By the time May rolls around, school is a deeply embedded routine, but it is also a countdown of just a few weeks left until we stop the routine for the bliss of summer freedom which lasts long enough to have to relearn the school routine again in the fall. Totally worth it! Here the kids are below in clockwise order from top left: the girls and I painting mandalas with q-tips, the girls plugging away at school while waiting at the dentist for Violet, Opal doing her obligatory morning snuggles so that she can face the day (this is equivalent to morning coffee for her - doesn't matter how late you may be running, you don't dare skip the obligatory morning snuggles), Emma doing school outside but needing shade, Lucy setting up the painting trays for us to begin the mandalas, and finally, one of the kid's answered a math problem in a funny to me way - 90 degrees is to right angle as 45 degrees is to _____. Freezing, of course!
My kids may not always get along, but I do feel like a major perk of homeschooling is that they do mostly play well together. They are each other's best friends and I know that having four girls close in age isn't always the homeschool scenario, so for that I feel very lucky. Here they are below, enjoying each other's company.
Spring weather means outside fort season, and Charlie couldn't be happier. I think he believes the forts are built just for him. In the center photo below, Violet was starting to overheat so designed her own seat that also created shade. Early May in Michigan is a tricky time where the weather is warm but the trees are not yet filled out enough to give any shade. I love the bottom photo below where I found the girls all reading in their fort outside but in homemade shade.
May is a time when we are all just happy to be outside and every activity in the backyard is still new and exciting as we had the entire winter to miss it. In clockwise order below: Will and the three oldest practicing physics, Violet's hair after a dandelion puff war with her sisters (this is actually the incident that showed us just how allergic Violet is to dandelions and sadly she won't be able to have any more dandelion wars where you take the stems gone to seed and blow them like bubbles or swing them like swords at your sisters), the entire family testing out physics at the playground at the end of our street, Violet trying to pull two sisters in play cars, and finally, Opal setting up her fairy house for the season.
Someone found a frog in the yard and all the sisters had fun playing with it. Will and I always feel sorry for the manhandled (or in this case, sister handled) frog and are at the point now where if we find a frog, we take it to safety, far from where the girls may find him. They are always gentle, but you CAN be too loving. In the bottom, right hand photo below, Will and the girls are discovering tiny green shoots emerging in our wildflower meadow along our driveway.
I've always wanted to find morel mushrooms in the spring, and this year I finally set out searching for them with the family. Imagine our excitement and thrill when we found some!!! Because we wanted to observe mindful harvest practices and I did't know how many morel mushrooms the woods across the street from us produce, we only harvested a few. I googled how to cook them, which involved a several hour soak in ice water and a lovely sauté in butter and invited my foodie neighbor over to try them with me. They were absolutely the best mushrooms I have ever tasted, and I appreciated my neighbor's trusting and adventurous spirit as no one in my family would eat them with me.
Flash forward in the middle of the night, and I woke up with a killer stomach ache and major sweating. I seriously started worrying that I fed my neighbor and I poison mushrooms so I took several charcoal tablets. As soon as it was polite to text the next morning, I asked her if she slept okay/felt okay. She did. What a relief. Sadly, I don't think my body will allow me to eat morel mushrooms again.
I continued to plug away at Wildflower Moon this past month, and started the lengthy process of proofing the journal that I wrote. Who knew that the layout and design process of the journal would be more consuming than actually writing it! I had many friends and family members proof read it for me and offered amazing editing suggestions and tips to make it the best it could be. The girls helped me make bracelets and even joined me for a meeting with the printer where they sat in the conference room with me and glimpsed their mom as a boss and not just their mom. My kids did so good at this meeting and I was so proud of them. I am so grateful to be a stay at home mom while still being able to be an entrepreneur and I hope that my kids are learning through osmosis what it takes to create and run a business or, even more broadly, how to follow your dreams.
Our suburban farm started to wake up this past month. In clockwise order from top left below: a failed attempt at zucchini chips, Will replacing the heating element in our oven after it started on fire! (I am so proud of him when he fixes appliances with YouTube videos, but this one had me nervous), Will with a giant stack of waffles for him and the kids and an egg-free applesauce pancake platter for me, Will making an outdoor nesting box for our chickens, as the they had been fighting over the nesting boxes in the coop, a giant tray of apple bars, and individual stews and several trays of banana bread for the freezer.
The girls hand me downs were getting out of hand in our basement, and so Will and I organized them out this past month. This is never fun and always time consuming but we were proud and relieved when it was finished. I can't imagine having hand me downs for another gender on top of this! Unfortunately, as we were cleaning up the clothes we discovered that several boxes of books I had been storing for my sister while she was in Europe for a few years were water damaged. We took the boxes outside to assess the damage and detected mold on the majority of the books. I felt terrible, as she had trusted me with these books and a lot of them were irreplaceable. We layed out all of the books on the driveway so that I could text photos to my sister so she could have an inventory of the damage. We saved the most important books in ziplock bags per her request and bleached the area of the basement where the mold had been growing and threw out the rest. Throwing out books is one of the worst things for a book-lover like me and my sister to have to do. Upon further inspection, we realized that our luggage was also moldy, as was some of the kids baby equipment so we tossed those too. Little did we know that some serious foreshadowing was starting to take place.
We celebrated Violet's 7th birthday at the beginning of the month and the desks were finally all with their new owners now. In the bottom, left hand photo below, Violet is holding up a popular figurine of a little girl with the number 7 on her dress from the 80s that I had when I was growing up. I had actually donated mine years before I knew I would have daughters, but my college roommate had saved hers and doesn't have daughters, so gave it to us when Lucy was 7. It has been passed down through the sisters at each 7th birthday and I love this little full circle tradition.
Violet received some great sister gifts and a few inexpensive gifts from Will and I, since the bulk of our budget was spent on her desk.
Probably her favorite gift was a Little Live Pet Shop fish that swims in water. And, as I am writing this blog post over eight months later, I can affirm that she still plays with this toy.
Violet spent her birthday playing with her new toys and her sisters and had a delicious brownie topped with cream cheese frosting and strawberries for her birthday dessert.
The next May holiday at our house was Mother's Day. We spent a quiet day together and despite the rain, took a hike on a newer to us trail at the local metro park. Will stressed me out as he and Emma mucked through a marsh to dig up a plant called Marsh Marigold for him to transplant in our native rain garden at home. I'm pretty sure this is illegal, and this gave me anxiety. See photo in the below, right hand corner of Will and Emma deep in the marsh and in my mind, deep in trouble.
The Marsh Marigold is thriving in our rain garden, but native plant nurseries need to get their act together and offer more varieties of plants so my husband doesn't start having a criminal record. Will made up for his shenanigans by making me strawberry rhubarb cobbler for dessert. What can I say, I forgive easily when food is involved.
Later that week the girls and I went over to my parents house to give my mom her Mother's Day gift. This year we gave her a rhubarb plant (with lots of Liz-tested rhubarb recipes) and helped her plant it.
Not only did she replace their hair, but repainted their faces. They are absolutely beautiful. All four girls dolls are hand me downs - one from my youth, two from my sisters, and one that Will's mom had won years ago in a silent auction. They look like brand new dolls now. It's hilarious to me to see my sister at work, with doll parts strewn around - kind of creepy but amazing too to see how talented she is. She is an engineer by day and a doll restorer by night.
Later on in the month we celebrated the May and June birthdays in my family at my parents house. To ensure COVID safety, we celebrated in the garage. We played games, ate great food, and opened presents. In the bottom, left hand photo below Lucy is carrying Violet in a tote bag I got from my parents for my birthday. Finally, I have a bag big enough to bring all of the accessories we need for a comfortable day at the beach.
My dad, myself, and my brother John all have birthdays within a few weeks of each other.
The photos don't really show it, but it was cold and rainy that day and none of us had dressed warm enough for it. Memories were made though, and when we finally do get back to celebrating indoors, I'm guessing we will never forget those garage celebrations.
This year I turned 40, and I knew I needed to be in my happy place when that happened. I booked our favorite place almost a year in advance, and the owner of the cottage was very understanding and blocked out the days for me despite it being Memorial Day weekend. And he didn't even raise the rate on me either, which is a huge kindness on the first holiday weekend in the summer in northern Michigan.
Will and the girls were able to hide my birthday presents in the car on the way up north, and so the morning of my birthday was filled with great gifts.
The photo in the top, left hand photo below is a selfie I took as I watched the sun set in my favorite place on earth on my last night in my 39th year. I told you I was sentimental, and that last sentence proves it. Will was in the cottage getting the girls ready for bed, so I had some solitude and this time alone could be the best gift he gave me for my 40th. I cried a few tears, and had a moment with God. The gratitude that filled me for being there at that moment, and for the gifts I have in my life had me feeling awed and thankful. I cannot express in words the moment I had here. I also cried out to God to help make a shift in my life. For several years now (seven to be exact) I have been getting sicker and sicker for unknown reasons - unable to eat so many foods and the list keeps growing, having anaphylactic reactions to unknown triggers and having chronic exhaustion and doctors coming up with no answers other than it must be in my head. It is a hopeless feeling to be so sick with no medical reason - it makes you doubt yourself and feel like you will never find relief and that your problems are not valid enough to share with others, since there is no medical thing wrong apparently. Plus, a feeling of needing to be up north more and just craving a shift to happen in my life, but not knowing what that shift needs to be. In short, I pleaded to God for a change. I felt a goose bump raising chill and a feeling in my gut that told me that this change would be one of the hardest challenges of my life thus far, and at this moment, on the eve of my 40th birthday, I felt the strength and readiness rise in me - I was ready. Bring it.
For months now I have looked back on that moment with the sunset and God, and have wondered if I regret this request. I do not, even as I write this blog post in retrospect. All I can say is, be careful that you are ready for what you ask for.
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