busy

Cora Bell is grabbing her toes and can sit up for a few seconds before she topples over. She's growing quite a bit of hair and drooling a lot. She laughs herself silly any time her brothers pay her the slightest attention.

Wiley, Archer, and I made strawberry ice cream and jello popsicles this weekend. I thought I had a bunk ice cream maker, but adding salt to the ice really makes the difference. Instead of spinning for hours without freezing like before, this time I added salt and the ice cream was made in about 30 mins. The popsicles were an experiment and I think frozen jello is kinda gross, but the boys liked them.
We also made popsicle stick treasure boxes, meant for father's day, but given before the glue was dry.
Today we made our own stuffed animals after I got home from work and during breaks while I made dinner (which by the way was a Thai inspired shrimp fried rice, which the boys ate up heartily, unexpectedly, so there wasn't quite enough for me!) This was a learning process. Wiley made a design that turned out to be overly complicated and difficult to stuff and difficult for me to sew. Archer made a kind of legless/wingless/crownless chicken that turned out well. They are up for making some more tomorrow so I think we'll refine our process and techniques....look out Christmas gifts!
We also made a list of things to do this summer. I'm excited about it. (from basics, like catching fireflies to something more complex like having friends over to camp in the yard).
The boys have also been super helpful in catching japanese beetles, which are destroying my garden. They particularly love my grapevine. Seriously, we catch about 50 a day, at least, and feed them to the chickens. This fall I will resort to whatever I have to put in the garden to kill their larvae/eggs. Even as much as I truly hate them, the lacy patterns they make of the grape leaves are quite pretty. They also eat my blueberry bushes and dahlias.