Garden Update: Holy Peas!

Planting snap peas may have been one of the smartest things I've ever done. They are growing like crazy. They are delicious. Ben will eat them, and Sam is considering it. And they make me look like I know what I'm doing. Which, of course, is completely true.

Morning sunlight through pea pod.

They've actually outgrown the bamboo stakes I was using as supports, but they've gotten quite strong and don't seem to mind. If they get too much taller, though, I'm going to need to support them with something else. I don't know what yet. (Click HERE to see what they looked like before) It's very encouraging to have things actually growing. I wish I had grown more now.

Here is an explanation of what is growing (Click on it to see it bigger).

The Tour

My lettuces have been eaten quite a bit by unidentified creatures. I'm going to try to home style remedies to keep them away. We'll see how it works. And they're kinda bitter. I haven't been overly faithful with my watering. Domage.

Cut-and-come-again lettuces

Now, the real question is, what do you use bok choy/choi for? And is this already too far gone? And why are there so many different spellings for bok choy?

Enormous Bok Choi

Chit Chat

Ben: Ma, you wanna come play puppies with us?

Me: Puppies?

Ben: Ya, it's a fun game where we pretend to be puppies and be puppies.

(while Ben was using the potty and Sam and I were right outside the door)

Ben: Ma, I need some privacy.

Me: Oh, I just love you to pieces!

Sam: No, I don't want to be in pieces.

Me: Oh, okay, well I'll just love you then.

Sam: Someone can't love their child when they're broken into pieces!

(I only caught the end of this, but they were interviewing each other with their little microphones.)

Ben: And what's your other favorite food?

Sam: Cereal!

Ben: You already said cereal.

Sam: Ya, I know.

(And here is a continuation of the above several minutes later. For the record, I don't think Ben has ever knowingly eaten cabbage.)

Sam: What's your other favorite food?

Ben: Cabbage.

Sam: What's cabbage?

Ben: it's a favorite food I like.

Tales from all Hallow's Eve!

I haven't gotten into Halloween for many a year. It's just never really been my holiday. I like the candy and the dressing up part, but that's about it. I'm not into scary. Or being scared. Or ugly things. I do like pumpkins and their seeds, but not their guts. I will say this though, Halloween is infinitely more fun with kids who care about it. Ben and Sam really got into Halloween this year. In the days and weeks leading up to it, the boys kept closing all the doors and turning off all the lights upstairs so that they could play Halloween. They would come downstairs and say, "Ma, come and play Halloween with us. Let's go upstairs to Halloween!" There are often spooky voices involved. It's been fun.

Ben and Sam showing off their muscles in a small portion of their costumes

The boys decided quite a while ago that they wanted to be space robots. I made them felt armbands with '"controls on them and jet packs out of plastic water bottles and paper mache. The jet packs were, if I do say so myself, pretty spectacular. I took a series of pictures if anyone is interested. We combined those with their letter shirts (from their super hero costume last year). Total cost = $0. And the boys loved them, which was the whole point.

Ben working on carving his pumpkin

Ben and his Jack-o-Lantern. If I called it a pumpkin after it was carved I got into trouble. "It's a Jack-o-Lantern, Ma!"

I mentioned to the boys that I could dress up as well and they jumped right on that. So, I went as a fairy queen. My neighbor let me borrow the wings and the wand and I used my old prom dress for the... dress. And yes, if I held my breath when Zach zipped me up I could still fit into it. Except I had a bunch of little bruises at the tops of my arms. I think the sleeves were too tight.

Sam, Me, and Ben after leaving a trick-or-treat.

They did pretty well about saying "trick-or-treat" and thank you. If anyone asked what they were they said, "space robots with masks."

Zach went as a bummer.

Sam, Zach and Ben

Ben, Zach and Sam. Too adorable.

It was very much fun. We let the boys stay up with us past their bedtime eating candy. They are doing a very good job sharing. I asked Sam if I could have a piece of candy and he said, "Yes, but just one!" The magic is in the inflection. They're also sharing with each other, which of course does a mother's heart glad. The only problem is that I should have snuck the package of Runts last night, because they wouldn't let me have any of them today. But, despite an almost total lack of banana Runts, a good Halloween was still had by all.