First Week of School

We servived our first week of school even with all the chaos in our life. The kids had to go back to waking up at 6am, I had to get in the hang of taking the kids to 2 different schools and picking up from 2 different schools and fit my work schedule into the middle of it all. Brooke had drill team Monday, I had to have tree estimates everyday to take care of our dead trees and then Brooke had to go to her lesson that was Thursday during the start of the storms from the hurricane. Pouring down rain and 25 mph winds doesnt stop her from riding. I am really glad the week is over! The kids both had a good week at school so that was a bonus to the whole week. I hope next week goes ok. We have the tree people coming at 8am Monday morning and I have to move all the animals from the barn and get the kids to school and my classes start ,so I may be a little crazy by Tuesday.

The Stray!

On Friday we went to Blizzard Beach for the day. We had a really good time and were wore out. We got home about 10:30 pm and went to the barn to give the horses hay and found this chicken in the barn. It is not one of ours. So we now have a stray chicken! Leave it to me to have a chicken just wonder up to my house, especially were I live. To top it off it is a rooster! So the kids have been playing with him and feeding him until I can find were he lives or I can find him a new home. I think all my neighbors would kill me if I kept a crowing rooster! He is not crowing yet but he is still a baby so I guess he can stay till he finds his voice. I think my chickens told him he can eat really good here if he stays!

Ashlyn's First lesson

Ashlyn had her first riding lesson. She did so good! Brooke normally takes a lesson every week to work on her jumping but she is at camp so we put Ashlyn in her place this week. Tony said she wouldn't last 5 minutes but she made it an hour and a half. It was the first time she got to ride in the arena by herself and she was so proud of herself. She got to do balancing games, do patterns and go over ground poles. She did a very good job. Willow was such a trooper. I love that pony! Bridie, the instructor, has named her super pony. Everyone just loves Willow. If every little girl could have a willow pony, it would be a perfect world!

Summer Camp

Brooke went off to 4-H summer camp today for the whole week. I took her to the Ag center to meet the bus at 8:30 this morning and she won't be back till 4pm Friday. She was so excited to get away from us crazy people! Ashlyn was really bummed that she is not old enough to go but we are going to do some fun things this week. We are going to go to the movies, the beach, and Ashlyn is going to get a riding lesson like Brooke gets every week. She is looking forward to that one. We miss Brooke already and can't talk to her till she comes home but we know she is going to have a great time!

Strawberry Jam

Me and the girls finally got to make strawberry jam! We canned it also and it turned out great. It was alot of mashing and the kids were shocked that 7 cups of sugar actually go in 9 jars of jam. It was a bit nerve racking for me because I have never canned anything and was sure I was going to blow up the kitchen ,but thanks to step by step instruction from Pioneer Woman (she has a great website of everything) it came out perfect. We are going to do pickles next before the kids start back to school. It is actually fun to do and Im looking forward to doing it again.

Leah

Leah is 7 months old now! She is getting so big. She weighs about 30 pounds now and I hope she stops growing soon. She is a trouble maker for sure, chews shoes, socks and every stuffed animal she can find. The kids are having so much fun with her. They just laugh all the time because she is so funny when she plays with them. Ashlyn has a tunnel that connects to a tent and Leah runs throuh the tunnel and whips it around the room. The kids think that it is really funny! Anyway, I think she will be a real dog soon, she has learned sit, shake, lay down and roll over. When she gets real excited she does them all really fast just to get a treat faster. If I could just get her to bark, I would have it made!

Ashlyns Funny Ways

The girls have 4-H day camp all this week. They are doing cooking, sewing, jewelry making, scrapbooking and learning healthy nutrition. They are having a blast. Yesterday they made freezer peach jam. I was in the jam class helping and all the kids had fun but what a challenge when you have 10 kids at a time trying to make jam! In the nutrition class they made yogurt and fruit bowls for a healthy snack. Iasked Ashlyn if she ate her yogurt. She said, "Yes, but I only put blueberries in it because I dont like pineapple". I said, " I thought you liked pineapple?" She said, "No! I tried it back when the dinosaurs were alive and I didnt like it!" I said, "What?!!!!, Ashlyn, you werent alive when the dinosaurs were alive". She said, "Oh!". I dont have a clue where that all came from but it made for a good laugh all day today! Ashlyn works the sewing machine on Thursday and Lord help us all! Hopefully she doesnt sew herself to her apron.