Ready...Aim...

What a beautiful late spring evening!

(Insert Morning Mood" by Edvard Grieg)

The perfect evening for...

getting dressed in camo and going shooting!

Shooting has become one of my family's 

favorite pastimes.

One that Matthew and I have not even tried.

Yet.

So off we go to our county's conservation club!

Now here are some people who seem to know what they're doing...

Can you see Matthew checking everything out?

Believe me...I was too.

I knew that this evening was coming for me, and I had tried to prepare myself, but I was still pretty nervous.

Prep work...

All set.

Paul knew that he needed to fill me in on everything.

I think the most important question I had answered was, 

"Where's the safety?"

Me!

Holding a gun!

I was sweating bullets!

:)

O.K., now.

This is pretty cool!

I can see what you guys love about this.

Carrie has already been shooting with the boys a couple times before.

She just needed a little brushing up,

 and she was ready to go.

There's just something about seeing my little girl holding a weapon that gives me great satisfaction.

Call me crazy.

William has been to the range almost every time that Paul has been, so all he needed were some reminders on safety and he was off.

I do believe that this young man is ready 

to try out some hunting.

I have a feeling that there will be a day in the near future when I will just have to try a bite of his deer sausage.

Ugh.

Love makes you do crazy things.

Matthew didn't touch a gun, but he enjoyed collecting shells that he found in the gravel.

And being silly.

As usual.

Ready Josh?

Paul took Josh shooting once before.

I think that since then, Josh asks Paul every evening, "Wanna go shooting?"

That's how we got here this evening....

that simple question from the mouth of our six-year old.

If you're wondering right about now if this made me completely nervous...

Yes.

Totally and completely.

You can't see the fire in this picture, 

but where there's smoke there's fire...

Time for the ladies and the small children to have a seat.

Have I told you how much I love this man?

And how much I love his love for his family?

And how much I love that he has a hobby that he enjoys and wants to share with us?

I found out on this pretty spring evening that 

I enjoy shooting.

I found out that guns don't have to be scary...as long as everyone is paying attention at all times.

I found out that this is going to be something that my family will enjoy doing together for a long time.

I also found out that the 20 minute drive home, listening to my family talk, is pretty cool too.

Enjoying my husband's hobby...which is becoming mine,

Wordless Wednesday..."One. Silly. Boy."

Enjoying his silliness,

Our Own Bit of Earth

I wish that I had my camera with me right after we finished planting the tomatoes.

Josh claimed the tomato plant on the left as his.  

It had two little yellow flowers when we planted it.

Josh stood there with the hose, watering HIS tomato plant and making plans for homemade ketchup.

In this little garden, we have two tomato plants, four zucchini plants (for bread of course!), and two rows each of onion seeds, radish seeds, and lettuce seeds.

See my cute little Garden Fairy?

That is the second one that has graced the garden.

The first one was found with a missing toe and hat.

Thank you, Charlie.

Here is the teepee!

Paul told me to mark out the places where 

I wanted the posts to go, 

then he and William set it up and staked it 

tightly into place.  

It is awesome!

I have to tell you...

When Honie, my gardening mentor at church, told our class about pole bean teepees, I did this inward sigh that meant, "That would be so cool, but..."

I really never thought that it would be something 

that would really be sitting in our yard.

And there it is!

Thank you, Paul and William, for encouraging me to follow through.

I have always wanted peony bushes, 

so this year I have planted two.

Both of them will have white flowers.

I hope.

In between the peonies are two rows of zinnia seeds.

I realized when I began planting that the box of seeds said that there were 100 zinnia seeds included.

But the seeds were in this great big box with all sorts of other stuff.

I'm not so sure I'll get anything here.

But I will hope...

My heroes...

After checking out some really pretty gardens on Pinterest, I decided to pull out the old window that I found up at Dad's.  I'm not sure where it came from, but I fell in love with it.

I had visions of repainting it and using it in our house somewhere, but I really like it here.

Look!  

The morning glories are popping up next to the mint!

And my bottle tree!

It is so pretty in the morning sunlight.

This is a row of hollyhocks planted beside the barn.

Mom always had hollyhocks planted beside the playhouse when I was a kid.

I remember my Grandma Huff making little dancing ladies out of them.

My dancing ladies will be wearing the color peach.

I hope.

:)

I am so stinkin' impressed by this!

This is the backside of Carrie's little pink playhouse.

It was a real weed mess before Carrie grabbed hold of it.

She worked out in the sun for a really long time to get all of the weeds out.

Now she has lovingly named it her Secret Garden..

her own little bit of earth.

Now, if the hundreds of bunnies, birds, and squirrels will just leave some for us...

Enjoying the out-of-doors,