A Midsummer Night's Dream..in February

The family. The cowgirl is cuddled up on the swing.

Here's my men.

Yes, you can even read comics in the dark! My husband likes to collect old comics, like Sad Sack, for the boys.

The guy who works so hard to make my life so good!

Like everyone else in the Pacific Northwest, I am amazed and thankful for this glorious weather we've had the last week. It's just been gorgeous, not to mention, the kind of weather that gets you out, working in the yard, catching the sun's vitamin D!

I've had my greenhouse heating for the last week, and have had to turn it off during the day! It's nice to think that I can go in there and get warm any day, rain or shine! My husband and kids and I went out yesterday and started on one of the flower beds farthest from sight (it always seems like we work on the one's more visable as you drive up, and the rest get too neglected) of the entry into the house. We worked hard, cleaning out the leftover stuff that had fallen during windstorms, like leaves and twigs, etc., getting the weeds out, the ground turned. We got quite a bit accomplished, and decided to quit on that for the day, and move to a different project so he, I and the kids didn't get so burned out on all the weeding right away. He promised we'd do a major part of the flower beds each week, then we'd get them covered with bark dust, and be ahead of the job.

So, our next project, was to go up to a spot we created years ago, which has two trees just the right space apart for a hammock. We used to have the hammock there, took it down for winter several years, but it got old and worn out, and we just haven't gotten it replaced. That's a priority for this year, we ALL decided. He moved my old bench back up to the spot, on the brick that I had put down all those years ago. I always called it my secret garden, but the last few years it was pretty much neglected. We got it cleaned up pretty good, now we need to get the hammock, and we'll be set for a pleasant afternoon of reading up in the spot. I'll take pictures when I get flowers and get it finished.

Today, after church, we had pizza with a lady Randy's building a house for after he gets the one done he's working on now. They talked about the plans, the ideas, all that. It was a nice lunch, our town has some good pizza!

When we got home, I took my Sunday nap. Before I did, my boys said they wished we had an outdoor fire today, so I told them, you build it, and after my nap, I'll be there. They came in and told me they had it going; dad had gone in to town and got stuff for s'mores. I surprised them with some homemade hot cocoa. We saw the saw go down, wish I would have thought to take the picture of the beautiful sunset we watched just over the edge of the fireplace, as we sat in the benches around the fire. The picture isn't real clear that I did get of the family around the fire. But we all had a lot of fun, visiting, talking about whatever, just relaxing, staring into the fire. Just some memories we will always enjoy.

The dark picture, I wish it turned out better, is the window of our chicken house, the hens are roosting. I always get a laugh out them when we go out to our hot tub, you look over at the hen house, my husband for some reason still has a lamp on it there, and you can see them all roosting. You get the feeling you're being watched...by chickens! Wish I would have gotten the picture just a little earlier, and just a LOT more skilfully, but use your imagination.

The best part of the whole story, is IT"S ONLY FEBRUARY!! Our first outdoor fire, and it's only February? YES!!! Thank you Lord! Here's to many more family evenings around the fire. Now you know why my boys would rather stay home than go anywhere else!