A Midsummer Night's Dream

Five years ago today, on a Midsummer's Night, I married the man of my destiny.

And the day was like a dream.

With a horse drawn carriage.....

....and a fairy as a flower girl.

 My father walked me through ribbon covered trees.

The ceremony was magical.
                                                      Among the guests were.......

fairies and monks.....

......Scotsmen.....

....and pirates.

 My dress was handmade (not by me) and dyed with tea leaves. It cost less than $300. My mother made my bouquet with flowers from her garden, as was tradition in Renaissance time.

Our "cake" was also of the tradition of the Renaissance age. Guests were asked to bring a homemade dessert. This was seen as the melding of the families.

There was a feasting hall...

....and thrones at the head table.

Wordless Wednesday - Big girl bed conquered!

Almost Daily Bread

So I have finally gotten myself back in the habit of making my own bread!! It has been months since I last bought a loaf of bread or a bag of buns. Logan is now bringing a lunch to school, so I have been making a loaf about every other day. I use my bread machine on the "dough" setting and bake my breads in the oven. I try to switch up my recipes and will be sharing my family's favorites.

White Bread

3/4 cup warm water
1/4 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons melted butter
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 3/4 cups unbleached all purpose flour
1/4 cup of wheat flour
2 teaspoons of yeast

Place ingredients in bread machine in order suggested by the manufacturer.
Select basic bread setting, normal crust if cooking in machine.
OR Select "dough" setting if oven baking. When "dough" cycle complete, punch down dough and form into loaf, place in greased bread pan. Let rise again for about an hour.
Pre-heat oven to 350 and bake for 25-30 minutes.  Remove from pan and cool on wire rack. Enjoy!

Herb Garden In Progress

In my neck of the woods, March brought us record rainfall. It rained and it RAINED!! Now April has brought us record warm temperatures. Tomorrow it is supposed to be in the 80's! Craziness. I packed up the winter hats and snow pants today really hoping that we don't get hit once more with snow. This is New England, it is still April, and it really could still snow.

According to the Farmers Almanac, it is not safe to plant here until May 9th, the date that the Almanac estimates we will be free of the danger of frost. This date is over a month away and I am itching to start planting NOW!!!!! But, until then, the kiddos and I have been outside every day getting the gardens ready. The first one we tackled was the herb garden. I wish I had pictures of the before. It was in ROUGH shape.

Now, I have to say,  this herb garden has been a long term project.  When the hubby and I bought the house almost 5 years ago, the herb garden was a lovely fish pond. A pond that did not hold water and was the biggest pain in my neck. So the fish pond got filled in, and the herb garden was started. At this time I worked full time and gardening and my job in retail did not work well together.  The next spring/summer I was preggers with Logan. I made a lot of progress at the beginning of the season, but once I couldn't bend over to weed, the garden went wild. Gardening and being huge with baby did not work well together either. And the spring/summer after that, Logan was a baby, which also did not mesh with the gardening. And the next 2 years, repeat with being preggers and again with having a baby to tend to.

Now, with no job, no pregnancy, and no baby, this is the year I plan on getting all the gardens in order- the herb garden, the veggie garden, and the various flower gardens. This might be wishfull thinking, but with Logan and Sophie (and the hubby who excels at heavy lifting and digging up monster Hostas) as my eager assistants, I am hoping that we can do it!

So, with out further ado, here is the herb garden, minus the plants.

I removed 9 monster Hostas from around the edge- remnants of the past life as a fish pond.

I made 4 "benches" out of rocks, one for each member of the family. I want to make plaster decorative stones to put in front of each bench. I want the kiddos to have their own spot to plant near their bench. I can't wait until May 9th!!!!

Wordless Wednesday

I Am But A Child

Logan came home from school today with this poem in the valentine from his teacher. It is so beautiful and true of every child at the age of 3!


I Am But a Child

Look at me, I am but a child.
I won't be grown up for awhile.
Let me enjoy my childhood days
Give me opportunities to run and play.

Let me make discoveries, give me space
That I might develop at a steady pace.
Let me be messy, let me explore
Then as I grow I will learn that much more.

I am very energetic though still quite small.
I run, climb, spill and that's not all.
I am but a child in my own little world.
Inside me there are struggles and twirls.

I have not learned to share or sit still,
When I am older perhaps I will.
I am full of life and curiosity
But that is how I learn, you see.

I need your help in all I do.
I need your love and approval too.
I need your patience day after day
So that I can grow in a positive way.

Play with me, smile at me, hug me too.
I need to know that I am accepted by you.
With your help and guidance, I'll grow to be
all that you expect from me.

by Lenora McWhorter

Valentine Crayons

We are on a cleaning and de-cluttering spree over in this household. While going through our crafting supplies I noticed we had 2 containers full of broken, old crayons. By OLD, I mean some of these crayons are a good 20+ years old, and I'm not joking! They came from MY Nana's house. The crayons I colored with when I was little. Yeah, we don't throw anything away over here!

I have always wanted to melt down crayons to make big cool looking crayons, so I figured we would give it a try. I found a "recipe" here, and I actually went out and bought a Valentine themed cookie tin (mutli-functional, and used to make Valentine cookies too). I decided to use all the crayons on hand and buy him a new box of "big boy" crayons now that he has finally stopped breaking and eating them. Here are pictures of our project in action!

 

 

Ha, Ha, I just noticed Hubby sleeping on the couch in the last picture! Here are pictures of the finished product:

 

This is Logan's "Space Ship" color. 

We had a lot of fun making these. And the house didn't smell like something burning, like the hubby kept saying it was going to. They look nice, but they don't really function that well. I was hoping that we would have created  large enough crayons for Sophie to manuever with her little hands, which she can, but they only work when held at a certain angle. It seems that most of the wax floats to the top when melted.  Maybe from using cheap crayons? The wax part doesn't make a mark. Oh well, they will be perfect for rubbing creations.