life is good

Butterflies and Blooms...and sneaking out of your room!

I finally captured the beautiful butterfly that hovers outside the kids' windows.

SELA!!!! The Butterfly is back! Get out here!!! What are you doing???


Zig planted little patches of wildflowers everywhere. Here is one little patch....

Rollin's way out of naps. Caught you, little buddy!

summertime

well, good morning!

Here's our little 14.5 pound baby Evan at 7 weeks.

More bunnies!

Juan found a bunny nest yesterday when he was weeding one of the garden beds. The girls were beyond excited and counted five baby bunnies. They are a little bit bigger than the little den we found last year so they may be leaving the nest soon. Within minutes, the bunnies had names, character traits and little girls willing to stand guard all day to protect them from Kona. Sela and Nina were up and out the door this morning before I even woke up. Zig told them he'd make a little wire fence with a hole for mama to get in to keep Kona out. Kind of like what we do for some of our younger trees that Kona likes to drag out of the ground.

Here's a little video clip of the bunnies:

Preschooler no more...

We celebrated Nina's preschool graduation on Friday. The graduation was held at Mrs. Judy's church this year rather than her backyard because it had been drizzling earlier in the afternoon. Zig's mom was here for the celebration which is always absolutely adorable. Nina was so proud to be graduating and couldn't wait for the ice cream bar that followed. A whole table full of toppings. Could there be a more fitting way to celebrate this milestone in Nina's life?!!!

Jessie getting Nina ready

The little graduate

The big walk

Time to sing

With a preschool diploma in hand, the sky is the limit!

Mrs. Judy's preschool class of 2009

Those pointy caps can be dangerous. When hugging her best friend, Kiera, it wasn't Nina's intention to poke her in the eye!

Nothing a big hug can't heal. A firm squeeze took Kiera's pain off her eye and onto the task to trying to breathe while in Nina's grasp!

Proud Daddy

Nina livin' it up on her big day.

The big sisters

Tina and Nina

Love you, Nina!!!!

This little graduate is all tuckered out.

Garden talk

Zig's hard work is paying off. Lots of fruits and veggies coming on strong during the past week. Even the existing fruit trees are doing so much better this year. We have about 200 strawberry plants and each day more and more strawberries are ripening up. Not that we ever see them. Nina and company stroll through the garden each afternoon and clean house. If there's a hint of red, in the mouth it goes! I packed she and Rollin a lunch one afternoon when they were going to the park with the babysitter. I gave them some little baggies and told them to go pick some fruit for their dessert. They came back with bags full of cherries and strawberries, all in various stages of ripeness, but they claim even the white strawberries taste good.

These yellow roses smell divine.

This tree bloomed this year and it is the most fragrant thing ever! The girls call it the perfume tree. I think they were trying to figure out some concoction they could make out of the leaves.

Progress

Nina's radishes! She loves, loves, loves radishes. So of course she planted a ton in her garden box.

Cherries!

Last year we had zero cherries so I was totally surprised to see both trees loaded this year. Most aren't quite ripe, but the kids were able to pick about a bowl full of ripe Rainier cherries. I guess the Mason bees must have done their job!