March Madness

March was a challenging month for our family with Will gone more evenings than usual with his High School's basketball team in the playoffs and even winning the State Championship in their division.  We were all happy at the end of the month when his team won, as at least if he was going to be gone so much, the team did a great job!  It really was a great celebration for Will to be a part of, as the community that makes up his school is a very warm and family-oriented place.  We maximized the time we did have with Will this past month though, and made sure to maximize the benefits of technology too with lots of texting, FaceTime and phone calls.  The pictures below from the top left in clockwise order: Will being his usual funny self, pretending to wash my car windows with a frozen scrub brush at the gas station, at the final basketball game for his High School, and finally, Will sending me his own version of an Emoji.   So many times I can hardly believe that I get to be the one person audience to this hilarious comedian.

The girls and I had a lot of time together while Will was gone, and we tried to have fun with little things, to make the time go by faster and to keep us from missing Will too much.  The pictures below from the top left hand side: out to eat with Will after a long stretch of the girls not seeing him, the girls and I scored a free pizza at a new restaurant by us thanks to the tip of a friend and were able to have a fun, no-work dinner on another night that Will wasn't home, the girls and I eating our free pizza as a picnic outside complete with paper plates, and finally, the girls and I taking a break while we were shopping.

The girls and I continued with our regular homeschool activities, including piano, swim and dance as well as yoga and some classes at the local nature center.  In the center picture below is a drawing Lucy made in her school journal of Almanzo and Laura Ingalls Wilder holding their daughter Rose.

Lucy and Emma participated in a Dance Marathon benefiting the local animal shelter and were so excited when friends and family dropped off and mailed donation checks.  The top two pictures below show Lucy getting checks in the mail and Lucy and Emma holding up their certificates of completion for the Dance Marathon.  The bottom two pictures below show Lucy painting a ceramic chalice for her catechism class, and the center, left hand picture below is of Emma and Violet playing on a playground we found near our church while Lucy was in catechism.

We also attended a fun homeschool hike with friends, which ended with lots of fun playing with the charcoal from an old campfire that the kids discovered.  I enjoyed texting Will a picture of Violet looking like a chimney sweep when it was time to go home.

The girls and I also enjoyed a kids concert with friends at the local university and watched amazing performances of violins and different kinds of drums.

Our homeschool social calendar was rounded out with some trips to the local ice arena, where we met our friends and my parents joined in so that I wasn't outnumbered by girls on ice skates!  Our friends have been ice skating for much longer than my kids and they are always so sweet, encouraging my kids to have fun on the ice.  I also love how my dad is passing on his knowledge of ice skating, just like he did for me when I was a kid.  Finally, I am grateful that my parents are healthy and can even ice skate with their grandkids!  Violet is the least excited about ice skating and the first time she was on the ice with her "baby skates" - that's how she refers to her tiny, two year old sized skates - we didn't even make it around one lap of the rink.  The last time we were there though, we did make a full lap.  Hopefully next time she will actually enjoy that full lap.  Baby steps in those adorable baby skates!

The ice arena is empty during the week and open skate is very inexpensive during those times as well.  Homeschooling for the win!  We have been officially homeschooling for almost three years now, and I feel so grateful that circumstances in our life led us into something that I would have never planned but am constantly amazed at how wonderfully it fits our lifestyle.  This past month it has become apparent to me the impact of small, steady and consistent increments to learning which can add up to huge growth.  Lucy and Emma have never played the piano before starting lessons this past fall.  Now, they have a list of almost twenty songs that they can play by memory.  It is easy for me to feel overwhelmed when I look at everything they need to learn and know, but when I take a moment to see how far they have come, their growth is truly amazing.

Here are my girls below, playing with some of their favorite things: PlayDoh, Duplos and Legos.

Other favorite things to do include playing house together with their baby dolls, doing crafts, reading, and of course, watching movies.  I love the bottom, left hand picture below of all three of my girls watching a movie while holding Luke's stuffed animal with Charlie peeking in the window.

Charlie loves to sit at the window while the girls watch a movie and also will lay by the girls whenever they are playing outside.

 We enjoyed watching our crocus sprout and bloom this past month and even saw a few honey bees on them as well.  Lucy was mad at me because I didn't let her pick any crocus.  I wanted the bees to have as much food as possible, considering our two dozen crocus seemed to be the only food around - and yes, I was choosing my bees happiness over my child's.  In the top, right hand picture below I noticed Violet "braiding" Emma's hair in the backseat of the car.  This is an improvement, as usually if Violet is touching Emma's hair in the car, it's to yank it and let her know who the boss is.

The above pictures were taken on our way to Ikea, one wet and rainy Sunday afternoon.  It has been a really rainy start to spring and there is nothing like a road trip to Ikea to make a rainy day feel like a holiday!  On our list at Ikea was more shelving for my Harding Honey business that the kids and Will put together for me.  I have one bee hive that has made it through the winter, which is the first time this has ever happened.  This hive was a wild swarm that I caught last May and so I have decided to actively pursue wild swarms this year.  Will built me three swarm traps and I am hoping that my theory is right and I can eventually have only free-bees that have already proven themselves strong enough to live through a northern winter.  Every spring the bees that I buy to replace my dead hives come from a much warmer climate and I believe that is partly to blame for my bees never making it through the winter.

My busy season is starting at Harding Honey, truly once the first weeds start to bloom, and I did my first kids class of the season for an energetic Boy Scout troop and loved how interested they were in honey bees - and anything else with a stinger.  It definitely is a different type of environment at my house with only girls around me most of the day.  I would love to see how Luke would have added to the atmosphere at our house.  Maybe he could have helped me to diffuse the insanity tonight when one sister realized with glee that daddy had put away another sister's clothes in her drawer, and well, finders keepers until the original owner notices and we have a genuine tug of war on our hands!    But, I'm not sure that Luke would have enjoyed all of the craft store shopping the girls and I love so much.  You know I would do anything to hear him whine at JoAnn Fabric that he wants to go home.  Here are Lucy and Emma below, helping me with my latest project of making flower crowns.  Lucy did an awesome job of combining colors for each crown and Emma did a great job sorting and grouping the supplies for me.  Violet did her best to run back and forth through the laid out supplies, while trying not to step on them but then stepping on them anyways.  I guess it was a fun obstacle course challenge for her.

My kids do have two boy cousins to help them understand somewhat what a brother on earth would be like.  Their two boy cousins are the cutest, so that helps sell the role too.  Emma got to meet her newest girl cousin finally this past month and we were able to get an updated group shot of all of the earthly cousins together in one spot.  You know I love pictures like that.  Maybe someday when they are all adults they can try to cram together on the couch and recreate it.

 We had fun with friends this past month and in clockwise order from top left below: My friend showing us how to make maple syrup with a tasting afterwards, my friend's son trying maple syrup for the very first time, me and a long time friend at her head shaving party that she hosted to prove that losing her hair to cancer could still be a joyous event, my kids in front of the book mobile (our friends were still checking out books inside of it!), and finally, my girls and our friends enjoying a pretend picnic.

We did plenty of real eating this past month including strawberry rhubarb pie that was ah-may-zing, Irish soda bread for St. Patrick's Day that was so good I've made it about once a week since, sweet potato muffins with too much molasses in them and so not very good (unfortunately I five timed the recipe too) and finally, a little fairy I found hidden in the potatoes in a bowl on my counter.

 Living with my comedian, best friend husband and the three little girls who share so many of our quirks and talents and faults is never boring and I am so grateful for my life.  They may push my buttons and wear me out, but at the end of the day (after they are tucked into bed AND sleeping) I can't help but think how lucky I am that I get to live this life.