Vegetables

Well, our belated summer has come to an abrupt end. Yes, the "summer" (what I consider traditional summer months) was freezing and rainy. But somewhere mid-August everything changed. It was warm, yea even hot, all the way through September! That is a rarity up here in the boreal forest of the Canadian Shield. It was awesome!

Then we skipped the cool fall and went straight to cold. In the matter of a few days. It was weird.

So we'll just say the summer wasn't ideal for gardening. However, I did plant a garden back in June, right on schedule. And we were eating some produce from it. But with this sudden switch, I decided that it was time to bring in all the vegetables. Our produce has its challenges, but we love it so much.
Some very tiny ears of corn, approximately 15 all together; several tiny eggplant; plenty of cucumbers and zucchini; lots of red beets; a few kohlrabi; 2 jalapeno peppers; 2 1/2 bell peppers. We also planted A LOT of potatoes. My first time. We had so much fun digging them up and finding the red treasures in the dirt.



Sadly, this is our bumper tomato crop. As you can see, there is one orange tomato. We've eaten one ripe tomato and there is one rotting on the ground. That's it for the large tomatoes. We've gotten close to 10 ripe cherry tomatoes. Green tomato recipes anyone?



Here's a cabbage, carrots, kohlrabi and two aliens.



Eli enjoying the dwarf corn.



Like they always say, "When life hands you unripe tomatoes, make a centerpiece."
(Should I be wrapping these in newspaper or something to help them ripen?)

Insight From the Backseat

This morning we were all in the car and this is what we heard from the backseat:

"Hey Dad? When we were in the boat with Kirsten at Phyllis and Loye's cabin, I saw a puddle the shape of a gun and I thought God was telling me that He needs another hunter...It was weird."

Dad asks, "Did you think He was telling you to be a hunter?"

"I don't know."

Kendall said, "Or it could have just been a puddle shaped like a gun."

Hmmm....Makes you think.

Ahh...

Today when I picked Evan up at school I asked him if he had a good day. He answered yes and said, “My days get better and better!”

We went and found Eli. Evan walked up to him and opened his arms for a hug. Eli hugged his brother and said, “I missed you today. I saw you at gym!”

Ahh….The moments that warm this mommy’s heart…

Eli's Song

Eli is learning Ojibway in school. He had the choice of French or Ojibway. We left it up to him and this is what he chose. Here he is singing numbers 1-10:



A little explanation from Eli: "It's harder with my eyes shut because usually someone does the motions and without doing the motions, it's harder for me to remember it. That's why I did it with my eyes shut."

First Bike Ride

Aggravation

"Aggravation" the hot new game in this house. You know, the game with the marbles. And I don't like it. I actually do feel aggravated when we play it.

The boys want to keep playing the game to its finish, but their attention spans do not match their enthusiasm. So they end up rolling around on the floor between turns. Then they're still rolling when I aggravatedly tell them to take their turn. Then I tell them that if they keep rolling around not paying attention to the game, I will put it away. They sit up for another round or two, then they forget and are back to rolling around on the floor.

Then I think, "What's my big deal? Why am I so aggravated? So what if it takes 3 1/2 hours to play one little game?" So I don't actually put the game away and just sit there really feeling the aggravation.

But tonight I put the game away, out of their sight. They still remembered it when I asked them if they wanted to play a game before bed. But I gave them a flat-out NO.

We need to have a garage sale. A secret garage sale when the boys are at school.

Advice Needed

Help. My boys cut a large hole in the side of a borrowed pack 'n play. A hole big enough to crawl through. I have had time to cool down now, but I was so frustrated. (To put it mildly.) So, unless I can find a good used one (the borrowed one was well-used), we will need to be shelling out a lot of money to replace it.

I need a creative idea. Obviously, Eli and Evan won't be able to come up with $65+ to buy a new one. I want them to see the seriousness of what they did and to face the consequences. But I am lacking creativity. I love hearing other people's ideas.