May

This blog post almost didn't happen, as my external hard drive that I store all of my photos on crashed literally days after I had deleted over a thousand photos from my phone.  Fortunately, Will figured out how to recover the photos and now I have a better back up plan in place if my first back up plan fails again.  As I was contemplating how much work was involved in retrieving the photos, as well as organizing, storing and blogging with them each month it made me realize just how much of a team effort this blog for my family really is.  Luke was the inspiration behind starting this blog almost a decade ago now, but Will has been the fuel to keep this blog running with his tech support, and especially his understanding and support by taking care of the kids, the house, meals and shopping when I hunker down to pull off another blog post.  It is my voice that you read on this blog, but it is Will's dedication to me and our family that makes it happen every month.  I am very grateful, and I hope that when my kids are older and read this blog, that they understand just how much their dad was a part of creating it too.

As you will see as you go through May's blogpost, a lot of happy celebrations happened in May, which would have made the loss of the photos even more painful.  All is well again though, as my photos have been restored and I would like to start off this past month's post with photos of Will, the guy behind the writer of the blog.  In clockwise order from top left below: Will came home from work one day and Violet exclaimed that she and daddy matched, Will holding up what had been clogging the shower drain (disgustingly enough, the hair ball he pulled out was thicker than my ponytail), and finally, Will and Violet putting training wheels on the bike that Emma passed on to Violet.  

Will is the best husband and dad anyone could ask for and he would be nearly perfect except he claims he doesn't have the ability to smell flowers!  I can't imagine that kind of struggle, and I am grateful that the trait wasn't passed on to our kids!  The girls and I all share a love of drinking in the scent of flowers and May is one of the best months for flower sniffing.  Also, as seen below, flower crafting as well.

May is also the month for harvesting dandelions and violets, and it was a family effort to harvest the plethora of 'weeds' in our yard for my products.

 We also planted the garden throughout the month of May, harvested asparagus and rhubarb, and enjoyed baking together.

 A black swallowtail caterpillar that went into a cocoon late last fall finally hatched on my Dad's birthday this past month and luckily we saw it fluttering it's wings in the butterfly container we had stored on a garage shelf for the winter.  It is amazing to me that it lived for almost six months in a cocoon!  We let it go in honor of my dad's birthday, all the while holding Charlie down so that he couldn't eat it for a snack.  We also found another one of those huge spiders - this time outside, thankfully, and Will relocated it to the green space across the street from us.  One night Will and I were watching TV after the kids were in bed and we heard tapping at our window.  It was kind of freaky, and I urged Will to investigate.  Imagine our relief and surprise when we found a moth about the size of our hand, perched on the window.  When it fluttered it's wings, it sounded like someone knocking on the window!

 Charlie has been happy with our increased time spent outside and continues to enjoy being with us, while whining for food and affection if we ignore him for too long.

We have eaten many a meal outdoors this past month, enjoyed swinging and sidewalk chalk too.  Violet is starting to figure out how to pump her swing by herself, but still prefers us to push her if given the chance.  In the bottom, left hand picture below, Will took a picture of the three girls swinging in their Little House on the Prairie bonnets I got them for their birthdays and told me that if the neighbors didn't know before that our kids were homeschooled, they definitely would have no doubts now.  Or, to quote a friend of mine, "Their homeschool was showing."

I love (sarcasm) the fact that my three girls pretend that they are Mary, Laura and Carrie Ingalls and chase Emma, I mean Laura, around the yard trying to force her to put her sun bonnet back on.  Of all the things they took from the entire year we spent learning about Little House on the Prairie, that is what they took from it.    It usually ends with me breaking up the fight/chase and taking the bonnets away from them.

It rained quite a bit this past month and so we spent time indoors reading, playing in the bathtub (note the trickery in the tub with the feet placement), playing Legos and Duplos, dress-up and fashion modeling.

 It was hard to keep up the effort with homeschooling as the weather got warmer and big life events were happening almost every weekend it seemed.

 We persevered though, and enjoyed some school time outside, as well as a Mary Poppins play that our friend played a statue in.

I was also busy with Harding Honey happenings and enjoyed making soap with a friend - that is us below getting a breath of fresh air as our lye mixed with water, and also enjoyed hosting a day of girl scouts in my backyard as well.

I've had great success online with a patch I had made for my scouting classes and all three of my kids helped me package them up and send them off in the mail this past month.

We were out and about so much this past month and in clockwise order from top left below: a bike ride through the neighborhood cemetery, Lucy getting her first bank account, Violet entertaining herself in the car, enjoying a pretzel at the mall in between errands, a family of ducks we saw at the park, and finally, the girls at their annual well visits at the doctors office.

 We enjoyed spending time downtown this past month from a skate board deck art festival, to opening day at the Farmer's Market, to ice cream cones on Main Street.

 We had fun with friends at the park, in back yards and even met (and held!) the newest member of kids in our circle of friends.

We spent time with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins...

...and celebrated Lucy's First Communion with our families.

We had a lovely day of celebration for Lucy's First Communion and watched in proud amazement as Lucy achieved a major life milestone in our faith family.

Lucy wore the same dress that both Aunt Jane and Aunt Cate wore for theirs.  I love when a tradition can happen like that!

 We had a party afterwards that we combined with birthday celebrations since we had five major holidays in under three weeks - Easter and Emma's birthday on the same day, Lucy's birthday twelve days later, and then Violet's birthday six days after that, followed by Lucy's First Communion two days after that!

 As if that wasn't enough holidays, we celebrated Mother's Day the following weekend!  I had a great day filled with all of my favorite things - a hike with Will and the girls, a shopping spree at a local garden nursery, and a dessert of peach cobbler to finish off the day.

 Violet finally had her appointment with a genetic doctor at a nearby hospital after months on a wait list.  We prepped Violet for the appointment by playing doctor with her and talked about how they might want to take blood while she was there.  She told me with a very serious face that, "I'm sorry mama, but my blood is all gone."  Fortunately they didn't have to take blood at the appointment, but we are hoping that insurance will approve some tests and we can go back for a blood draw soon.  The good news is that if insurance approves the test, Will and I will both give blood samples as well.  Violet likes this, and told me that I will go first, then daddy, then Violet.

 Violet currently has four molars and unfortunately, the top two are misshapen due to Ectodermal Dysplasia and also missing enamel.  As a result, she had to have her first cavities drilled and filled this past month.  She did AMAZING and laid on top of me for the procedure.  I was so proud of her bravery and calm and I do believe that Violet is more than capable of handling anything that Ectodermal Dysplasia throws at her.  Here are pictures below of my sweet and feisty girl playing.  She loves playing dress up, PlayDoh, reading and telling stories.

 She also loves spending "Special Time" with me as we wait for her sisters at various classes.  In clockwise order from top left below:  Violet and I reading stories and drinking water in the car as we wait for Lucy and Emma's yoga class to finish,  Violet and I shopping as the girls are in yoga, Violet and I at the park next to the girl's yoga class, Violet and I shopping while the girls are at dance, and finally, Violet playing Barbies while I take a shower.

 At the beginning of this blog post I mentioned how this blog is almost a decade old.  Well, we sold our car that we had for just over a decade this past month.  It was a sentimental moment for me, as I was pregnant with each of my four babies in that car, and had the emotional memories of driving home from the hospital after having Luke with an empty carseat, and then the happy memories of driving home Lucy, Emma and Violet from the hospital after they were born.  Not to mention all of the car trips, chickens, bees, furniture and other cargo from a decade of life that made that car seem like so much more than plastic, metal and rubber.  But, a friend told me that if our time with that car had to come to an end, at least it was being driven away by a happy new owner instead of being pulled away by a tow truck (as seems to be the usual way we say goodbye to cars).  I am very grateful that we didn't have to see our memories towed away, but happily driven away by the new owners.  That car was good to us and will forever hold a place in our family's story.

Which brings me to our last celebration for the busy month of May, made happier by the bigger, roomier car we now drive.  My birthday was on Memorial Day this year, and so I decided to capitalize on that and ensure that I truly had a four day birthday celebration!  We drove our roomier car and took a trip to a destination up north that is the farthest we have driven since we have had kids. None of our kids have done well in the car as babies (non-stop scream fest), and Violet seems to be outgrowing that habit even slower than her sisters did.  We borrowed our friend's portable DVD player and that, coupled with the fact that our new to us car has a third row of seats, we moved the kids seats so that no one was able to touch anyone and we had a somewhat peaceful trip to our cottage rental!  

When we arrived at the cottage we were greeted by three purple tulips.  I couldn't help but believe this was Luke's gift to us, telling us that he was there with us in spirit, enjoying our family vacation too.  The cottage was perfect for us, with a porch swing, a tree swing, lots of kid friendly games, toys and books...

...a fire pit complete with gorgeous sunsets, yummy s'mores and one night even roasted hot dogs...

...gorgeous beaches and our kids even acquired their first stamp in their National Park Passport books...

...time spent at the National Park Sleeping Bear Dunes, complete with me reading them the story of the Legend of Sleeping Bear Dunes...where I broke down crying because the story is about a mama bear missing her two cubs that drown in the lake...

...we played horseshoes, and lots of board games when it rained...

...and had one of my favorite hikes of all time as I have never seen so many wildflowers in bloom in the woods before - trillium, forget-me-nots, yellow, white, blue and purple violets, ferns, and even some daffodils.

There was a lilac bush in front of the cottage which was a bonus for us as our lilacs back home were done blooming several weeks prior.  The hike that we took from our cottage went to an overlook of Lake Michigan that was a spectacular view...

...we didn't even mind when we had to run almost the entire way back as it started pouring rain on us. We even met with friends at a nearby city for ice cream and playground play and enjoyed time at the Farmer's Market there too.

Crazy enough, this was one of our favorite family trips since we have had kids and that is even with Will starting to pass a kidney stone, me having a pretty severe histamine reaction and spending time in several outhouses while the kids and Will played at the beach and toured a lighthouse, and Emma, puking up the roasted hot dog at 4 a.m. on my birthday.  We have actually never had a family trip where one of the kids didn't puke, and this one was the worst mess yet.  Fortunately the cottage had a washer and dryer and cleaning supplies but it was ironic to me that in the early morning hours of Mother's Day Emma had also woken us up to hot dog puke.  No more hot dogs for Emma, and fortunately sleep deprivation is like an old friend to me so not something that could ruin my special days!  So, my birthday dawned bright and early because after the 4 a.m. puke, we moved her to our bed, where she puked again at 4:30 a.m.  The sun was coming up as we were finally laying down and then we were kept awake by the sound of the washing machine across the hall that Emma claimed sounded like it was saying "Hot Dog, Hot Dog," over and over again.  Once Emma told us that, it was impossible not to hear it too.  

I had a good birthday, filled with some of my favorite things while we waited for all of the laundry to finish before we checked out of the cottage - reading stories with my girls on the porch swing, opening presents from my girls who were so excited to have me find out what they got me, smelling lilacs (I've never had the pleasure of smelling lilacs ON my birthday before!), taking a turn on the tree swing, drinking my favorite hot tea on the porch, and of course, peach cobbler for my birthday dessert when we got home that night.

All in all it was a lovely trip and we hope to make it back to that cottage again.  A barf bucket is now officially on the packing list and I don't think I will ever purposely plan coming home from a trip on my actual birthday again as it was too much work with laundry, packing, unpacking and more laundry.  Not to mention the long car ride with our less than stellar auto travelers.  Despite the work however, this getaway was still what our family needed after such a busy month of celebrations!