Spring Projects

I'm tired just thinking about all the things I should write about our spring projects,

so I will just hightlight a couple.

Potty Training
Long overdue, I know.  We were waiting for a more convenient... well, I'd settle for less crazy, time to train Elijah.  But have finally admitted that that is NEVER going to happen.  So we jumped in. Cold. Turkey.  Well, maybe not completely cold turkey.  We put pull-ups on him at night and on Sundays.
We had 3 weeks of accident after accident after accident.  Lots of laundry and frustrated people.  I finally decided to try the buzzer thing.  And it worked well.  As long as I set the timer.  And if any of you know my memory you'll know that was hit or miss.  We did train him Pavlov-style to drop everything go at the sound of the timer, but at least we were having some success.  Then on Saturday something clicked.  And since then he has had only 2 accidents.  And that includes night time.  Whew!  Not completely potty trained but waaaaaaaay better than it was a week ago!

Clean Mom and Dad's room
Since we brought the girls home our room  has become home to all things dangerous, riot-causing, breakable or otherwise untouchable.  It is so bad that we only have little paths to the bathroom, bed, drawers and closet.  It depresses me every time I go in there.  Which is why I only go I there to sleep, get dressed, take a shower and get Ryah's clothes.  So I'm taking one cubic foot each day and cleaning it.  So far I've gotten 6 cubic feet cleaned and lost 2 when more dangerous, riot-causing, breakable or otherwise untouchable things moved in.  But hey, that is a net positive, right?!?!?

Dog Fence
We are very tired of Sheba leaving wet deposits on our floors.  The kids have scrubbed (as the Mystery Chore) the floor so much that the carpet is fuzzy.  So in order for her to spend more time outside and not tormenting the neighbors, we took the plunge and bought a "Humane Contain," an electric fence for her.  Caleb and Jonas took one Saturday (while the rest of us were planting trees and clearing blueberry patch) to run the wire a long the neighbor's fence side of our property.  They worked hard and did a great job!  But that is as far as it has gotten.

Plays and Science Fair
I think I talked about Caleb being in the Aladdin play.  This is the second year they are doing Aladdin so there isn't much costuming and I think I've gotten them mostly done. 
The science fair is coming up.  Of course all three kids that qualify to be in it want to do some extravagant experiement.  I've got them talked down to the following: Miriam (and her friend Mimi) are testing which kind of sugar makes the best crystals, brown, powdered or white.  Kristina is testing which medium makes the best invisible ink (there is a list of about 10 things she is trying).  And Jonas is doing something with boats and floating in different kinds of water or something like that.  We haven't even started his yet.

Well
The well has been on the list for a while, so by default it moved from a winter project to a spring one.  There are a lot of things standing in the way of the well getting done.  Not the least of which is the most knarly, tangled, vicious, menacing patch of blackberries you ever did see.  But there is also a fence and a couple huge chunks of concrete in the way of the truck that needs to get in to fix the well.  Oh, and then there is the need to come up with a cement mixer to pour a foundation for the new "well house."  The age old dilema, do you buy?  Do you rent?  There are an inordinate amount of excuses reasons stretching out in our future for a cement mixture purchase plunge... so then, which one to you buy?  Do you go larger to do big jobs quicker? Do you go metal drum to last over the plastic ones?  All the while jacking the price up.  Decision-making at our house is a long and arduous process, sometimes stretching into years.

Greenhouse
This hasn't materialized yet for many reasons (and seasons), which I have next to no time here (as kids are waking up) to hash out.  Suffice it to say, I gave up and planted seeds in trays that we now have all over our house.  I do this every year.  Call it spring fever, whatever.  I get a hankering (usually about 2nd week in March-- I'm early this year) to plant something.  I drive Keith nuts with this.  But he humors me and lets me do it every year (he is wise to allow me to keep my sanity).  Often many of the plants don't make it to the ground, but he is still very patient.

Generator
We have had a generator sitting in our garage, looking very pretty and useful, for about a year now (we got a good deal at Costco).  Waiting on the purchase (or rental) of a cement mixer to pour a pad for it.  Of course we are through most of the power-outage-food-thawing-winter weather, and there it sits, looking useful.

Blueberries (and trees)
I already discussed this in the last post, so I will just say that FINALLY our "orchard" started last year (well, technically 10 years ago) is all planted.
And we are in the process of clearing to plant the blueberries.

Piece de resistance
(Pardon my french or at least my french spelling).  All that and much more, once again, leads to the need (or desire) to purchase a small tractor.  When I said that decision-making at our house is a long and arduous process, I really meant it.  And buying a tractor (a "BIG" purchase) is definately no exception.  We have been threatening trying to buy a tractor for about 13 years now.  I think this time it just might happen.

So our spring plate is spilling over.  But at least we have a lot of this going around

to keep everyone happy, if not sane.