Annie at the game

Annie and I went to our first baseball game yesterday with Texas (I'd been once before, but I was little and all I remember was walking up ramps).   It was so much fun.   Annie had the best time ever.  Not sure she even looked at the players once, but she was over the moon when she realized I was going to let her eat a hot dog and Texas bought her the largest root beer she'd ever seen (which she tried her best to consume every drop of).    Then came the peanuts.  She worked her little fingers to the bone trying to open them on her own.   She relished in getting to drop the shells on the floor, and then crushing them with her feet.    

    It was such an awesome day.    The weather couldn't have been nicer and the seats were amazing.  We were super close and under the shade, so Annie wasn't baking in the sun.    All in all the best first baseball game anyone could ask for.  Thank you Texas. 

 Annie was exhausted from all the excitement that she totally passed out in the car on the way home.   

And continued to sleep for hours afterward.

Here's all of us in our Cardinal's gear.  

meeting the parents

So last night I went to dinner with Texas and his parents.   SO scary.  I spent the entire day super stressed.  Bought four pairs of shoes (which are all going back), tried on 18 different outfits and forgot to eat the entire day (thankfully my mother had the forethought to take me to lunch).  In a state of utter panic, Texas shows up.    Laughing when he walks in; seeing me in a complete state of frenzy.    Long story short...  He told me to put on a pair jeans and we left for dinner. 
Then we pull up at the country club.   I'm nut sure I remembered to breath until Tex put a drink (single barrel whiskey) in my hands.   His parents were beyond nice, but I'm still fighting off the memories of the last mom I encountered.   I really did fear that at any moment she would jump across the table at me yelling.   She didn't of course.   She is incredibly nice, and I had a great time at dinner.   I think I'm over my mom fear, but it might take a while to adjust to the country club. 

Meet Texas

Well I'm a little shocked to be posting this, but Texas has given me the OK to post a picture of him on the blog. Only one, but I'm excited to get to post it. Perhaps in the future he'll be ok with my posting every moment of our lives on the blog. For now, he thinks its a little weird.
So here he is reading Annie a bed time story with Banjo.

Cloth Diapers and my sister?

I am speechless.

Banjo...

(Banjo's new favorite spot: under Tex's truck)

Um, so my dog has now decided that he likes Texas more than he likes me. I feel like my little family is trying to tell me something because both Annie and Banjo have fallen head over heels for Texas and I'm still standing on the side lines scared to death. It's one thing to go on a string of bad dates, it's another to go out with someone you are actually interested in. Suddenly I worry about what my hair looks like and if he'll think I'm cute, or if my crazy lifestyle of chickens and gardening is to much. The conversation of paper towels came up today and I found myself almost saying that they aren't that bad and maybe I could live with them in my kitchen. Thankfully I came back to my senses and was totally honest with him about my irrational hatred for paper towels.

Good morning Girls

Annie went out in the yard with me this morning before I went to work and helped me water the garden and feed the chickens. It was a pretty fun morning. She was really excited to be outside in her jammies and she got to put on my garden shoes. We watered the yard which takes me an hour every morning (unless we get rain), said hi to the chickens and then walked around looking for new flowers opening.

Annie saying hi to the girls

It looks like she's wearing giant gnome shoes.

Purple Clematis
Started last summer and is already bigger than it was at the end of summer last year.

Blueberries
This blueberry bush is one it's third year.
I want to add a new blueberry bush every year, so far I have four.

Lillies of the Valley

Pansy's (Started this in the basement)

Inpatients
I planted these yesterday with Texas. If you remember I started these in the basement back in February. I put in 144 pots and we came out with about 100 plants. A lot of the white didn't come up for some reason. I kinda wonder if I didn't put the seeds in a few of the trays.

Wow

So it's a little shocking how much my hit counter goes up when I even write the name Texas on my blog. I'm not sure if I should be insulted or not. Our daily lives just aren't that exciting I guess. I'm sure Texas would be flattered, but for now I am going to respect his privacy and not post to much about him. Over time I'm sure most of you will meet him and maybe one day if we're all really lucky he'll let me post a picture of him up here. For now the best I can do is say he's a pretty amazing man, I really like him, and yes you can blame him for my lack of posting. It seems dating Texas has been taking up a lot of my project time.

Annie Eating "Texas Pizza" for breakfast Monday morning.

(I did not feed this to her, she got it out of the fridge herself)

Annie dances

Last night Annie stole my phone and invited Texas over for dinner. It was more than a little strange for me. She's met him once, and that was when she was sick, but I guess he made an impression. She was more than excited to show him her bikes and how fast she could peddle. The whole night kinda made me want to cry. I'm not sure how all this works. Dating a man as a single mom. Protecting your child as you get to know someone, but also making sure he's able to handle the reality of, I have a kid. I'm so thankful for counseling, or I might not even try. Texas was more than amazing with her. She wanted to go to the park, where she got up on the little stage and danced for us (this is where I started crying). She never dances around people if she thinks they're watching. Then it was home for dinner and a movie, our Sunday night ritual. She climbed up on his lap and sat there for the whole movie. Telling him all about Scooby Doo and Shaggy. Obviously they get allong swimmingly, but it was a lot more than I thought. This morning Annie woke up and asked for Texas. So I've pretty much decided I will have to seriously limit the amount of time they are around each other.
As much as I like Texas, it is very early in the game and I need to be sure of whats going on. If left up to Annie I think she would see him everyday. So if you have a few extra minutes in the day, please throw in a prayer for me and Annie. That I will be able to handle all these changes easily and be able to protect Annie. The thought of her getting attached to someone and that person leaving is a serious fear for me, as it should be. I want her to always feel free to dance.

Strawberries

So I know I posted a few weeks back about moving our strawberry crowns, well they really like their new home. They have taken off and are about to produce their first crop. The rest of the Garden is slowly getting planted. I put in the tomato plants today and I'm going to plant the rest tomorrow if I have the time. I know this might sound weird, but the Soil blocker recommends planting at night, so yes I was outside planting tomatoes in the dark. My neighbors think I'm psycho.

Annie meets Texas

So last night Annie met Texas. It wasn't really planned, but it worked out. Annie ended up with a fever and I couldn't leave her, so Texas came here for dinner instead of going out. Annie is a total sucker for a man with gifts. He brought her a chicken (not a real one) from Hawaii and a blue t-shirt. She said very little to him, but this morning she woke up and asked if Texas could come visit again when she wasn't sick. Stating, "I was shy to him because I was sick." And then her new chicken took bunny's place on the sofa. I was a little shocked to see that.

How annie cures hiccups

It's no secret I'm a bit of a food Nazi. I do not let Annie have junk food, fast food or mounds of sugar. What I love is that recently Annie has started making her own food choices, and I love her attitude about it. Instead of just telling her "no, don't eat that." We talk about why eating sugar is good in tiny amounts, but too much is bad. Why eating veggie's helps us grown strong and healthy. Over time Annie has started developing little "food Cures" for what ever ails her. For example, if she's feeling short that day she'll ask me for Brussels sprouts.

These are few of my favorites:

Carrot= "get rid of hiccups"
Tea= "to get the sneezy monster out"
Avocado= "make my skin beautiful"
Brown Rice= "it's for my hair shiny"
Brussels= "so I get tall"
Spinach Sausage= "these make me nice."

This morning when she got out of bed and put on her dress that was way to short I told her to stop growing. Annie just smiled and said, "it's cause I eat the good stuff."

The healthy sneak

Annie and I went to the grocery today. Something we as a rule try to avoid on Saturdays, but Wholefoods was having a sale on chuck roast and whole chickens, that we couldn't miss. Our freezer is stocked with meat, and it is such a happy sight to see. On our way home from the grocery Annie sneaked into the grocery bags and helped herself to some Spinach and Banana. She told me, "together they make a lovely snack."

Good mornings

Annie has a new morning routine that I think is wonderful. She comes into the den sits up on the back of our new sofa and watches the birds outside with Bunny. I love that she doesn't go straight to the TV or even the kitchen. It has been really nice having a permanent sofa in here. Annie and I both kinda like small spaces. The big rooms in this house feel to empty.

I used to have to move our living room sofa in here for Annie and then move it back whenever we had company over. It was a pain. Thank you to my friend Texas for helping me move the sofa from a friends house. I don't have to relocate my old sofa twice a week, and Annie has started this new morning routine.

Why does my hair not look this good in the morning?

An overworked security system

I'm very sorry to say that I think Banjo has snapped under the pressure of his job. It is no easy task to guard a single mom and her three year old when your only a foot and a half tall. For the past three days Banjo has been very timid and quite. Not his jolly self at all. Then tonight he just snapped. He's been barking at the ceiling for the last 45 minutes and I can't get him to stop. He is sitting next to me right now barking. Nothing but barking. I have to admit it freaked me out for the first 25 minutes, then I realized he's just cracked and I may need to consider trading him in for a bigger model (just kidding). So far the two times he has gone ballistic like this someone really was trying to get into the house, and I was very grateful to have him with me. Tonight though, there's no one out there. We checked. I think Banjo is done with us living on our own and so am I. I've had enough scares to realize that I am seriously not tough when it comes to intruders, and I'm tired of being so scared. Taking applications now for roommates. Must love Annie, chickens and know how to use a kitchen without a microwave. Preferably large male and very scary with a small arsenal of weapons (that I will never see, but find comfort in knowing you have them).


On a happier note we had some wonderful signs of spring in the yard today (and one not so wonderful).

The Good:

This is Carla the frog. Annie did not kiss Carla, but assured me that, "If I kiss him he will turn into a real prince."

The lettuce is coming up

And my favorite, Lillie's of the Valley have come through


The Bad:
The first tick of the season! YUCK! Thankfully I found him crawling on me and not on Annie.

Tuesday night in the dirt

My Tuesday night was spent making lots more soil blocks. I think I've got it down now. I made 150 blocks last night, and it was super easy. I think I was over packing the soil blocker before and so it took me forever. This time I just hand packed a little and then repeatedly plunged the soil blocker into the bucket to pack it in. They came out just as tight as when I would cram soil into each block individually. Annie came home from her dads just in time to help me finish off the last 50 blocks and seed them. We should have started the flowers weeks ago, but I was busy and the lights were overcrowded at the time. Now with all the cold veggies (lettuce, Broccoli, and Brussels), Pansies and Impatiens out there's lots more room.

We started Zinnias, bachelors buttons, pincushion flowers, morning glories, and lots more tomatoes and bell peppers.

I'm in trouble

"Annie, please put your pull up in the trash."

Annie's reply, "We not robots mommy."

Easter

The Easter egg hunt was a little ridiculous. When hiding the eggs, I forgot to calculate height, and ended up putting everything to high for the girls to reach. I will have to remember not to do this for next year.

Annie enlisted the help of her trusted sidekick Banjo in hopes that he could sniff them out. Sadly the eggs were not at his level either and so Banjo wasn't much help.

After the egg hunt came picture time. I got each girl a pair of goggles. It was pretty funny trying to get them all to wear them. Notice Sadie is not in the photo. In recent days she's become to cool for such things.

Annie really likes hers. If you can't tell from the photo, she's pretending to be Flounder from The Little Mermaid.

Getting photos is not as easy as anyone thinks. Here's our first attempt:


And this is what we show to people:

And here's how we got it: "If you don't smile you will get NO CAKE!"


And this is the end result of egg hunts, photo shoots and cake.

today

planted lettuce starts. Sowed purple carrot, beets, orange carrot, leeks, and spinach (had to dig out and trench in new soil for the spinach). Now I'm going to bed.

Getting the Clay out of Clayton

My back will probably never straighten out after yesterday. All because my sweet Annie wants purple carrots. Which means I need a root bed to plant them in.

I don't know why I didn't think about the fact that I live in a city built on solid clay before letting Annie pick out purple carrot seeds. I guess part of me thought the entire yard can't be clay. I was wrong. All of Clayton is clay. It has two inches of top soil spread over hundreds of miles of solid heavy clay.

So back to my dilemma. Root veggies need need nutrient rich soft loose soil, not hard clay. So I needed to find an area that would be contained to dig out and refill. The clay is actually a great container in a way. It's just hollowing out the container that sucks. I went with "Mels Mix" for the soil composition. If you've heard of Square foot gardening then you know what it is. If you don't, it's basically, 1/3 Compost, 1/3 peat moss, 1/3 vermiculite. Not the cheapest route to go, but it's a amazing how well things grown in it, and how low the maintenance is.

So this is what I started with:

I tend to garden to opposite way. Most people lay out their garden on paper and block things out before they start anything. I can't do this. I have to actually see the canvas I am working with in order to plan out where everything goes.

So I decided to put the root veggie bed in the middle. It will be a great container with very clear boarders. It's hard to tell from here, but this is dug out two feet deep.

After I finished digging I realized I couldn't reach the center from the edge of the bricks and you cannot walk on a root bed. It will compact the very soil you are trying to loosen, so I made a bridge from clay in the middle.

But that took up to much planting space, so I backed it off to just go halfway through.


It was really late when I finished, so I took a picture this morning. This is the bed filled in and ready for seeds.

10 hours of back breaking labor for Annie's purple carrots. If she doesn't eat them I will most likely cry for a month. If she does it was a day well spent.

A Few days

I haven't had the chance to post for a few days. Sorry about that. I've been spending every spare minute outside in the yard and just haven't wanted to come inside. Today is a different story. I went off my diet last night and now I am paying for it. My allergies are terrible, and going outside makes me fall apart. So, here I am blogging because I can't go outside.

Yesterday morning was awesome. Annie and I got up early and went to work in the yard. She discovered roly polies and I laid bricks down in the new potager garden. It was a blast.

Annie playing with her new friends.

half way done with tilling and removing old plants.

Potager garden before.
Notice all the lovely mulch put down. I'm super grateful to my new friend Texas (this is not his real name, but what all my friends have decided to call him) for helping me get mulch in his truck. More about him another time.

After. We are making our own little fence around the garden (rabbits are terrible here).

close up.
I put the herbs in from last year and they are already doing great.

And our basement is full of flowers, patiently awaiting the last frost date.