Lessons from the garden

To summarize everything that I am about to say, I love to garden.

I love the dirt, the air, the water, the sunshine, the greenness. 

I love the leap of "if I plant it, it will grow" and then secretly wondering if it really will. How could it? How could this tiny little rocklike seed in my palm possibly become more than it is? 

So you plant it. Somewhere dirty and sunny. Then you water it. Then you wait. Maybe water it a little more. 

Then you wait some more. Maybe do something productive. Maybe not. 

And then, almost without fail, it becomes more than it was. 

And you have visible evidence that things can change and literally grow larger and more beautiful than they were before. 

Like love, gardening requires sacrifice. Time, energy, money. 

 But as with sacrifice, it will give you back more than you gave away.

With patience, one little seed will become thousands of seeds. 

If you spend the time to weed out the bad, give it the good, and then let it do it's magic - it will give you back beauty. 

For many years I didn't put much value on growing flowers. You can't eat them, right? So why work for it? 

Oh how wrong I was. How little I valued the joy that beauty brings. You'd think an artist would realize that, but I was naive. 

I'm quite excited for the day when I will no longer be naive. Someday I won't be. 

Look at the way the vegetables swell in the sunshine. Sometimes I think I can almost see them growing as I sit there in the dirt with my little ones giggling and growing around me. 

Sometimes I think I can see them growing as I watch, too. 

And as it turns out, you can eat flowers. Well, critters can. 

 John Denver was singing words of truth when he sang about homegrown tomatoes.
All winter without them is a culinary bummer.

My favorite way to eat them is on wheat bread with provolone cheese.
I'm salivating.

 One little pepper seed. That's all it took to grow this whole plant full of peppers, which in turn are full of seeds.

Sometimes the thing that you are growing isn't visible until you harvest it. Until it's all the way done growing. 

Sometimes, when you don't see what has been growing until the end, you are amazed by what you didn't realize was down there. 

Sometimes the things you harvest are so tiny that it doesn't seem to amount to much at all. If you give up early, it really doesn't amount to much.
But, if like my husband and his raspberry loving Claire, you stay in those pokey bushes and keep on picking, you will end up with an overflowing bucket of berries exploding with sugar and juice and love.

Sometimes when a fruit looks ripe, it really isn't. That takes even more patience than waiting for the sprout in the spring.  

 Sometimes, after giving your little bit of love, you end up receiving so much love in return that it overflows and spills over to your neighbors and family and anyone else who happens by.

And sometimes you learn that to be truly fed, you need more than food. 

Benvenuto!

There was some major excitement in the air at my Mom's yesterday - many preparations going on!

Benvenuto means "Welcome!" in Italian, and we were preparing to greet one! An Italian, I mean.

My brother, C.J., has been serving a mission for our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, in Rome, Italy for the past two years, and returned safely home late last night.
There were so many commas in that last sentence, sheesh!

He got in at 9:30pm, which was way past my kiddos's (is that a word?) bedtime. They all slept the whole way to the airport and were only mostly awake once we got inside.

We let each kid choose what their poster would say.

Emmy was worried there would be a language barrier. 

These two had to share a poster because they were last the best of all the game.

Jonah did not want any exclamation marks.

Lainey was adamant about what her poster would say, and wasn't about to be talked out of it.
Tess: "How about, 'welcome home!'?"
Lainey: "No, Lovin' Chee-Jay!"

The airport was surprisingly quiet, and since no other missionaries were coming home to Salt Lake with him, we were the only group there waiting.
Luckily we arrived with plenty of time to spare, because his flight got in 30 minutes early! One of the first men to come through said to us "He's coming!"

There he is! YAY!

He got a nice shot of us too. He was taller and skinnier than we remembered - but seriously. This kid is very tall, and very skinny. Who comes home after living for 2 years in Italy without putting on some Pasta Weight?! My brother. 

Emmy was only 3 when he left, but she remembered him fine (and was very relieved that he was speaking english).

These two are glad to have someone around to fend off the mobs of boyfriend-wanna-be's, since my parents are failing in that department. Last week:
JoJo: "Cami, would you just fall in love and get married real quick so I don't have to write you every week on your mission?"
Cami: "Thanks Mom."

Claire was much more interested in the snacks than in meeting yet another Uncle, but she'll warm up to him soon. She's not very free with her affection, so if you happen to be someone that she will snuggle up to, count yourself lucky.

We didn't go to sleep until nearly 2am, which hasn't happened since... uh... can't remember that far back. He has yet to emerge from his bed this morning, but since he was awake for 24 hours during all of his flights home - he has some catch up to do. It's going to be great having him around again, we sure do love him!

The Ogden Nature Center

Have you ever been here?

I hadn't been since I was a wee litt'l homeschool lass... which was only like 2 years ago. 

Or 20. 

ahem. 

Groupon had a family pass deal a few weeks ago, so I grabbed one just for kicks. I had been wanting to take my kids for a while, and Caleb has never been.

The birdhouse exhibit is Tweet! I mean Sweet!
Don't tell anyone I said that.

After disposing of your vehicles in the parking lot, you get to walk along this little winding path through the birdhouses to get to the actual Nature Center Lodge, but as with many of our destinations in life, the journey is part of the adventure.

?

There were some very noisy birds on loan to the center for their "Rare and Weird" exhibit.

You really should check it out if you're in the area, these birdies are cuh-yute!

Inside the lodge there are many live reptiles, owls, and critters to see. Plus, lots of hands on stuff, like this magnifying table with feathers to see up-close.

It's all very geared towards kids, but interesting for adults as well. 

The Nature Center is also a wild bird rehabilitation center, and they had so many gorgeous eagles, water birds, and other birds of prey there on display while they healed. Most of them were found in the wild with gunshot wounds or other harm done to them.

All of the ponds there look like this... creepy, right? It looks like slime!

But when you look close, it's just tiny little leaves.

Aren't they the cutest? If you throw a rock in, they ripple apart for a minute, then close right back up.
I know cause I tried it.

The pathways surrounding the Nature Center are narrow and lush and wild - just like they should be. It really is amazing what they have created there, with it being right in the city and all. It feels like you're in the boonies!

If you happen to be in Ogden, and you're easily amused by leaves and sticks and dirt and critters, I recommend this place.
And with a year long pass now, I'm definitely looking forward to incorporating their programs for kids into our home schooling activities.

Cucumber Overload

In the springtime, when everything is just waking up and thawing out and soaking up the sunshiney rays and I'm out in my garden digging in the moist dirty freshness - I don't always think ahead to what it will be like when the garden is actually producing. Keep that in mind. 

I love cucumbers. Love. Their juicy sweetness brings me much happiness. So when I planted 5 cucumber plants I was just thinking how lovely it was going to be to have a cucumber whenever I wanted one! 

Pete loves cucumbers too. Sometime in the planting process, he said "Well, we have an extra whole section here, why don't you just fill it with cucumbers too and see what happens?" 

Want to know what happened? 

For the past 6 weeks we have picked an average of 30 cucumbers per WEEK. 

See that bag? With 10 cucumbers in it? It's headed to the neighbors. It's not the first one to head over there, I guarantee it.

We put these two on wash duty.

I don't know if the cucumbers are actually getting cleaner by putting them in the kiddie pool - but you can't see any dirt, so that counts.

After dropping off a pile on another neighbor's porch last week, Emmy said to me
"We should call us the Veggie Fairies!"

Don't worry, this long green thing which is about to meet it's dirty doom is not a cucumber. It's a zucchini.

Does anyone out there have any great ideas of how to eat cucumbers other than the usual on a salad, dipped in ranchy dip, or on a sandwich?
Better idea: Does anyone want a cucumber? I have some for you.

Don't even get me started on the tomato plants.

Sometimes we play in the mud and call it exercise

So, you've heard of this, right?

The Dirty Dash?

It happens every year, in quite a few states. It's a 10k run which raises money for charities and stuff like that, and basically gives semi-normal people the chance to get really really muddy all in the name of exercise. 

(May I take a moment to admit that I just had trouble spelling 'exercise'? I'm usually a champ speller, but this one had me stumped for a minute. I'm choosing not to be disturbed, since when would I spell that word, let alone do it?)

ahem.

Sign Caleb up! 

 The Utah race takes place at Soldier Hollow in Midway, which happens to be very conveniently located to us.

It wasn't just Caleb who did it either, he roped his Dad and a few friends into it too. 

Caleb bruised one of his leg bones last week, so he was having doubts about whether or not he would enjoy the run. 

There was a cut-off which turned the 10k into a 5k which he was contemplating taking, just in case the run didn't turn out to be as fun as he was hoping it would be. 

His worrying was in vain. 

When they came out at the end, they were beaming with little-boyish "I just played in the mud for an hour and it was awesome" faces and were already planning next years race. 

Seriously. You should have seen this guy in the hall at church today, getting together a neighborhood team!

Whilst we were waiting (say that really fast) for the runners, I gave Jonah my camera, and what do you think he took photos of?

 His favorite doggy.
"Hi Daddy! Look, Utah's here!"

He even figured out how to work the zoom real good. 

So, back to the race, it's more of an obstacle course - with walls to climb over, hay bale mountains, a jaunt through Deer Creek Reservoir, giant water slides - the works, man!

 Oh, and a mud pit. A giant mud pit.

Right at the end.

 You don't actually have to roll around in it, but when they were halfway through it and only muddy from the knees down, Caleb decided that it was his obligation as 'Son' to tackle 'Dad' and take him down.
Don't worry, Dad got even.

They did eventually emerge, with mud in places that mud doesn't need to be.

 This one wasn't really sure what to think of it. Daddy looked happy, but why? Ew!

They opted out of the $4 warm shower, and went for the "free"-zing one instead - which was true to it's name. They were blue under the brown. 

But through it all - they couldn't stop smiling! 

So, here's the official invitation. Next year, our valley.
See you there!