had a few little plants sprout up, but they are looking pretty sad. At this point we are thinking we will have to purchase seedlings. We did end up buying two heating mats to put under the plants, but they may have arrived too late. Most likely (according to more experienced gardeners-the seeds have rotted) AND the little seedlings that did come up met their ultimate demise this morning........

It was an ordinary Sun morning, much like any other, kids messing up the playroom, Daddy cooking breakfast and just general mayhem. It took my brain a while to register what my youngest was saying "I pick, I pick, I pick" and by the time I turned to tell her –“honey,no picking the plants” it was too late. She was pretty upset too.

Livy at the scene of the crime

Rest in peace my little sprout.

What was your first job?

Can you guess what mine was?  Let me give you a hint "Would you like fries with that?"  You got it, McDonalds was my first job- I think I was 15 or 16.  Honestly, I don't know why my pants HAD to be pulled up SO far??  Check out my cool Swatch Watch- remember how cool those were.  And that is my white station wagon in the back ground- we called it the Fridge and I had "ski naked" bumper sticker on it.  What WAS I thinking??  Thought you could all use a good laugh.

Butterfly snacks

We were headed out to a play date this week and I wanted to bring something fun for the kids to share with their friends.  I found this idea on Family Fun.  Butterfly Bounty.  They were very easy to make and I was able to put them together with things I had around the house (the girls craft area) and the pantry.

I used to fill the bags:
-Kashi heart to heart cereal
-marshmellows
-cranberries
-choc chips
-cheezits
(*I know what a combo right- I don't think the girls will care-I am sure they will eat it!)

To make the butterflies I used:
-ziploc bags (snack size)
-pipe cleaners
-closepins
-I did not have googly eyes as suggested by Family Fun so I put them on with perm marker
-glitter glue

*I ended up using my glue gun to attach the antennae (aka pipe cleaners) b/c the glitter glue did not hold them on.  I did use the glitter glue to decorate the bodies.

Happy Wed!

I loved the colors in this picture and thought I would share.  

Garden Post # 5

No, nothing has grown in our indoor plantings yet.  BUT-we did spend time outside lugging soil to the raised bed garden and planting the lettuce, spinach, peas and carrots.  We also came to the realization that we need to built the girls their own garden or the large one will be destroyed!  Funny, 2 and 4 year olds think stepping on top of the garden is fine, rooting around for worms and "oh look mommy I found that seed we just planted!"  Errrr, nothing is ever going to grow at this rate..................

Abby convinced Olivia that if they replanted these "sunflowers" they would surely grow! 

 Nothing like a few weeds in the garden!!

Tia has found her new spot for the summer.  She is never very far from the kids.

Now we water and sit back and watch them grow.  Maybe, hopefully, oh please oh please............

A blog is born!

And I get to take all the credit.  Well, not for the blog itself, but for making (twisting her arm, nagging) her to write the blog (she even says so in her first post)!

I am excited to announce my friend (who has a 4 year old and twins soon to be 3) has joined the blogging world.   And if writing about raising 3 girls is not enough, she is going to be making and selling jam (Can't wait to get my hands on some of that) and the Easter bunny just brought the girls 5 laying hens.  Oh this will be a wild ride!!  Check out her blog at Above the Dam Jam

*disclaimer:  I have absolute faith (I am being serious here) that all will work out in their endeavors and if they don't they won't even care.  You see that is what I like best about my friend- she goes with the flow!  Even though hanging out together with FIVE girls sounds like a trip to crazy town, we always have a good time and she is always up for anything-rain, snow or sun!  You can't beat friends like that.

Garden Post # 4

HOUSTON we have a problem!  NOT ONE plant is growing!  NOTHING is poking through the soil??

I am hoping that something pops up very soon or I am going to dig them up and see what is going on under all that dirt.  hmmmmm, maybe I don't have the patience for this gardening thing???

On a good note, we finally got the garden/compost mix delivered for the raised bed.  We have been getting so much rain it took over 2 weeks for it to be ready for delivery.   Hopefully something will grow outside.  This weekend we will plant the peas, lettuce and carrots.  Wish us luck- looks like we need it!!

Banana Nugget Cookies

Another great way to use up those bananas turing brown on your countertop!  My mother used to make these for my sister and I when we were little.  This recipe is adapted from Marjorie Standish -Cooking Downeast.

They look almost the same after they bake! 

Banana Nugget Cookies

Ingredients:

3/4 cup shortening (I used 1/2 cup of applesauce and 1/4 butter instead)

1 cup sugar (I used 1/2 honey and 1/2 cup sugar instead)

1 egg

1 1/2 cups flour (I used 1 cup flour and 1/2 cup wheat germ instead)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

3/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1 cup banana, mashed (2-3 ripe bananas)

1 3/4 cups quick-cooking oats

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (I used 1 cup of raisins instead)

Directions

1. Cream shortening, sugar and egg.

2. Add dry ingredients and mashed banana and mix thoroughly.

3. Stir in oats and chocolate chips.

4. Drop onto cookie sheet. Bake at 350 about 15 minutes.

Button Baubles

I had this page stored away in my "craft folder" and my oldest daughter and I decided to give it a try over the weekend.   I think she had more fun organizing vs. actually making the rings. 

Here is the link from Family Fun Mag

Finished rings with a bit of hot glue still attached!

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Family Dog!

I have blogged about the cat, now time to give the dog some props and the wonderful organization we got her from!  Thanks North East Rott Rescue!

Tia is actually our third Rottie that we have owned and our second one from NERR.  Sadly we lost Tosh two years ago.  Tosh was the first recipient of the Bobbi Fund at NERR.   After being hit by a car when he was just a puppy and neglected by his owners he needed to have his front right leg amputated.  NERR performed the life saving surgery and Tosh came to us as a foster dog to recover.  Tosh put an end to our fostering days and became a permanent member of our family!

Tosh and Abby

Tia and Tosh

Tia has been a wonderful family dog.  Abby "tolerates" the dog, but Olivia LOVES her. 

Our little dog whisperer.

One VERY patient dog!