I love all those first wonderful blooms that come out.  The yard is looking so cheerful and lovely these days.  Here are a few shots.

  Knockout Roses 

(They bloom all summer)

Peonies

(One of our favorites!)

Weigela

(A gift from AtTheCross)

Some of the front yard

(Notice HisCross--he's doing a mess science experiment)

(Yes, we're still schooling.  We'll go all summer.)

It was such a joy to have our first homegrown salad of the year for lunch today.  We had kale, spinach, romaine and red lettuce salad.  Nummy!!!  Can't wait for all the other fixin's to come in so we can add them. 

I always giggle when the boys get out in the backyard and play on the swingset.  All the swings have to come down.......

So they can play......

BEFORE

AFTER

NEW LIVING SPACE INSIDE.....

AND OUT!

Here are a few pics of our new raised beds.  They were taken a few weeks ago so the plants were much smaller and fewer in quantity.  Now that I have the boys computer figured out, I'll get some updated ones on soon. 

Our peas, protected by HisCross's wonderful net cage  :-) 

Baby Jalapeno and Swiss Chard.  Nummy.  So glad Peter Rabbit doesn't like these!

A glance at our new living space under the new room.  We have furniture under there now but this is the only photo I have so far.  You can see my hydrangia and holly plants on the other side of the patio.  We are so excited to have these planted.  They will grow and block our view of the neighbors yard soon.  Yipee!

Finished garden boxes along patio and stairs

Hey all,  I just went to this link off a friends blog and was so encouraged by it, I thought I would share.  I don't have any affiliation with this church, I just was touched by the video.  I pray it reaches your soul as well. 

Video that encouraged me today!

Also, I wanted to share a recipe that I made today that was nummy, nummy.  It was so easy and fast, it will surely become a family frequent favorite. 

Curry Quinoa and Garbanzos

Saute 1 Finely Chopped Red Onion in

1 tbsp Coconut Oil for about 4 mins.

Add 4 tsp. Curry Powder and

4 cups Filtered Water. 

Bring to a boil, then lower heat and simmer about 15 minutes. 

Then, add 3/4 c Finely Chopped Dried Cranberries

and 2 15-oz Cans Garbanzo Beans (rinsed and drained).

Heat till cranberries and Beans are nice and warm.

Serve and Enjoy!!!  It was sooooo simple and nummy. 

Let me know what you think. 

Now, to rebuild our room here in minutes.  It only took 4 months in real life-Yikes!  Now, we're planting, decorating and all that fun stuff. 

     I feel a bit like old man McGregor in Peter Rabbit tales.  I am close to beaing armed and dangerous with those little critters :-)  It looks like the only ones enjoying the broccoli this year is Peter, Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail.  However, we have outwitted them with HisCross's great pea cage he made me.  When the beans and cukes go in over the next week or so, hiscross will have to rig up another contraption for those nummy seedlings, as well. 

     In other areas of my wonderful new raised beds, the Roma tomatoes are in and going strong, Big Boy slicing tomatoes, yellow cherry tomatoes, onions, kale, lettuce (Go figure the rabbits don't eat this!), cilantro, basil, cauliflower, cabbage, spinach, jalapenos, red peppers, hmmmm......thinking.....thinking..... drawing a blank on the other couple things in already.  Oh, zucchini, chives, parsley, I think that's it.  I can't wait to start getting whole meals from the garden.  Yum!! 

     Today, TheBean and I harvested more lettuce (romaine, mixed greens, and red leaf), spinach and kale.  Tomorrow we are going to have a yummy salad.  We also picked some chives to add to our butter which we make on Thursday.  We try to make butter twice a week.  In the winter, we like a bit of fresh, raw, local honey to spread on warm homemade bread.  In the summer, however, we like some fresh chopped herbs mixed in.  It just tastes so refreshing on warm homemade rolls or bread. 

     Pictures to come soon.  I think I have it figured out how to do it on the boys computer.  Yipee, pictures again. 

How I am quickly starting to dislike these cute, little, hopping creatures in my yard--Rabbits!!  They have never bothered our garden before this year, but this year, boy are they having a feast.   TheBean and I have planted 3 plantings of broccoli, 8 plants each,  and they have devoured each and every one.  Yesterday, we tried once more, though we are getting very late in the season for cool weather plantings around here. 

While TheBean and I planted. HisCross worked hard on some little netting cages to try to keep the cute little critters out.  He made a big box around the peas, as well.  They are just coming up high enough where they would have been leveled last night.  We were so thrilled this morning when everything was still there.  Yipee!!  Here's praying they work and we can have some harvest this year. 

The Bean and and I also got some swiss chard, jalapeno peppers and roma tomatoes in.  It is a bit early for tomatos around here so we only put in three.  We will add 5 more romas, 8 slicing tomatoes and 4 cherry tomatoes in a couple weeks.  

Our raised beds are working so nicely.  I took some pictures of them today and will try to get them up on my blog soon.  My main computer has been broken since before Christmas, therefore no new pictures.  I never even put up finished photos of our finished construction.  I'll get some of that up soon, as well, I pray. 

The rain keeps coming down.  What a blessing!  Spring rains, though chilly, give me a sense of warmth and excitement.  The heat kicks back on, warming the house, as we look out the windows at all the green popping out all over.  The rains will bring warmer days and much, much more green.  For that, I am truly thankful. 

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I have my cauliflower and onion sets ready to go the ground but it is much too wet right now.  I also have another set of lettuce ready to go in.  I always plant my greens in batches so I have them for weeks on end.  Nummy.  Soon, the sun will peek out from behind the clouds, dry God's great earth and we will be able to get these in the ground.  Also, I MUST get my peas in, way late.  I usually get them in earlier but life has not allowed for that this year.  God's plans are not always ours, are they.

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My mom goes home tomorrow after a 6 week stay.  We have been trying to restore her to health, as much as humanly possible.  Now the time has come for her to try on her own.  We pray she succeeds and gets stronger and stronger.  She will come back again over the summer for a month - 6 weeks again for one more little stay with her little doctor daughter, me--No, I'm not really a doctor but I love to study and study natural medicines and practice them on her.  Hey, this trip, I managed to get her off 3 of her medical prescriptions.  Yipee!!!

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Pray you are all enjoying this wonderful time of year, preparation for plantings, summer, new growth and, most importantly, the celebration of our dear Lord's resurrection.  What a blessed time of year. 

The raised garden beds are finished  :-)  Yipee!!!  We are all jumping with joy.  Now the fun begins.  I raked in the "good" dirt we have been building up over the years and added that to the beds.  Wow, they were an inceh full.  Yikes!!!  I added a block of peat moss to each one, as well as some good compost, and turned that all in.  Looking better but still only a couple inches full.  I guess the soil will build over the years. 

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With the soil all worked up, I got my first spring plantings in Thursday  :-)  I put in 8 cabbage, 8 broccoli, one square foot romaine lettuce, one square kale and one spinach.  I will add a square foot of these last three every week for about 6 weeks.  Then, we take a break from these til spring.  I still need to get my onions and cauliflower in sometime this next week. 

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I love all seasons but there is something special about spring.  The flowers, budding trees, first warm days, planting those first plants in the newly tilled soil.......it is such a wonderful time of year.  It is the expectation and excitement of things to come.....like the season of advent.  We anxiously await the celebration of Christ's resurrection and his return.  What a glorious day that will be!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

WIth construction finished on our new room, the wonderful patio poured and only some painting to do, it is now time to focus on the outside.  This week, we have been working on getting our raised beds put in.  I have had a 8 x 26 garden for a couple years now.  Much of the space seems wasted, though, so I have wanted to do raised beds and square foot gardening for a while.  This year, we are going for it.

___ 

First, we had to increase the garden size to 8 x 28 to accomodate our new beds.  Next, Hiscross and I made 5 4x8 raised bed boxes using 2 x 6's.  Ultimately, we are going to have our beds 8-10 inches high but we started with 6 to build up the soil a bit.  By the time the beds are all filled up, the 2 x 6's will need replacing and we can go onto 2 x 8's at that time.  I think this will work well.  We are all excited. 

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After the boxes were made, we pulled dirt into mounds in the center of  where each box would go.  Next, we set the boxes, Atthecross leveled them, and Thebean and I spread the dirt back out.  We soon realized we were going to need more dirt.  After a quick trip to Lowes, we put a huge block of peat moss, 2 bags organic humus and 1 bag composted mushroom mix into each box.  They still aren't full but as I add compost from our pile throughout the summer, as well as mulch the plantings, they will start to fill a but more.

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Tomorrow, we will divide the beds into square foot boxes for our gardening.  Then, we will put in our fist 6 broccoli, 6 cabbage, 6 cauliflower, 9 spinach and 9 romaine lettuce plants.  It may still be a bit early but these are cold hardy plants and should do well.  I can always through out a covering if we get a frost.  I will continue to plant more of these plants, as well as peas, through the next month on a weekly basis.  This gives us a nice weekly harvest and not one big crop. 

___

We are excited to try this new method this year.  We used to have "208" square feet for gardening but I felt like we had a lot of wasted space and were never really happy with it. Now, even though we are only gardening 160 square feet, I feel like we have more usuable space and should get more with the square foot gardening method.   It will be interesting to see how it turns out.   If we need more space, next year we'll add another box or two.  We are praying that between this and our weekly CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) produce, we won't have to buy any produce for about 4 months.  Yipee!! 

Today, demolition was completed!  That Bobcat got to work first thing hauling all the concrete out of the yard.  It also had a bit more foundation and a few steps to take out.  Now, the house sits and waits for its' new room.

Once the Bobcat was gone, the boys celebrated by spending a lot of time having fancy jumping contests from the remaining steps.  We are all excited for tomorrow to come.  The rebuilding begins then. 

We had a very nummy lunch today and I wanted to share it with you all.  We named the recipe

 Amazing Pineapple Lentils

Soak 2 cups lentils in 4 cups filtered water for about 4-6 hours

Rinse and drain lentils and set aside.

Melt 4 TBSP coconut oil in  skillet.  Add and saute 1 chopped onion to oil til brown.

Add 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp ground pepper, 4 chopped garlice cloves and your lentils.  Saute on high about 2-3 minutes.

Add 2 cups water and 1 cup pineapple juice (or 3 c water) to lentils and bring to a boil.  Lower heat and simmer for about 30 minutes until lentils are tender. 

Remove from heat and add about 1 - 1 1/2 cups crushed pineapple.

Enjoy!!!!!  We just ate it  plain, but you can serve over rice or on tortillas.  That would taste nummy also. 

Due to a bit of rain, todays work was cut short a bit.  They managed to get the whole room floor torn out, though.  Boy, was it loud.  The house was a rumbling and shaking for quite a few hours.  Go Bobcat, go! 

Today, the room itself came down.  It was fascinating to all of us as we watched it come down piece by piece.   

First the siding was all torn off.  

Then, the skylights came out.  Bye-bye leaky, old skylights.  We won't miss you! (See the kids all watching out the window?)

Next, the roof started disappearing, bit by bit. 

Then, the walls (still have kids watching out the window.  Hey, get back to those school books. )

By days end, the room was gone.  Wow! 

     When we purchased out home 5 years ago, it came with a "lemon" room addition.  This room has leaked from the foundation, the ceiling, the skylights and door since the day we moved in.  After thousands of dollars in repairs, we still had leaks and problems. 

     The latest problem showed up about one year ago when the room decided to pull away from our home leaving up to a 2 inch gap between the room and the home.  Also, the floor started to buckle, crack and sink in many areas.  With a little caulk and insulation, we made it through the winter and summer, but we knew we would have to do something soon. 

     After weighing our options, meeting with many contractors, realtors, repairman etc., we  finally made a decision.  The room is coming down and will be rebuilt upstairs on post.  We will have a family room off the kitchen upstairs and a nice screened in porch downstairs.   It is a huge project but will be so nice when it is all finished.  

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This is the room addition off the basement before any work started.

Notice the HUGE oak tree?  It's way bigger than our house!  The new room is going to be on pier and post so the tree had to come down.  I was soooo sad. 

Today, the contractors placed their camo porta-potty in our drivieway.........

and started the room demolition.  All the drywall and insulation was torn down.  Wow!  What a project this is going to be.

     Without a doubt, besides seeing my best friend, our time spent in Germany was the highlight for me.  We stayed 4 days touring the Rhineland area of Germany.  It was absolutely gorgeous!!!   Part of the hightlight was staying in a 1000 year old castle for 3 nights.  How cool is that? 

     I will share some of my favorite pictures in two or three  different posts because there as so many.

The Bean in a peep whole of our castle.

AtTheCross taking in the amazing view of the Rhine and the town of Bacharach from our castle stairs.

The gang exploring the part of the castle we stayed in that wasn't renovated.

What an amazing place to stay.  I recommend it to anyone traveling over there.  It was so fun. 

How about this for a day.....On my birthday, I woke up and had breakfast in Belgium, spent the day and had lunch in Luxembourg, and had dinner and went to bed in Germany.  3 countries in a day. Not bad. 

Here is a cute photo taken across the street from where we ate lunch in Luxembourg.

     Another memorable day was the day we visited a concentration camp called Breendonk.  Breendonk was not as huge as some other camps but was just as bad.  It was actually what they refer to as a torture camp.  People suspected of spying, leaders of the resistance, traitors.....people like that were brought here to be tortured.  They were starved, worked, tortured inthe torture chambers, and killed for the sake of getting information. 

     It was an intense 4 hours as we toured the camp.  The boys were really affected and learned so much.  What a sad time in world history that war was!!! 

     After an intense day, we spent the evening in Gent.  What difference!!!  We enjoyed a nice supper, a canal ride and the viewing of a torture castle (Yikes, I am noticing a theme from that day!)

It was a fascinating but very long day.....