I had high hopes for April – and while it was a pretty darn good month, it was still really cold here in Michigan. Hopefully May brings the temps we are wanting, the nice, beautiful, warm days before the sticky, swampy days of summer. We love summer these days, but still avoid the heat of the day. Spring is pretty perfect for us, and usually involves lots of playing outside and porch drinks.

I have some fun activities in store for us this month, but my main goal for the month is getting the garden all ready and planting what can be planted. I really want to get my tomatoes planted but it is still too early here. We are looking forward to garden fresh tomatoes! My friends and I are hitting up our favorite nurseries this upcoming weekend, and I am making a list of what I think I need.

As I sit here and think about what we are doing this month, it seems like May is sort of a staging ground for summer – planning summer gardens, summer vacations – and I am deciding here and now to not miss the month of May by looking ahead to June.

Wyatt and I are about to start reading Charlotte’s Web together, which I also am going to use as a jumping off point for a big unit study on farms. I am super excited about this unit study, and have so many books and activities waiting for us, as soon as we finish up our ponds study. We have about two weeks worth or learning left, including some fun field trips, art projects, science experiments, and even a tiny container pond build. But once we finish up, we are starting on farms. I am super excited about it. I feel like we can include so many different little rabbit trails of learning, which usually ends up trickling into our everyday lives. That is one of my favorite things about homeschooling – how our daily lives and homeschool learning activities can become intertwined. (Like, don’t you all think I need to add a tarantula to our menagerie?) And I already have a trip planned for July, to a tiny house set in the middle of a farm.

Speaking of school, I need to get moving on next year’s curriculum! I already know what I want to use, but I want to purchase the programs I am using so I can get working on planning. I am also creating our own language arts curriculum for next year. It’s a lot of work honestly but I think it will be worth it! We will still rely on other curriculum for grammar, phonics, etc but for language arts, that is all me. I am really excited about what I have planned!

I am really looking forward to going to restaurants again this month! We are a bit slower here, to rejoin the world, but we are working on it slowly but surely. I am still nervous with Wyatt’s health issues but things are definitely better than they were two years ago at this time. I am hoping to start with some outside dining before taking the plunge. In fact, I should look at the weather and set something up soon!

What are your plans for May? Is there anything you are looking forward to this month?

We have had quite a fun reading month! I go to the library at least twice a week and bring home stacks of books, for me, for Wyatt, and for my mom. I love that it is the same library I have gone to since I was a child; the other day I was checking out books and the head librarian, Wally, was telling me how he remembered me checking out books when I was just a little girl. I love that now Wyatt is doing the same at the same library. Our library is such a special place for me.

Let’s start with my mom!

She just finished up Radium Girls and loved it; now she has Code Girls and America’s First Daughter that she is working on. My mom is primarily a nonfiction reader, so if you have any suggestions that are like Radium Girls I would love to hear them (and so would she!)

Now me:

I had a really slow reading month, but it was a good one! I am including Seed to Dust although I still have a bit left. Hopefully I get to these reviews soon!

And now Wyatt:

The Storm is our current read aloud. I wanted something sort of short (lol) to squeeze in before our next longer reader aloud. So far this is pretty cute, and it is a series so there are more to explore if Wyatt enjoys it. Little Blue House Beside the Sea is beautiful, and made me dream of visiting coastlines. Wyatt liked it but I think I liked it more. We both really enjoyed I am You: A Book About Ubuntu! I had never heard of Ubuntu before! It is a South African philosophy about community, a belief system that a person is a person through other people. If you hurt, I hurt. If you are happy, then I am happy. When I am kind to you, I am kind to myself. I love the idea of this connection and empathy and while Wyatt was a little lost on the bigger message, the ideas of friendship and kindness were quite clear to him.

Wyatt absolutely loved Jeff Goes Wild and Moose’s Book Bus. Both were so cute, and filled with animals which Wyatt is all about in a book right now. In Jeff Goes Wild, an orange cat imagines he is a jungle tiger before concluding he likes who he is as he is. I loved the colors and illustrations in this book! And Moose’s Book Bus – I think this was the hands down favorite for both of us this month. Moose starts checking books out for his family, then the animals in the woods. He reads to them until his house becomes too full to hold them all. So he teaches a neighbor to read, who teaches another, and so on, until everyone is a reader! Moose still will have guests drop by though, to hear him read aloud. We loved this one! Somewhere is a very sweet little book about a child’s first “adventure” while on a walk with her father.

Harlem Grown and The Hiking Viking were also at the tops of our list! Wyatt is excited about gardening right now since he got to plant a little garden of his own so he liked Harlem Grown. The Hiking Viking is about a young Viking who would prefer to spend time in nature than doing the typical viking things, like fighting and feats of physical strength. In the end he learns that it is ok to be different. It reminded me a little of Ferdinand, which was one of my very favorite picture books as a child. It also had really fun illustrations. And finally Watercress. I should have included this in my section, since I read it but not to Wyatt. I am definitely buying this one, it was so beautiful and made me cry and touched my heart. It is an autobiographical moment in Wang’s life, about growing up an in an immigrant family in the midwest, being embarrassed of her family, then as she learns more about her family, she feels ashamed of being ashamed of her family. It was just excellent.

And that’s a wrap!

Yay! The Village is open for the season! We love Greenfield Village so much. We live so close that we get a membership every year. It is fun to go to the different events and exhibits, but what we like to do is just go and enjoy the grounds themselves. It is a wonderful place to go with Wyatt that always has something to do, or if we are feeling low key we can just go for a walk around or a train ride and eat frozen custard.

It was seriously the BEST spring day. Vivid blue skies, a breeze, just warm enough. The perfect day to visit really.

This pavilion is new. Well new to the village at least. It was originally part of Detroit’s Central Farm Market, and was built in 1860 and closed in 1890. It was moved to Belle Isle until eventually falling into disrepair. The Henry Ford bought the building before it was destroyed in 2003 and reconstructed it at Greenfield Village, where I believe they plan to use it for their own farmers market filled with the produce and products grown and made there. I am excited to check it out!

And in all of our years visiting, we never knew there was a candy store! What! Now that we know, we will be back. I particularly loved these Michi-gummies. So did Wyatt, although I am the only one who played with them.

This is early spring at Cotswold Cottage, one of my favorite houses. The flowers have not come up yet, but they want to! The birds were busy making nests in the house, and we had fun playing around inside and out. I can’t wait to go back and see it in all of it’s summertime glory. (Daggett Farmhouse is my other favorite building)

Another sleeping garden, a sleepy Main street, fit the mellow mood. Soon these streets will be filled with families and couples and tourists, but while we were there it was still fairly subdued. I couldn’t help but think of Murdoch Mysteries as I walked around this part of the village.

It was a relaxing outing, low key, easy. We have many more visits this season in our future!

If you want to take a digital look around, click on the locations on this map!

We took a much needed week off last week! We spent the first two days laying low, reading, playing games, and watching tv. We have been working hard and we deserved it. By Wednesday, we were feeling restless though and we picked up mom/Grandma Bird (Wyatt started calling her Bird when he was a toddler and it has stuck) and went for a spring walk in the woods.

It was a great walk, there was sunshine, woodpeckers, and flowers just poking their heads up. And bluebirds! I spotted two bluebirds on our walk and I was thrilled! We checked for frogs and salamanders but didn’t spot any. We will keep trying though!

Since it was our spring break, Billy took Thursday and Friday off! We spent Thursday at Greenfield Village, which I will post about tomorrow, and then the rest of the weekend we spent bopping around with our various mini-adventures. We all had a few requests that we wanted to do – Wyatt wanted ice cream and a picnic, I wanted to visit the nursery on opening day, and Billy wanted a beard trim. We all got our wishes plus a few extras!

The nursery happened first. We got up bright and early, braved the slightly chilly temps, and poked around the aisles, planning and choosing. I didn’t buy much this go ’round – spring is being too fickle here in Michigan right now. I did pick out a few new houseplants. Wyatt loves to name my plants, and he named these three Zoey Zebra, Emily Elephant, and Peppa after characters from Peppa Pig. I think they were pretty spot on! Wyatt also picked out a few for a little pot all his own.

Then we had an impromptu visit to the doctor for Wyatt. On Tuesday, he woke up with a red spot in his eye. By Friday, we thought it was looking worse, and we were afraid he had something in it, like one of his super long eyelashes.

Thankfully, it was just a broken blood vessel – which he may have gotten from singing loudly. Picture me rolling my eyes here, because this kid can get LOUD!!

The next day was 80 degrees! We decided to split Wyatt’s requests up into two days, and have our picnic Sunday when the ground would be a bit more dry and we could really take our time. So Saturday, Billy got his beard trim – or chop, however you want to view it, as he had like 8 inches cut off! I feel like he looks quite distinguished now. We also got ice cream, to Wyatt’s delight. On our way home we impulsively stopped at an estate sale, which I ran into alone. And I feel like I left a winner! I picked up a beautiful chair for my office for only $15 dollars. As I was carrying it out people were commenting that it was a gorgeous chair, and a man pointed to it and told his wife, “That is the chair I wanted you to see, but you were too slow..:. I guess my chair was popular! We went back later in the day, all three of us this time, and left with two hedgehog statues – I picked one and so did Wyatt. He is totally my kid. (and I promise that in the photos Wyatt did have ice cream, he just likes his cone on the side)

Sunday finally was picnic day! It was a beautiful day for one, 80 and sunny!

It was a great few days of fun before returning to all of responsibilities!

My Sunday Post is hosted by Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer
Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz
It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date

Hi everyone! This past week Wyatt and I have been enjoying a break from homeschooling and maybe just all work in general and it has been awesome. Billy even took two days off work which made the time even better. We’ve been having little mini adventures, lazy days, and just plain having fun living life.

I am all over the place with reading right now. Like picking up books but skipping around from this one to that one, like a butterfly visiting flowers. I have been reading Watership Down most frequently, taking my time with my favorite book and not speeding through it, which when you have read a book this many times would be quite easy. It’s so familiar, every bit, and I want to take my time with it instead of flying through. I have a bit left in a few other books too, and I am planning on wrapping all of those up before moving on to my next read, Beauty From Ashes by Lisa Howeler! She blogs over at Boondock Ramblings about her life as a homeschool mom (her daughter and Wyatt are very close in age which is super awesome and I love sharing stories back and forth with her), avid British cozy watcher, random musings that make me laugh from her wry sense of humor that is so much like my own family’s sense of humor, and her faith. She is also a very talented writer! Her third book in the Spencer Valley Chronicles comes out on May 10th and as part of the launch team, I have a copy to read now!

I can’t say we are watching anything right now of note – we seem to have gotten sucked into Murdoch Mysteries. We are on Season 7 now and we have noticed that the show is seeming to take itself less seriously. This different sort of feel, a bit more humor, makes the show fun to watch. One of the last episodes we watched even got sort of meta on us. We have been playing hard during the day the past few weeks too, and it is pretty perfect to just unwind to at night.

We haven’t had much wake up music either! I think because we have been lazy in the mornings these days. Lol. We did have one the other day, and Wyatt was jamming out to it – Grateful Dead’s Touch of Grey, one of my faves. Apparently Wyatt is a fan as well.

I did manage to post a few times last week!

Making Things: Project Updates

My National Parks Bucket List

Easter Weekend

We Saw the Sun!

And.. that is about it from here! What is going on in your world? Reading anything good?

It was a busy busy weekend! I had to finish tying up so loose ends, buying a few more basket stuffers for Wyatt and my nieces, making sure I had all the ingredients for our offering at Easter dinner (mac and cheese), and cleaning our house which had become a bit neglected through the week.

Saturday after taking my mom shopping, I came home and Wyatt wanted to take a nap. I was all worn out from shopping (doesn’t take much lol) so while he slept I laid on the bed next to him, listening to a podcast with my headphones on. Billy headed down to his office where he played video games with his headphones on. Well, when Wyatt woke up I checked my phone and found I had missed a million calls from my family and my brother and sister-in-law were texting asking if we were ok, etc. I felt sort of like Rip Van Winkle. How long had we been relaxing? Apparently just an hour but in that time my brother had stopped by (Chrissy was going to shave Miso, more on that in a minute) and knocked a few times with no answer. They saw our cars in the drive, tried the door, yelled hello into the house, and even came in and walked around, while Wyatt, Billy, and I were totally oblivious. When we connected they were amazed and alarmed that we had had no idea they were in our house. Lol. Chrissy even commented that I was probably even listening to a true crime podcast (I was..). So just a reminder all to lock your doors! And Miso got her haircut too, poor thing. She had a huge mat that she just wouldn’t let me take care of, so Chrissy had to bring the clippers. Miso is so much happier and more comfortable now, although she was really quite upset with us for a bit.

Later that night we dyed eggs with Wyatt. I had thought I messed up by buying brown eggs as I usually do, I didn’t even think about it when I bought them. But it worked!

Sunday morning, Wyatt was happy to see that the bunny had come.

After relaxing for a bit, it was time to get a move on! We had two stops – Billy’s parents and later my family gathering. First up was Billy’s parents, where my MIL gifted me with some of her plant babies!

After a nice time there, we headed home and Billy started the macaroni and cheese. He has a delicious recipe that he got from a coworker which was going to be our contribution. It was finished just on time to head out the door for Devin and Chrissy’s house. Where we will all just ate so much good food it was crazy. We had Billy’s macaroni, Devin and Chrissy made salmon, bean salad, and broccoli and Brussels sprouts. And deviled eggs! Everyone was going wild over the deviled eggs Chrissy made, and I realized I had never had one, like ever in my life. So I had one. Then another. And then another! Why did no one ever tell me deviled eggs were so good? For dessert we had ice cream and homemade carrot cake, because we apparently needed to eat even more food.

In between eating we laughed and chatted and the kids played and tried to eat all their candy in one sitting. We talked about our family trip we are taking up north in June, we talked about recipes, we just talked about everything. It has been a long few months inside and away from each other, but it was so much fun to finally see each other again, altogether in one room and sharing stories and good food. It was a fantastic day and we were all happy and full and relaxed when we all headed home. I am so thankful for my family!

I am also thankful that this week Wyatt and I are on break, since I don’t feel like doing much of anything this morning, other than drinking my coffee and apparently writing this post. I hope you all had a good weekend as well, whatever you were doing!

We had a pretty terrific weekend! I feel like we really kicked off the spring/summer/sunshine season the past few days and it has been awesome. Just the lift my spirits have needed.

First, Saturday was “name day” at our favorite ice cream parlor for Wyatt and Billy, so those two got free ice cream! We had been meaning to get ice cream since the parlor reopened for the season and that was the just the motivation we needed to stop in.

Wyatt chose mint chocolate chip, his favorite. Billy picked black cherry, his favorite. And I always mix it up! I got bear claw that time, which was delicious! We had to eat in the car since it was too wet out but it was still a good way to start the weekend.

Sunday the sun was out and shining its heart out. We couldn’t wait to get outside, so we had some breakfast and hit the road.

We wandered down near the river, where Billy and Wyatt chucked rocks into the water. Wyatt seriously had the best time and it was cracking me up. The bigger the rock, the bigger the plop, the bigger the laughs got.

Then we found a rock that could not be budged. So we played on it.

When we had explored all there was to explore, it was time to head home. Billy and I had an amazing dinner of Salmon Pesto Pasta, Wyatt had chicken and noodles, and by the time we all took showers we were more than ready for relaxing for the rest of the night.

The past two days have been beautiful as well. We have been spending our mornings homeschooling, then getting outside for a few hours before finishing up school for the day.

Now let’s just hope the weather is here to stay!

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date

Last week was just a regular old week around here, which isn’t a bad thing. It was just one of those living my life kind of weeks, nothing too exciting. Wyatt and I are chugging along with school, and he had two appointments as well. One 7 year wellness visit with his pediatrician and then an Occupational therapy session/evaluation. Friday night tacos, ice cream on Saturday.. it was nice. Hopefully we get a hike in this afternoon. Then the week begins all over again with school. We are taking a break next week from school so that will be fun! I am trying to get some ideas together for our staycation!

Reading:

I started both of these and I am enjoying them both! I am not done yet with either but I will be soon, probably later today (at least with Wild is the Witch). Then I will be picking up my annual reread of Watership Down! It is my favorite book, and has been since middle school and I have read it so so many times. I am on my 4th copy at least, and I am pretty sure I need to buy this one too – the 40th Anniversary Edition. I was toying with the idea of an actual read along event but I realized I have no idea what that entails!

Posted Last Week:

10 on the 10th: Diamond Edition

A Day in the Life

Hello April!

Watching and Listening:

Nothing new to report here. We are still watching Murdoch Mysteries and now I am all in, and keep watching because what the heck is going on with him and Julia!! We are on season 4 (or 5 I’m not sure) so we have many more episodes to go.

For Saturday night movie night we were going to watch Green Knight but it wasn’t available on any of our platforms. So instead of an hour trying to find a movie we went back to Studio Ghibli. This time we watched My Neighbor Totoro, which was so cute! I am going to rewatch it with Wyatt.

I have been listening a lot to the podcast National Park After Dark. I listened to one this week that was crazy scary! It was a two part pod called Night of the Grizzlies, about a night of Grizzly attacks at Denali National Park in the 60s. I guess prior to these attacks the park service and tourists all believed that the grizzly bears were harmless and not a threat. There is also a book about this tragic night, written by Jack Olsen and it is also called Night of the Grizzlies. They have a mix of terrifying tales but also inspiring tales of survival, all set within the National Parks.

And that is about it from our little refuge!