Spring Terrain...

My friend, Ann and I had lunch last week at my favorite store/cafe in the whole world...

...T E R R A I N!

It's a well curated garden and home store that inspires me each time I visit...(Anthropology owns it, so the home goods, stationary, dishes etc. are all a mixture of eclectic, creative and downright adorable).

While I didn't capture any of the actual food aspects of our day, (creamed mushroom soup with black truffle oil, quiche and cauliflower fritters), I did take pictures of some garden inspirations...

I love the idea of growing wheatgrass in a container and then taking it out after it gets to it's root bound stage and placing it on a cake stand...wouldn't that be cute with a few colored eggs nestled in for an Easter table?

This burst of color is exactly what these "winter logged" eyeballs needed to see...

now THIS is a gardeners sink!

 

I always like getting inspiration for terrariums and fairy pots...

And who wouldn't be charmed by this little visitor?...

I can almost hear him proclaiming that "Spring is Here at last"!

Jake's 14th birthday

It seems like just yesterday, Brian and I were bringing Jake home from the hospital in a NY taxi...

Now here we are, 14 years later, driving him with 4 of his friends to Lancaster, Pa for an overnight excursion.  (PS--we're not the one's in the buggy)

The drive was so beautiful. (About an hour and 20 from our house).   Everytime I take a trip to Lancaster, I act like I've never seen Amish people before.  There's something about it that feels like I'm stepping back in time.  

For the past year, Jake's dream has been to have breakfast at Shady Maple Smorgasboard in Lancaster.  (Gotta love a guy that has high aspirations!)  Because the breakfast buffet ends at 10am, it made it more convenient for us to just drive up the night before and stay over rather than have everyone meet at our house early on Saturday morning.

I booked two rooms...one for the boys and one for Brian and I.

This cozy fire in the lobby was what greeted us as we walked in.  I loved this hotel!  

The location was perfect! It was right smack dab in the middle of Amish country.  The view from our hotel window, in fact, was an Amish house with a buggy parked in front.  Look at the contrast between the red convertible car and the buggy behind it.

I ordered pizzas for the boys and after they ate, they went outside to play basketball for a while.  Thankfully, the weather was mild, so no one really needed a jacket.

They then spent the next few hours yucking it up in the pool...

and then spent the rest of the evening hanging out in their room playing strategic board games and eating snacks until around midnight...

                  The next morning, we headed over to Shady Maple for the breakfast extravaganza...

It was impossible to capture the magnitude of food that was available at this buffet.  I took a few pictures but looked like a nerdy tourist doing it.  In addition to the buffet spread, you could have any breakfast thing under the sun made to order...

                                          I think this was a picture of the first round

Evidence of the second...

And onto round 3...(made to order m&m pancakes)  

They all ended their meal with creamsicle slushies

Shady Maple has a ginormous gift shop, so we hobbled  walked downstairs to browse.  The boys had fun looking at all of the knicknack toys and gadgets.

                              Brian found this hilarious bumper sticker that had us all laughing...

On the way home, I couldn't resist taking an illegal action shot of an Amish buggy as we passed by...

Granny drove up from Butler to stay with the girls while we went to Lancaster.  When we got back, she and the girls had everything decorated for our family party...

                        which was, of course, Granny's traditional..."A Mexican Dinner"....

I only chose to keep this picture because it's good of Brian...(what's up with Reilly's evil glare and Jake's awkward tongue?)  

With 14 candles, "it almost looks like the pie is on fire".  (a quote from Reilly)

Jake is the person that made me an official mother...I have a tender spot in my heart for him., and am grateful for these past 14 years we've been able to share together.

Miscellaneous Monday

It was crazy socks/hat day the other day at the elementary school in honor of Dr. Seuss's birthday...

To be honest, I usually dread these school "spirit" days because it always ends in a fight or last minute scramble to come up with an appropriate ensemble.  My new rule is that if it's important to you to participate in the spirit day theme, then everything has to be done the night before...

We hit the mother load this year thanks to our neighbor, Jeannie, who lent us her Dr. Seuss and leprechan hat.  

I was surprised that Reilly agreed to go as a "semi-twin" with Ellie with the socks...

Notice how she switched the pattern up so as not to be completely identical with her, though?

A few years ago, for this crazy hat/socks spirit day, Reilly wanted to wear a crazy hat but was too self conscience to wear anything remotely crazy. After I  produced several options, she ended up deciding on a rather understated stocking cap, but then was in tears at the end of the day because no one thought it looked crazy.  What the?!  I can't win!

Jake's in house basketball team played their last game last Saturday...

This wasn't their best season, sadly, but he still had fun.

Brian was the head coach which was nice...I love watching him coach...he's exactly what a coach should be-

He's encouraging, knows the game like the back of his hand, and has a good relationship with the boys...

My friend, Megan, called me the other day in a panic, as apparently, there was a fox attack on several of her chickens.  Out of the 10 that she had, only 5 were recovered--two of which had major gouges and chunks taken out of their backs.

I offered to help her since I have had a bit of experience with wounded birds...

She brought one of the hens over and I got her cleaned up as much as I could with hydrogen peroxide and neosporin.  

She wouldn't keep the dressing on though, and kept trying to put straw on her wounds which was making a gooey mess.

I had her stay in a cage in my potting room that first night.  (Notice, the chicks are in the pack and play with the heat lamp).

The wound still didn't look great the next morning, so I decided to give her a "spa" treatment by soaking her in epsom salts and warm water.  (I probably should have done it the day before, but didn't want to send her into more shock than she had already experienced).  She didn't seem to mind and was very calm through the process.  I kept pouring the water over her back for about 20 minutes or so with a cup since that's where the bite marks were.

I wrapped her in a towel and then blew dried her until she was fluffy and dry, 

 put more neosporin on her and then some clean dressing and then. . .

I put a chicken saddle on her!  (Thanks to my friend Olivia who made these for her hens that were getting pecked at by her rooster).  I called her to ask her if she would be able to make a chicken saddle for this chicken and within an hour, she was at my doorstep with two!  

The saddle, which fits over their wings with elastic, was the perfect thing to keep her (and the other hens) from pecking at her exposed back as well as keeping the wound clean.

Since it was warm yesterday, I put her in our spare chicken coop and had her stay there for the night. I was pleasantly surprised to see that her wounds have made a drastic improvement and she appears to be on the mend.  Epsom salts are one of my go to remedies for many different chicken related ailments!

Father Daughter Dance

The Annual Father/Daughter event was tonight...

This year's theme was a"Sweetheart Dance"... 

I'm pretty sure Brian appreciated this theme over some of the others in his Father/Daughter night history...(ie...pirate, luaua, and an 80's theme which actually ended up being quite funny)

They've been so excited for this!  

The girls wanted me to do something special with their hair, but I have as much skills in the hair department as I do in making a flaky pie crust!

Fortunately, Rock Star Carissa Nielson came to the rescue after a panicked call this morning requesting her help.  She's great with hair and was able to whip up these hairstyles in no time!

I am so appreciative to her that she was able to make them feel confident about their hair.

 One last picture before heading out the door, to go home and put on the final touches!...

I totally scored on this dress...When all was said and done, I think I paid $12 for this!  Ellie loved it and couldn't stop twirling in it.

Reilly picked this little number out (and paid for it with her own money!)...

She was so proud of this--I thought she looked great!

There was much excitement in the air at this point!...

"We'd like to thank the Academy Dad, for taking us to the dance"

He's a great egg, that guy!

Dancing is totally not his thing, but he bucks up every year and makes this night a fun memory for the girls.

Everywhere a chick chick

Spring is just around the corner (or so they tell me...who would know with these freezing temperatures?!)...and that only means one thing...

Chicks!

We went in on an order with the Bucks Clucks 4-H club for chicks from Murray McMurray Hatchery...

We ordered 3 cochins...(our favorite breed of chickens)

They're the ones with the feathered feet.

This brings our chicken population up to 14...

Mary saved the day again and came over to take a few professional photos of our newest additions...

This little black and white chick will one day be an all black, elegant chicken.  We got her as a replacement for our other black cochin, Sonny, who died last year.  She's the one that won Reserve Champion at the Grange Fair 2 years ago.

The green dot on her head is just a temporary thing used for identification purposes in shipping...

Reilly claimed this buff cochin, and named her "Peaches"...

Ellie was so excited to show her class at school this picture...

Here she is holding "Blue Bell", "Chippie", and "Peaches"

This was a photo taken of our last batch a year and a half ago...these guys are at a bit of a gangly stage, but still cute...

I have to chuckle when I think of how this photo would make many of my non-animal loving friends' skin crawl...

Good times!