Working Hard

Our backyard is really starting to take shape now. Yesterday DH and the kids went into town and got a trailer load of bark chips to put under the swing. Hopefully that will help to keep the weeds down, as well as providing a softer fall surface. We've recently changed our swing set from the toddler swing in the centre to the roman rings so the kids are doing all kinds of fancy tricks (along with having a few more spills).

Here are DH and the boys unloading the trailer of bark chips. My kids are blessed with a wonderful father and I hope someday they come to realise and appreciate that. I love it when they do things like this together. It's so much easier now that DH isn't working quite as much too. No amount of money can replace these times together. :-) DD was going to help but was too involved in watching the latest Barbie movie on TV and decided she would rather be doing that. LOL.

If you look carefully you can see my pea plants in the background of the photo. They have outgrown their frame and seem to be preferring to hold onto one another rather than getting a good grip on the support that is there. Which is fine until they get a battering from the winds we've been getting lately. Still, we're getting some peas from them which is great.

DH also got the site for our garden shed semi-levelled yesterday. He had to shift some dirt to build it up level with the backyard. Over tea last night I asked him who he was going to get to help him put the shed up. He informed me that he and I were going to do it. LOL. Apparently it's not heavy or anything - he just needs a hand steadying it. DD piped up and said that perhaps we could have a family day putting up the shed. :-) Isn't she sweet? So it looks like the 5 of us will be putting up the shed together which will be a nice project. And nice to be able to look at the shed and remember putting it up together.

I have my times when I mourn the fact that I no longer have a baby (now that the children are getting older). Part of me would love to have another one. But days like yesterday remind me that there are some wonderful parts to children growing older - like being able to do things together. :-)

In the afternoon we had a bit of a baking spree. I baked a banana cake and some chocolate chip biscuits. Then DS decided he wanted to make some peanut butter sweets that are in a recipe book he got for Christmas a couple of years ago. DD wanted to make some honey biscuits that she had a recipe for from school (they've been learning all about bees and honey). As we were finishing off I was talking to them about how it's a good skill to learn how to cook. DS is something of a perfectionist and wanted me to finish off what he was making. I told him it didn't matter how it looked but it was more important that he practise the skill as that was the only way he'd get better.

I'm thankful for the fact that my MIL had a similar idea with her boys and made sure they knew how to cook. I was all "cooked out" come tea time so DH made dinner. :-) He does have a limited range when it comes to his culinary abilities but I'm sure not complaining.

Our youngest sure loves his trailers and couldn't resist the opportunity to hook our trailer onto his tractor while it was still in the backyard. LOL. Then he enlisted the help of his older brother and sister to see if they could in fact "tow it". When I went out to take the photo they tried to enlist my help but I politely declined. :-) The older 2 are pretty obliging to DS's scheme's most of the time. At least there were no jumps in sight! Which reminds me, guess who ate his broccoli last night. LOL. So there are some health benefits to taking him to see motorbikes jumping off ramps!

This shows how he has attached the trailer to his tractor. It has a pin at the back where a trailer can be attached but because this was a freebie there wasn't a trailer with it and we can't order them individually. DH is *planning* on making something for DS to attach to his tractor - we'll see if he gets around to it before DS outgrows it. :-) It doesn't actually *need* it but he is so trailer crazy that we know he'd LOVE it. There is a practical aspect to it as well though. DH was watching DS reversing his tractor yesterday. The steering apparently works the same way as a vehicle and DH thinks if he had a trailer on behind, he'd not only know how to reverse a vehicle when it comes to driving but also how to reverse a vehicle with a trailer. Skills like that in a farm kid can come in VERY handy when dad needs something put away etc. :-)

Unfortunately DH and I have come down with a vomitting bug today. We thought we'd missed it when the kids had it a couple of weeks ago. It makes me doubly glad that we took the time to do things with the kids yesterday. Today MIL has driven out and picked them up as DH and I aren't really in a great way to be looking after them (especially getting food for them). It just brings home to me that fact that we really don't know what tomorrow is going to bring and we have to seize each day that we have. Not out of fear of the future, but in appreciation for what that day brings. I won't go into detail of what my day today has brought so far though. LOL.