Our YARD: Beauty and Harvest

We LOVE our yard (...for the most part. There is a lot we are going to do to make it better, but...)

Please enjoy some pictures of the things we enjoy about our yard.

 The view (even in Winter)

 Robby loves the sound of the wind through this tree.

In Spring, our yard came ALIVE with Beauty.

 daffodils

 These purple things I don't know what they are called.

 We have awesome, HUGE shade trees. I think they are willows.

 Spencer loved to rip these little flowers apart.

 Timothy smelling the flowers.

 This tree also provides an awesome climbing spot.

 Our back yard backs to a sheep pasture... so we enjoys our neighbors!

 My dad saw these all around our deck and said they were called "Bleeding Hearts" (this was before they had bloomed, I didn't get it)

 Until they flowered. So neat!

 Our awesome front yard!

 And back yard.

 There were LOTS of sticks throughout our yard and Timothy took advantage of that.

 I was so excited when these bloomed

 They are so pretty and really added a POP of brightness to our yard.

 And there were lots of different colors of them.

 This is the lavendar in the back... it is really pretty and smells nice too.

 Apricot tree 

( was able to make 2 jars of jam + we enjoyed just munching on them)

 This WAS our Cherry tree... we got about 1 handful before the birds.

We have three garden boxes that we planted
These are really outdated pictures, but this is what you get for now.

Tomatoes

broccoli

zucchini 

plum tree (they are now very ripe and dark purple)

I have plans for plum jelly.

This is a small sampling of what we get from our harvest.

We have made lots of yummies with these. Blackberry jam and smoothies, cucumber and tomato sandwiches up the wazoo,  tomato sauce, and fresh salsa, ratatouille, and steamed broccoli.

There you have it. The Beauty and Harvest that is our yard.

I would go take more pictures of what things look like now, but I am too lazy and I promised to blog more, so here is a post that is somewhat incomplete.

Our front flower beds have needed a bit of work, so I have been slowly working on those. We also have BIG PLANS for out back yard. We'll see how things come to be. Stay tuned.

The Beautiful Blogger Award

THANK YOU:
Lucky me, I was nominated for another award! THANK YOU Melody at Merrie Melody for the Beautiful Blogger Award. I'm not sure I deserve this, as you definitely have a BEAUTIFUL blog, and mine is...not. But I am excited for the opportunity to nominate some BEAUTIFUL BLOGS and bloggers that I follow!

Rules

7 Interesting Things about Me:

1. My favorite color is yellow... so I painted the whole upstairs of my house yellow. So now I have sunshine wherever I go!
2. I have chickens! 6 beautiful hens that give us wonderful eggs to eat! But I'm the big chicken when it comes to being near them. Poor girls have been rudely scared away too many times because I don't want them near the door when I get their waterer (otherwise they peck me or I think they'll peck me) Robby laughs at me for this, but it's something I've accepted about myself- I'm jumpy with animals.
3. I like to read (not as much as some people I know). As in movies, I'm a chick flick kind a girl... but don't give me dirty trash, I'll take an LDS Romance novel (say Anita Stansfield addict) anyday.
4.  I love and have always love dill pickles. (and lucky for me I discovered recently that they are 0 calories)
5. Something that I am always surprised at when people say they didn't know this about me (like... I haven't told you that before?) is that I am from Canada. I was born there and therefore will always be a Canadian! My family moved to North Dakota when I was 10 and I have since become a naturalized citizen of the USA.
6. I like to think that I am crafty... I sew a little, scrapbook a little, attempt to make cute things for my kids rooms or my door a little... but really I'm not. I have pipe dreams that usually don't happen but in all reality I think it comes down to me being too cheap to get the tools or materials I need to make my craftings great.
7. Bragging moment! I was the 5th child in my family and 5th to enter college... but the FIRST to graduate! That's right, when does the 5th kid ever get to be the first at anything? Well, I'm proud to say I was my parents' first college graduate!

Nominations:

The rules said to nominate 7. Well, to continue with my adjustment that I did for the Lovely Blog Award I will half that and do 4 beautiful Blogs:

1. Shelley at Burdens Made Light- because she is beautiful inside and out. She has a beautiful heart, a beautiful testimony that she shares, and a beautiful angel baby. She has been through a struggle that would break most women, but she is strong and helps others by sharing her thoughts on her Beautiful Blog.

2. Kayli at Bells and Whistles- because she is the most beautiful redhead in the world, her children are absolutely the most beautiful kids (aside from mine own, of course), and they live in Switzerland (what's more beautiful than that?). She is funny, and clever, and she shares her life.

3. Sarah at Sarah Rae Photography- because she takes beautiful pictures and lets us all see them.

4.Brittney at Seth Loves Brittney- because she shares the little things that make her life beautiful and things she loves about her beautiful kids! She also takes beautiful pictures! (although her blog is private, so most of you can't link to it, you'll just have to take my word for it. Beside the award is for her anyway)

The One Lovely Blog Award

THANK YOU:
My Blog was nominated by GlowWorm at Marvelous Pigs in Satin for the One Lovely Blog Award. Thank You so much! I was truly surprised and honored to be given this. (Especially since you only nominated 1 person for each award you gave). On her blog she said this about me: She shares her family and her struggles and successes and I love reading her tiny adventures whenever she posts.  She is also a rockin' kickboxer. 

Thank you. I'm not really a rockin' kickboxer, but I do enjoy it!

Criteria

Nominations:

For the next part of the criteria (after Thanking GlowWorm) I was really torn. The rules I read said to nominate 15 blogs for this, BUT she only nominated ONE, me. It made me feel special to be the one chosen out of all the blogs she follows.

WELL, I decided to choose 8 (half-way between) and to help you feel special about your nomination, I will tell you all why I chose them!

1. Michelle at The Richardses- because she is HILARIOUS! I love reading about her adventures as a mom and the pictures she shares of her little girl are adorable. It reminds me why she was one of my favorite roommates (even if that was for only one summer).

2. Katie-bo-batie at Dear Goodness- because she shares about her family (her 3 boys are dang cute) and the crazy outdoor endeavors they go on the make me wish I was more like her.

3. Becky at My Reason to Smile- because she is inspiring and beautiful and strong and I love reading about her love for her family.

4. Ilene at The Thatchers- because she is the best mom I know and she uses her blog to share her family and is able to share so much in few words (something that I have never been able to do). AND she's the Real ROCKIN' Kickboxer.

5. Sarah at Dave & Sarah- because she shares lovely things about her life. She is honest about it and continually shares how she is working to improve.

6.April at The Carrs- because she has a fun and cute family and when I read her blog, she helps me to realize how much more I should appreciate my kids. She is awesome!

7. Lisa at For Kicks and Giggles- because she shares her happy moments, her frustrations, her cute kids, and the things she loves to do.

8. Kami at La Familia Latorre- because she is just amazing. She has darling kids, but shares all the funny and frustrating moments as well as the happy. And she is the best seamstress I've ever known!

7 Things about Me:

1. I have a hate-hate-love relationship with dishes. I hate dirty dishes all over my sink and counter, I hate doing dishes, but I love the look of a clean kitchen with no dishes in sight. (remember this?) Sadly, the middle hate over powers the other two, but when when the hate of dirty and love of clean kick in, it's a beautiful thing. (having a great dishwasher helps too).

2. I am not a great/consistent blogger. I have at least 4 unfinished posts and way more ideas for a post floating in my head... but do I work on them? No, I tend to blog read rather than blog write. So thank you for supporting my obsession for living through others. I think my main problem is that I want to get things just right, I want to be witty and funny (really, I'm not either) and try to appear better than I am... that's why it takes so long to post, I can't really ever get there.

3. I've recently taken up running (always hated it before, then I wanted to lose weight and running was a way to help). I got myself signed up for a race to keep motivating me and have now run five 5k's this summer and just last Saturday I ran my 1st 10K. It was awesome! I plan to post about this... soon.

4. I probably have an unhealthy fixation with facebook. I really don't even get into all the apps or games or anything, but I have gotten into the bad habit of checking facebook all day long (in the interest to see if anyone as commented or liked a status, or whatever). I need help.

5. I am #5 in a family of Eight! I have 6 brothers (3 older, 3 younger) and an older sister. I love my family.

6.I have 2 adorable little boys. They make me smile and laugh... they also drive me nuts and make me want to hide. Sadly I need to be better and play with them more (rather than play on facebook and blogger) btu I love them

7. I think my favorite game of all time is Wackee Six. I could play and play and play. Good thing I have Kathy and Robby to play with. (and it most likely comes down to the fact that I am good and I win often. I mean who wants to play games they lose all the time?

Amateur Night in the Sewing Room

Well, I did another sewing project. This was a bit more complicated (still basic though), and I'm proud to say I finished (in basically 1 day). Wahoo!

CURTAINS!

 And believe it or not (i'm more on the not side) the pattern mostly lines up.

 The upclose of this darling fabric I found.

 Technically it is reversible... but when I reversed it in front of the window, the pattern showed through.

I could also put it this way if I so choose.

Now Spencer's room looks a little bit more complete.

Shame!

All my blog friends are putting me to shame. As I follow and read several blogs everyday, I am never disappointed to find nothing to read... There is always something. I need to do better so I can contribute to all your blog feeds. Consider this my goal renewal to be a better blogger.

Family visits: Part 1

Towards the end of July, we had my sister's (Jerusha) family come stay with us on their way to a Reunion for Chris's (her husband) family. It was AWESOME to see them and play and especially to have a home where we could keep them while they were here.
We did lots of fun things during their stay, so I am going to break it into parts! ALTHOUGH, these are NOT in chronological order (mainly because I don't have all the pictures for their whole stay, yet).
Part 1: Temple Square
On Wednesday of their stay we went to Salt Lake City! Robby had to work, so I took my 2 kids and Jerusha and Chris took their 4 and we headed north.
 We first had lunch at the new City Creek Center. It was great to get whatever we wanted to eat from different restaurants, but all sit together in a back secluded corner! Although I have no pics from here, it was nice. Timothy's favorite part was the potty. In the Family Restroom they had 2 toilets, a big one and a little one with a "flower " seat. It was great to be able to go to the bathroom and take the boys with me (and have room for us)... and Timothy went, too!
After lunch, we headed across the street to Temple Square. We first stopped in at the South Visitor's Center and learned a bit about the building of the Salt Lake Temple. It was pretty neat to see the model of the Temple with the walls gone, so we could see what was inside. I've been inside, so it was cool to see where things are in relation to other things (because honestly I'm lost when I'm inside).
Then we put pennies in the fountain and headed on up to the Tabernacle. We just stopped in quick to see the Organ and sit in the really uncomfortable benches for a minute.
Then up to the North Visitor's Center. We saw some really cool thigns in there.
 First off, the Christus Statue.
Timothy was so excited to see Jesus. He wanted to talk to Him. I had to gently explain that it was only a statue and he wasn't going to talk back... but I wanted to try to do it a way where he still felt like he should "talk to Jesus and He would answer". I hope he understood.

  We saw a lot of beautiful Art; Depictions of scipture stories and such. Then downstairs there more cool things about the scriptures and interactive things for the kids to do. There were also displays about humanitarian efforts. We watched a little video about the food stuff the church does with canning and meat packing. I was able to tell Timothy about how me and daddy have served in the cannery helping with peaches (we saw that on the video) and Daddy has also served in the meat packing plant.

After that, we went across the street to the Conference Center.

We decided we had enough time to do a tour. (Good thing we had 2 double strollers, or our kids would not have made it).

The nice Sister who took us around really made an effort to keep things brief so our kids wouldn't be to antsy and bored.

The Fountain

The "hour" tour took probably 30-40 mins. But we got to see it all still! (we just may not have learned as much trivia as other groups).

We Love our Prophet dear!                           

From the roof 

The kids loved the little water fall and fountain

Belive it or not, we ALL fit in the elvators.

After our tour we headed back to parking at the CCC, via the picture spot.

(some people were less enthused about more pictures)

 Isn't the Temple so beautiful? And the landscaping they do is amazing.

All in all, it was a great day! Both kids slept on the way home (Spencer got 1/2 his nap while we were still touring). And afterwards, Jerusha's family was able to visit a good family friend in SLC.

Credit where credit is due: My amazing sister took ALL the pictures (except the ones she is in, I took those) So if you love a picture, it was all her! Thanks Roosh for giving them to me!