Plants and The Circus

In the news...

Hurricane continues to amaze us with his swimming prowess. At his most recent swim meet, he decided to wear a bracelet with plastic charms on his wrist. It came off at some point during the race and he spent the rest of the race clutching it in his fist. He smiled and finished, happy to be able to compete.

Underfoot participated in Junior Ranger Camp for the second time. Last year he really enjoyed it, so we enrolled him in it again this year.

Teaching about Teddy Bear and Chain Cactus

Another boy from his class (both school and church) also participated, so the two moms worked out a carpool arrangement.  Underfoot brought home an owl pellet with bird bones and bird skulls.

Underfoot and Ranger Emily

He was very proud of his discoveries. Mom was not excited to see the owl pellet pinned to his bedroom wall.

Mama has been a good sport about scurrying around, taking care of her boys, (young and old) and keeping our household running. She is preparing for our annual summer trek north, which includes shopping, packing, and cooking.

She has a meal calendar worked out for the next three weeks. She continues with her physical therapy on her ankle and shoulder. We look forward to the day when she can go back to exercising without any restrictions.

I continue to be super busy with work. Busy is good. I am involved in challenging but rewarding work. I love to see the fruits of my efforts.

I recently was able to change the way something was done which reduced a particular set of tasks from 23 seconds down to about 9 seconds. This kind of execution time reduction is huge when multiplied over may thousands (if not millions) of times over.

Mama spent time teaching  Underfoot how to sew. They both made wallets out of canvas.

Mama helped him learn how to do the stitching with her machine. I am glad she was able to teach them. That is one skill that I wish I'd learned.

On Wednesday I attended the Eagle Scout Board of Review for one of the young men in our troop. I was able to observe his final interview. He did great. It was good for me to remember what the boys must go through to qualify for the rank of Eagle Scout.

On Friday we took the boys to the Circus. We enjoyed 12 dollar popcorn and watching lions, tigers, and elephants.

They also had a steel sphere where they put 7 motorcycle riders inside. It was amazing to see them spin around. The high wire trapeze was breathtaking.

The boys both had a great time. After the show, we grabbed some lunch at a local sandwich shop called Eegees. I went back to work, Mama took the boys shopping. Later that night we went to the boys' soccer practice. After soccer practice we attended an open house farewell for a family in our congregation that is moving to Texas. We are sad to see them go. Their 16 year old daughter has been our go-to babysitter for the last couple years.

On Saturday we took six young men from our congregation to a nearby lake for a day of canoeing. We got to the lake at 7:30 in the morning and got home about 3. I was able to take the International Scout and had two 12 foot long canoes on top.

 Everyone had a great time, including  Underfoot and Hurricane, who played in the water and rode in the canoes. They both experienced what happens when the canoe tips over...

Hurricane wanted to jump out and swim to help his brother. Mama and I didn't see the exchange, but we heard about it from the young men.

In other news... Today we harvested our first fruits from the aquaponics system. We ate one small strawberry (which was surprisingly full of flavor) and 6 bell peppers.

The strawberry is a surprise because daytime highs are between 100 and 110, which is typically too hot for strawberries.

 We have about 10 tomatoes on the massive plants and the first one is beginning to turn red. The watermelon plant is growing nicely and the bell peppers have additional peppers in the works. The four tomato plants have grown so much that they are covering nearly the entire two grow beds.

We also harvested grapes from our grape vines this week. Next year I will have to pay more attention to how the grapes grow when they are little. If I take time before the grapes get big, I can route how they will hang and I can cover them in paper sacks.

The paper hides the bunches from the birds, so the grapes don't get devoured by them.  We let our chickens out a couple days this past week and they completely cleaned the one bunch from one of our newer vines. This year I didn't take the time to check where the grapes were growing, and some of the bunches grew in places where the grapes were difficult to harvest. The grapes would get inter-twined with the metal wire which supports the vine, causing some of the grapes to get lost when harvested.

Last week's new.....

The boys picked all the apples, and we juiced them.

The juice is currently sitting in the freezer.

We also had other activities like swimming, soccer, reading, and learning to sew.