Everything OTHER THAN the anniversary events!

So 10 days ago was the 20th anniversary of our wedding! And, yes, I'm still not quite ready to write about the week's events! Still collecting photos and emotions and video footage and thoughts - and hoping maybe that post will be a guest post written by Jason once he has had adequate time to absorb the week's events. :) For the record, I'll just say that I went a tad overboard and realized I was doing so once it was a bit too late to change course. So I just threw my love of details, planning, surprises, fun community events AND Jason into both a surprise anniversary dinner with close friends and a surprise anniversary concert with 120 or so amazing people! More on those celebrations and our marking of 20 years together to come! The only other thing I'll note here is that our gals were amazing throughout the 10+ months of planning and preparations - they like surprises too and Alida especially seemed to be joining me a bit for some "post-anniversary-excitement-blues" - the morning after it all concluded she bemoaned that that day was going to be the "boring-est" day ever!

So now for a gardens and family times update, and we'll circle back around to the anniversary celebrations before too long!

First the signs of our kids growing up continue to come at us often. I was at work the day this photo was taken, but it appears that Alida was taking breakfast into her own hands - I'm not sure what the backpack was about. She is enjoying cooking more and more and some of her current specialties include: Making dill and onion chive salad dressing with yogurt. That even gets Terah crunching on lettuce! And she also made a garlic scape garnish for our meal the other night that disappeared quickly. She spent about an hour chopping up garlic scape medallions for that one - it sure helps her appreciate the time her mom puts into cooking when she does it for a meal and sees the fruits of her labors enjoyed AND go into bellies in a fraction of the time it took her to make the dish. 

Terah is also growing up and seems to want to be outside as much as possible. Swinging on the big swings is an all time favorite thing but IF the weather is agreeable (not too hot or stormy) she is also always game for some family gardening. Last evening was one such night where we got the popcorn side dressed with compost together and it was as if we were doing the most exciting activity in the world. Alida was talking to her popcorn about how happy they must be with the compost and then water. Terah was proclaiming how fun gardening was. If only it always went like that! The evening ended by those two gals getting soaked by running through the sprinkler. They were happy and tired by the end of it all!

Last week, I had a bee in my bonnet to get as much in the ground as we could by Friday (when the concert happened, which kicked off a weekend with family around that Jason did not know about). He's pretty used to me getting bees in my bonnet so it did not raise suspicions. Thankfully the weather cooperated and we had a gorgeous day at home together on Thursday to go at it! This is probably not an all inclusive list but in addition to the earlier spring plantings, we now have tomatoes, sweet peppers, okra, basil, trombone squash, delicata squash, yellow wax beans, PA dutch squash, sweet potatoes, white potatoes, kale, amaranth, hot peppers, cantaloupe, Kali's eggplant, Alida's flowers, and I think a few other things Jason slipped in here and there in the ground.

And I didn't know when this day would come but we finally have the sprinkler out and running on a rotation through the gardens. Yes, I never thought I would say it, but we could use some rain. Another news update that is notable probably only for us is that as of last evening, we are also officially out of this year's compost supply so may have to get creative - though most of the things we wanted to be sure to give a boost have gotten one. One of our biggest challenges continues being how to protect plants that are outside our garden fence - and not so much from deer or rabbits or groundhogs but from our chickens. They sure can make a mess of things!

I'm enjoying having a much better sense of the gardens this year than I have in the past. Getting out in them more and more is a very energizing thing for me and helpful to feel like a more central part of that aspect of our homestead. It also means I'm struggling to keep up with some of the other things - it's definitely time to get some oregano in the solar dryer (especially since Alida cleaned out all her dried flowers yesterday when I told her I needed to use it). There is also tea ready for drying. But when the evening is cool and there are weeds to pull, that's what I gravitate towards! One of the things we are doing to not need as much compost is to try to pull and drop as many of the weeds as we can for mulch and fertility. We do takes some basket loads to the pigs for their daily salad intake, but leave the remainder for the gardens!

The spinach is waning (or better said putting its energy into making seed) and the lettuce is going strong. The strawberries were horrible this year and the asparagus has had another welcome surge. We've never put in such robust looking tomato plants and seeds are emerging from the soil about everywhere we look. We are eating some of Kali's yummy collards each week, and filling in with nettles or lambsquarter when we are needing some alternative green options. The sugar snap peas are flowering which is an exciting promise of one of our favorite summer treats to come.

My parents were in their quarters over our anniversary week, making the whole week flow more smoothly AND netting Jason and I not one but two sleepovers. :) The girls have never turned down an opportunity to hang out upstairs and this week was no different, so when they voted on whether to spend another night in "the cave" (Mom and Dad's walk through closet), I believe to vote was a unanimous "Yes!" (I don't remember if my parents got to submit votes or not but either way they would have been outnumbered).

There is always something exciting happening upstairs - Grandma baking, puzzles to put together, crafts happening, Grandpa hanging around to tease or play games with, and this past week a new and very exciting thing! We have joked that our "Tangly Woods television" this spring has been the owl box out back. For weeks we have been seeing the adults poke their heads out of the box, but this past weekend my dad caught sight of a baby owl. We have no idea if we saw multiple ones or the same one but either way the girls (and adults) were mesmerized watching the little one and then getting to see the parents fly in to feed them. We had front row seats!

So after a week full of gardening, we mostly set that aside to soak up extended family time. My parents and siblings and Jason's parents and siblings were all able to make it to the Friday concert - making it the first time both our families were all together since our wedding 20 years prior (at least that is what our memories tell us). Most siblings also came with partners and/or kiddos and two of Jason's aunts and families also joined us. It was great that they could linger into the weekend because, very much like an actual wedding, there was not a lot of time on the night of the concert for in depth catching up!

Saturday included some great hang out time on the soccer sidelines where we took in Alida's game first and then Kali's. I'm quite sure they had the highest number of fans on the sidelines! It was a hot day but thankfully we were able to secure prime shady spots under the few trees at Smithland Soccer Complex for the second game. Some napped, some picnicked, some chatted, some kicked the soccer ball back and forth or played hide and seek or tag, some watched the game intently, some lounged...

Following the soccer games, we headed home and were joined at first by a trickle and then a flood of family. It was a picture perfect evening - cool enough to be pleasant outside and not buggy! So very little time was spent within the walls of our home. The swingset was popular, as were the baby chicks and the soccer field and the view of the mountain and the gardens. And we didn't have to set aside gardening for the whole day, as Jason's sister Christie offered to don some gardening clothes and pitch in so the PA Dutch got seeded before most folks arrived for the evening.

Everyone had cleared out by midday Sunday and then the challenge was upon us to switch gears from anniversary celebrations and meaningful family times to what?! Oh, right, the normal routines that are the basis for all that makes the special times special. So we are back investing in the daily tasks of loving each other and loving this little piece of land. Of tending soil and plants. Of watching things grow.

So here's two short video favorites from the past week. Both highlight well the things growing around here! We've got baby chicks and mama hens all over the place right now (sometimes you won't see chickens in a particular garden but the whole thing will be peeping with little birds in there under plants - we are so grateful for the way they are helping to control our tick population!). This first video highlights what happens when a mama hen is ready to go outside for a break and her chicks are not big enough yet to follow here and do not think they are old enough for her to leave them for a probably much needed break. They call her back, probably way before she has gotten rejuvenated! The second highlights that even our littlest is getting into playing piano. So much that we are about to expand piano lessons to include all 3 girls. Terah's aspirations include learning Mary Had a Little Lamb and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. She's well on her way! Enjoy!!