Curtis and I went and took pictures of our blessings.

The tomatoes, eggplant, beans, and most of the peppers are now planted. I still have all my cucurbits to plant (fancy word for plants including squash, melons and cucumbers). They happily turned on the irrigation water to flush the system out. It gave us the opportunity to adjust it, and we will also be able to more easily water everything. And the kids got all wet and muddy.

I’m also watching far too many videos on youtube. The kids have been watching lots of mincecraft videos on there, so we played minecraft last night too. I usually hate video games, but minecraft is just pretty cool. I even attempted to play. I’m horrible.

I want to do more of the things I enjoy doing. Reading outside while the kids play. Giving hugs and kisses. Being productive at my chores. Spending time thinking and researching about topics I’m interested in. Physically working hard. Waking up early. Organizing, and planning. Writing, taking photographs. Hiking, gardening, working on my house (but not drywall–that’s no fun at all). Playing games with others, getting inspired online, and more.

During college, I wanted to get a degree so I could be successful and have a career. I married and started a family instead. And during the early years of marriage, when money was tight, I wanted to be able to make a bit of extra money in my free time, and I did. Sometimes I wouldn’t mind being successful in some area beyond my job as a stay at home mom. But more importantly, I want to be happy and progressing where I’m at.

It is really nice when thing go better than planned. We went on  a nice little bike ride together.

I struggle when my expectations fail. Today I had some fun things planned, and the kids were indifferent. I took it way too personally. Sometimes I’m not as grown up as I would like to be.

Second haircut

Yesterday afternoon we had a friends over and weeded out the garden. This morning we also had a friends over. The little boys enjoyed having toddler friends over and I enjoyed talking to their moms.

I made a resolution to be more friendly this year. A lot of times I treat friendship as more of a task to check off my list. Friendliness isn’t quite like that. I do more with friends if I’m simply being friendly than I do if it ends up on my to do list. I’m also more open to help others, to listen and not ignore them, and to not worry about the tasks I need to get done.

We signed Curtis up for preschool next year. I worried so much about Peter and school, mostly because he was my first and incredibly smart. It was difficult to know what was the best option for him. Curtis is a more typical kid and not my first, so I’m having no such dilemmas about him.

Mother’s day was just fine. We visited our moms. What was more fun was my sister’s birthday, and having this huge cake to eat with only eight people. So much cake.