Feels Like Spring

After a brief snow over the weekend, it feels like spring has finally sprung. I got out yesterday and mowed my (what is becoming) gorgeous lawn. I must be getting better at it since it only took me 45 minutes instead of 1 hour. There are still a couple of bare spots, but they seem to be filling in quite nicely. Also, the areas that I thought were low spots in the yard are raising up (probably because of healthier grass) and aren't so low anymore. We don't have nearly the flooding in the back yard when it rains. That Idiot Proof Program must actually be working! :) All I know is the yard looks fantastic.

I cut down half of our pampas grass (I hate ornamental grass) today and my arms are killing me. The suck part is that you really have to cut it down every year or it looks really strange. You wouldn't think that it would be that hard to cut back but when it dries it becomes like twigs. I guess I'll finish it tomorrow since those areas look dumb now with half chopped down and half still up. Maybe I should look into getting a chainsaw. That would be awesome.

I also went to Bible Study this morning (love, love, love my Bible Study). And took all three to a playdate this afternoon since they had early release (I stuck around for a mommy playdate, which was great). And took Daniel and Hannah to TKD. And took Jacob to baseball. And then picked Daniel and Hannah up from TKD. And picked Jacob up from baseball. I've been on the go since 7am. I'm exhausted, but I'm wired. I really hate that. I guess I should just be thankful that we didn't have Cub Scouts too. LOL!

We should find out soon if Hannah got into full day kindergarten. I found out at my mommy playdate with Teresa this afternoon that as of this morning, 21 people had signed up for it. 23 is the limit. At 24, they hold a lottery for the spots. Personally, I think that if you have a bajillion kids in the school already (like I feel like I do) you should be able to get right in. Noooo...they have to be all "fair" about it. Seriously, I'm not going to be heartbroken if she doesn't get in, but she might be.

Hopefully a Green Lawn Soon?

Jacob had his Cub Scout Den meeting last night and he earned his Whittling Chip. His den leader also provided all of the boys with their first (although Jacob actually had one before) pocketknife. I guess they had a huge safety class on pocketknives because Jacob came home with a little card that is his pocketknife certification. This also means that he's allowed to carry a pocketknife to Cub Scout functions. He thinks that's pretty cool since Daniel can't (and definitely shouldn't) carry one for 2 more years.

Daniel lost a tooth last night. What's funny is that I didn't even notice that it was loose until yesterday afternoon. Apparently, he didn't work that hard to get it out, either. He was pretty pleased that he got a visit from the Tooth Fairy last night. He decided to save the quarters he got to help pay for a new DS game.

After gymnastics this morning, Hannah and I headed over to the Grass Pad to start the Idiot-Proof Lawn Program(I'm not kidding...that's what it's called!) I've heard so much about. They were very helpful and even loaded the, whopping, one bag of Prevent that I bought into the van. We came home and I applied Step 1 and are now waiting for the rain that is supposed to come this evening. Our neighbor, Larry, drove by as I was putting it on the front yard and told me that he wouldn't be upset if some of it accidentally landed in his yard. All of his yard. LOL! I told him that I'd be more than happy to let him put whatever I had leftover on his yard. He laughed at that. I hope this stuff works. I spent way too much time on the lawn last year...although I don't know if that's really a bad thing. :)

Wednesday Already?

Wow. Where has the week gone?

It's been hard for everyone to get back into the routine. It shouldn't be that hard after a little better than a week. I mean, it's not like it was summer vacation but it has been difficult.

The boys got their report cards yesterday. No big shock that Jacob is doing well in Reading. We were a little surprised that he got 2's (they are on a 1-2-3 scale...1=A, 2=B/C, 3=D/F...confusing because it's the opposite for Daniel!) in science and math but got +'s in most of the other subcategories. Daniel is doing better. His strong suit is math and managed to get several 3's (remember their scale is backwards) in some of the math areas. We got a report from the Reading Specialist but I'm having trouble reading it. We have conferences with everyone next week.

The grass is beginning to grow! I know that I've been completely obsessing about it...what sane person goes out with a flashlight at 11pm to see if anything's coming up?!? LOL! Seriously, though. I did that. And it may have actually been closer to midnight. Anyhoo...I was out watering the other day when Amy from the cul-du-sac (as opposed to Amy across the street) came over to tell me how much better the yard looks this year. I looked at her, looked at the yard, looked back at her and said, "really?" She then told me that the previous owners had pretty much killed off every blade of grass last spring. She said that for most of the summer, it was all mud. I don't know if they tried reseeding last spring or fall but I'm thinking that they did a fairly good job if there was nothing here last year. It's just so cool to look out and finally see little blades of baby grass growing where there was nothing two weeks ago.

I've been trying to divert my attention from the grass by working on the little garden areas around the yard. I've gotten two completely done and one has a few pansies planted (Jacob begged to plant a few) I've still got a lot of work to do on the flower beds before I can plant anything. Good thing nothing's set to go into the ground for a while because I really think it's going to take about 2 weeks, if not longer, to get everything ready.

Here is a picture of the Dora cake I made for Hannah's birthday today.
I'm pretty proud of it. I'm always amazed at myself when I make these and they actually look like what they are supposed to! LOL!

Stupid Weather

The wind is seriously thwarting my lawn watering efforts today. It rained yesterday so I didn't need to water, but since there is no rain in the forecast today, (you wouldn't know it by looking outside) the sprinkler came out.

I put it in the same place I did on Monday - the same place that let the sprinkler cover the entire front lawn. Today, it was watering the left side of the yard and the neighbor's driveway. Thank you 21 mph winds and 31 mph wind gusts! Grrr! So, I ended up putting the sprinkler in our driveway. Amazingly, the driveway is barely wet and the whole yard is being watered. LOL!

Obviously, it's too early to tell if my re-seeding efforts are working, but at least the areas that already had grass are becoming a lovely shade of emerald green. I hope the bare spots fill in!

The Seed Is In!!!

Yay! I got all of the grass seed in and it is currently watering. I wanted to get it down today because it's supposed to rain off and on this week. So, I thought it would be perfect. This yard is seriously a mess. I'm a little concerned because Mike told me last night that the previous owners reseeded last fall and it didn't take. Hopefully, this'll work. I also did a light overseeding on the areas that currently have grass. Why is it that when you want grass to grow, it won't and when you don't (in flower beds and such) it grows like wildfire? LOL! If half of it takes, I think we'll be in good shape.

I don't know why the lawn bothers me so much. Maybe it's because we had the nicest lawn in the neighborhood (minus the ivy patch) in Virginia...ours was green when everyone else's was icky and brown. I just want a beautiful lawn!