Motherhood
April Monthly Round-Up: Plants: Baseball, Homeschool, + 90!
My husband has recently started doing weekly round-ups, so I’m taking his format and making my own monthly round-up. With more photos. Because that’s what I like.
GARDENING
My garden was a huge focus in April (it is a lot of other months too, but especially in April). Planting transplants, putting in more seeds, purchasing other plants. I love it all so much.
Pictured here: Swamp Milkweed, Spoon Tomatoes, Craspedia, Sage, Jalapeños, more Sage, Bachelor’s Buttons, Beefsteak Tomatoes, Borage, and Four O’Clocks
I’ve also been reconfiguring a few of my garden beds. I’m making two from three. And they’ll match two in front of them, so it looks a little more symmetrical. I’ll also be able to add another arched trellis (like in the photo below) for some climbing plants (and beauty).
I let the kids take over one of these new beds, and they have been excited. They’re currently growing (everything from seed) beefsteak tomatoes, jalapeños, bush beans, sunflowers, borage, sage, and swamp milkweed. All with minimal help from me.
So far, I’ve harvested about 30-something Sungold cherry tomatoes, several handfuls of strawberries (the birds have enjoyed way more than we have this year), and 2 banana peppers. And there’s a lot that’s looking good and should be ready to pick pretty soon.
OTHER PLANTS
Outside of the garden but still in the outdoor plant realm :), I’m probably most proud and excited about my Louisiana irises and Peggy Martin roses. They were beautiful this year. My next project is going to be attempting to propogate some new Peggy Martins.
I have 3 of these roses climbing on their own 16 ft. cattle panel trellises secured to 3 t-posts with UV resistant zip ties.
BASEBALL
My son is enjoying playing coach pitch baseball for the third season. And I thoroughly enjoy (with some nerves mixed in) watching him learn, grow, and have fun doing it. We all do. He was invited to try out for an all-star team again, but we decided to pass on that as he’s only 8, and we’re not ready to have baseball completely take over our lives. I really don’t know when we might become more involved, but now just isn’t the right time.
HOMESCHOOL
We’ve found a pretty good rhythm in our homeschooling lately. Getting done earlier in the day has always helped, and we’ve actually been able to consistently accomplish that.
We’ve also had a really great semester with our co-op. Our topic this semester was animals by location (so there was geography mixed in). There was a lot of great learning opportunities. And most weeks included some sort of a craft or hands on project. Simply because I love how all of their creations look in a group, here are a few of the things they made this month.
We also had some pretty cool field trips. Just a couple of weeks ago, we met a fellow homeschool momma and her daughter at a park and learned all about showing goats. Milked goats and fed the kids too. But the highlight was definitely baby goat snuggles!
MY GRANDPA TURNED 90!
My Pop, my last remaining grandparent, turned 90 at the beginning of April! We took a trip to North Louisiana to see him and celebrate with a lot of other family.
I’ve so enjoyed cuddling up in bed every other night with my bud and reading two chapters of (our 1970 thrifted edition of) The Chronicles of Narnia series. We finished The Silver Chair last night.
Conversation in the grocery store with Ro this afternoon:
Ro - “What’s beef made from? Cow?”
I said yep.
Her response - “I like cow!”
older gentleman walking by giggles to himself
Made gingerbread cookies (my favorite!) last night
Currently 🦁🎥🌾🌮👟🐅🍪☕️🧱
Reading: Just finished reading “The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe” to my son. We’re 4 chapters in on “Prince Caspian” now. I found this whole 1970s Chronicles of Narnia set at a thrift store for either $4 or $5!
Watching: @mtt and I just finished watching “A Gentleman in Moscow.” I liked it.
Researching: Countertop grain mills. I think it would be so amazing to mill our own flour.
Purchasing: Lots of Christmas gifts. ‘‘Tis the season. 🎄 My grandfather graciously gives me money to purchase my own gifts. So more specifically, I just purchased myself a Masienda tortilla press and masa. Something I’ve wanted for a while, but just couldn’t justify. But that’s what makes it a good gift!
Wearing: I got a new pair of classic Vans. Sized up half a size for some toe wiggle room (because I wear barefoot shoes a lot of the time and can’t do a tight toe box anymore), and they are so comfortable.
Enjoying: Took my kiddos to the zoo here recently. It’s not very big, but they’re making some improvements as of late. My kids have visited with their grandparents a lot in the last few months, and they were so excited to show me around because it had been years since I’d been. We had the best morning there.
Eating: I’m making gingerbread cookies this week. This is my favorite recipe! In the past, I’ve just mixed powdered sugar and milk until I get a consistency for icing I like. But I think I’ll try a royal icing this year.
Drinking: Bone broth hot chocolate. The recipe calls for chicken bone broth, but I actually prefer beef. It’s really good either way, though! My kids have actually had the opportunity to have packaged hot chocolate several time recently, and they wouldn’t drink it because they said it wasn’t good.
LEGO-ing: I got 3 Christmas Polar Bears sets for 70% off after Christmas last year. Saved them and got them out this week to do with B and Ro. Fun times.
Some Lego Organization
Organized our “imagination” Lego pieces by color a few days ago. Wasn’t positive they’d stay that way. But so far, the kids have played with them more AND put them back in the right trays. ✨
Used these clear trays from Target and tried not to overfill them so that they can easily search for the piece they want.
Shuttle Pen Valentine’s Day Exchange Gifts
On Monday, a precious homeschool group we are part of met up for a Donut Shop Valentine’s Party. A family in our group owns a donut shop, so they invited everyone to come see the process of making donuts on a large scale, and then, the kids decorated mini donut king cakes (‘tis the season in Louisiana). It was so sweet (in more than one way) and special!
After the tour and decorating fun, the kids all exchanged Valentine’s cards and little gifts. Side note: homeschool kids still get to do all the fun things! I kind of had an idea of what Brigsby would bring, but didn’t make a final decision until the night before (with his help). Honestly, that’s usually how I roll.
His gift and Valentine’s card came together sooo cute, and I was proud because I created it myself. Super easy. So, thought I’d share. And bonus: IT’S NOT CANDY!
I searched Pinterest a week or so ago for some Valentine’s exchange ideas. Found some cute things, but not a combo of anything I liked (or wanted to pay for). In searching, though, I came across these cute shuttle pens! I ordered them just in case since Amazon returns are pretty simple.
I moved on from them thinking we’d do some cute stickers with a card that said, “Stuck on you.” But the night before, Brigsby and I decided we preferred the pens for the exchange.
So, Monday morning, I quickly (which isn’t usually the case) pulled up a flash card template in Canva, deleted everything except the layout, and made these “cards” that say, “You color my world.” Perfect for the colorful ink in the shuttle pens! I printed them on card stock, and they came out so nice!
I should’ve pulled out my paper trimmer to probably speed up the process a bit, but it actually didn’t take long to cut them out. And I would’ve had to do the rounded corners (which I think make things look extra nice!) with scissors anyway.
After I got them all cut, we stuck the cards in the pen clip, and voila! Homemade, purposeful, and not super cheapy Valentine’s gifts!
A Rowyn Moment
Yesterday afternoon after @mtt got home, I told the kids I was running to Target. Ro immediately runs to her room. She comes out with this “list.” She made it a few weeks ago. Very tediously, as you can see. She told me it was her birthday list (which is 3+ months away), but that I could use it as my shopping list with the stipulation that I not mess it up and bring it back. 😊
Hand-Print Flowers
We did a quick Mother’s Day craft with stuff we had on hand. I got the idea from Pinterest. The original craft used foam for the “blooms” and leaves, which I’m sure would be a little more durable (and not show the bleed through of glue). But I didn’t have any, so I just grabbed the card stock. Amazingly, both my 3-year-old and 13-month-old let me quickly trace their hands! My expectations were low, but highly exceeded. Brigsby carefully painted the popsicle stick “stems” while I cut out handprint “flowers” and leaves (I just quickly drew them with a pencil). Although it’d be super easy to finish quickly, we actually didn’t get it all done in one day. Brigsby probably spent about 20 minutes painting (crafts aren’t typically his jam, but he connects with painting here and there), then was ready to move on. So, I set everything aside and finished up today. I love how they turned out! 2 are for my mother-in-law, 2 are for me, and 1 is for my husband because Brigsby wanted to make him one too. 💙 If I had planned ahead (story of my life, but I’m working on that), I would’ve done a few more to gift to my MIL because the little wrapped bouquet is so fun! Maybe we’ll make some more later. This would be a great keepsake craft, birthday gift, Spring/Summer activity, etc. Definitely not Mother’s Day specific. But that’s how I found the idea, and I’m glad I did!
PS - I might have had as much fun taking pictures of them as I did putting them together. 🙂🙃
Books Pictured:
Nature Anatomy: The Curious Parts and Pieces of the Natural World by Julia Rothman Everything is Mama by Jimmy Fallon