He's the MAN

My husband is awesome! Have I mentioned that lately? He single handedly took on wiring all the electrical for our unfinished basement and today he passed the final inspection! He's the MAN!

Becca & Kathryn win

Congrats to Becca who won my bloggy giveaway! Her little girl is a beauty and just starting to walk!

Another cheer for winner number two Kathryn. With three kiddos (two of them being adorable girls).

My very technical winner picker system worked quite well. In fact the boys wanted to keep playing so why not have two winners? Someone was kind enough to do the same on their give away and I got to get in on a great book. Numbers 87 and 116 . . . you're the big winners over here at Granola. Happy hair clipping!

Sigg Bottles

Okay I'm of course chagrined to admit this but I made it through all 700+ of the bloogy giveaways and have registered for tons of great stuff (I was up way to late last night). Who can resist up the opportunity to win a free gift certificate to Amazon? There were a few people giving away Sigg water bottles - awesome since I'm trying replace the kids' plastic water bottles and get a couple of stainless steel/aluminum sippys for our babe. With that in mind I thought this was a good read. Over at UpNorthica they have a list of things you can do with your old plastic water bottles.

How we enjoy the outside

The temperature is predicted to reach 72 today! It's supposed to snow tomorrow night but hey give me snatches of summer and I can handle it - well maybe - or maybe I'll be huddled under my "happy" light with a pile of blankets rocking back and forth chanting giberish.

The boys and I went outside to dig around the yard and get the garden ready. The dirt sifting through my fingers and the heat on my back was magic. I am so very grateful for our fenced in backyard. Each of us have our own reasons for enjoying it. I think one of E's reasons is cause he can now hitch himself up on the horse swing, for me it's the gardens, for agent H it's well . . . the joy of being able to pee outside. Yes folks, as I dug away in the garden he called to me "Mom don't look!" I don't know what mom would actually abide by that request so of course I snuck a peek at what was going on . . . sure enough he had stripped down and was taking care of business next to the oak. I so hope the neighbor wasn't looking out her kitchen window. Two minutes later E was at the tree trying to tug down his pants too. Augh!

Baby bud hairclips giveaway

This bloggy giveaway is now closed. Thank you. I'm giving away another pair of baby hair clips from our shop! The carnival has started over at Bloggy Giveaways and I'm getting in on some of the action. EH might even get in on the fun and offer up one of his picts from the shop - I'll let you know. Most everyone is welcome to enter (bloggers & non bloggers; sorry no internationals), please leave me a comment and a way to get in touch with you (email or blog). I'll come up with some way to pick a winner, probably a random number deal. I think that should do it!

A little about my blog - just in case you're wondering if you should subscribe to one more feed. :) I journal the chatter/activity going on around our house (mostly coming from our two little boys, my husband and baby berry who is expected to join the ranks in August), and there's some preschool/kindergarten homeschool ideas and organic/healthy living and cleaning mixed in. Mostly I think this is my place to feel the satisfaction of completing a full thought - something that doesn't happen very often in a home blessed with small children.

Tech savvy

Okay so I just took pictures off of my husband's camera and put them on my computer (a new trick for me to have learned), I updated our etsy shop with the new picts, AND I added new elements to my blog (note preggy ticker and baby boutique link on the left). I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself. Who knows, maybe I'll learn how to check my phone messages when away from home next or maybe just catch up on reading the 750+ posts on the blogs I subscribe to. Ugh!

Messy is more fun

Thursday and Friday are my cleaning days. Since we're off for the weekend I wanted to make a special effort to clean up so I could come home to a clean house. I must have mentioned this to H (who for the time being shall be called Agent H - yes we're big into playing super heros and spies around here!). His reply . . . "It's just more fun and interesting when it's messy."

He's um . . . reading?

E has always loved to tear apart the pie cabinet in the corner of our kitchen. It's filled with all the school supplies and learning games. Now since I cleaned it H and E both have their own shelf, a shelf for games, and a shelf for the coloring/cutting supplies.

The door was swung wide open as E was pilfering through games and H's eye was attracted to the beginning reader books on his shelf. We've barely cracked these open, I guess I figured we'd spend time on them next school year for kindergarten. He strolled over to the shelf, pulled a set of Brand New Readers off the shelf and casually said "I guess I'd better get started on these Mom." I didn't give it much more than a passing thought until I heard him over on the steps sounding out the words. . . ahh . . okay. I decided to go check things out. He proceeded to read through two books! Okay, yes I helped him a bit, especially since we haven't really practiced the long sound for vowels, etc. But he knew the "sh" sound and a few other word combinations that surprised me - way to go Word World! Now I know we have a long ways to go on this, but it is so much fun to have him be so excited about reading and trying to do it all on his own.

Puree it away

Nuts! I am embarrassed, a little mortified, discouraged. I've just experienced one of those moments where you do something really stupid and it effects a number of people and a lot of my time and energy went into it (all with ernest good intentions of course!) Unfortunate (or maybe not) for you I'm not going to relive my humiliation in print here.

But I will say that a good way to sort through embarrassment (besides realizing that wallowing in self-absorbed "why? O whys?" is vanity and not becoming of a trying-to-be godly woman) is to PUREE! This morning I've steamed and pureed a head of cauliflower, a tub of spinach, and a red bell pepper. Now I just get to pick a recipe from Deliciously Deceptive to try out. The brownies with spinach are sounding really good! I could use some semi healthy guilt food.

How?

H asked the following question as I was changing E's diaper:

"How does the baby (in my womb) get its diaper changed?"

We Have Movement, Act II

Last night EH put his hand on my belly and was able to feel a very active baby wrestling around.

It's a girl!

That is according to last night's labor dream (the first of many if this is like other pregnancies). As we were unable to make it to the hospital in time (1.5 hour delivery, now that's wishful thinking!) we had a home birth in the utility room at my parent's house. And of course we were in the middle of having a family get together so even family from out of town was at my folks to welcome the babe. I couldn't go back to sleep because I kept imagining holding a little baby so close. Can you tell I'm pretty excited?

Spring Cleaning

I don't think I was up for much spring cleaning last spring so the house really needs it now. The boys and I have had a great time wiping down all the bedroom walls. After discovering the walls were covered in spider webs, I'm surprised the Adam's Family wasn't knocking down our door to move in - yuck! It was a game of musical ladders as every time I went to rinse out my rag some little one swiped my ladder and I had to start in another spot.

I saved the boys' room for last just because there was more stuff on the walls to take down. Having just finished it, I'm glad that it worked out that way. Someone, who shall remain nameless, seems to find it convenient to wipe boogers on the wall rather then a tissue. Do little girls do these things? Augh!

I used Dr. Bonners Sals Suds for cleaning. I love it because it's very kid/environment friendly and it has a nice piney scent.Generally I use a lot of scented vinegar for cleaning but I had this on hand for some cleaning solution recipes from the book above. The book gives a great overview of common cleaners and why they are or aren't good to have around.

The kitchen cupboards and school cabinet are all fresh and reorganized inside too! I've included some pictures - mostly done ones because I forgot to photograph the befores. Yum - I just love deep cleaned places.













What else is on the to-do list?
-Wipe down the walls of the main level
-Deliver the bags of extra "stuff" to 2nd hand store, friend with a toddler a size down from mine, etc
-Craig's List all the magazines we're finally "letting-go" of
-Sort and purge in the bathroom closet
-Paint the boys' new room (hopefully with a low VOC)
-Use Howard Naturals to wipe down all the woodwork in the kitchen
Feel free to check out what others are doing to "green" spring clean at Natural Family Living Blog

Don't Make Me Count to Three

Oh that feels good! I have finally finished reading one of the parenting books that lay stacked beside my bed for way too long. Don't Make Me Count to Three by Ginger Plowman. I even took notes as it's not my book and I there was so much I wanted to be able to review and remind myself of. One of the major points that I walked away with was this:

Do we want our children to obey God the first, second, or the third time? Okay a no brainer. But if we as God's appointed authority over our children allow them to wait until the third time to comply what are we teaching them? So as inconvenient as it is we are going to do our best to follow through with our boys the first time. This means I need to be more mindful about the words that come out of my mouth, am I able/willing to follow through with a request before it's out of my mouth. So "let your 'yes' be yes and your 'no' be no". By the way diaper changes have been easier with E since he has been getting a time-out the first time he doesn't come and lay down. We have been experiencing PEACEFUL, compliant diaper changes (not all the time but enough to notice).

Another point that was a new concept for me to wrap my thinker around was this one:

We all know that consistency in parenting is so very important for our kids but when you consider the verse "Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking in anything" James 1:2-4, it leads us to understand that when we are persistent in the godly rearing of our children (as in many things) it will bring about a maturity in us. Cool!

There was this other parenting book I really wanted to read but I wouldn't let myself read it until I had finished this one and I'm so glad that I did. The other book I wanted to read I'll review sometime here but let me just say that I just finished it and it only took me 10 days to read!