They're coming back!

After the few freezes we had this winter, I wasn't sure my plumbago plants would come back. I cut them down to sticks in March, and have just left them alone, watching. Green leaves have been growing, and today.......

I saw blooms!!!!

And more to come, see those buds?

At first I wondered if it was just weeds growing back, or the actual plant. I am so pleased it's the actual plant!! Something I thought was probably dead, really wasn't. It just needed pruning. Oh, how I can relate to that thought in so many areas of my life! Being the semi-gardener that I am, I can now see why Jesus chose to use vine illustrations all of the time (well, that was the main thing the people of that time related to as well, but still.)

I am so encouraged by these little flowers. Pruning doesn't feel good when it's happening in our lives, but look at the result, if we are just patient!

The Beginning of a Butterfly

Mom has a Butterfly Plant. The flowers on this particular kind of plant attract caterpillars - they eat the leaves, and then make their cocoon - or is it a chrysalis? - and eventually a butterfly comes out! Mom was so excited to see a cocoon on the side of the pot. I found myself getting excited about it too. Mom is on butterfly watch, as soon as it starts trying to break out, I plan on coming back to her house to take more pictures! Here's what we have so far:

Isn't it the coolest thing? It has the prettiest gold line going around it, and little gold droplets towards the bottom. God must have had fun designing this one. I am fascinated by these beautiful colors. Certainly doesn't look like the cocoon in "the hungry caterpillar" book.

Here's the plant, with the leaves eaten off.

There are TWO cocoons on the pot.

Another angle.

And yet another angle. Hopefully soon I'll be posting the Birth of the Butterfly!

More Baby in the water

We went over to mom's house on Monday; her neighbor had given her a plastic kiddie pool that her grandchildren had used. This time, E got to wear his swim diaper and swim suit!

Mom was trying to blow bubbles to E, but couldn't get a good stream going!

We were cracking up about it. I left the bottle there so she could practice!

conversations with Maggie

Maggie rarely lets E close to her; she still doesn't know quite what to think of him. We had them both on the bed yesterday while getting ready for church, and she was unusually paitient with him!

My all-time favorite so far.

We were given this outfit that came with this hat, so I kept trying to get a cute picture of the whole outfit. Never could get a good one, but here's a few ok ones. Was also making us late for church by stopping to take these pictures....

He kept looking at Lucy on the stairs! Probably hoping he'll get some good one-on-one time with her next, since Maggie was so agreeable this morning!

Introducing the pool

Bought a cheap pool at HEB the other day for E. After we got it inflated, I couldn't wait to try it out, so plopped him in it in his diaper.

At first, he wasn't sure what to think. I think he might have been thinking, why am I taking a bath outside?

Then he started splashing and getting into it.

Hi sweet water boy!

Doug decided to just get on in with him.

We ditched the diaper. Eli's first skinny dip.

I thought what the heck, my turn to get in now.

Do you like my strategic cropping of this picture?

Creative Nest

Whenever I'm working on a project, I tend to make a nest for myself. When I sit on the floor for a project, I tend to sort items and make stacks all around myself. Same goes for working at a table:

Yep, had to step over stuff to get into the chair.

I love making these nests. If you look closely, you can see I was working on my Halloween layout for Eli's book - see the title "Eliasaurus"? He had a dinosaur costume.

Yes, it's harder to scrapbook these days with a baby around. And he's not even all that mobile yet! I love digital scrapbooks too, they are fun and easy, but right now I don't see myself totally giving up my paper and glue. I LOVE scrapbook paper. Love to just look at it sometimes. If I were a hoarder, that is what I would hoard. My sister loves fabric. I love paper. Actually, I love pretty fabrics too. But sewing just frustrates me because I have a hard time understanding the instructions on the patterns. That's another blog post I guess. Back to current topic. I love preserving memories through pictures and albums. I don't care how hokey that sounds, it's true. At family gatherings I always try to get everyone in a picture, I think it's important to be able to look back at the pictures and know who was around, what did they look like, what was going on at that moment in our lives. I know one doesn't HAVE to scrapbook in order to preserve these memories, but for this arts and crafts girl, it's a good combination. I know when E is old enough he will enjoy seeing the pictures of himself in his book, and reading what his mom wrote about him. I don't know that he will treasure these albums his whole life (but I bet his future wife will be glad to see them!) and that's ok. I know he will appreciate them at least. Speaking of baby E, he appears to be stuck by the rocking chair so I will end this post now.....

Garden update once again

Here's the garden back in March.

In April.

Today, in May. As I was going through the pictures to post, I realized I didn't get a full picture of the garden. But I don't feel like going back outside, taking a picture, downloading it, and uploading to here. So you'll just have to trust me when I say it's HUGE now. Bursting at the seams.

Watered the garden before I took the pictures. I don't understand why the birds haven't stolen the tomatoes yet. Is it because they are still green? I don't WANT them to steal them, and am glad they haven't, but I thought I would need to do something more to keep them from being stolen. Is my little frog solar light really all that scary? I hope so.

Check out this little pepper!

One parting shot of the tomatoes.

S(crap) Room Update

Remember when I posted this last month? (has it really been a MONTH? I intended to work on this room like within the week after I posted the picture!)

Well, I finally have gotten the motivation and time to start sorting though all the craft stuff. It's a great feeling to go through all the scrapbook stuff and get rid of things I'm either done with, or not going to use. And then, to sort all the good stuff. Now I can go through and start matching up my paper to my pictures.

The tall white container of drawers (to the left up there) is empty except for one drawer. Also emptied out the contaier with the blue lid (on top of hte white drawers), but am going to put some stamping stuff back in it. Almost got rid of all of my stamps, but changed my mind. Believe it or not, the items on the grey metal shelf are organized. Still need to finish it up, and get to the paperwork behind me that needs to be shredded and/or filed. Would love to just dump it all in a shredder right now, but that probably wouldn't be so wise.

Here's some of the stuff that kept E entertained while I worked.