Backyard Storage

Weekend Project #3: Backyard Clean Up

Our backyard has been kind of a mess.  The patio area isn't huge and we've managed to fit our large patio table, 6 chairs, a zero gravity lounger, a water table, 3 hoses, a slide, grill, miscellaneous yard tools and toys all in the small area.  It hasn't been pleasant.  When Nate's parents came to visit, they brought an outdoor storage chest they bought at Menard's per Nate's request.  You can see how small the patio area is below.  It was a bit crowded!

We put the kids in charge of filling it up with their toys.  It also helped clear out a few boxes from the garage too!  It worked out great!  And we know that it is waterproof.  We have had a ton of rain and it has been dry inside.  Perfect!

To take care of the hoses, I screwed some yellow hooks into the fence and hung two of them up.  Now we don't have to move them when Nate mows either!  

We cleaned up our outdoor living space with just a little organizing, storage, and handy work.  Now we can enjoy God's creation without tripping over toys to get to our chairs!  

Blessings,

Planting Our Lemon Tree

Weekend Project #2: Our New Lemon Tree

Nate and I love the idea of having fresh fruit at the tip of our fingers.  My parents have an apple tree in their backyard and we have helped take some apples off of their hands when we lived up North.  Now, we are not so fortunate.  When we go to Home Depot or Lowe's or any store with a garden center, we always walk by the fruit trees and dream.

We finally decided to buy a lemon tree!  Yeah!  I'm super excited to have one.  We bought one of the patio citrus fruit trees.  It came in its own little planter, but we decided to transplant it into a larger one before the tree got too big.  We have to have it in a planter since we are renting our duplex.

We bought a large planter and Nate drilled 3 holes into the bottom for drainage.

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I got Jman outside to help me pour the dirt into the planter.  We had fun getting a little dirty!

 We bought a plant with 3 lemons growing on it already.  I teased the roots before planting it and made sure it was well watered.  Planting this makes me miss having my own garden.  I love gardening and landscaping.

Now the fun part is keeping the bugs and animals away from it, and waiting for the lemons to ripen!  

Blessings,

Amanda

Restarting Our Christmas Cactus

This week, I'm going to be posting about the projects we got busy on this weekend!  We finished almost ALL of them!

Weekend Project #1: Saving Our Christmas Cactus

We have a christmas cactus that is well over 100 years old.  We got it from Nate's grandma in Montana.  She has a green thumb, and that is an under statement.  The cactus has been kept alive from cuttings and restarting it.

Our cactus was doing really well in Minnesota.  It was blooming and looking great.  Since the trek down south, it hasn't been looking so hot.  First of all, we didn't have room for it in the house, so I had to keep it outside.  The shock of moving from 70 degrees to 90-100 degrees really affected the plant.  Secondly, we have been getting a lot of rain lately and I have forgotten to pull it under the overhang.  That could have been avoided, if I would have been a little more responsible.  Lastly, there are a lot more insects outside than inside.  Enough said.  :)

Here is what the cactus looks like now:

I'm lucky I got any cuttings off of this at all!  It was completely brown at the stem and the cactus leaves were just falling off.  I was able to get a few cuttings with some branches on them to hopefully get some roots growing.

When I take cuttings, I look for bright green leaves with a "Y" in them.  You can see one clearly in the picture below.  I always take more cuttings than I'll need, to ensure I get at least one or two cuttings with root growth.  I placed my cuttings in a small glass filled with just a little bit of water.  The glass is sitting on my kitchen counter, next to the window so it can get sunlight.  It should take a few days for the roots to start.  I'm hoping to have a positive update for you next week!

Blessings,

Wasp Nest Removal 101

We have recently become aware of some unwanted guests at our house: wasps.  We had noticed a few buzzing around while we were outside in the afternoons, but I would just wait for them to land and smash them with my sandal.  Standard operating procedure at our house for many pests.  

We did ask our landlord to take care of them for us since they were already there working on our dishwasher.  I showed the workers where the 2 nests were, yet they still managed to miss one.  Not all that surprising.

After talking to Nate, we decided we needed to go to battle.  This could only mean one thing: a Home Depot run.  I love Home Depot.  They have a Garden Center!  It is almost heaven for me.  Not only do they have LOTS of plants, containers, landscaping and gardening projects just waiting to be tackled, but they have SPRINKLERS!!

Who needs a pool membership when you can go to Home Depot on a hot Texas afternoon??

Lulu and BG were testing the waters

Jman stood back and prodded his younger siblings to go try out the sprinklers.  "You'll have fun!"  Then he'd watch them go through while staying nice and dry.  A regular salesman. :)

They had a lot of fun!

But, the fun couldn't last for long.  We had a job to do.

We had to prepare ourselves.  Nate put on his game face and I grabbed the camera and a fly swatter.  Isn't that what everyone grabs?  :)   

Game on.  We were a little nervous.  Nate's first spray forced a wasp to fly out.  My video documentary was ruined since I decided to "quickly move away."  (I wasn't too bummed.  I'd rather have a bad video than a bad wasp sting!)  That was the last wasp to fly out.  Nate doused the nest after that. 

This is the post spraying picture.  He was pretty happy with himself.  I was pretty happy too!  

Lots of spray foam on the light!  We wanted to make sure we got it all.

We are hoping this will keep the wasps away for good.  We don't want to see them back ever again.

Adventure awaits us at every turn.  We choose to enjoy it and embrace it all!  You never know how much fun you may have!

Blessings,

"Not in School" for the Summer Part 2

In my last post, I mentioned walking around in your own backyard to find lots of goodies for "non-school."  Apparently, our yard is FULL of interesting things!

I was already aware of a few of our "fun" spots, but the rest were something of a surprise.

We have mushrooms.

 We have moths.

 We have 3 mysterious holes; home to a snake or moles?  Unknown since we haven't seen either yet...

We have a wasps nest in the light on the back of the house.

(This is my camera work while trying to avoid looking into the bottom of the light!)

And another wasps nest in the light by our sliding door.

Surprise!!

Needless to say, I am going to be a little more careful in the backyard until those nests get removed.  Maybe not even be in the backyard!  And I'm especially not thinking of pulling any Duck Dynasty moves to acquire the comb, whether there is any sweet honey or not!  Stay tuned for tomorrow's blog - Wasp Nest Removal 101.  Yikes!

Summertime, sweet summertime.  Full of fun and adventure!  What have you found in your backyards??

Blessings,

"Not in School" for the Summer

Summer school, or non-school, is what I should call it at my house.  I don't do a particular curriculum over the summer.  We learn through play and exploration.  Just yesterday, my 5 year old found a butterfly in our backyard.  It was no longer living, so we got to look at the eyes, wings and body up close.  The boys wanted to read The Very Hungry Caterpillar and asked if we were going to have butterflies again in our house.

We had caterpillars last year during our bug week.  I'm planning on doing the same this year with our very own butterfly garden.  If you buy the garden, you get a voucher for free caterpillars inside the box.  You only have to pay shipping for them.  It was exciting to watch them grow and turn into cocoons and butterflies, even for me.  :)
 

When we're outside, we'll talk about the sun and why it's important to wear sunscreen.  I am constantly reminded that we need to put it on before we go outside now.  I'm working on getting them to wear sunglasses next.  :)

When the grass starts to turn brown, I'll ask the boys if they know why it turned brown.  We'll dump the water from our inflatable pool onto the grass to see if it will make a difference.  Sure enough, the grass will turn green within days and then we'll talk about what the grass needs to grow.  We may comment that "Daddy needs to cut the grass" as well.

Walk around the neighborhood, park, even your own backyard and you'll find something you can pick apart, take a closer look at, admire and talk about.  The best part is teaching your kids about the wonder of creation and showing them God's vivid imagination!

My kids are already getting the itch to start school.  It makes me happy to know they enjoy learning!

Have fun exploring and learning while NOT in school this summer!

Blessings,

Backyard Work and Fun

This past weekend and week we did a bunch of work in the yard.  We decided to plant grass where we had our gardens last year and have a much smaller garden this summer.  We did add some landscaping though.  We paved out a semi-circle and I planted some different perennials back there.  It turned out great and we're hoping our grass grows!

Our landscaping - There are blanket flowers, creeping phlox, lupine, hot pokers and "gold in a basket" (I'm pretty sure that's the last kind) planted back here.

BG in the mud

Jman petting his swing, Charlie Horse.  He came up with a great name!!

The bucket filled with muddy water.  You'll notice the rock in BG's hands...yes, the boys were throwing them in and laughing hysterically when they got splashed.

The only problem with planting grass is that the boys now have no place to dig...which causes problems!  My boys LOVE to play in the mud.  Monday and Tuesday of this past week were warm and beautiful here.  (And we didn't plant grass until Thursday night.)  The boys had lots of fun making mud pies and splashing rocks in a bucket filled with muddy water.  I think they went through 3 outfits in 1 hour before I finally had the bright idea to put them in their swimming trunks!  Needless to say, they had 2 baths and a ton of fun!   

Get Those Bunny Rabbits!

Jman got a 2 pack of nerf guns for his birthday. After opening them, I don't know who had more fun off the bat - Nate, Jman or BG!

As you may have heard before, we have rabbits that live in our back yard, under the shed. Last summer, they did a number on our garden. Nate and I did some "pointing" to make a couple disappear. If you ask Jman what needs to be done to rabbits, he'll answer with "You point!"

Jman and BG, since bringing home the nerf guns, now tiptoe into the sunroom and whisper "We need to get those bunny rabbits! Shh! Don't scare them away." Then the darts start flying! They are definitely ready to keep the rabbits out of our garden this year!