May is Going Fast

 When the days are beautiful and warm, and you're busy, the days just fly by.  Some of these days I want to freeze for when the gloomy days come, but sometimes I'm more than ready to fall into bed at the end of the day.

Last week was quite busy, and I'll mainly just post the pictures I took or was sent.  

Just random photos of the balcony, Steller, and other pretty places.

Can't get enough of the view from the living room.  It's still a little cool for sitting outside for long periods, but it won't be long.

Emily's favorites this year are ranunculus and lupine.  She planted seeds in the raised bed on the side of their house last year, and nothing came up, but they sure did this year!

The cats can't get enough of that sunshine and will lie out there and mutter to the hummingbirds all day.

Sunday:  Mother's Day.  The girls and I were pretty last minute with their mom's gift.  Early in the afternoon, we were in the garage potting petunias.  I didn't even take a picture of the gifts, but they were pretty cute.  Graysen chose pink and Katherine purple flowers, and they were received excitedly since Emily's very favorite things nowadays are plants.

I found these little plastic pots with a clear overlay.  Once the picture is colored - or drawn - you sandwich it between the pot and the plastic cover and have a nicely decorated pot.

They got busy immediately and started coloring and discussing their choices - and then they discovered a blank band of paper, and that was just what they wanted - to be creative.  They just created their own pictures, which is one thing I love about them.  One had MOM on it, and the other one had EMILY!  I'll ask for pictures of the finished products.

The girls chose Mother's Day outfits for everyone.

Princess

Harry Potter

Archeologist

This is a little bit of a stretch from digging dinosaurs out of rocks, but it's much more exciting for a cat-loving little girl.

From Katherine to Mom.

I got beautiful hand-made cards from the girls and a glassybaby hand-blown candle holder from everyone.  I kept hearing about those uniquely-named products through the years on the community page and never expected to own one.  Now I'm in the inner circle. It's beautiful though.  I'll take a photo tonight when it will show up the best.  Elise brought in five different colored geraniums and that beautiful petunia basket.  She listens well and knows what I like.

This sweet surprise came in the mail Friday from Debby.  It's perfect, and I am blessed.  The girls were so excited to see a shirt with my name on it, like I'm the only Mimi ever.  I LOVE it.  A lot.

We don't personally have a dog among us right now, but I do have a new cousin - Max.  When I called Debby to thank her for the shirt, she and Tom were at the airport picking him up.  I can't stand it!  Who can resist that little face and that little body!

And of all breeds to run into last week, there was another English bulldog, Chomps, at the park where we were.  Katherine was yelling, "Awwwwwwww, a puppy," and I asked if we could pet him.  He belonged to someone from Duvall, which is a good distance away, who was here watching his brother play baseball at the high school nearby.

The paw print stamp on Katherine's hand was their reward for a good gymnastics hour.  At first, she was disappointed.  "A PAW?"  A different child gets to pick the stamp every time, and the only boy chose this one.  Appropriate!

Monday:  This was my first visit to soccer camp.  It's just an introduction to soccer in preparation for teams in August.  Graysen decided she didn't want to go but wanted to stay home and help her dad, so it was just me.  A few of the kids were really into, but most of them were just running around joyously and having fun.  Katherine was very enthusiastic but didn't seem to be paying particular attention to what they were supposed to be doing.  I'm not sure any of them did.  Coach was patient and seemed to enjoy himself.  Such a beautiful windy day.

My time has run out, and I still have to cover gymnastics, a train, moving, and more things, I'm sure.  

I'm Expecting Good Things From May

 It's been such a hard winter and hard year for me that it was pretty good to open my planner to start looking at May.

It's not going to be a beautiful week weather-wise, but that's okay.  I have some pretty flowers to look at and plans!

Emily and I plan lots of outings that just don't pan out for one reason or the other.  We have good intentions, but life seems to get in the way.  But now I know how to get it done.  Mention plant shopping!  

I had seen a Senior Center Plant Sale on some of the community pages for Friday and Saturday, so we got on board with that Friday, thinking it was the Si View Senior Center in North Bend, but it was actually the Sno Valley Senior Center in Carnation.  That was even better.  It gave us a chance to take a little road trip and see some pretty things.  It didn't matter too much to us that it was raining.  It wasn't a cold rain, and Emily had already warmed up my car seat and bought Starbucks.  

It was SUCH a good day.  It's rare to make ourselves stop long enough to talk without the girls around, and I can't even remember all the things we talked about on our short trip there.  I remember a discussion about roundabouts and how many of them keep popping up around here.  We reminisced about Remlinger Farms and the Pumpkin Patch and loved seeing the fields of flowers blooming.  We laughed about the crazy things the girls are doing and saying lately and talked about plans for the summer and what to put in her flower beds.  

Carnation is a small farming town, but we just love it.  We think it looks like a really old fishing town with the old wooden buildings and ancient signs.

This is the most interesting Ace Hardware we've seen in a while.  I didn't take more than a couple of photos so found a few on Wikipedia.  

We didn't really have any idea about the sale.  We just wanted to smell the earth and touch some tomatoes, but it was very nice with so many unusual plants.  There were master gardeners walking around to help answer questions and sweet people ready to give their opinions and ideas.

Emily:  I'm about to spend a LOT of money.

We both got an Autumn Joy sedum because I remember loving the one I had in Greensboro, but after we got home, I gifted her mine after I remembered how big they become.  I had not planned to do much with the balcony this summer since I hope to be moving, but there was too much temptation.

This is what we hope for after a few months.

We each got a couple of tomato plants.  I got a Bush Early Girl since it sounds like it will do okay in a large pot.  The rest we'll put in the garden.  I just don't get a ton of sunshine here.  I got some beautiful basil, some parsley, and a jalapeno pepper plant.

They can sit in the window for a few days until we get some more sunshine.

I now wish I had gotten a little cedar tree.

There were so many perennials that we've never heard of.  

Emily found a huge wisteria that she pounced on and loaded up.  I thought we were going to have to open the sun roof, but it just fit.  I hope she doesn't regret it since it was bought without too much thought on where it's going to get planted!

Lots of pretty hostas and heucheras too.

It was a good trip and made us so happy.  Elise already has a couple of plants on the balcony that are doing well, and I'm going to try to hold off on buying too much.  I do want another coral geranium since I let my last year's beautiful one die.  😔

Layla and Bowie are enjoying a little outside time on the balcony.  I think.  Judging by her expression, she wishes I would just go put a can of salmon in her dish and stop looking at her.

The girls spent a couple of hours over here yesterday, and we walked up to the Chevron station to get an Icee, or whatever the latest name for them is.  Frazil, or something like that.  The one they chose was blue.

I love it that we can do such a simple thing as walking that couple of blocks and discussing at length what we're going to get and then being SO excited over it.  We saw two bunnies, went up on Queen Kitty Hill to look over the town, discussed when the pool will be open, and then we came home and acted silly for a long time.

This girl just rolls with the punches.  I'm not sure I would have been as pleasant on finding out I had to sleep with this on my face for 6 weeks.  

Graysen wore an expander on her upper teeth until she had room for her teeth, and she has had that removed and only wears a retainer.  Katherine has more serious problems with her mouth that will affect her breathing if it's not corrected, so she's having to go the extra mile.

She had just picked up that homemade bread in her hand and was sad at not being able to eat it.  In about 2 seconds, she had broken it in half and stuffed the pieces in on both sides.  

I'm about to find out my week's schedule, but whatever we do, it's going to be in the rain.  We have one really warm day without rain, but the rest are drizzly and cool.  I hope to see a soccer game tomorrow and go to gymnastics Tuesday.  And PT.  Wednesday we will work on a Mother's Day surprise for Emily, and the last two days are still questionable.

I have my taxes done, so that takes a little pressure off.  They were easy, but I still had to pay almost what my last incentive check was.  That's not fun.