Garden Update and BIG news

Our garden has been growing a lot this past month. It has been fun to see all the seeds sprouting and we've already been able to havest some of the radishes (as you will see from the pictures). We've lost two pepper plants, a tomato plant and a summer squash seedling to frost, but everything else is growing well. I'm waiting till Apri 20th, the official no more frost day for our zone before I try and replant them.







Jovi likes to help water, but her favorite gardening activity so far is picking radishes. Our radishes are pretty hot so she doesent actually like to eat them, but she is always trying to talk me into picking more, telling me that they look big and ready to pick.




And now for our BIG news...we are moving. We are putting our house up for sale on Saturday and as soon as it sales we will be moving closer to Juan's current job. Right now his commute is about 1 to 1 1/2 hours each way and it will just get worse with construction starting on 114 this summer. We haven't picked a specific place to move to yet, but are leaning towards Coppell or Frisco. We've been spending a lot of our time getting the house ready to put up for sale and yet there still seems to be so much more to do. We should have the big things like paint touch ups, the carpet cleaned and the front yard landscaped by Saturday though. It will be exciting to see what happens in the next few months.

A few finished projects and a Jovi quirk

I know this is a month late, but better late than never right? Jovi is part of a neighborhood preschool and they had a Valentines day party where they were supposed to bring a valentine for each class member. The day before the party, Jovi was SO excited to make her valentines. Here is a picture of what we started with (perhaps I have too much crafting supplies?) and another picture of the finished valentines, one for each member of her class and she even made one for herself. They are all 100% Jovi originals (she did ask me to cut the hearts out). I thought they turned out pretty good myself. She even wrote her name on most of them, but would ask me to write the V because she didn't like how her V looked. Since then she has gotten over that and can write her whole name.



In our backyard garden, Jovi has her own 4 squares to grow flowers in. She helped plant lots of the other squares too and helps water all the plants regularly, it really is a family garden and has been lots of fun getting excited about the sprouts that are starting to come up. Here are some pictures of me and her planting her four squares of flowers.





Jovi is such a funny little girl. We have a lot of fun together. She makes me laugh all the time. One of the funniest quirks she has is that she thinks toilet paper makes everything better. Think Windex and My Big Fat Greek Wedding, well Jovi's cure all is toilet paper. I don't know why. If she hurts her foot, she wants to wrap it in toilet paper. If she has a tummy ache, she lays strips of toilet paper on her stomach. She once hurt her finger and went around with it wrapped in toilet paper all day. It is soooo funny to see the relief she gets from covering her hurts in toilet paper.

And finally, since I haven't shared any sewing in a long, long, time, mainly because I haven't done much, here is a XL receiving blanket and 3 bibs I made for Juan's physical therapist who just had her first baby.

Our Square Foot Garden

About two months ago I was on amazon.com ordering some books and after putting the ones I had originally wanted in my cart, I needed to find one more book to get free shipping. I decided to look for a gardening book because I knew we wanted to put in a garden this spring and because our previous years' attempts at gardening didn't yield many vegetables. The All New Square Foot Gardening book by Mel Bartholomew looked interesting with grow more in less space and no weeding being the points that sold me. So, I got it, I read it, I was impressed. I started looking for where to buy the specific things this gardening method requires and how much they would cost. The day before we planned to go our and buy everything, my neighbor and facebook friend posted pictures of HER very cool square foot garden. What?!?! She has a square foot garden?!?! Well, we went across the street and saw her garden and talked about where she got her stuff and she told us that two other people in our church and neighborhood were growing square foot gardens too. And then another friend told me she was planning on putting in a square foot garden too. Honestly it almost makes me believe in a collective unconscious, everyone coming up with the same idea at the same time that way. But anyway, here is our square foot garden, hopefully I'll get to take lots of garden pictures with green stuff throught the summer.

My Grandma Beth

My Grandma Beth died last Monday. She was a wonderful lady and will be missed by many people. Just a few of the things I will miss about her (in no particular order)are:

Grandma hugs. She always gave wonderful hugs that really made me feel loved.
Grandma Angel Biscuits, well, all grandma food. She was a WONDERFUL cook but her angel biscuits were my favorite.
Playing cards with her.
Playing dominoes with her, she taught me to play.
The way she loved my kids.
Watching her cook.
Spending Thanksgiving at her house.
Going shopping with her.

Some of my favorite memories are:

Going to a small farmers market with her and getting a bunch of purple hull peas. She taught me to shell them as we watched TV and then I watched her cook them for dinner.

My grandma took us to a pick your own bluberry farm when I was very young. Before that day I didn't like bluberries, but ever since I've liked them. How can you dislike a sweet little berry that you can pick and eat off a little bush as you try and collect them in your bucket? I remember having a bit of a sunburn afterwards, but feeling it was totally worth it.

I remember that almost every time we visited, grandma would end up taking us to the mall. It had a dollar store in it and she would let us pick out any one thing we wanted.

I remember playing lots of games of hearts and spades, she was excellent at both and we always wanted to be grandma's partner.

I remember this last Thanksgiving watching her hold Corbin as he slept in her arms.

Grandma, I will miss you!

My Mom's an Author and Juan's new job

There's lots of good news today. First of all, my mom is a published, with by line author!



You can even buy the book from amazon.com HERE. My mom has wanted to write books for as long as I can remember, but growing up she was always so busy with our family and other things that she didn't get the chance to write. She has written LOTS of things for other companies and programs, but never anything with a by line that you could buy from an actual bookstore. The book is a college text book on abuse and neglect and was co-authored by her friend and collegue Elaine Wilkinson. The book is dedicated to their grandchildren, Jovi and Corbin's names are in the book. I'm so happy that one of my mom's long term goals has finally been realized.

The next good news is, Juan has a new job. He will be working for Coca-Cola Interprises as a demand analyst and starts his new job Friday. We are really excited about this new oppertunity and hope it will be a great change for us.

Corbin is ONE

Corbin turned one on 1/13/09. It is hard to believe a whole year has passed and yet, I can't imagine life without him. He is such a sweet, cuddly, easygoing little boy. The week before his birthday we started brushing his teeth. It is one of his new favorite things to do. Here is a picture I took of him brushing his teeth the day before his birthday.


On his birthday, I attempted to style his hair. I'm not very good at doing hair, but I still think Corbin looks cute. Here are some pictures of him and his dad. In the second picture, Juan was smiling a "Corbin" smile.



We took Corbin and Jovi to Chuck E. Cheese that afternoon, but by the time we got there they had fallen asleep in the car.


We let them sleep for a little while and then woke them up for fun and pizza. Unfortunately my camera battery gave out after only a few pictures, but here are the ones we were able to take.



On Saturday, the 17th we had a family party for Corbin. My family was there along with Juan's family including his sister from Minnesota. Having his sister there was a complete surprise. Juan's family all ended up spending the night so we could spend time together. It was a lot of fun.

Corbin was reluctant to eat his cupcake. He liked playing with it, but didn't really want to eat it. Juan had to show him what to do and then help him with it. He seemed to like it ok, but all the new people around and the fact that he woke up only half an hour before made him kind of reluctant to try stuff.





He liked opening presents and thought his new tool bench was pretty cool.




Here are some family pictures taken that weekend.

SAVE HANDMADE TOYS AND CLOTHES

Legislation was passed last year because of all the Chinese toy recalls. It was meant to increase standards for toys and clothing comming into the US, which involves a lot of third party testing to confirm lead levels and other dangerous substances and batch labling so that you could trace where each item comes from. Sounds good right? Well, it would be if the legisilation only effected toys made in Asia or if it only effected mass produced items or large companies, but instead this legislation was written so that it essentially effects anything marketed and sold to and for anyone 12 or under, toys, books, clothing, sporting goods, car seat covers and I'm sure I'm forgetting a few things. This legislation is retroactive so that all untested items made before the law goes into effect on February 10th will become illegal to sell. Third party testing is very expensive, $300-$4,000 per item, every "batch" sold must be tested and the testing required destroys the product. The penalty for not complying includes extremely large fines.

So what does all that mean? It means that thousands of small business will go out of business because they cant afford the testing costs, even if they are using items they KNOW to be lead free and safe (as all toymakers I know do), testing must occure on the end product, not the components. It means that ALL custom children's items, toys, clothes and cloth diapers will be against the law. According to the law, each custom item would have to be tested, but since it is, costly, destructive testing...well, I'm sure you get the idea. Say goodbye to toys or clothing from Etsy and children's craft fairs, this law does not distinguish between the hobby seamstress/ toymaker and the multimillion dollar corporation, if you sell the items specified you will fall under the legislation.

I am truely shocked that this has not recieved more media coverage, but I believe it is because no one wants to put their name behind what could be seen as "relaxing" safety standards on children's items. But that is not what I want, I just want toys made in the USA and Europe, toys that were safe and are safe to continue to be legal to sell. Small European toymakers are already leaving the US market because this legislation will not recognize the standards already in place in Europe and requires them to retest all items according to these new US testing proceedures.

What can you do? The Handmade Toy Alliance was created by small business, US toy makers who what to change the legislation. They have a form letter you can send to your Congress Person and Senator. You can post a comment HERE so that this story will be on CNN. You can join them on facebook HERE. You can sign their online petition HERE.

I am lucky enough to know a few people who make and sell children's toys and clothing in real life and online. I thought that once my little ones were in school, I might join them. This legislation could wipe out a whole portion of an industry, I am sure it is not what the lawmakers intended and it must be fixed!