Busy Times

We've had a lot going on the last few weeks - here's the condensed list:

1. Harvest Season - we always love our garden, but it is sure a lot of work this time of year. What to do with the excess is always the question - we usually can most of it and give away what we can't can. This year we had some kind friends give us about 6 bushels of pears from their trees. It has been such a treat eating our fill of fresh pears! So far we've been able to can 42 quarts worth. We've also canned 21 quarts of peaches, a few pints of salsa, 7 quarts of tomatoes and several dozen quarts of applesauce (the apples were provided by another neighbor). It's been a wonderful bounteous harvest!

2. Home-Preschool - We decided that Curious George needed to be at home learning this year and I'm really glad that we made that decision. He's learning to read and it's so fun and rewarding to be able to teach him.

3. Preschool Music Class - I wanted to put C.G in a music class this year and I couldn't find one in our area that taught music in the way I wanted him to learn it so I decided to teach one myself. It's been a lot of fun (our first class was today) and I'm really excited about it. C had a blast and so did I - I really love teaching music.

4. Soccer - C.G is in a little pee wee soccer league. It's been so much fun for him to make new friends and learn about teamwork. It's been fun for us too - if you've never watched four-year-old's play soccer, you really haven't lived! It's hilarious.

5. Pre-two-year-old - We're going through the pre-two's with Jesse Bear. He loves to exercise his independence and "do it". He learns more and more words every day. I'm learning that when you have more than one child, it's the combination ages that are difficult. Like for us right now, the combo of an almost 5-year-old and an almost 2-year-old has interesting challenges. For instance, the other day I hopped out of the shower and the entire box of cheerios (that was securely locked in the "baby-proof" pantry) was poured all over the floor. Now I'm sure the toddler was not able to get into the pantry himself, but with the help of a four-year-old looking for laughs- no problem! I come into the room to two boys in the middle of the pile of cheerios gobbling up fistfuls of them at once. I of course was too cheap to throw the things away (after all they were eating them off the floor anyway, right?). So we spent the morning cleaning them up and putting them back in the box. That was less than a week ago and we've had a similar situation repeated with the same box of cheerios two other times. All I can say is, I'm glad I didn't throw them away!! :)

Don't you love life? There are always new interesting phases to experience. The phase I'm in right now is wonderful - I love having little children at home. I love to teach them and I love the things they teach me. There are plenty of rain clouds when mothering little ones, but their little sunshiney spirits can usually brighten even the most dismal of days.