It's science fair time again!

You may remember three years ago when The Girl did a science project about yeast a couple years ago.  My folks were in town and my mom helped her do it--it was painless for everyone and the project was a success.  The only downfall was that the house smelled like fresh bread and there wasn't any bread.
This year, it is the boy's turn.  He had heard somewhere that fruit could be used as a battery.  After using about 8 lemons, The Boy and Mr. IM discovered that there is an issue with the current (description here), but it was a very interesting project for all of us (and the house smelled good, like lemons!)

Writing Assignment

The Boy had a writing assignment this week...here is his Venn diagram planning document...

In case you need help reading it....
Title:  Similarities and Differences, Colorado vs. New Hampshire
Colorado: In the West, Mountains have snow, temperatures change dramatically
New Hampshire: On the East Coast, Mountain are icy, temperatures don't change a lot
Same:  Very Nice, have mountains, good skiers

I can't wait to read the finished product....

First Harvest!

There may be snow predicted for tonight, but the (Sub)Urban Ranch is harvesting veggies!

As usual, the green onions win the first harvest prize, followed closely  by some asparagus (asparaguses?asparaguy?)

Funny, but not so much?

When The Girl was little, Dave Barry's column was syndicated in our local paper and we enjoyed reading about his daughter, Sophie, who is about a year older than The Girl.  We always joked that thanks to Dave Barry we knew what was coming and how to make it funny.

In the May 2015 Reader's Digest, there is an article about Sophie learning to drive. When I turned the page and saw it, I think I actually caught my breath and then giggled. I mean, we knew she'd be driving in a little over a year, but oh, boy, things just got real!

Spring?

This is the first weekend since November that the family hasn't skiied/snowboarded and everyone is home (together) the whole weekend.  Yesterday we all slept in.  The Girl and I ran some errands while The Boy and Mr. IM worked on The Boy's science fair project.  Today after church we did a little yardwork, trying to get the place in shape for planting in the next couple weeks.

 In the continuing saga of the pallets, here are four new planter boxes, designed to mount to the fence.  They hold small flower pots, or can have a bottom put in to hold dirt.

 The front yard looks better--we cut back the old growth (from last summer) on the butterfly bushes and removed some leaves and trash from around the daisies and roses.  The shrubby things (what are they called?) have been trimmed, so our neighbor can get into his driveway and we can get to the side gate.

 The maple tree definitely has some buds!  The grassy area beyond the tree is on the list of "things to deal with".  We need to install a better drainage system and probably remove the sod and put in some kind of rock (there is a ton in the side yard that can be used for something).

 And the lovely ground cover (that eventually will be the setting for the fairy village, with little white flowers) has started growing.

 Inside, we're trying to get the garden going.  I think the greenhouse was too wet, so some of the plants were moved into slightly bigger pots--so far we have okra, tomatoes, yellow squash, jalapenos, banana peppers, and some flowers.  The cucumber seeds are not cooperating, but I will try again after the greenhouse dries out a bit.

 I transferred some of the flowers (they are a sad little group) into a flower pot that can go outside eventually.  In other news, my cactuses look good...

 Outside things still look pretty blah--we did harvest some dirt from the composter and toss it on the garden.  No sign that the peas and lettuce planted last week before the snow are growing...they may be a wash.  The yucca plants are showing a little new growth.  I cut back the mums, we'll see if they come back.

 I do have some produce (or will soon!)--spinach!!

 And scallions....lots of scallions...in fact, they have escaped their fence there are so many.

 We were worried about the apple tree--Liberty has spent the winter trying to dig it up--but there are buds.  We staked it (it was leaning) and are hoping for the best.

 The cherry tree has a few small buds--no leaves yet, but buds...

 and the peach tree has lots of leaves!  You can also see the side yard, which is on the list of projects to deal with...someday...maybe this summer, maybe not.

 The duck family is happily strolling through the garden--the lavender bushes are starting to leaf!

 The little pine trees seem to have survived another winter.  We started with five and now have four, but they look pretty good.

 Mr. IM discovered that these pots will fit in the new planter, so I will be on the lookout for more so that I can still have flowers  by my sink window/tiki bar.







And here we have the dilemma of the day--a brave little plant growing up through the patio pavers.  It is so cute I want to let it grow...but I don't need anything else making the stones uneven...eesh.

Since we've started working on the yard it is a guarantee we'll have one more snowstorm--maybe if it is a big enough storm we'll have a snow day and I'll get the pantry cleaned!

More Legos...

The Boy has completed another Lego creation and wants me to share it with all of you.  He says "you should do more posts about Legos"

According to the Boy...
This set contains The Boy's three Luke Skywalker mini figs.  Tan-faced, Tatooine Luke has Yoda's lightsaber.  Yellow-faced Tatooine Luke is the gunner for the back.  And Hoth Luke is the pilot.  They are driving a retrofitted landspeeder.

You can also see how dusty my desk is in this photo :)  Good times.









Earlier story here

Saturday morning brain dump

This weekend is the last for The Boy's snowboarding team and the end of my spring break, so we borrowed Mr IM's cousin's condo for a few days and stayed in the mountains.  Early this morning we saw a lunar eclipse--that was cool!

I had a lovely breakfast of coffee and little donuts (I shared with the kids and the mister before they headed up the mountain).  I'm going to miss you little donuts...see you next ski season!
















Hanging out in the mountains means that I get to hang out in the fabulous Breckenridge library for the day today, while the family gets in one last day of skiing.  They are trying to hit 1,000,000 vertical feet as a family for the season...and they should get there today. And I have a lovely view of the mountain and St.  Mary's.  I am seriously procrastinating on the long list of school work that needs to be done....but that's what evenings are for, right?












Last weekend I was able to spend the day with a good friend who now lives out of state (boo)....as usual, there are no pictures of me with adults, but I did have fun taking selfies with her son and niece :)
















When I get back to school on Monday, I'll have 8 weeks of school, then summer.  I guess that means I should get going on the garden soon!  I did plant some seeds in the seed starter/greenhouse in the living room--hopefully they will survive us being gone for a couple days. Don't worry, I put the cover on before we left!














It is also volleyball season again, so you can all look forward to lots of posts from inside a gym.  So far they've won game and lost one...so it's all good....

That's all for now...I'm off to find one last Empire Burger for the season!

What I read in March

I was going to write a post about International Children's Book Day, but that would require creativity and thoughtfulness...and since I just spent (another) 3 hours working on the kids's bedrooms, that might be beyond my abilities at this point. (I'm on spring break--code  for "get all the stuff done that I've ignored all winter....") Some of the links this month are to our local library site--if they don't work, google or amazon the titles...in honor of April Fools Day, Amazon is not functioning well.

Six books this month--

1.  American Sniper (Chris Kyle)--"Everyone" kept telling me I "had" to read this.  It was fine...Boots on the Ground by Dusk (Tillman) left me feeling much more empathy and patriotism (maybe because it was written by Pat Tillman's wife after he died). Sniper reminded me a lot more of Jarhead.  Both Sniper and Jarhead were interesting books, but I didn't close either at the end thinking, "that was great!".  I'm glad I read it, now I know what everyone is talking about, but it isn't going to make my "top 10 of 2015" list.
2.  Anne Frank:  The Book, The Life, The Afterlife (Francine Prose)--This was an interesting read.  I picked it up a while back from Amazon when it was free (it is 10.99 now!).  It's been a long time since I read the "real" Anne Frank book, this one analyzes it and gives some supplementary information.  Worth it if you can find it free again or at the library.
3.  The Grey Beginning (Barbara Michaels) This was my trash reading from spring break #1 (in Breck with the kids).  I've read it before (I don't think there are any Mertz/Michaels/Peters books that I haven't read....) but don't own it in paperback (I don't think) and haven't read it for years.  It was 99 cents on Amazon, so it was well worth it.  This is one of Michaels' books that I don't love the ending (it just, well, ends), but the characters are fun, the story is engaging...a little bubblegum reading, well worth the 99 cents...
4.  The Queen (Kiera Cass)-Actually a novella, so I don't know if it counts, but it finally came available through the library (electronic version).  It is a background novella, set when the Queen from the Selection books (see last month) was a teenager.  It had a lot of foreshadowing, I'm glad I didn't read it before I finished the "true" series  because I think there were also a lot of spoilers.
5.  Saint Odd (Dean Koontz)--The First Odd Thomas book was published in 2003 (I thought earlier...but that's what Wikipedia says) and I really liked it.  It was kind of in the style of Stephen King, but not as scary--some supernatural stuff, but entertaining characters who save the day and a (light) love story.  I'm pretty sure I read the 2nd and 3rd, and liked them, but not as much.  Then Koonz started making video trailers for the books (I know, that is what authors do now) and sending (almost daily) updated to my email (I was on his mailing list, waiting for the next book). The final straw was when the "next book" was a graphic novel not a real book...blah.  So I was stalking the "it's your lucky day" new book bookshelf at the library, hoping to find the new Kearsley book there, and ran across Saint Odd and though, "meh, I'll get it...probably will have no clue what's going on because I've missed at least two books...".  I actually enjoyed the book--it was not too hard to pick up and figure out what I'd missed (which doesn't say much for the missed books), but the book was a good ending to the series.  The ending was a little strange (I think leaving things open for more Odd Thomas or a spin off series) but a good read none the less.  I might go back and read the missing books...or not.  Start with book 1 of the series if you're going to read--Odd Thomas.
6.  A Desperate Fortune (Susanna Kearsley)-I've been on the waiting list at the library for months to get this one--It is a typical Kearsely book--has ties to her other books, especially Firebird, my favorite Kearsley book ever. Someday I'm going to read them all in a row and make charts of the connections. Instead of time travel this time though, there is a code breaker (who has Asbergers).  There are two stories, one set in the 1700's and one set today--there is a connection (because of the code).  Good story, I still like Firebird best though....maybe her next book will be a sequel to that!

In April I am going to reattempt "The Maze Runner" on the advice of my friend, T...she hasn't steered me wrong yet, so I'll give it another try...