Ian's New Love!

In ode to Valentine's Day I thought I should tell you about Ian's new love. She is very important to him. When he is not with her he is thinking about her. She has even inspired him to organize the garage. In fact he spent Valentine's evening "bedding" her. I'm sorry it sounds that way but that is what it's called. Makes the shooting more accurate. Whatever. Who decided to call it that? Anyway, who is she? His new gun. She is a mini 14.

We celebrated Valentine's Day early so it was cool that he was hanging out in the garage. I did go out and ask him if it was going to be his new man cave. Ian saved his fun money for his new toy. I gave him mine as well. I know must be love huh? Actually now I get his money for the next two months. Woohoo! I won't be using it for firearms.

About a week ago we took his gun out. He is a bit obsessed with the accuracy of it. He had put on a strut which is a bar along the barrel on clamps. It does what you would imagine. Keeps the barrel straighter for a more accurate shot. Guns are simple machines. It was raining so we shot under the barns with only shop towels tucked in our ears. It was a bit loud.


As always I was a pretty good shot. I had never used a scope before and that was cool and annoying all at the same time. The butt of the gun is a little short so it's difficult to see properly in the scope. If you are in to close you will only see black. It was a really annoying game of trying to get your head back further while your body was stuck where it was to support the gun. I suggested he extend the but which amused him because I've been doing nothing but complaining about him adding things onto this gun.

I also shot Ian's 48. There are no pictures of that because I shot it while he was in the old barn looking for something to level the mini 14 on. Scared the crap out of him. Scared me a bit too. I was prepared for a kick but I don't think I've ever shot anything more than a 38. I did not expect the way this would make my hands seem like noodles. This thing leaves holes the diameter of a magic maker in your target from a good distance. I shot it three times and I was over it.

So as if we are not redneck enough now we've taken to shooting things for fun as a couple. Oh and what were we shooting? Well at least it wasn't beer bottles. We found an old dish in the barn. Yeah Ian measured the distance between the shots. On those we were aiming for the D. So it was off to the left. Once he adjusted a few things it was perfect. After the adjustment I was aiming between the bolts. I got one dead center but a little low and the other two strayed off to the right. I kept closing my eyes anticipating the bang. What can I say I'm a girl.

Check out our bookshelves!

I'm really loving shelfari. With my terrible pregnancy brain (really it shouldn't start this early)I can't remember who left the voicemail I just listened to much less what I read last week. You might have noticed that I've had my bookshelf a few weeks on the side bar. Today I made one for Teagan. He is going to be so excited when he gets home. I took his AR (accelerated reading) reports and added the books he has read so far. I'm missing one because I don't have the report but you get the idea. I'm only adding the books he reads to me not any of the ones I read to him. I think he will love it and maybe at the end of the year we will see what books he would like to add to his real bookshelf at home. Fun!

Jade Knievel

Jade has been a busy girl as usual. It always seems to me she insists on doing things too early, rolling, sitting, crawling. Although, walking was about right. Maybe it’s me. Perhaps she is doing everything appropriate to her age but because she is so tiny it just doesn’t seem right. Her latest achievement has some background to it.

We try to get to the park as much as we can. At the park is a mom named Valentina who has a daughter about Jade’s age. She is from Russia and her mother is down visiting for six months. Valentina’s mother is a very sweet woman. Although we can’t communicate I can just tell she is a darling. She seems to understand some English but doesn’t speak English as far as I’ve heard.

When we are there she treats Jade just as she does her own grand-daughter, making sure she doesn’t fall, teaching her things. Jade was having trouble getting up this ladder. I believe in a previous post I mentioned she usually waits for her brother to help her up this ladder rather than do it herself. Anyway Valentina’s mother told Jade in Russian how to climb the ladder. She did okay and I thought that was that.


Fast forward a week later. I’m in the back yard cleaning the bouncer and putting it away. I’m completely worn out and lying down on the bouncer to get the air out feels like heaven to lay there. I forget for a second that Jade is running around in the yard. I look over to where I saw her last and see her there at the top of the ladder. I continue to lay there and then it hits me, AT THE TOP OF THE LADDER!


I run over there. By the time I get there she is already in the fort area heading for the slide. When she slides down she goes so fast she flies off completely and bumps her head at the bottom. Unfazed she gets up and heads for the ladder again. This goes on for a good thirty minutes. I finally just let her climb alone and just ran over when she was going to slide to slow her down a bit.


When she got bored she would throw her legs over the side of the slide for a bit more excitement. Imagine sliding down a banister. That is when I put my foot down and made her go inside. It’s funny when I tell her no she searches my eyes and seems to decide each time that I’m not really serious about it.


The other day we had friends over. Thank you Tami for coming over and Rusty and Christian. Jade fell off the ladder, well fell through the ladder, about four times. Poor thing was so upset and a little beat up. She kept trying though. Jade would get right back up and climb through her tears. Below is a little video of the first day she climbed the ladder.

Thanks Teagan!

Well we have an announcement and Teagan has been sweet enough to illustrate it for us. We told him first and the next day we wanted a fun way to tell Ian's parents so Teagan drew them a picture. The funniest part about it is he remembers the poster on the wall in the hospital from when we had Jade. Amazing! So yes we are pregnant and very excited. Looks like an October baby.

Our Garden

I’ve wanted to do a post about our garden for a long time. I take pictures and by the time I get around to blogging I’ve planted something new or it has grown so much it looks completely different. Can I just tell you how much I love my garden? Notice it’s “my garden” not our garden as the title suggests. Ian built the boxes for me and mixed the soil. Under my direction because I wanted everything to be by the book so I wouldn’t have any problems. I planted everything, watered it and just stared at it daily.


I get so excited when my seeds sprout. I love gardening from seeds. It is much more rewarding to start from scratch. It’s just plain amazing that these plants have grown from just a little spec of seed. I’m very partial to my lettuce because I planted a mix and they are just so pretty. I kneel down and look closely at the leaves. It’s amazing how they can all be lettuce but be so very different. Today I planted more peas and sugarsnap peas.
Tomorrow I’m going to plant some herbs.


Sometime in the next few weeks we are building another box. I really want to make a garden for Teagan. A little box with four squares that he can plant whatever he wants in. Jade is not ready. She would love nothing more than to use my garden for a sandbox. I am very partial to this square foot gardening method. I have plucked a grand total of five weeds from my garden. I’m confident I wouldn’t have had one had I not insisted Ian dig into the soil. Which is not by the book by the way and just for that reason. Here is one of the pictures I took before of the garden. See how much it's grown.


Plus we have a small space to work in. Were this our house I could til up the yard and plant a big garden but it’s not. So out of respect I don’t want to damage the lawn too much. Our garden boxes are in an area the grass wasn’t growing well anyway. This method is a more costly up front but you save so much in seeds and next planting I won’t have to rebuild boxes. Plus I hear this method produces far more than traditional gardening. We will see. By the way if anyone out there has any scrap wood lying around that is at least six inches wide call me and I’ll take it off your hands yesterday.

Fun With Daddy!