The Latest Project

Nathaniel got a shed to keep the kids' bikes, scooters, and miscellaneous.  It took most of the weekend to assemble.  Malachi helped a bunch, and Elijah and Pilot put in a few hours, too.  Unfortunately, Elijah got a scrape from some old chicken wire and had to get a tetanus shot, but in the end, we have a new shed:

I am happy to have a new shed, but I am even happier that Nathaniel and Malachi were able to work together for several hours over two days.  

 

Also, yesterday Lydia signed the book and got a youth Bible to prepare for her confirmation next spring.  And lastly, a cute picture:

 

New "Toy"

 

I told Nathaniel that I was thinking about renting a chipper, since we have so many branches around here, and I really want some mulch.  Last year, we bought 18 yards of mulch.  I have no idea how many branches you need to chip to get that kind of volume, but I suppose we will be finding out.  Nathaniel got on facebook marketplace and bought a gently used chipper, so I think this coming weekend, I will be making some mulch.

Currently

 We've finally gotten everyone healthy (for now).  Today, Pilot got to compete in a TaeKwonDo tournament. 

It was a lot of fun to watch, and I got to enjoy it.  There's not enough room there for all of us to watch (I had to stand for 2 hours behind people in a crowded area), so Nathaniel stayed home with everyone else.  

Recently, Emry and Gyunay ran across some of Malachi's old video game drawings:

(This picture is sideways.)  They have enjoyed them, and they started making some of their own.

Gyunay likes to read to Panther.  Panther doesn't seem too into it, but Gyunay doesn't seem to mind!

January Harvest Total

 109 eggs

Packer Fans and Snow

 

First of all, we saw the strangest sunset yesterday.  See that shaft of light going straight up?

It was hard to get a picture from a moving car, but I've never seen a sunset like it.  Lydia and I were heading to see a school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream (which was excellent).

Most of our neighborhood has lost its snow, but we still have most of ours.  The kids worked on snowballs and snowmen on Friday:

And Lydia has recently taken to wearing this Packers jacket:

It's too big for her, but it looks really cute.  And she says it's very warm.  It used to be Elijah's, when he was smaller, but it doesn't fit any of the teen boys now, so Lydia has taken it over.

Bubbles

 We've had a productive time during quarantine, and I was pleasantly surprised by how well homeschooling three kids went, since I usually only homeschool two.  So today, to celebrate getting out of quarantine and to use the science kit Gyunay got for Christmas, we had a bubble afternoon.

I broke out the bubble maker.  It was quite cold, so we didn't last too long, but they had a good half-hour trying to catch bubbles on cotton-gloved hands.  And the boys also spent some time blowing bubbles.

The rabbit ran around the deck, totally ignoring the kids also running around the deck.  

The boys have been enjoying drawing monkeys.  They have a 5 Little Monkeys storybook collection that they can read themselves.  In the back is a little drawing tutorial on how to draw a monkey face, so both boys have drawn a lot of monkeys lately.  Emry drew 8 little monkeys, for the eight of us:

This and That

 I never posted any pictures from Emry's roller skating party, and I didn't get an action shots, but you can see how happy he was:

We also got to spend a day with Nathaniel's sister's family.  Here is Lydia with her little shadow:

And since my passport expired, I had Lydia take some pictures of me for a renew:

Unfortunately, I couldn't get them printed in the right size, so I ended up having Wal-greens take one for me.  

Lastly, Gyunay wanted a picture of him with Panther: