The reason for girls' nights...

The following are some conversations here that happened over the past 24 hours.

Conversation #1 "Who's on First?"

Finn: walks into kitchen announcing "Grandma is your MOMMY!"

Me: "EXACTLY!" (yay, he finally gets it!)

Finn: "But I thought you said she was my grandma"

Me: "she is, and she is my mommy, too"

Finn: "so whose kid is Grandpa's?"

Me: (sigh) this is getting old

Loch: yells from the other room "we are all a family, it doesn't matter whose kids is whose!" (me thinking wha? are we in West Virginia now?)

Finn: "If you are grandma's kid, why don't you live there?"

Me: "CUZ SHE KICKED US ALL OUT, NOW STOP TALKING!"

Conversation #2 "Why Ask Why?"

Me: (it's 10 am and they are playing Legos still in their jammies) "you boys go get dressed and brush your teeth now"

Finn: "WHY?"

Me: "Because I said so."

Loch: "Are we going somewhere?"

Me: "No."

Loch: "then howcome?"

Me: "because it's 10 am and you look lazy like that, now get dressed and ready"

Finn: "what are we getting ready for?"

Me: "ready for ANYTHING, now just go do it!"

Loch: "well, what might happen if we weren't ready?"

Me: "what if your uncle called and said 'hey, I'm in town come and get me' and we couldn't do it just because you weren't dressed yet?"

Loch: "I don't think so, isn't he over doing a war or something?"

Me: "YOU NEVER KNOW! THAT"S MY POINT!!!"

aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!

So there ya go, this was only a 24 hour snippet! That's why we need more girls' nights! And lots more wine, one bottle is clearly not enough when dealing with these children LOL! Last night was very appreciated, even if we didn't get too much knitting done. I got about 10 rows done and watched L cast on and knit the same row about 10 times, but whatever, it was nice!

Other funny (to me) observations last night: we got home about 10 pm, which is a late night for the kids so I told them to go straight to their rooms and put warm jammies on because I'm NOT turning on the heat yet. I go in there to check on them and see Finn like this:

Is he putting jammies on or getting ready for the Iditarod?!

To put things in perspective, it's only getting down to the 50's at night and still mid-upper 60's during the day and the house temp is 66º, this is my one month so shut down that heatpump and save some $$!

Left one of my knitting needles at L's house, ooops! That was just insurance that we have to go back soon and do it again. No gardening today, the wind is gusting about 45 mph out there so I am tackling the sewing machine today and the kids' Halloween costumes. Of course here I am procrastinating by blogging:)

Back into the garden!

I did it! Like Brett Favre, I finally got motivated to get back out there for another season! I'm not going to sugarcoat things, it had gotten pretty bad... (again like Favre? LOL)

So who knows what this is that has infiltrated my border beds?

A closer look?

You got it - those damn COSMOS! I HATE THEM! I planted them once, 3 years ago, ugh....thank goodness for my stirrup "ho"! They are even all over the lawn.

I have a lot to do out there, but I think I got most of the past due things accomplished before the rain started yet again today. The storm last week knocked over my 12 ft tall Maximillian Sunflowers before they even started to bloom, so I tied them back up. They were uprooted too but I think the rain will smush them back into the ground tonight, I give them a good stomp tomorrow when it's still wet out. They're perennial, so worst case I just chop them off and we'll see them again next year. They opened today, and will stay blooming almost til Dec, nice!

Above is the perennial Maximillian Sunflower (some people regard it as a weed!)

Below, these are the Montauk Daisies, they opened last week and will bloom until about Thanksgiving.

The good ol' dependable mums now in full bloom

Mums & Rosemary

Sorry all these photos are pretty bad but its been raining and overcast for days. I was able to get the broccoli & cauliflower trimmed of badly eaten leaves, planted my leek seedlings that had been forgotten in flats outside, and the cosmos pulled out of the empty beds where the garlic, shallots & onions will go. My peas are about 8 inches high now. Trimmed the zinnias in the pea bed, I can't bear to pull them yet since there are still some buds on them. I am finally seeing spinach and lettuce after a long hot summer with no greens! I will go out there later this weekend after the rain and do a second sowing of greens and leeks.

Current state of the garden from atop the kids' fort

In other news, this week was "eat school lunch with your munchkin" week. Since I have 2 kids I had to go twice. Monday was Finn and I wimped out and had the chef salad which was really quite good, but a bit spendy - I think this is really a big fundraiser since adults pay twice what the kids pay for the same lunch! Wednesday was Loch's day and I chose to eat the actual "meal". Choice between Pizza Hut pizza (yuck) or Boca Burger. I happily chose the Boca since I love those, we eat them at home all the time.

But wait... check out my banana!

Blech!

Wow, I finished up outside just in time - it's really dark outside and raining and the wind is blowing about 25 knots.

Tonight I am headed to BFF's house for some knitting and wine - her 2 boys and mine are the same ages and are like cousins so they do pretty well with little intervention from us, so it can actually be relaxing. Yay for adult conversation! It's pretty hard to come by these days...

The wine selection for tonight says it all!!

my crack pipe is broken!

Oh yes, it's THAT serious! Some of you are familiar with my addiction. Well, my world stopped turning about 4 days ago when my espresso machine developed a serious leak that was preventing the water from entering the basket... i.e. NO ESPRESSO! I cannot afford to replace this machine! I have been drinking iced coffee the past few days and let me tell you, it's not the same - not even close. I am the whack job that drinks espresso pretty much 24/7. I think nothing of drinking a double shot latte at 11 pm. I decided to do what any self-respecting mama with limited funds would do: I fixed it myself! If you are really bored, you can visit this awesome tech post on the Breville! Yeah, I didn't think you were that bored LOL.

Household Emergency

I really don't know exactly what I did, but it involved tightening screws, shining flashlights, a wire brush and lots of vinegar.

The big moment!

Yay! Back in business!

For any of you considering an espresso machine purchase (the kind of machine that makes real espresso), I actually highly recommend this one. The Breville isn't cheap (several hundred), BUT - it's not digital, which means it can be fixed, customer service is awesome, and it's been pretty much unstoppable - I've had it 5 years already. I have had one problem a couple of years ago with the power cord, and Breville not only replaced the entire machine with a new one, it was delivered the same day UPS showed up to collect the old one. And I am NOT gentle on this thing, I pull about 12-15 shots a day and it is on for at least 14 hours a day. So there's my plug!

In other exciting news, I was able to go thrift store bargain hunting without my kids for the first time, and it was pretty lucrative today. Get ready for this: I got Patagonia and Columbia fleece jackets for the kids, the 89.00 Mountain Hard Wear fleece jacket I was coveting last year, and Banana Republic and Icelandic wool sweaters with original tags still on for hubby for a grand total altogether of $13.50!

I hit it on just the right day, winter clothing was 50% off plus my military discount = Sweet Bargain! I have been stressing all the winter clothing we need for our upcoming winter vacation but this has made things much easier. I think it helps that we are in VA, there's lots of winter things that have pretty much never been used! Now if I could just find tires for the Outback for 75% off LOL, those are seriously needed before we go too!

and oh, look at the time - I guess I forgot the garden again today!

Weekend photo update!

I admit it, I still haven't gone out to the garden to do chores! I had everything weeded, ripped out, replanted and looking pretty good - then I got sick and the caterpillars took over the broccoli and cauliflower beds, followed by a week of 10 inches of rain which just destroyed my lettuce seedlings and made a mess of everything! I kept meaning to go out and start over again, but haven't had the motivation. Too many things happening last week not leaving me the long block of time I need for a do-over.

This past weekend I decided yet again to shirk my garden duties and took the kids out to enjoy the nice weather:

Saturday we got our pumpkins...

and made our way through the maze...

and finished off with fresh strawberry ice cream!

Sunday was unbelievably warm, temps in the 80's, so we spent most of the day outside, kids riding their bikes and me knitting in the driveway watching them!

I let Loch practice his violin outside and he got the first glimpse of how "the nerdy kids win out in the end" LOL.... some girls were hanging around him saying "wow", "you know how to play that?" and "cool!" A nice confidence booster for him, I noticed the bully down the street didn't have his own groupies that day!

Not to be outdone, Finn asked the girls if they would like to hear him play the piano!

His selections were "Old MacDonald" and "Jolly ol' Saint Nicholas" LOL

The kids have been begging me to get down the Halloween decorations for 2 weeks now so I went over the proper protocol for what to do if they hear a "thud" followed by mommy's legs sticking through the ceiling and braved the attic!

Success! (This is usually DADDY's responsibility!)

We spent the rest of the afternoon making a scarecrow guy and assorted spooky stuff

The nighttime shot!

Today I was sidetracked by having to go to the post office to mail a care package to hubby (which was closed, duh) and then it was "school lunch with your child" day - so basically I'm not out in the garden today, either!

I have every intention of going back to the post office early tomorrow and getting back in time to spend 3 good hours doing garden chores tomorrow.

Do any of you get overwhelmed in the fall or is it just me? Even though the temps are perfect for doing chores, I am preoccupied with the holidays, deployment stuff, kids and their school-stuff, wanting to get back into knitting and learning to sew, etc, etc, etc!

Fun at the Farmer's Market

For the past 2 days, I've been working the Harvest Festival at the Farmers Market doing Master Gardener stuff. I can't imagine more perfect weather for it, it's been cool and crisp in the 50's in the morning, rising to about 68 in the afternoon, just perfect!

We had local 1st graders come on field trips to come through all the exhibits, I don't have pictures of everything since I was working, only the stuff where I was working but besides these pics they got to do hayrides, pick pumpkins and see 4-H animal exhibits. Even though I live here and my kids are in the school system here, it remains shocking the amount of classes & kids we have, since I grew up in a small farm town. We "ONLY" did about 8 schools in the past 2 days for a total of 800 first graders! Get ready for this... we have a total of 56 elementary schools in our district! I'm not sure how it is determined who gets to come to us for the festival, I am sure it involves a lottery or Title I designation or something. So here's some photos of the past few days:

This is the backside of our Farmers Market

OMG here they come!

This is where they eat their bag lunches, they sit on hay bales and listen to a guy tell them about the journey of their food from the farm to their lunchbox. Their next stop from here was a tent where someone tells them about how food crops are used in packaging, what things can be recycled, and what ends up here in our bays polluting the water and seafood (LOL I think the parents are going to get an earful when the kids get home from school - good!)

Ok, I can't get through this without telling you about the cute "Fish and Game Boy"...

He showed up in the morning and didn't know where he was supposed to be. Well, of course he asked our group, which just happens to be a group of women between the ages of 35-60.... well of course we told him he needed to set up right next to us! I coined the term "FishandGameBoy" for obvious reasons, he is Va Dept of Fish & Game and didn't look too many years (months!) out of college:)! We don't know his real name and it doesn't really matter, does it? So we watched him unpack his fishandgame "stuff" and took turns going over to ask him stupid questions about his taxidermied friends. I think this was obvious to him by that point that he walked right into our "trap" but I think he was pretty amused by it all and I'm sure his buddies will get an earful about the "hotflash" women this weekend hahaha!

Fish and Game Boy was way more popular with the little boys who were more interested in the dead animals!

I walked over to take a picture of his owls and asked him what kind they were, a semi-intelligent question I thought... his answer was "geez, I don't even know, they just put them in my truck". I told them don't worry, they're just 1st graders, he had 10 minutes to figure it out and suggested that they were "Eastern Coastal Owls", he actually laughed at that and said that's what they'll be today, then LOL

Below is part of the Master Gardener stuff, this is a craft activity table. Each class was about 25-30 kids and I don't know how teachers do this every day with this age group! I had PTSD after the first class for awhile, the ADD kids were jumping and yelling and then there were kids who couldn't keep their hands from touching all the other kids, the tactile-issue kids who freaked out when they got ink on their hands, the quiet OCD kids who couldn't seem to finish their project and move on.... oh my teachers should get paid MORE! I'm thinking more along the lines of astronaut pay. I mean hey, we don't depend on NASA astronauts for our daily life, but we depend on our nation's teachers to teach these kids to be productive, intelligent adults, and they sure do have their work cut out for them!

Below are the Tidewater Beekeepers, they are always my favorite!

Here is the Master Gardeners' New Kitchen Garden, a year-round garden at the Farmers Market, all the harvest is donated to the food bank. Not sure how much will be left after all the kids got done tromping through, but it's worth it since many were completely amazed that food comes from there....wow.....

After we were done working both days, our lunch was provided by the butcher shop (yummy sandwiches and fresh bread!) and the Market restaurant (yummy N.C. pulled pork BBQ).

I warned my unnamed fellow MG friend that I just HAD to post this gem I overheard:

While we were in the butcher shop picking up our lunches, FishandGame Boy was standing next to MG friend and he said "I don't know what kind of chips to get"...

she replied "get the hot ones".... LMAO!

Finally, last night after I had recovered a bit, I took the kids back to the Farmers Market for their free Friday Night Hoedown. This is always fun as it truly is free, there aren't even any vendors open that time of night so I don't have to hear the kids whine for ice cream from the creamery! It's just a low key, bring your own lawn chair and cooler if you need one show. I sure wish I had more friends that enjoyed this kind of music, but we go as often as we can, and I think all the older people enjoy seeing the kids there. It's important to me that kids be exposed to regional music, growing up here they have no idea that mountain bluegrass is a regional thing, they'll thank me someday! At least hubby will be with us next year for it. They do this every Friday night all summer through Halloween. It's also known as a "jam spot" on Friday nights in the parking lot so you can also wander around and listen to others play, we had a tailgate show of 3 guys all on banjo about 80 years old each, parked right next to us! Anyway, here's a few minutes of the music last night:

ok, NOW I can start getting things accomplished by working in my OWN yard this week!

Never worry about having a black thumb again!

Introducing the first AUTOMATIC PLANT TOWER!

This is a fantastic solution for those that never quite know when it's time to repot their plants or a good time to take cuttings for propagation! It's quite simple, really - when the time for repotting/cutting is detected, an alarm goes off (kind of resembles a crashing noise), the plant stand automatically comes down to ground level, ejects the plants and severs stems perfect for dipping in rooting hormone and propagating.

Figure 1: the budding horticulturist is automatically alerted to plants needing attention and potting soil clumps are naturally broken up and aerated

Figure 2: After repotting whole plants, take your pick of the stem cuttings, dip in hormone or water and propagate, the difficult work of scissor cuts is done for you

Figure 3: when plant maintenance is completed, place tower back in upright position and smile knowing the guesswork has been taken out and you will never again have to worry about "when" - the Automatic Plant Stand will worry about it for you!

And to think I woke up with nothing to blog about today...

Drowning in Mud!

So it's STILL RAINING HERE! This brings our 7 day total to around 12-13 inches I think, 8 of which fell on one day setting a record. It's very cool here, in the upper 50's and lower 60's, which is a welcome change, but I sure wish the sun would come out, we haven't seen it since September 26th!

I am on the mend now thankfully, I have some leftover tiredness but anything else can just be attributed to the weather at this point! Here's some photos of the garden of destruction this week:

This is what happens when you call in sick to the garden for a week:

I think I need a "DO-OVER"!

The peas are actually enjoying the cool, wet weather and have finally sprouted

The "clump of dirt" I brought home and planted last fall - Maximillian Sunflowers! They were about 12 feet tall and covered with buds and the intense wind and rain knocked them flat and uprooted them - they were due to bloom in a week or so. I'll tie them up and stomp the dirt clump down and hope to see some flowers, if not we'll wait til next year again!

Below: Loch has been keeping busy with building balsa wood models while I've been sick. He asked for help but I have no patience for that stuff, especially with a headache and flu, and eventually he figured it out on his own. This thing had about 500 pieces! The past week he built a skeleton, airplane, and this ship, I'm pretty impressed - he gets this skill from daddy, definitely not me - I'd be the one lining them all up according to size, but never actually putting it together LOL

Here's one for you: I was out mowing the lawn during the 2 hours of slack in the drizzle on Saturday and the mail-woman came with a box. She went to the front door, talked to the kids and gave them a slip for an "undeliverable" box, "signature needed".... I WAS IN THE FRONT YARD!! Apparently she's too lazy to wave me to cut the mower, so now I have to drive to the post office and stand in line to pick up a box. Guess who's NOT getting a Christmas present in the mailbox this season? LOL....

I seem to be into the winter blog mode already, so rather than feel guilty, I'll just announce that I am backing off to less-than-daily posts, I need to concentrate on some fall chores like closet cleaning, knitting, desk cleaning, etc... all things I look forward to doing all summer and the time has come for me to get busy on my chore list that has been accumulating all summer!