but wait! there's more...

The beet goes on.

Yesterday in the cold rain I pulled out one bed (half the harvest) of beets to can up. They could have stayed in longer as they get sweeter with the colder temps, but I have to move the bed they were in to a new area in the yard.

My dad helped me pull them, rinse them off and pile them in the sink. It's the one vegetable that takes the most processing to can up. First I snipped of the stems leaving 2 inches of stalk and the root on so the red doesn't bleed out too much and we'd be left with white beets. Those get placed in a pot with water until boiling, then plunged into cold water to slip the skins. Messy business.

 

While they were boiling I sorted through all the greens and got rid of all the ones with leaf miners (no extra protein with my greens, please) and set them in a steamer to have with dinner. Beet greens taste exactly like spinach to me, and I like that I can be growing things in one place that have two purposes. This all wilted down to a small bit, but enough for my dad and I to enjoy (nobody else likes them).

 The skins were scraped off with the flat side of a butter knife after cutting off the small stalks and root end. Again, red beet juice all over the place. After slicing into manageable pieces, I filled my hot jars with them, covered with boiling water, wiped the rims, screwed down the lids and into the canner they went.

They must be pressure canned, not canned in a water bath. 30 minutes of processing time later and these 6 pints were popping and sealing on the counter.

Beets are one of my favorite things to look at in the jars, they are like sparkling little tasty jewels.

Carrots are up next!

School.

Zack is back into the swing of things at school now, and we've pretty much got our schedules set up for homework and all the things he has for OT as well. I actually had to break down and get a dry erase chart to keep everything straight this year as he had a few assignments that were due at a later date as well as things that had to be plotted out over the course of the week.

Over the summer he worked really hard on his handwriting because he needed to continue to build up his fine motor skills that make writing harder for him. I picked up workbooks at Lakeshore Learning and we worked a lot on capitilization and punctuation, two areas that he needed to work on. His sensory issues (at least the visual parts) make spacing difficult sometimes, but we saw great imrovement over the summer. He even worked on things while on vacation which was hard sometimes, but he got a dime for every page he did and was allowed to use that money on whatever he wished. We do not pay for homework during the school year, but because this was summer work I gave him some incentive and there was very little complaining.

The way he's holding the pencil there is a big deal here as all last year he needed a grip to get him positioned correctly. Lots of work went into getting him to write with finger movement and not his wrist. He's in a typing program now (assigned to him through Children's and his OT worker) that helps him build strength and he can do the home row with 'e' and 'i' without looking! He loves it because it's fun too.

Lily was there every night while Zack did his work and would beg (and I mean BEG) to do her 'homework' too. Zack had some older workbooks for creating letters that we pulled out for her to get her started in the right direction. Zack developed some bad habits early on like writing letters from the bottom up that we want to nip in the bud early for Lily. She loves working in those books! Zack is totally confounded by her enthusiasm and keeps trying to tell her "homework is awful" but she won't be discouraged (and we tell him not to instill that in his sister as well).

She will be five in October and if it wasn't for her birthday falling where it does, she would be in kindergarten already. So, I decided to give her a little jumpstart here at home since she's so gung-ho about learning. I picked up this book for her after I saw the third grade version (and bought it) for Zack. It has lots of fun things in it for me to do with her and some cool ideas for fun learning. I started working with her this weekend on learning the letter sounds from a great phonics kit that a friend had given Zack in kindergarten. She's picking it up quick and every morning when Zack is at school we listen to the cd and go over the letters and so far she's loving it. 

The book has some fun topics by subject that we can grab books for at the library since she loves being read to at night no matter what the subject. She's really excited about it because she wanted to go to school so badly and this way she feels like she is. :)

Snow White.

This was one of those Disney moments that I'll never forget, right along with the time when Zack kept hugging Pooh bear and wouldn't let go back when he was a mere 2 years old (we still talk about dang cute that was).  A kind of memory that makes you forget how much work a Disney trip can be sometimes, or how much your feet ache after a whole day of walking, the mini-meltdowns and the scorching summer heat. They all fly out the window when you see your little one light up when she meets her favorite princess.

After meeting all the other princesses and finding out where Snow White does her meet and greet, we headed over to wait so we would be towards the head of the line that was sure to form. We were over 45 minutes early, so we were actually FIRST in line and while we were waiting one of the Disney folk came over to let us know that it would be 10 am before she came out. He was really sweet and asked what Lily's name was and said "I'll go back and let Snow White know that her twin is out here and tell her your name so she can meet you!". Pretty cool, huh? We waited (me with camera at the ready) and no sooner did she come out the door did she swoop right over and whisk Lily away to talk with her.

I'm not sure what they talked about as I was concentrating on capturing every single moment with the camera. This was a long time in coming as she'd worn this costume on Halloween and in the laundry room it had hung every day since for this moment. 

She spent a few minutes adjusting her cape, asking her if her mom had made her outfit, and telling her how lovely she looked. Lily absorbed every word and was more than a little awestruck.

She spent at least 10 minutes chatting with her and letting us take a zillion photos. This one is one of my favorites and will be added to the photos in frames on her wall.

At one point she saw Zack (who still hides from characters) and asked if he was one her dwarves and made him come over for a picture. As he was heading over, I caught another favorite shot ... I love how they aren't looking at the camera and the look on Lily's face as she smiles at her big brother just gets me every time.

Still can't believe she got him to stand with her!

Then we said our goodbyes.

And there was one little girl who kept her costume on the entire day after that and who snagged all sorts of attention from every passerby. It was awesome, and so is she :)

 

Disney- Day 4.

Magic Kingdom! This park is my favorite and it never fails to deliver on the magic, but this year that magic got started at an insane hour because some crazy woman (who me?) planned a breakfast at 8:30am. That's right, we had to be AT the park, IN our restaurant by that time. What was I thinking? Oh wait, photos on Main Street with Lily in full princess regalia with (almost) no crowds in the backround, yup, that's what I was thinking :) 

Everyone got up without much of a fuss and Lily got LOTS of oohing and aahing over her outfit from the second she walked out the hotel door. On the tram, on the monorail, and in line where there were lots of Cinderella's and Belle's but no Snow White (what can I say, we're old school with our princesses). Once inside we made a mad dash to take photos against the castle, but you think my kid would give me a decent smile? Lily, you are in DISNEY WORLD smile for goodness sake!

We weren't eating at the castle (too pricey), but at Crystal Palace. A full breakfast buffet was the only way we could get daddy on board with such an early morning. I love this shot even though there is no smile ... AGAIN.

I've only ever eaten there for lunch/dinner so I was not prepared for the huge lines that breakfast brings. Most of the time I spent in line only to have Doug have to take over my spot because a character was coming and I'm chief photographer. Not the most relaxing breakfast ever, but it was worth it for the kids who love seeing Pooh and the gang. Aw heck, we love it too.

The park had just opened while we were finishing up, and one of the main perks of early reservations is you are in the park before the rope drops. So, I left Doug and the kids with directions to meet me at the princess meet and greet and I bolted to Space Mountain to grab our Fast Passes. Then a quick jog back to take Lily in to see the Princesses. Zack had NO interest in this so the boys waited outside.

When I walked in I was bummed to find out that Snow White wasn't here, and that was big on Lily's list. Meeting the princesses was so cute because they kept calling her "my sister!" and saying "we missed you, where have you been?" which was a little lost on Lily, but I thought it was sweet. A perfect Disney moment.

They would try and talk to her, but she was a little shy.

Belle was great and really got her talking although I couldn't hear much of the conversation with all the cameras snapping and people talking.

This 'deer in the headlights' look is something she always does when taking character photos.

Cinderella came over and walked with her to the autograph area, chatted with her ...

taught her how to hold her dress up and curtsy ...

I sure wish she'd told her how to look into the camera as part of her princess training.

After we left, we found out the Snow White has a spot all her own and at least 2 people ran to tell us what time she would be out for autographs (they could tell it was a big deal for Lily). Turns out it was right next to Town Hall and we headed over to wait. It was by far the highlight of Lily's day and deserves a post all it's own. Some of the cutest photos ever, and it makes my heart squish just thinking about how sweet and innocent little girls are when they are small.

 

School garden work and a project.

The kids are loving spending all day at the playground while I do garden stuff and they come home all tuckered out so I love it too!

Today I got a few more beds cleaned out (only 3 left!) and while we were there Ms Frail came out with her kids to tour the garden. I happened to be weeding the carrots so her kids helped pull out 1 or 2 for me, I love the look on kids faces when those carrots come popping out of the ground. 

This the kindergarten bed with the carrots, beans and potatoes all cleared of weeds. Some of the potato vines are still alive, so I'm hoping there are lots of spuds under there! Only a few carrots left though.

Here are those mammoth sunflowers after I pulled all the dead leaves off the stalks. The path has been raked and pulled of weeds along the back too, the crabgrass was encroaching big time. 

Here is the beautiful view through the sunflower stalks at all the newly fixed stakes holding up the green beans. Lovely, no? Gardens make me happy :)

And the project I referred to ...

A functional rain barrel! Well, almost, there are a few minor details to fix (flashing behind the gutter and under the shingles (the rain runs behind the gutter otherwise), raising up the barrel a bit, and cleaning it off, but otherwise it works great. Just in time for the expected rains of hurricane Irene!

 

School garden work - Day 2.

What a gorgeous day it was today! I think I spent about 6 hours working in the garden today while the kids played and made friends on the playground. My back is really mad at me for bending over for that long (getting old is for the birds!), but I got loads done.

First up, I tackled the second three sisters bed. The corn stalks had been pulled down by the beans (gardening note: should have had the kids plant corn that was already growing to give it a head start to the fast growing beans) so I cheated a bit and added some stick stakes to tie the corn stalks up to. The nasturtiums were taking over so they got a big haircut and the squash got wound back into the beds and (mostly) out of the paths.

The before ...

and after ...

I think I spent a lot of the day avoiding wasps and bees!

Next up I did a quick trim in the First Grade Flower bed. Super easy, just trimming back the impatiens which were cutting off the sun to all the other flowers in there. And it seems most of the 'little friends' have wandered off and are visiting other beds ... I found Bugs Bunny in the corn bed ;)

The before ...

and after ... weeds gone, flowers trimmed up.

We headed home for a snack and I came back with metal stakes and twine to fix the poles that were holding up the beans and moonflowers as they were bending under the weight of all the vines. I discovered that stone dust is slippery stuff and the stakes were sliding right out so I managed to wedge them under the boxes and pull up some of the green beans.

I only remembered to take a before shot, but it's a little better now. They mowed the grass and there are clippings everywhere! 

I moved on to the Moon Garden with the intention of only pulling back the stakes that had collapsed (yeah right) and as is typical with me I ended up cleaning out the whole bed. Only Lily having to go to the bathroom kept me from fixing more stuff ;) I didn't take a before because I thought I wasn't going to work on it until tomorrow, but picture moon vines taking over and alyssum that was in need of a haircut. 

Here it is after I trimmed it back to a crescent moon shape ...

And thanks to the big rain storm I didn't have to water :)

My week in the school garden - Day 1.

Yay! It's finally my turn to water and take care of the garden at Zack's school. I've been puttering around down there when we haven't been away, but I'm really going to pretty it up for when school starts up again.

Today I took care of some overdue pruning in one of the 3 sisters beds that had been hit hard by powdery mildew and squash vine borers. 

Here is the before shot ...

I took out a lot of the vines that had been killed of by the fungus and gave them more airflow and then trimmed off the leaves that had it the worst. Squash is so prolific that it quickly makes new leaves and comes back to life afterwards. I even hand pollinated a female flower that was opening. The beans were pulling down the corn, so they got restrung and the weeds yanked out.

This is the after ...

While it doesn't look TOO different, there is a lot more airflow in the middle now. The vines look a little sad, but it's because they hadn't been watered and it was hot out there.

This bed from another angle (the before) ...

And after pulling out the mildewed stuff ...

There's a path in here somewhere ....

There it is!

I forgot to get a before shot of the 'sun garden' but this is what it looks like after cleaning out weeds and dead cucumber vines (NOT a good year for cucumbers sad to say). The marigolds are once again in a neat circle ( representing the sun).

And check out the height of the sunflowers! Zack is almost 5 ft tall so you can get an idea. There are watermelons underneath but we should have left the sunflowers away from one side since they aren't getting enough sun (my bad). The one that was big was pulled off and smashed by someone ... so sad.

 

Lots more to come as I'm hoping to get it all ship shape for the incoming kids :)

 

Disney Day 3.

I'm all over the place with the blogging these days. I need to finish editing the photos from Disney and getting them posted so I can reference the details I usually forget when it comes time to get them into their books.

Our third day was Animal Kingdom, and while it's not our favorite park we still have a few favorites. This was really the first year that Lily remembered things that we did last year and talked about doing them again (and by talked I mean pestered, a LOT).

Animal Kingdom has the Everest ride which requires nabbing some fast passes, so I bolted off to do that telling the fam that I would meet them over by the Dinosaur ride. Now, I know Disney like the back of my hand so I took the quickest route to Everest and was back waiting for them in no time. And there I waited, and waited and took some photos and waited some more. Finally I moved to where the roads intersect so I wouldn't miss them and waited some more, now getting a little annoyed that they were taking so long and the line was getting longer. Finally I took a chance and ran up one of the paths to see if they were waiting there and sure enough, they were just hanging on a bench. Turns out Doug thought that this was the ONLY path to the Dinosaur ride (men and their directions!) but there are 3 and he thought he was waiting in the one place he 'couldn't miss me'. Ha. 

Luckily the line was only 5 minutes long, so we rode what is a fun but VERY loud ride. It's a killer on the back too!

Dinoland has a little carnival area where Lily won a stuffed dino last year (one the things she remembered) and insisted (i.e. begged) that we "win her" another buddy. All 3 of us (I was 'helping' Lily) played a Whack-A-Mole type game and since it was just us ... we won her this little chameleon.

This buddy never left her side the whole trip and caused one meltdown when she left it in the car and we'd parked at the Magic Kingdom and her and daddy took the bus system back to the hotel (Zack and I stayed for extra magic hours that night). She's been named 'Cammy' and has joined the brigade of buddies that cover her bed.

By this time our fast passes for Everest were ready so we headed over. With daddy not enjoying the big rides, and Lily too young, Zack and I get to use all four passes to ride twice. It's a great system that will be useless once Lily wants to ride... and ride she will as she's the daredevil in the family. They built a new waiting area that has a great view of the big drop, which is phenomenal.

There are only a few attractions in Disney that I've never seen for one reason or another, and Flights of Fancy was one of those. It's a great bird show and I took lots of blurry shots of flying birds, but only got these two clear ones after the show was over.

This owl had his head turned around while a woman in front of me tried to get it to look at her for the longest time so she could snap a shot. No sooner had she given up and walked away did he turned to me so I could snap one ... cheeky little owl.

We hit up the Tree of Life, ate lunch at Flametree BBQ and started hearing thunder ... one of Florida's famous afternoon thunderstorms was on the way. We took shelter under a roof overhang and waited until it was mostly over and headed over to the Kilamanjaro Safari (whose fast passes I had to run and fetch while everyone ate). The animals were out in force since the rain looked like it was here to stay for the day and it was considerably cooler (by Florida standards anyway).

Giraffe camouflage working well ...

and not so well :)

While we were all oohing and aahing over the elephants, this little baby one came shooting out from behind a rock running and swinging his little head from side to side. It was so cute.

These little trouble makers were super curious and had wandered in front of one of the vehicles further up on the ride, so we had to wait them out for 20 minutes or so since the animals rule the roost here.

It was raining buckets again when our ride was over, so we opted to head over to see the Lion King show which is indoors. We had 45 minutes or so to wait and we ended up under a trash barrel with an umbrella where another couple came up looking for shelter. They had a little girl about 1 and a half and we chatted with them while we waited. I guess they had been traveling all over the world for about 6 months or so and this was the last vacation before heading home to California. They were really nice, but both Doug and I got a strange vibe from them we couldn't quite figure out. You meet interesting folk at Disney ;)

Once we got inside we were pretty wet and of course it was air-conditioned. Brrrr. A nice lady behind us lent Lily a towel she brought saying to make sure we gave it back as she took them from her hotel ans wanted to return it (we did). Sometimes you meet really nice people at Disney :)

Lily asked me to make sure I got a shot of Pumbaa as she likes him.

We were on the elephant side ...

right next to the star of the show himself.

The show is an awesome spectacle, but it can get a little long for the little ones. This fire guy was my favorite part.

Animal Kingdom doesn't have long hours and I chose it for this day because the next day was our crazy early pre-park opening breakfast at Magic Kingdom. We hit up a Wendy's for a quick dinner outside the 'World' and I took the kids swimming before bed to wear them out before we all crashed early.

Early August Garden.

I left my garden to it's own devices for another week and a half (aside from my dad keeping it watered and watched) while we were off camping. Yesterday I got out there and managed to get some work done before we had major rain. 

Here is the tomato/pepper bed with my small little pepper plants. Not a good year for them, but they are starting to kick up and make some good sized ones. Not near the production of last year, but I'll take what they give me.

I've had a lot of issues in the tomato patch this year dealing with blossom end rot. It's coming from a variety of factors, some mine and some from the weather. They have also taken a long time ripening, but some are starting to turn now. 

It seems the rot issue has gone away, but it may be too late in the season for them to get big and ripen before the frosts hit. We've also had rain, so they are splitting a little (not a big deal for me as they are for sauce).

While I was away, my dad discovered a random onion in the carrot bed that had been pulled by an animal. It seems the knocked over onions are because this same creature is walking in them every night. Some are still growing, but I will put a small fence up around them next year.

Yesterday I pulled out the Jacob's Cattle bean plants because the pods were almost done drying and the rain was coming. 4 or 5 were still making beans so I left them, but lettuce is going in here for the fall and early winter (with row cover).

The other side of that bed is the Soldier beans which are later coming on and leaning so far into the path that I can't walk on that side. 

Kentucky Wonder beans. And what a wonder they have been! I've canned 3 quarts jars (a fourth tonight) and my folks ate them fresh while I was gone. They are still going gangbusters and I have to pick every other day. 

The carrot bed (formerly pea bed) with it's uneven rows ;)  These are the seeds that I grew myself and they germinate at 100%! Last year I had spotty germination with careful planting so I sprinkled this year and of course they ALL came up and I spent 2 days thinning the buggers. (Rebekah if you are reading this, I have a package for you of these that I forgot to send).

It has also been a sad year for my slicing cukes. This is the lone one.

My compost volunteered squash/pumpkin. It is HUGE and goes over to the other side too. The female flower is coming out today and we will fertilize it ourselves to ensure fertilization.

There she is!

The beets are moving right along. I can't wait to can some of these and try grilling some which I heard is tasty. Love my beets!

Photos can be deceiving.

Sometimes when taking photos with the kids it takes a lot of cajoling (and yes, sometimes bribery) to get the shot you want. Take for instance this little gem. Cute right? Siblings smiling for the camera all cute like. I'm now going to take on the behind the scenes tour of getting to this point ...

Shot number one. Aside from Lily's closed eyes (moments before she'd dumped the popcorn in that bucket and was none too pleased) there is Zack deciding that a team of wild horses couldn't get him to actually sit next to his sister. Notice the clenched fists.

Lily's feelings got hurt and she took off to stand by me and cry while Zack kept saying 'take a picture of JUST ME".

Daddy tries to break the tension by throwing water from his bottle on Zack which makes him laugh, but Lily is still upset and telling me her brother doesn't like her.

Still with the water throwing and a few "take a picture with your sister!" thrown in. By now people are walking towards the exit wondering what on earth is going on.

Great shot of Zack, but now I've got to get Lily back in the shot without another meltdown.

Ok, Lily is back in the shot with daddy poised and ready with the water bottle to douse the boy again if he gets feisty. Lily is giving him her "see brother, I don't bite" face.

Ah, there's the stuff! This is the first shot I posted, but now with all the backstory you can see that he is indeed sitting with her, but making absolutely sure that he isn't touching her AT ALL but pulling his leg away and daddy is ready behind me with the water bottle hence the smiling faces. 15 minutes of drama all for one little picture that the mama wanted. Ugh.