28 Big Ones

I had a fantastic 28th birthday. Thank you all so much for the gifts, cards, and phone calls. I felt like a princess all day!

Dave and I got up late for a weekday, but early for a weekend in order to hit some yard sales. First things first though...presents!

#1. A Brighton Charm that says "baby girl" on the back. The little critter is taking over everything including my birthday theme! As Dave is fond of saying when he's indulging me, "Hey, how often are you pregnant?" For me that would be a maximum of 18 months out of my entire life so I always take advantage. Bring on the baby stuff!

#2. Dobson's latest release. He got the last copy and we're both enjoying reading it

After going to some yard sales, we made our way to the JRC April Horseshow. This was Brandon and Aran's first show and I didn't want to miss seeing them compete.

Aran stuck with Abe for the whole show. He may sleep through most of the patterns, but Abe will do you proud. He and Aran won 3rd in Showmanship, 3rd in Horsemanship, and 1st in Trail. Congrats, Aran on a rewarding first show!

Brandon opted for more of a challenge (why doesn't that surprise me?) and chose to ride Milo. Milo was a bit uncooperative for both Brandon and Andrea, but they still had fun and looked great in the process!

This was Bella's 3rd show and she rode Abe this time rather than Lilly. They brought home 6th in Showmanship, 3rd in Trail, and 1st place in Horsemanship! Great job, Bella. Show 'em how it's done!

Mom brought me a cupcake and a card with shopping money. Yay!


A few of my favorite pics...

We stayed for about 1/2 the show then headed to Downtown Hartselle to peruse the antique stores. I bought some old Coke crates that had caught my eye and they look uber cool in our kitchen. Dave took me to JW's for dinner and afterward we had some time to kill before our movie started. We went to Shoe Carnival so I could get some Yellow Box flip-flops with my b'day money and lo and behold - we spotted a car show on the way. Being the virtuous pinnacle of womanhood that I am, I encouraged him to stop and have a look. Is that the same truck on his shirt?

All-in-all a perfect, carefree day. Thanks to everyone who made it special!

Square Footish Gardening

What is square-footish gardening? It's just like square-foot gardening except you use whatever you have on hand, cross your fingers, and hope for the best. :)

All the tomatoes, most of the jalapeños, and two plots of basil went in as transplants. The rest I seeded so we'll see what happens. It's almost too simple. Not easy mind you, just simple. You mean I really just throw some vermiculite and seed in a dirt hole, keep it watered, and out comes food after a while?? The transplant thing I get because so much time is spent coddling them before the go into the ground. It just seems too simple to expect anything out of direct sowing, but I hope I'm proven wrong.

This is the final layout we wound up using. Most of the sheetrock bucket crops should have been started earlier so by planting them in containers we'll be able to shield them from the sun this summer when it's technically too hot for them. The blank place is for acorn squash to go in this summer. I may put some asparagus in there until then.

I cannot believe we were thinking of doing a 15x15 plot. This 10x10 took two days and nearly killed me. I have the sore muscles and sunburn to prove it. Granted I only have about 1/2 the stamina these days. It's so frustrating to spend hours doing something (when you calculate the numerous water breaks, heat breaks, and potty breaks I have to take when undertaking anything outdoors right now) that Dave could probably do in 1/5 the time. However, there's only so much Dave to go around so I must gird up my preggo belly and persevere.

Behold our hopefully rabbit-proof garden. Thankfully, we don't have woodchucks around here. My transplants are being shielded from the heat of the day with containers, but I took them off for the close-ups.

Northeast square. Don't the popsicle stick stakes look like little tombstones? Hope that isn't an indication of things to come.

Here lies Basil and Marigold.

April 12,2010 - April 20,2010

Victims of an "ish" gardening attempt

The author of Square Foot Gardening would probably be happy to RIP with Basil and Marigold if he could see the travesty here, but Backwoods Home Magazine might give me kudos for doing what I could with limited energy and money.

Northwest square. Like my dried up brush grid? It put the "ish" in square-footish. Gift wrap raffia path markers tied with carpenter pencil stakes also help with the "ish" factor. Lead...it's what's for dinner!

Southwest square

Southeast square - loving that free cedar mulch from the trees at church!

Special thanks to Andrew for letting us borrow his tiller, to Dad for driving all the way out here to till it for us, to Gilbert for chipping up the felled trees at church, to Dave for building the fence, and to the previous homeowner for leaving us a ton of seeds in the freezer!

Can't wait to reap some harvest and hopefully there will plenty of goodies to share.

Easter Sunday

I love it when Easter Sunday turns out to be warm. More often than not we seem to freeze to death in our spring clothing, all in the name of tradition. Not so for 2010 with a high of 78. Yay!

When you're born in March or April, sometimes you draw the short straw and have a holiday birthday. Such was the case for Micaiah this year. Happy Birthday, Micaiah! And thanks for sharing your cheesesticks with us. ;)

Home Sweet Home

Behold our ancestral manse! Instead of "wash me" traced in the dust it should have "side me" because it's begging for it. All in good time.

Back of the house

Back yard looking north

Back yard looking west

Back yard looking south

End of our property line in the back (west) backs up to pasture land

South view from the carport. That overgrown mess is our 1/2 acre garden plot. I'll hopefully be planting about 1/4 of that plot this year but would love to do the full 1/2 acre next year.

View from the porch facing east. That ramp will be used for a chicken coop as soon as we get the piano in the house.

Master bedroom

Office

Kitchen. Doesn't it make you want to make some homemade bread and butter from scratch?

Laundry room

Jess has volunteered to help me remove this atrocious wallpaper border. Ya'll know my feelings about border!

Sold that freezer for $75. Woo-hoo!

Baby's room. Boy or girl we're going to go with this western nursery theme to match the rustic style of the house.

Hall/bathroom door. I forgot to take a picture of the bathroom which is just as well because there's more border for Jess to help me with in there!

Some of my favorite features....pickled wood kitchen floor

and a distressed tin ceiling in the living room

My favorite feature of the house is the location. We're just a few miles from Walmart, Lowes, Walgreens, Sonic, etc, yet have the benefit of property and a mini-homestead. You don't have to wait in line at Walmart and are greeted at the checkout with a " hi how are ya'll doin'?"

Little rant and rave here***
Unlike our previous community, I have yet to see anyone with a Starbucks cup griping loudly about how you just can't get good Thai food around here or how their community in D.C. is just so much more culturally diverse. No offense to my non-southern readers, but this is Alabama! You technically shouldn't be able to get Asian fusion or a chai latte at all so just be happy with what we have brought in to accommodate you or move somewhere that can better please your palate. Of course we shut down school for 1/2 inch of snow. Do you really want people who can barely drive in the rain to be out in that? Yes, you're probably going to be invited to church or see a scripture billboard on your way to work every day. This is the BIBLE BELT. Nobody is holding a gun to your head and forcing you to convert. There are other places is the country to live so if you can't respect our culture feel free to relocate. You won't find me moving to New York City then complaining about the fast pace and rude people. I said all this to point out that now we feel like we are in the South again and are both very happy about it. Huntsville/Madison needs to pick up and move north of the Mason-Dixon. That is until I get a craving for P.F. Chang's or want a caramel macchiato. Yes, I'm a hypocrite.
***whew! I feel better. Thanks for listening.


My second favorite feature of this house is the price. Our property taxes are $126 per year (that's right per YEAR) for the house and an acre of property. If I told you what our mortgage + escrow payment is per month you'd hate me so I just won't mention it.

My third favorite feature of the house (so far) is the neighbors. We haven't seen hide nor hair of them! They must be working and minding their own business rather than playing an organ on the porch or calling the police on one another. Time will tell, but so far so good with the neighbors.

Ya'll come one over! You can even bring some sushi and decaf skinny mocha lattes as long as you serve it with kindness and don't razz me for lack of winter driving skills. ;)

Disney Trip 2010

It's against my religion to bring a child under the age of 4 to the parks. Crowds and heat are bad enough without a stroller, diapers, and feedings. Not to mention spending a small fortune on something the child won't even remember! If I was diligent with photo-taking over the last several years I could start a blog entitled "Miserable Parents of Infants and Toddlers at Disney." Knowing this would be our last WDW trip for at least several years, my parents treated us to a "last hooray."

We had a fabulous and surprisingly relaxing time with lots of special surprises along the way. There were only a few rides I wasn't able to ride and while the rest of the group indulged, I was busy having fun with my new camera. Five hundred pictures later...

Some highlights of the trip

*Stuffing ourselves at Ohana


*Spending time with Margaret and Martin

And sharing a kitchen sink with them!

*Meeting our favorite duck in his adorable frontier getup

*celebrating baby with a surprise mini cake
*staying at the Boardwalk

*Making our first purchase for the baby

*breakfast at Crystal Palace and being in the Magic Kingdom before it opened*all the special free desserts Mom and Dad got for celebrating an anniversary

*just taking this picture!

Also our Backstage Safari at Animal Kingdom was awesome. No photos allowed though. ;)
Thanks, Mom and Dad for an unforgettable trip! We'll need to reminisce in a few months when we're running on 3 hours of sleep and the whole house smells like poo. Haha.