better than my own creations

I love spending time in my yard in the summer. We were blessed to buy a house with a beautiful, established yard. When we bought the house in the dead of winter, we had no idea that we were going to be in for such a treat in the spring. This spring was even better than last year, and here is where maybe I can take a little credit, I took really good care of all the flower gardens last year, fed them and weeded them. This year, because I knew what we had and were, I was able to take better care of the gardens in the spring time. My work has paid off, our yard is even more incredible than last year.

This is my favorite flower in my whole garden

Sure I have other gorgeous flowers like these

or these

But this....

...this is my favorite. A simple yellow long stem rose with just a hint of orange on the edge of the petals. It is so perfect. It smells so sweet. It thrills me to see it bloom, and saddens me when the last petal falls.

Last year this rose "bush" only produced on incredibly gorgeous flower, this year looks to be the same. I am far from an expert on roses, I would love to have this rose make more flowers, so if anybody knows anything,
I would love to hear it.

I also look forward to these ripening!

Can anybody say raspberry jam?

Last year we only got enough to sample every other day. This year? Well, we may have more that I can keep up with! I am so excited! I'll let you know if I get tired of raspberries, though that is really very unlikely.
In other news....

What do you think my cats have been up to?Poor birdie!

She's taking matters into her own hands.

We had a great Canada Day. It started out not quite how I had planned, but ended up being just what I needed. It was relaxing and low key.  First of all we slept in, which is always nice. Then Daniel headed across the border with Brother Brown to pick up his truck and bring it back. While Daniel was gone, the girls and I thought we would try out the stuffie patterns I won for playing along in this post.
I don't have pictures yet of the finished projects, but I will post some later today
. If you go over to my other blog you can see pictures of the stuffies we made. I let the girls pick their own material so that it would really be special to them.
When Daniel got home we headed to Lethbridge to spend some time with family. We had a BBQ at my mom and dad's and then later headed over to his mom's place until it was time to go to the fireworks at Henderson Lake Park. I wasn't sure how well this was going to go. Last year Tansley curled up in a ball under the blanket, sucked her thumb and cried and Kymberly screamed. This year Tansley was determined to be brave, and she did a really good job and actually enjoyed them. Kymberly was a different story. When the first test one went off, she froze in my lap and stayed that way until the real display started, at which point she started to shake. I could feel her little heart racing. I tried to hold her close and whisper to her that she was OK, that I was right there, but she started to squirm. She kept saying "stroller, stroller" over and over and reaching for it. So finally I put her in it. Then she reached for dad and said "Daddy, push!" over and over in a terrified half crying voice. When that didn't work, she tried "momma, push!". So I once again picked her up and held her tight and tried to comfort her. But she would have none of that and squirmed her way off my lap and started running in the direction that we had come from. We had parked just off of South Parkside Drive and cut across the golf course and then just sat on the south side of the lake. So off she went into the complete darkness of the golf course, running holding her blanket and stuffed kitty, crying "van, van, van". It was so increadibly funny, that I just laughed as I went after her. If mom and dad weren't going to take her to safety, she would go on her own. You have to give her credit for knowing which direction to go, I thought that was pretty smart. She was really moving too, I had to run to catch up with her. I wonder how far she would have gone if I would have let her? She was still so mad when I caught up with her and picked her up. I told her we would go get the stroller and then go back to the van in a few minutes. I put her in the stroller and just paced back and forth until the fireworks were done. She sat there with her face turned away from the fireworks and her blanket pulled up to it like she was trying to pretend that it wasn't happening. The poor little girl. We may have scarred her for life.

Finally!

It's summer, and I don't know what to do first. So many things to do, places to see, friends and family to visit....where should we begin?
Canada Day is the first big thing to do(July 1st), and we don't even have that planned yet. When I ask my husband what he would like to do he just says "I don't know". So I guess we'll be flying by the seat of our pants tomorrow and see what kind of fun we run into.
As for the rest of the summer, we have some camping trips planned and at some point we'll head up to the Calgary Zoo, the rest we'll just fill in as we go.

I think that came off wrong.

I fear that my last post was somewhat misunderstood. I may have sounded like I was ungrateful or complaining. That was not my intent. I was touched that this sister wanted to help me out. I have turned her down before when she has asked if she could help(as I do with anybody). I think she just figured me out....if you are going to offer your help to me, you need to just tell me that you are going to do it, don't bother asking, just do it.
Let me share a few examples.
1) January 2005, I am five months pregnant and getting ready to move from Edmonton to Lethbridge at the end of the month. Every Sunday we drive an elderly sister, who lives in the same complex as us, to church. She continues to tell me that if I need someone to watch Kathryn while I pack that she would do it. I never take her up on that offer. With less than two weeks left before the move, this kind sister calls me up and says "You haven't yet taken me up on my offer. So this is what I am going to do...". She sends her cleaning lady over to my place for half a day. She flat out tells me that I can't say no. She just wants to know which day will work best for me, and that she is paying for the service.
2) Two days before the afore mentioned move, my sister-in-law, who also lives in Edmonton, calls me up and tells me that my brother will stop by our place on his way home from work to pick up Kathryn to come and stay with them for the next few days and that they will bring her back when they come to help load the truck on moving day. I would have never asked her to do this...and she knew it.
3) December 2006, I am serving as the RS president in my old ward. I am two months pregnant with my third and suffering from hormone headaches. Daniel is working a full time job and a part time job as well as coaching basketball. I sometimes feel like I don't want to open my eyes in the morning, just stay there in my nice soft warm bed. Not every day is like that. But I often feel worn out and over used. But I keep trucking along, trying to do my very best as a RS president at this very needy time of year. A young sister(wife and mother of two), who has been in and out of hospital for the past 6 months or so, stops me in the hall at church and tells me that she wants to do something special for my family for Christmas and wants to know if Monday would be fine for her to stop by. She comes by with boxes of presents and candy for the girls and a few for Daniel and I. Shes also comes with supper prepared. I am so touched I cry.
4) June 2009, I am busy this week getting things ready for the RS party that is going to be held in my back yard on Thursday. I also have a new calling as a counsilor in the Primary presidency and this coming Sunday is my week to do sharing time. I have never been in primary before, I haven't a clue as to what I am suppose to do. Lucky for me it is Father's day, so I can plan sharing time around that. My visiting teacher calls me up and tells me that she is coming by to do what ever I need her to do. I am to prideful to let her help me with what I probably need help with the most, so I tell her she can help me in the yard. The work got done quicker, and gave me more time to do other things to get ready for the RS party.

The moral of the story is this....if you want to offer your help to me, you need to tell me that you are going to help and how you are going to do it. Because if you ask, I will tell you that I am fine, even if it is quite evident to everyone else that I need help. It is hard for me to ask for, or accept help when I know...or think that I know that I can do it for myself. I am slowly getting better at it...slowly.

help and guilt

One of my Visiting Teachers(an elderly lady...quite elderly) called me this morning and told me that she was offering her help to me. Anything that I wanted done, she would do, inside the house or out. She said she was coming over in 15 minutes and that I could put her to work. There was no discussion about it, she was coming. I couldn't say no, because she didn't ask. Now, there are many things that could be done in my house. But I have this thing about other people cleaning my house...not that I don't think they can do as good as job as me, I assure you I know that they will do a better job that I do, but because I don't want most other people to know how terrible I really am at keeping house( now the secret is out). On my list of things I wanted to do today was weed the veggie garden so that I could water it. This is what I said she could do to help. She is now sweeping my deck and driveway, while I am inside feeding the kids lunch(yes I know I am also blogging, but a woman can multi task). I feel somewhat guilty, I spent the first while outside doing yard work along with her while the kids played. But then the kids got hungry and grumpy and she told me to go take care of them. It is hard for me to have someone else here doing the work that I am quite capable of doing myself...that might be part of the reason I don't like people cleaning my house for me...I can do it just fine...I just don't sometimes. So now I am going to go eat my own lunch and try not to feel guilty for allowing someone to help me out, because I really do appreciate it...

The Garden Project, year #2

Do you remember all the work I had to go through last year before I could even plant my garden? If not you can read all about it here. I was later than usual getting things planted...especially my cucumbers(darn garden critters). But all in all I had a great harvest(with the exception of my cucumbers).
Ever since winter started to give way to spring I have been looking forward to planting my garden this year. Mainly because all I would have to do is plant it. I stared my cucumbers and pumpkins indoors this year in my fish tank(that has been without fish since we moved), so I was able to avoid the garden critters eating my seeds. This year I took my brothers ingenious idea and picked up more than two dozen 5 gallon ice cream buckets from Booster Juice, free of charge(it took 3 separate trips to gather enough). These buckets replaced the milk jugs and created a bigger hothouse for my tomatoes and cucumbers and pumpkins to live happily in. The week before May long, I put out my cucumbers, and pumpkins. The week after I planted everything else.

a tomato in his warm and happy in his home

Cucumbers warm and happy in their home

This year more than any, those buckets have been a life saver(for tomatoes and cucumbers). We are 8 days into June and we have already faced 5 frost warnings and a day of snow. Luckily, my beans have survived the cold weather so far. I planted peas and radishes the first week in May and they are coming along slowly, but doing fine.

My beans, the survivors

peas

Radishes with their friends the pumpkins in their warm home

Do I have to say the words?

Really?...Snow?...REALLY?

Our willow tree bowing under the pressure

Our house, June 6th, 2009

It's still snowing....