A loooong looong post about beach, sleepover, sickness, schoolwork and gardeing

A few weeks ago we bought two chickens. The plan was to let them walk around the in the back yard but we learned quickly that they can fly higher than we though, and so escape over the fence... While letting them live on our back porch we built them a very simple little chicken coop. Now we have finally bought some higher chicken wire to be able to let them out but this picture was taken before that. More pics will come... It is so nice to have our own eggs every day!!

Happy and Hey (the names Marlee and Noah gave the chickens)

A cloudy beach day with friends.

Jules and Noah

Marlee and Lexi

Maybe we have had too much going on but the other week I accidentally took Marlee to soccer practice on the day he has gymnastics, so he ended up missing the gymnastics. He was really disappointed but did not get too upset about it. I felt so mad about it and we ended up going home, having lots of ice cream and played board games. It cheered him up some :-)

Noah and Gabriel are taking a nap :-*

About a week and a half ago me and the kids went on a field trip with the coop to a reptile center. It was a lot of fun! However, the craziest thing happened after that trip. 15 of about 30 children who went got sick the next day, as well as some of the parents who went (including me and Noah). A few days later some more siblings and parents got it who did not come on the field trip. Long story but it was extremely contagious and got everyone in its way. I have never seen anything like it! The only good thing is the vomiting only lasts for about 12 hours and after that the recovering goes pretty quick.

Most of the children who went on the field trip

Marlee touching a snake

Marlee HOLDING a snake!!!

My little crew watching a cobra

The day after the field trip me and Alex were supposed to go to a wedding for Alex's nephew about 7h from here. All the boys were dropped off at Alex's house in the morning to go with her and her mum to coop and stay with them for the day and the night!! It was the first time I would leave Gabriel for so long and the first time he would spend the night away from me. It was also the first time all the boys would have a first sleep over at a friends house. All things being big things but I felt pretty confident with Kathie (Lexi's mum) since all the boys, including Gabriel, really like her! 

Well I got home after leaving the boys with Kathie and started having some health problems that had me call my midwife. After a few hours a felt better and we were ready to leave for the wedding. Several hours late but we decided to go. However, before even reaching the highway the car got overheated for no obvious reason. That delayed us even more and by this point it was no idea for us to leave anymore. We had not other choice than to go home... 

After some thought me and Alex decided to let the boys stay with Kathie even though we were home again. They had all so looked forward to the sleep over so badly and Alex and I could use a night on our own. Gabriel had not cried once since we dropped him off so we did not have to worry about him at all :-)

Back home again I started to feel sick and sure enough, after a few hours a started throwing up... A few hours later Noah did the same over at Kathie's house. He was such a trooper about it though and never complained, just stayed positive. It was late at night at this point and Noah spent the night.

The next morning Alex started to feel sick, too. He picked up the boys and we took turns resting and taking care of them. Noah still slept a lot but stopped throwing up around noon. 

It was a rough two days but the only things a could think of was how grateful I was for so many things. That we were still home when all the sick problems started, that the car broke down close to home, that the children were not home, that Alex was home to take care of me before he got sick and that we had awesome friends helping us! Marlee's soccer coach picked him up in the morning to take him to his soccer game, that we could not go to. It could have been so much worse!

Gabriel and Noah at the coop with Kathie

Gabriel at Kathie's house

Life went back to normal again and everyone got well.

This little guy LOVES being in the water!

Gabriel got his first nose bleed a few days ago. He was very concerned about the paper in his nose!

Marlee had his first presentation at coop last Friday.  All kids in the class had to pick a state and do research about it. He picked Nebraska. Don't ask me why!!?? But we all had fun reading about it. He did such a good job finding facts in our ancient encyclopedia :-) and watching you tube videos. When presenting it to the class he did a very good job and we brought Kool aid for everyone, since that apparently is from Nebraska :-)

Writing bout corn which they grow a lot in Nebraska

Noah has really made great progress lately with his numbers and letters. I never tell him that he has to do school work but most of the time he wants to join me and Marlee when Marlee does his. He can identify all numbers 1-10 and write most of them and he can probably identify 5-10 letters. His alphabet place mat has been a big help!

Noah practicing counting and writing the numbers

At rainbow park

Mamma, take a picture of me!

My little nap companion :-)

Noah practicing letters, using his alphabet place mat

Marlee working on his Nebraska project

Noah in his class

Practicing drawing numbers in shaving cream was so much fun!!

 Another beach afternoon in gorgeous weather!!!

This little cart was such a good investment!

Marlee and Curren in the water

Noah has become very brave in the water, too!!

Alex have worked hard creating a garden in our back yard with all kinds of fruit trees, berry bushes, herbs and vegetables. I need to post some pictures. He likes to go out and take care of it every day now when he does not smoke anymore!! (I am so proud and happy about that!!!!!) It gives him a reason to go outside and get away from the computer for a while. We have all been apart of creating it but he has surely done more work than anyone else. Me and the kids have started a small garden from seeds that we are taking care of. Just hoping that the squirrels wont eat it. They are the biggest enemies right now!

Our small garden

A squirrel trying to take Muffin's and Quack's food!