The "Fruits" of Our Labor

It's been nearly three months since we planted our garden at Grammie and Papa's house. We received a call that it was "time to harvest." And boy was it! It was actually overdue on the zucchini's. There were about three of them that are uneatable because they grew too big.

We harvested all of the carrots, because the pumpkin had no place to go. I picked it up off the ground (where I can see it had already received a tasting from some little critter) and placed it where the carrots had been.

I'm pretty sure that we won't have any cantaloupe. Th

ere just isn't enough room! Next year, we are going to make our planter box MUCH bigger, and plant MUCH smarter.

We may or may not get a watermelon. The

plant seems to be getting big, but as of now, it's only flowers. It may be too late in the season, and they may have been overtaken by the zucchini, which is way out of control. Zucchini bread, anyone?

Here are the pictures from today. We will go back in a couple of weeks to check on more zucchini. I'm sure that more will be ready to pick.

Gardening at Grammie and Papa's

Last year Savannah and I planted sunflowers, pumpkins, and watermelons at my parent's house. The only thing that ever grew was the watermelons. The rabbits and ground squirrels ate the sunflowers as soon as any green come up out of the dirt and the pumpkins flowers never had a chance. The only reason we were able to grow watermelons was because Papa covered the foliage with chicken wire!

This year, we are going to outsmart those little varmints. This year Papa build a planter box. It's about 10 or so feet long, 3 or so feet high and about 3 or so feet wide. Papa drove the tractor while Wayne and I filled the box with dirt.



We added vegetable planter mix (not organic unfortunately) and Savannah helped to til it together with the native soil.



Here is a picture of us planting the sunflowers. We put them at the back of the planter box where they wouldn't shade the rest of the fruits and vegetables.





Next we planted watermelon, zucchini, cantelope, carrots, and pumpkins. It's probably too much for that little area, but we just couldn't make up our minds!





Last year, Grammie bought Savannah her own gardening tools. She had fun using them for their practical purpose!



The height of the box would keep the squirrels and bunnies from eating our garden, but we wanted to make sure that nothing would even think about approaching. A mini-sized scarecrow should do the trick! (Um, notice the adorable dress Savannah chose to dig in the dirt with? She said, "Mommy. You can always wash it.")



We're very optimistic about this years crop. We're just sad that our yard doesn't get enough sun to have the garden at our house. For now, we're grateful for Grammie and Papa helping us out and letting us grow our garden in their yard!

PB & J

It's kind of freaking me out, how independant my little girl is becoming.  Nevermind the fact that she doesn't need me to stay with her to fall asleep.  Forget the truth of it that she can pretty much take a shower without me.  Let's focus on the day she decided she also didn't need me to make her peanut butter and jelly sandwiches anymore.  Isn't that one of the quintessential duties of a mom?  To make their kids pb&j's?

It almost hurt, like a growing pain, to watch her do it so well! I did get to help cut off the crusts, though.  Phew!  I'm still needed. She has told me a couple of times in the past week that pretty soon she won't need me...  Can I put her on a time-out for a statement like that???

Going into Retirement

Her shoes, that is.  I'm not sure exactly how long Savannah has been wearing these Wal-Mart brand "Crocs" but it's been well over a year.  She wore them in Hawaii in June of 2007 and I know that she had them approx. six months before that!  And, as you can tell from this picture, they have been worth the whole $6 a pair that I paid.

"Why are they two different colors?" you may ask.  Let me tell you a story...

Once upon a time Savannah had two pairs of Crocs (yah, I know they aren't really Crocs, but that's what we called them); one pair were pink and the other pair were blue.  She loved matching them with her outfits.  And then, the unthinkable happened.  One of her blue ones fell out of the car when we were shopping never to be seen again!  She was so brave.  She didn't even shed a tear because she still had her favorite pink ones.

Then, one day while Savannah was playing at the park with her cousins, they decided to start kicking dirt into a grated drain.  As everyone knows, Crocs don't fit on the foot real tight, so after a few kicks, her right pink Croc went flying and fell down the drain!  Daddy tried his best to retrieve the shoe, but to no avail.  This time tears were shed.



Wouldn't you know it though?  What are the chances, I ask rhetorically, that she'd lose the opposite shoe?  She still had a complete pair, even though they were two different colors.  So, she began to wear her Crocs, one of each color.  We would get so many people commenting on how unique and "hip" she was to step outside the norm and wear two different color shoes.  Sometimes we'd just smile and other times she'd share the story.  Pointing out her left blue foot she'd say "This one fell out of the car," then she'd switch to the right foot and continue, "and this one fell down the drain."

So, my daughter's fashion statement was nothing more than a set of unforeseen circumstances. She did look pretty cool though.  (At least to me.  I was one of the weird kids in high school that would wear two different color of Converse shoes...)

Anyway, the poor things had seen their day.  The tread was almost completely gone from the bottom.  Her toes were almost popping out the little holes, not to mention the fact that they looked as though they'd been run over buy a car at least half a dozen times.

Off to the mall we went to purchase her a pair of "real" Crocs.  And "real" Crocs is what she got.  They are a nice shade of purple.  We even got those little things that pop into the holes.  I'm thinking of getting her a pair of pink ones hoping that she will opt to wear one of each color.  :)

First day of Kindergarten

My little girl is officially in grade school. I can't believe how fast the time has gone! I remember my mom saying that and thinking, "Are you kidding?!" Now, as a parent, I completely get it. And although I still cherish the season when she was a toddler, it is so rewarding to see her off to "big school" as she called it. She realizes that kindergarten is different than preschool. She will correct me though, if I call it school. She wants it to be called kindergarten. ;)

I was a little nervous to drop her off because the last few months of preschool, she would cry when I first dropped her off. I wasn't sure how she would react to kindergarten. I tried to not make such a big deal out of it, because she's too smart for that. But, she did get brand new shoes and a brand new backpack which I think helped a lot. The night before it took me at least 30-45 minutes to get her to sleep because she was "so excited!"

Here is a picture of her with her new shoes and new backpack.


A closer look at her pink camo backpack (wish I wouldn've taken a better picture of her shoes.  They are so cool!)



Here she is being silly.



I think she feels a little more comfortable at this school because we are within walking distance.  It's on the same street as us, about 3 minutes of walking time.  So, we walked to school for her first day, since she has afternoon kindergarten we have to time to do that.



Once we got there, we waited for her teacher to come to the back gate and let the kids in.  It's a closed campus, so unless you go through the office, you are not allowed in.  I love that.  Once her teacher came, Savannah gave me five kisses and two hugs and went through the gate to stand in line.



Here's another shot where you can actually see her teacher too.  I was shooting through the chain link fence, so it was a bit of a challenge.



I have to admit, I got a little choked up while she was standing there.  Not as much as when she started preschool, but a little bit.  I turned to the mom next to me as I started to say "I think it's harder on us than them," when I noticed she was bawling.  Her son was so cute though.  His little brother who was about 2 1/2 was crying so he says to him "When I get home, we'll play roller coaster like 5 times!"  Every one was saying "Ah..." when the dad says, "Yah, who do you think the roller coaster is?"  LOL!

I waved to Savannah a couple more time before her teacher told the kids to blow us kisses.  As soon as she was out of site, I walked home.

When I picked her up, I asked if she had fun.  She said that she did, so I asked her, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No," she said.

"Okay."  So much like her daddy.  Everything is on a "need-to-know" basis, and I guess I just didn't need to know.  LOL!

I was so excited for her first day, and I know she was too.  The best way that I could've and did prepare her was by praying and letting her know that Jesus and His angels would be with her.  I just trusted Him that she would be fine, and she was.  It was also comforting to know that she was exactly where the Lord wanted her to be.

Thank you, Jesus, for the beautiful little girl that I have the privilage of calling my daughter.  Thank you that you love her more than I ever could and that you always have her best interest at heart.

Click, Click, YES!

So, I've decided that I really need to get behind my camera more often.  I've gotten pretty rusty.  I haven't had a photography job in almost a year (anyone? anyone?)  Anyway, before I left to go on a girls-night-out, I shot a few pictures of Savannah with her new parasole.  Of course, she wanted to take a few with her best furry friend D'Argo.

Here are the first few shots...



I'm actually pretty surprised that she allowed me so many shots.  The past year or so she's been such a pistol when it comes to being in front of the lens.



If things keep going this well, I may need to get a Flickr account.  I'll still post some here too, but the majority will go on the Flickr.  That's of course only if I get up and behind the camera more!





This next one isn't my favorite.  Savannah's face is a little blown out, but I love the look on D'Argo's (not in focus...) face, so I had to add it.  It looked really bad in color.



So, those are from Saturday.  The one's below are from today.  We were outside playing with the dogs, and I thought Savannah's hair looked really pretty, even though it was kind of a mess.  She didn't have a shirt on and I didn't want to take her picture with no shirt just in case one of them turned out good and I wanted to hang it on my wall!  So, she ran inside and grabbed her hand dyed silk.  It was perfect!  Love these shots...





Loooooovvvveeeee this one.  I think it's hang on the wall worthy.  I'm so glad I made her put  something on.



This one she is actually laying on D'Argo, but you can't see him.  Her face just looked so beautiful I couldn't ruin it with a big drooly Rottweiler!  LOL!



And last, but not least, my favorite one.  Well, of Savannah.  I wish I could crop it just perfect so that it was just her, but I can't.  :(  I wish it didn't look like she had a choke hold on the dog because I love everything about the capture of her.  *sigh*



And that's all for now.  Don't forget.  You can click on the image to make it bigger.  Remember though, that it opens in the same window, so you have to click the back button to get back here.

Trip to Montana

After last years vacation to Hawaii, I think that Wayne realized how nice it is to not only take time off of work, but to actually leave the house and enjoy some time away!  This year we were blessed once again and were able to spend an entire week in Montana.  Well, Savannah and I had two weeks there.  My parents drove the two of use there and we spent a week with just the four of us.  Then Wayne flew in the next week and the entire Fox family flew home a week later.

Our time there was amazing and a total blessing.  The Lord does answer prayers and this time He actually answered one of mine the way that I wanted it to be answered!  I prayed that Wayne would fall in love with Montana and he did.  We would love to move there within the next five years.  We're working towards that and I just keeping praying for God's will to be done.  If He wants us there, that's where we'll be.  All in His timing, of course.  ;)  (The sooner the better, Lord...)

Savannah loves Montana as well, and when we were there she kept saying that she wanted to move there.  That was until she got home and got to play with her best friend (and neighbor) Geneva.  She wants Geneva and Heather to move with us.  LOL!  Hey, God can do it!

Here are a few images from our trip.

Here is the family.  Not the best picture of Wayne, but it's the only one of the three of us!



This is a picture from our trip to Yellowstone.  See the bison?  They are all over the place there.



This picture was taken on our way to Yellowstone.



This is the little town that we stay in.  My parent's actually live there for the summers in the house that my grandma owns. It has no stop lights.  :D



This lake was completely frozen over when I first arrived in Montana.  By the time Wayne got there it looked like this.  A few days later it had completely "defrosted."



Savannah.  'Nuff said.  ;)







And I know I've said it before, but honestly, I'm going to try to post once a week.  Even if it's just with a Hi.

First Day of Pre-K!

Well, Savannah had fun on her first day of school.  When we walked in, her class was in the garden watering the vegetables.  Her teacher asked if she wanted to garden or go see her classroom with me, and she chose to garden.  ;)  I went and put her backpack in her cubby (of which they left the 'h' off the end of her name) and came back to the garden.  I gave her a kiss goodbye and she said goodbye and I left.  Actually, I sat in the parking lot and watched her for a few minutes.  She couldn't see me, but I could see her.  She followed her teacher around for a bit with her hands on her hips.  Then the teacher pointed and Savannah ran to be with the other kids.  Then I went to the gym...  WooHoo! When Ipicked her up, she said she had fun.  She's not one to talk about her day much, but her teacher said they worked on the letter "P" and the numbers 4&6.  She has homework, but it is optional.  She was excited to do it though.  We tried to wait until Daddy got home, but she was just too excited!  She finished doing it today, and I have to say, my kid is pretty smart.  LOL!

She is looking forward to going again on Friday.   In fact, she was upset that she couldn't go today!  I'm just so excited for her to have this time to grow as an individual. She's just so grown up!  Where did the time go?  Here are the few pictures that I took today.  She didn't let me get your typical "First Day of School" picture, but they'll do.  LOL!

Here she is in the car before we left.



This was right before I went to put her backpack away.  Walking away from me to start school for the first time!

Here she is helping her teacher and two of her classmates (the ratio is 2:1, with boys being the 2!)

This is her cubby with her backpack hanging up.  Notice the incorrect spelling.  :D



This is half of her classroom.  The other half (to the right) is where the cubbies are as well as the bathrooms.)

I am very happy with our decision to go to this pre-school.  Even though it takes about 15 minutes to get there, I honestly think that she will make memories that will stay with her for her entire life.  I know I remember some things from pre-k!

Soooo Waldorf!

Savannah and I made homemade pretzels yesterday.  Although she had fun, I have to say they were a pain in the butt!  I'd never baked with live yeast before, so that was an experience.  Luckily one of my bestfriends, Natalie bakes a lot so she was able to help me. 

 Getting the space ready was easy.  I let Savannah do it all by herself.  She was great and so neat when spreading flour over the countertop.



Savannah and I kneaded the dough...







  ...we put it upstairs in her bedroom where it was nice and warm.  But not warm enough, because it took forever for the dough to rise.  So, using Natalie's help, we turned the oven on to 100 degrees and kept it open a crack and put the dough in there to rise.  So much better!

Now the hard part came.  Savannah tried to help, but she got frusterated.  Rolling the dough into long ropes to make the pretzel.  The first two were too thick.  The last five were ok, but my arms were so sore by the end!

 Unfortunetly, I didn't take pictures of the final project.  But trust me.  They weren't anything to behold.  They were tasty though!  I made half with salt and half with cinnamon and sugar.  Did I mention they were tasty!  :D