Crazy Dreams!

Well, here it goes...I'm going to document my crazy dreams (a few fulfilled).  As Matt has found out many a time before, I've got a lot of crazy ideas.  I also like to act spur-of-the-moment on them.  And I like to start projects with lots of oomph, then loose steam and not finish them.  It's an exciting and great way to be for me!  It holds my interest just long enough, but when I get bored I stop.  But, my better half, and I really do mean better, 'gets' to then finish my projects, of which he had little interest in the first place.  Opps.  Though this is ingrained in me and I liken it to personality traits, I MUST work on this.  Seriously.  (I totally admire my husband, Aunt Chris, and friends Amber and Theresa for being totally opposite of me on this subject...I aspire to finish projects in the future.)  Matt tells me why my ideas are crazy and will never work.  Maybe this is to discourage me from starting them so that he doesn't finish them.  Maybe they really are crazy!  Either way, I thought I'd share them with you, blogging world...

• Bilingual Kiddos - Yes, this started out as a crazy dream!  Matt was totally wondering how this would ever work, and me too, actually.  One of the few that has stuck and is working out - re: we actually have raised a daughter who can and does speak German just as well as she can speak English!  And I'm sure Henry is on his way too...
• Chickens - Wouldn't it be awesome to collect fresh eggs everyday?  Grandma and Grandpa Dodge think this is crazy and have tried to talk me out of it.  They insist that I'd have to have hundreds to make it work.  Not. True.  Amber's mom has a dozen or so and they're great!  (And I'd also like to slaughter some too to eat, but I'm not sure you can have both kinds together.  Research needed.)
• Garden - My enabling husband (love him to death!) prepared the plot for me at our old place.  He shoveled and sifted rock and turned the earth for hours, only to have me let the patch become overrun with weeds.  Fruits of our labor?  Not much.  HOWEVER, this year at the new place I started very small, prepared by hand with a spade and shovel, and planted myself (mostly...Dad helped with the asparagus.  Even though he doesn't like his own projects, he's awesome at helping others with theirs!), and have a cute little garden that is producing.  Tomatoes and peppers and basil and parsley and flat leaf parsley and sage and mint and rosemary and oregano, oh my!  Next year, it's going to be bigger...a LOT bigger!  I can't wait!
• Root cellar - I was baffled that my potatoes and onions kept spoiling (gross!) in my cupboard when 'in the olden days' people were able to keep them all winter.  Did a little research and who knew, root cellars are awesome!  But, they have to be humid, dark, and have ventilation.  This old farmhouse basement could be good for something after all?!?!  All I need to figure out is ventilation, but with two pipes in the wall, it sounds very doable.  I know it won't be THAT easy, but hopefully it won't be too hard either.  This will fit perfectly with my bigger garden next year.  Potatoes and carrots and rutabaga and kohlrabi and parsnips and turnips and onions, yum yum!!
• Pigs/Cows - Not now!  However, when the kids are older it would be such fun (and lots of work) to have a few of each.  A little hobby farm.  Fresh milk, who cares if it's pasteurized if we know right where it's coming from...a little cream glob at the top - yum!  And a butchered cow and pig in the freezer.  Again, not sure if you can have dairy cows and cattle for meat together.  Research needed.  And I think it might be possible once Matt doesn't have to work full time at P anymore.  Although, I'd have to give up travel altogether.  We'll see on this one.  If Mark is reading this right now he's thinking "I knew my daughter-in-law was crazy, but not this crazy!

Well it turns out a lot of these are farm related, but what the heck, let's embrace that fact that we are farmers!  I know I might be glamorizing farm life and as I've heard from Grandpa Dodge time and time again, it's a lot of hard work.  But there's got to be something so rewarding about working hard and the fruits of your labor.  All I know is that I'm not getting any help in the garden from him...according to him, he's been gardening all his life (farming) and has no interest in it now whatsoever!  (However, he does bring me compost every couple weeks and even went to the landfill and added some fresh composted dirt to my pile without me knowing it.  Speaking of compost, I've got to fix that somehow.  I have a wire fence around it, but have learned that it's a skunk magnet!)

P.S.  This is in no particular order.  I wrote them as I thought of them, and I don't even want to begin to explain my random trains of thought to you.  I'm at times scatter-brained.  (Turns out I may have gotten this from my Dad, who told me just last week that he's like this too.  Never knew that before.  I think he also maybe doesn't finish projects - at work he did like a champ, of course, but at home his natural tendency is to just let them go on forever...)

P.P.S.  A girl has got to have her dreams!  Mine have been changing a bit.  Had you asked me five years ago, none of these would have been on the list.  I guess I have to accept and embrace the fact that I'm no longer going to be a city girl, but now a full-fledged country girl!

Disclaimer: I will NOT ever say ain't and will continue to use correct grammar and conjugate my verbs according to subject correctly.  (Though I love all those people in my life who, when really relaxed, embrace this part of their upbringing like my husband, in-laws, and uncles!  Love you guys!)  :) :)

HESITATING TO PUSH 'PUBLISH.'  DO I REALLY LET EVERYONE IN ON ALL MY CHARACTER FLAWS AND CRAZINESS?  HERE GOES NOTHING...

Where Does the Time Go?

After a big celebration on Saturday, Claire's "party-day," we just took it easy on Sunday.  The kiddos and I took big fat naps and Matt got a little 'playtime' in with his hobbies, which he doesn't get too often these days.  I can't believe that tomorrow Claire will be three years old.  I'm a bit sad about it - two years old still seems like my baby, but three...that's a whole other story.  That's closer to kindergarten than birth.  That's crazy.  I suppose I will get used to it, and it's a good reminder to enjoy the time we have together at home and make the most of each day.  It's my prayer that I am thriving as a mama to these two blessings and that I don't take time with them for granted.  I'm sure every parent has thought this at one point, but 'where does the time go?'  (that's on a daily basis, for example 'what did we actually get accomplished today and has it really been eight hours since Matt left for work?' but it's also a milestones type of question like 'when did my baby start crawling and cruising?' or 'how is it that my little baby girl is three years old?').

Here's what we've been up to the past couple of days...

Happyhappyhappy boy!  LOVE HIM!
(Love our new screen door - it's the little thing like the breeze
through the house that make me happy.)

Hard at Play!
We always have so much fun mixing food coloring to figure out different colors.
Seriously, I have as much fun with it as Claire.  Here we made cloud dough
with a little baby oil and flour.

A bit too lovey!
I feel like half the time I'm praising Claire for being loving and gentle and generous, while the other half of the time I'm reminding her to be gentle and not squeeze so hard, and sometimes even putting her in a time out for pushing.  Okay, actually it's the latter reminders more than the praise.  That seven to one praise to correction ratio just isn't working for us! ;)  LOL.

One of Henry's typical faces...I love it!  We'll call it "Elvis!"
Hey Dada, this oatmeal cereal isn't too bad?!

Happy 8 Months, Henry!!!

We've been having a great last couple of weeks with 4th of July activities and just fun things around the house and town with the kids during the day!  :)  (Okay, so I wrote that on Henry's 8 month birthday, July 12th...here's to finishing it about a week later!)

We love our little man, Maeuschen, so much!!  That's my nickname for him and Claire uses it too.  It means "little mouse" in German, which I understand is not at all cute in English.  In fact, when I translate it, it just seems weird, but it's like saying "sweetie" for us.  :)  Here are some updates...

Annabelle and Claire had so much fun jumping in this pool in Okoboji!  Jump, jump!

Here he is - my Maueschen!  Hanging out in the stroller on a road trip with Mami, Claire, and Grandma!   It was HOT this day and he was watching Claire run through a sprinkler.

Candy!  At the 4th of July parade with Markus, Dani, Maximillin and Katharina.  :)

Henry is chilling on the boat with Daddy, Spencer, and Jeff in Okoboji!  :)

 

• Two top teeth and two bottom teeth.  His toothy grins are so cute!  He has only clamped down a few times while nursing, so I'll consider that a win.
• Drool - machine!  I wonder if he's getting more teeth.  It's a lot easier to just have him play in his diaper and wipe the drool off skin than to deal with wet onesies and bibs.  Can you tell this is our second? ;)  God was really thinking when he made skin waterproof!
• ONTHEGO!  Henry never stops moving!  We have to watch him super closely or before you know it he will be in the bathroom playing in the toilet water (yes, this did happen at Romber's...where's Henry?...moment of panic as I searched around the entire kitchen and hallway and living and dining rooms when he had JUST been in the hallway...laughs from Amber...found him!  playing in the toilet...you're very welcome Amber for grabbing your face with my wet hands when you picked me up!).  Seriously though, this kid is on the go.  Usually I try to put him down standing up next to something because he's slightly slower cruising along furniture than crawling.  Oh, and his crawling went from army crawling to up-on-the-knees crawling about a month ago.  At first during the transition it was this cute little scoot...scoot on one leg, knee forward with the other, scoot on one, knee forward with the other.  Adorable!
• Sleeping!  Much to my heart's dismay, we have been letting Henry cry to learn to put and keep himself asleep.  Before this, his routine was to nurse to sleep, stay in his crib a couple hours, wake up wondering where in the world his mama was when she was just here a second ago, then be comforted back to sleep nursing with mama in their bed, and snuggle with mama all night after that.  Believe me, it was the life!  (Go ahead and chastise me now, I know you're not SUPPOSE to sleep with your child. However, I'd like to record for future reference how it really was.  Also, go ahead and tell me everything else I'm not doing by the book.  ;)  Then I'll tell you that we do what works and thankyouverymuch but I don't want your opinion!  Hehe.)  Back to the point...Henry has been crying more the past two weeks than he has in his whole life and it breaks our hearts.  But, it was time.  We were doing what worked, but I was starting to sleep more deeply and didn't think it was safe for him to be with me anymore.  I think my body was telling me that I'm getting exhausted and needed that deep sleep after months without.  So we took the sleeping plunge!  Longer story now only long, he cried for almost two hours the first couple nights, but the last couple of days has been showing lots of improvement and we're finding again what works for us - nursing to sleep, waking up only a bit when transferred to crib, then staying in the crib and falling back to sleep alone upon little wakings.
• Claire speaks German and English to Henry, depending on what she's thinking at the time, I guess.  I just wanted to record that because the 'sibling language' is always interesting to me.  :)
• Henry is still just as happy as ever!  He kicks his legs a lot when he's excited - it's adorable!  About a month ago, I told him we were going outside to see the "Katzen" and he got really excited and starting kicking and wiggling in my arms!  I really think he is starting to understand a few words, in this case, cats!  He also has said "mamamama" when he wants me but is not consistent at all, so that may just be in my and Aunt Lori and Matt's heads (they heard it too!).

Swaledale Big Days...err, Day

Swaledale had a town festival this weekend - it consisted of a short parade and maid-rites in the park while enjoying the performance of dancers from a local kids' studio.  Claire really liked watching the little girls dance and even wanted to join them on 'stage!'  Ten and twenty years ago it was a big deal that spanned the weekend, or so I'm told.  Maybe young new families to the area can revive it - I'm thinking a 5K and bringing back the softball tournament.  We'll have to find those young families though...I don't know of any around here but us!

Daddy drove the John Deere G in the parade and threw lots of candy to the kiddos!  Claire, Henry and Mami enjoyed watching and getting lots of candy since all the people we were sitting by were 70 and older and they like to share the sweets that come their way!  ;)

The parade was entertaining!  I love how C and H are watching so intently!
(Local newspaper took this picture!)