Spring planting and someone's turning 3!

We did in fact do our main spring planting this past weekend - kale, spinach, lettuce, chard, beets, sugar snap peas, hull peas and snow peas are all in the ground.  And they are currently being snowed upon!  It is now officially spring and the ground is white and snow still coming down. It's to be in the 60's by the weekend so we'll hope for good germination. Time will tell!  But the weekend felt like the promise of things to come. And I even got outside to join in the fun for a few hours on Saturday, thanks to a friend taking the girls on a little birthday outing.

Here's what it looks like outside today - two days after we were busy putting seeds in the ground!

In the meantime, the excitement in this house is palpable.  There is one and only one link left on Alida's birthday chain and she is excited!!! The little pile of presents building up in the dining room is tantalizing but she is actually displaying more patience than I might have expected. I've been the one to initiate an occasional present interlude, as I can imagine it being a little overwhelming to open them all at one time. The most fun to date has been had by opening envelopes that have arrived in the mail. Yesterday there were 3 pieces of mail ALL for Alida and all a little heavier than your average envelope.  Thanks grandparents!!

In the video below she is opening the first of three.  Yes, our daughter is a little obsessed with money, which might concern me if it wasn't so absolutely adorable and if she wasn't also completely generous and unattached to it - she tries to give it away to me sometimes, which I try to accept even if it feels odd for my daughter to give me money (at this stage in life anyway).  She is very excited for our next trip to the Friendly City Food Co-op since her little purse is getting quite heavy!  Last night she was going to buy 4 more boxes of mac and cheese and then she upped it to something like 20 boxes.  So hopefully a few more envelopes with three 1 dollar bills are on the way!  She is currently chomping on some YumEarth Organics gummybears which she opened, expressed complete enthusiasm about and then said, "what are they?"  Is it so about the process for her and we are enjoying watching her!

One final sweet note: a few days ago the girls showed up at our side door with a small bouquet of daffodils.  They were coming up for a vase for them.  They had three little yellow flowers that they had picked from Nora's garden...