Although summer isn't quite over yet, I sure feel like it is. I sit here on the eve of our fifth year of homeschooling, and wonder what exactly I've accomplished over the past few months. Last summer we were so busy I began to think of it as the "throw away summer". I wasn't really able to enjoy it as I was stuck in the house most of the time ripping out carpet, painting, unpacking, moving things. It'll slow down next year and I'll get to relax more, I naively thought. I'm beginning to think I've hit the downward slope on the hill of my life where time speeds up on me until I'm old and senile.
Today I decided to look back through my photos, and was reminded that we have had a pretty nice and productive summer, as quickly as it seems to have gone.
Eli and a longtime friend who's a carpenter got the crumbling chimney taken down from the rooftop and the roof patched.
Still on the To-Do List: power washing the house
We removed the concrete deer from the front lawn and I put in this little flower bed on the other side of the sidewalk, right in front of the dining room's picture window. The plan is to expand it a little every year until it fills the whole yard in front of the house.
Two months later, the snapdragons and lobelia have died off and the forever plant and alyssum have more than doubled in size. My poor hydrangea blooms have also lost their vibrant blue and are now a mix of pale green and rusty/purple.
We put up the old picket fence as a backdrop to a new flower bed on a bare stretch of lawn along the creek. The poppies I was trying to start never came up, so a thin border of impatiens and snapdragons is all that remains. I'll try again next year!
I made a couple stumps that had rotten centers into (free) planters
I really missed the hanging baskets of begonias I had on the front porch of our old house, so I was able to find a place on the side porch for one. It's visible through the dining and living room doors.
I was also gifted some hostas, which I planted around a couple trees in the front yard. They still look pretty tough, but are still alive. Hopefully they survive the winter and come back nice and healthy next spring.
Yes, that's a rope grown into the tree. I keep forgetting to cut it off. Many of the trees here have grown around things that were attached to the trees at some point, and it's an ongoing project removing it all.
We started a garden. Again. We planted onions a week before Addie was born, and managed to get in radishes, kohlrabi, peas, spinach, and tomatoes after. First year gardens have never been spectacular for us, and this one was no exception. I spend about two hours one day trying to weed it before baby girl needed me again. Since then I've sent the boys out there intermittently to try to get it done, which has resulted in strange looking trails through the prairie grasses that have taken over. And mud. Lots and lots of mud. Radishes did well, and we managed to get a handful of peas...but cut no spinach before it went to seed. The onions were mostly choked to death by grass and stopped growing between golf ball and tennis ball size. Getting onions now is like a scavenger hunt...in the savanna...which at least lends an air of excitement to meal preparation. We are currently getting tomatoes, though the plants have gotten blight, and the occasional kohlrabi is a treat.
Look at the size of this weed!
Eli put in a sandbox for the boys! (We discovered later that it was directly under a mulberry tree, in the direct line of fire for falling berries and the birds feasting on them. Oops.) We never got around to buying/building a swing set, however.
They were more excited to play in the mound of leftover sand that we planned to use as a base for a paver patio by the back door (another untouched project).
My four year old geranium is doing amazing this summer! It's officially reached "bush" status, though it's not quite big enough to cover the run-down house next door. I still haven't decided if I'm bringing it inside this fall. I feel bad giving up on it, but it takes up so much room. Do you spy the little creature sipping from the blossoms?
We planted 10 blue spruce trees the day before Addie was born. At last count we still had six living.
I finally got to meet a longtime friend this summer! And it wouldn't be like me if I failed to tell you the story behind how all this occurred. The school we received our curriculum from when I was homeschooled compiled a pen pal list every year for students. It was always hard for me to make friends, but I liked writing and it took all the awkwardness away from forming friendships. I began "collecting" pen pals in 7th grade, writing to as many students as I could. At one time I had as many as 22 pals that actually wrote back to me. I kept a map on the wall in my bedroom that had a push-pin for where every one of my pen pals lived. (The furthest was Justyna, from Poland.) Most correspondences didn't last for more than a few months, but to this day the majority of my closest friends are those that began as pen pals. Around the time I was 13-14 I was writing to a boy from Oregon. After a couple months he mentioned there was this girl from his church that he really liked...and would I please write to her and say some good things about him? So he gave me her address, and we began writing. I gave her his address and suggested they start writing as well. I'd like to think I had some influence in getting them together, but I highly doubt that's really how it happened. By the time I graduated high school I had lost track of all but a couple pen pals. Fast forward to 2009, when I decided to open a Facebook account, and track down all my old acquaintances. To my excitement I found the boy from Oregon had married the girl he liked from church and they had three boys (now four)! Over the last eight years we've somehow stayed in touch through some of the hardest times of our lives, and this summer she flew out from Oregon to stay with us for a week. It was hard to say good-bye when she left!
While she was here I got to check off a "to-do" from my bucket list: see a rodeo in person. It was the first rodeo hosted in my husband's home town, and they plan to be back next year. Please excuse the poor audio, this video is best watched silently. There were gale-force winds that day and we were on the top bleacher.
We discovered this year that we're on the parade route. The boys love this. I do not, but realize it's good to fight my inner Scrooge at times.
Memorial Day parade
Irish Fest Parade
The boys, Addie, and I walked downtown while Irish Fest was happening. They got to dig for coins in a pile of sand, then bought themselves shakes with the money they found.
We went camping with a two month old! I don't recommend it. I sat there drinking my coffee one morning outside our rented trailer, wondering if the pioneers had a portal to our world and could see us sitting here with all of our ridiculous taken-for-granted amenities while supposedly "roughing it" as a form of vacation...what in the world would they think?
We camped with Eli's family. The boys had friends to run around with and fish with for three days!
The bridge over the Mississippi River at Lansing, Iowa
We had well-child doctor visits...a few months late, but they got done. Gavin remains off-the charts in height and weight.
For reference, this is Gavin at 7 months old with his godmother. He weighed about 26 pounds here, and was 32 pounds by 12 months.
We recently pulled (and chainsawed) out the evergreen bushes surrounding the house. I know it had to be done, but at this point it still feels like a bad haircut. We literally gave our landscaping a mullet! 😂 I have plans to put an herb garden in next year, flanking the steps. We'll also have to replace the steps, having discovered the concrete crumbling away under the carpet. The rest is still in the planning stages, but I was thinking along the lines of coneflowers, black-eyed susans, Asiatic lilies....
Boys and a few summer shenanigans...
This was Frogger. He escaped after two days (ie, he made it out alive!)
Kites!
They keep trying to rescue baby (immature) birds that don't need rescuing!
Liam got this badminton set for his birthday. When the boys are outside, this is what they can be found doing.
Gavin continued finding treasures down in the creek bed.
And at thrift stores.
Where has this been all my life? ahahaha
Liam learned to ride his bike! He skipped right over the training wheel phase. He looks so tiny out there on the "open road".
We celebrated the 4th of July with a coworker of Eli's, and his wife, shooting off fireworks.
We survived the influx of over 1000 bikers to our tiny town. We were on the RAGBRAI (Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa) route this year. While most bikers were respectful, there were many who were not. We live just a block from a gas station and where rows of port-a-potties were set up, yet multiple bikers thought it appropriate to use our trees instead. Others found a refuge behind our house for some quiet time, while still others decided to wander all the way down by our fire pit and check out our wildlife feeders before I stuck my head out the window and asked them to please stick to the road. When the day was over our lawn was flat from hundreds of bikers sitting and laying on it.
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