So I'm CHEAP!!

Last May, for Mother's Day and my birthday, I wanted to make our yard look nice. So we made a BIG trip to Home Depot, spent a LOT of money, and then made our muscles ache by digging, raking, planting, etc. We were careful to choose plants that worked for our zone...the ARCTIC ZONE. Those poor plants struggled all summer long. They looked pretty much dead at one point. We slowly nursed them back to life...if you want to call it that. Each plant sprouted at least one new leaf on their dead brown stickly bodies, so we called them "live".

Well...it's sort of spring again, or at least the calendar says it is. Let's just forget the blizzard we had on Friday. Those plants were officially dead. We were looking at our receipts, and in a few days, it would be a year since we bought them. And hey...they were guaranteed for a year. THEY WERE!!!!! So yesterday morning, when the snow had mostly melted, I sent Chris out to dig up the dead plants. We made another BIG trip to Home Depot. This time, we carted in 6 very dead plants. As we got near the "RETURNS" counter, Chris and the kids started to walk the other direction. Yours truly was, of course, pushing the cart with the dead plants. I turned to Chris and said, "OH NO YOU DON'T! YOU GET OVER HERE!" There was no way I was going to keep that embarrassment all to myself. But as I got busy explaining myself to the guy at the register, my family quietly slinked away. The young register guy with grommets for earrings was NOT amused! But how could he argue...the guarantee was for a full year, and the year wouldn't be up until later this week.

As I walked away with my $127 gift card, a man in line even complimented me on my gardening skills. I thought that was nice.

We didn't leave empty handed. I mean...what a deal! If the plants die, we'll just get fresh ones again next year.

We got some Honeysuckle (mmmmmm....it smells SO nice),



a couple of Lilacs,



and some Sand Cherries.



We even had some survivors (Lilies) from last year.



Yep...you might say we're quite the gardeners.

Tagged....AGAIN!!! :)

Just in case you haven't had enough of me...I've been tagged again...this time by Kris of Designer's Notion. So now you have a chance to find out a few more quirky things about me. :)

1. I'm terribly afraid of spiders. There's no traumatic reason behind it...I just am. I could spot them in the dark from my crib, and I still wake up in the night once in awhile yelling about spiders.

2. I'm in love with nature. Mountains, wildlife, the ocean, marine life...I'm awestruck by every bit of it.

3. People who speed in school zones really irritate me.

4. I have a thing about my house smelling good. I burn candles almost every day.

5. I'll admit it (for those of you who want to say "told you so")...I'm REALLY tired of snow. And, despite the fact that it was almost 70 degrees today...snow is in the forecast for Thursday, which is just 2 days away...well, a day and a half really. :(

6. At the risk of having my mom and my mother-in-law BOTH disown me...I'm so NOT a shoe person. I'm just not. I get a pair I like, and they're IT. Flip-flops are good, and barefoot is even better.

7. I'm sort of a morning person AND a night owl. However, if made to sit still for very long, I'm likely to fall asleep.

Ok...so here are the rules:

1. Link your tagger and list these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Just for fun, I think I'm going to tag some people I either don't know, or don't know very well. I'm tagging:

1. Emily of Sugar Sweetness
2. Christina of Abby-Lane
3. Allison of Lula Bee Boutique
4. Clara of Mimi Kattini
5. Amy of Funky Monkey

I'm going to cheat, and leave it at 5. :)

Dear Mother Nature,

I thought you might want to know...it's April. It's ok...I completely understand. What, with you running the universe and all, you do kind of have a lot on your plate. Sometimes I even write June on the date line of my checks in the middle of September. Trust me...being a mother myself, I totally get it. It's tough keeping everything straight.

Sometimes though, when I seem a little lost, someone is kind enough to give me a little nudge and bring something to my attention. I just thought maybe you could use a little help too.

I'm not mad or anything. We did enjoy what you gave us.

But could you just focus a little, and bring us some warmer weather please? And, ummmm....could you maybe stop with the snow??

I've been TAGGED...twice!! :)

How funny!! Especially since I've never been tagged before. I was tagged by Brooke of Willow Tree and Beki of Pampering Beki. I'll spare you the pain though, and only list 7 things about myself. The instructions SAID weird or random, so here goes:

1. I love coffee, but with lots of good (bad?) stuff in it. I use cream...not half and half, and not the powdery stuff, but real cream. And sugar...the brown grainy kind. Not brown sugar...it's called turbinado sugar.

2. I really DO want to kayak. Not on a calm little lake, but down the rapids. I'm scared to do it alone though, and my family will have nothing to do with it. I went into one of the outdoor shops in town to "inquire"...the kind with the hot rugged looking young guys working. They sort of laughed.

3. I sometimes hide cotton candy and chocolate in my fabric closet so that I can eat it without having to share.

4. If I simply can't stand to be cooped up any longer, I get in my Jeep and drive towards the mountains. Just me and my camera...and sometimes the dog.

5. I sleepwalk, and sleeptalk. In fact, I can be quite entertaining in my sleep. If I'm told of the episode the next morning, the memory of it usually does eventually come to me.

6. I like perfection in some things and total chaos in others. It's sometimes a struggle for my family to figure out exactly what it is I do want.

7. I love to do a lot of things, and I'm always wanting to try new things. As a result, I don't think I've mastered many things, and that bugs me.

Okay...now for the rules.

1. Link your tagger and list these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Here's who I'm tagging:

Kathy of Pixie Dust Studio
Melissa of Journey To The Beach
Rhonda of Hipchick
Janae of Eldredge Family Blog
Misty of Lilly Anna Kids
Eva of Fresh and Vintage
Lindsay of Hair Candy

She's 14!!!!!

I've got some catching up to do. It's been a busy month around here. A few weeks ago, Cassidy turned 14. I'm still trying to figure out how that happens. In her mind, I'm probably like 67 or something. In my mind, I'm about 27. Neither of us is quite in touch with reality it seems.

Having a teenager of the female variety is one of the hardest things I've ever done...and I'm certainly not done yet. It's one of those journeys that, when I'm all finished and I look back, only then will I have the answers I wish I'd had along the journey. I want to be super cool, because, sort of like the "27 thing", in my MIND I pretty much am cool. But, my job is, first and foremost, that of being "Mom", so, in her mind, it's sort of like the "67 thing", and I have a feeling I don't quite have the "coolness" status that I desire. It's sort of hard to mix...that "cool" thing and that "Mom" thing. It's a difficult balance. Once in a blue moon, I hit the mark, but that seems to be pretty rare. Of course when SHE finishes this part of her journey, I do believe that she'll look back and see things a little differently than she does right now.

But all in all, I look at my daughter and I'm proud. I know I see more of her than what she sees in herself at times. I see all the goodness in her heart, and I want to bring every bit of if out to the surface. In this difficult stage of her life, I know she's trying very hard to find herself...to figure out for herself who she really is. All I want for her is to become that person inside herself that she already is...it's just a matter of figuring out how, and that is something she can only do for herself, which is also one of the hardest things as a mom. I can certainly guide her, but ultimately, I can't do it for her.

I know that through my blog, she sees a side of me that she doesn't always see. So I just want to say something that I'm sure she doesn't hear nearly often enough. Cassidy...I love you.

Do your kids ever want your attention, and, at the moment, you're just a little "too busy". You put them on hold rather than stop what you're doing. Then later, you realize that what you were doing wasn't THAT important, and you really weren't SO busy that you couldn't put it aside for a moment.

Paityn loves to sew. She has her own machine in her room. Her "designs" may not be quite ready for eBay or Etsy, but I like that she figures things out on her own. She doesn't use a pattern. Isn't that sort of like "playing by ear" or something?? I like to think so. Granted, she has a slit in the fabric rather than an official buttonhole, and maybe there are a few puckers, but for 10, I think she does pretty good.

So she sewed up a tote the other day. I don't know how she figures out how big and what shape to make each piece, but she does. She was SO proud of this tote. Of course I praised her...ranted and raved about what a great job she did. But when she wanted to send a picture to "MeMe", I didn't have "time" at the moment to stop what I was doing and mess around with the camera, computer, etc. Besides, "MeMe" is away from home and doesn't have computer access at the moment, so, in my logical adult mind, it really didn't matter anyway.

This was what I found on my camera the next morning when she was away at school:


Do you think she's been watching me a little? Notice the set up for the picture? It seems a little boutiquish to me. Yeah...I think she's been paying attention. Maybe I need to pay a little more attention to her.

Did I FORGET to mention.....

STAY OUT OF THE MUD!!!!!

I know I said I'd stop talking about the weather, but this is sort of indirectly. We have snow one day followed by spring-like weather the next. It's a vicious cycle. And do you know what that means?????? MUD...and LOTS OF IT!!!!!

We parents tend to forget that we need to give our kids specifics. Obviously I forgot to mention staying out of the mud, and if you forget to mention it...well...it's fair game then, right? And if you think the bike is bad...you should have seen the kid who road in on the bike!!!

She's a good kid though, and, secretly, I kind of like that she still loves mud. It's much better than being in such a hurry to grow up that she passes up being a kid. However, she still had some clean-up duty. The clothes...well, I handled those. There's no sense making a bigger mess. The Heely's....did I mention they were only two months old?? Well..they were her job. The bike was in for a bath too.