Poor Eliza

Eliza's had a rough bout of bad luck with physical injuries, lately. And of course, it's right before we update our family pictures. I only hope that she doesn't look like she's wearing the make-up I'll be putting on her to cover-up the scrapes and bruises

First, we noticed this cut next to her eye.
Observe the black eye on the right (her left)?! Didn't even see that because we were too focused on how she got the cut to the right of it.

What the...is that food on her face?! Sheesh. What kind of a mom leaves her kids looking so scruffy?!

After we cleaned up and kissed her owies on the face, we noticed her poor knees.

So what could be the cause behind the owies?


Possibly the super-safe, level, crack-free concrete retaining wall between our driveway and our neighbor's yard.

Eliza loves to show off on this ledge, which is just her size.

Or maybe her sweet ride, which I recall her pushing Seth right before we noticed the scrapes (he's comfortable with his masculinity and doesn't mind the faded purple and pink)

Or it could have been completely while on her own, going over the equally safe and level driveway next to the tree.

Showing off another angle of the owies. Just ignore that she's not sitting like a lady. We're working on that.

Slowly everything's healing, so hopefully she'll be scrape-free enough for family pictures, but she's got proof that she's been enjoying the summer! If only I could keep band-aids on her to eliminate all the blood spots on her clothes...

Bane of My Existence

The tree is already showing no mercy as Spring is starting to bloom. Apparently it's also developed a personality as it openly mocks me cleaning up after it.

Little pieces from the now-opening buds have littered the ground and especially my car. I've been cleaning up from it for days now, and you'd never guess.



I sweep and sweep, but I can never get all of it. What's worse than the pods are the little caterpillar-like pieces that fall from the tree.

Aren't they gross looking?! I nearly deleted these from my camera because I forgot why I had taken a picture of them for blogging purposes and thought one of the kiddies got a hold of the camera. Not the first time that would've happened...

Ooh, I shake my fists at you, Tree. I swear, it's mocking me even now as it contemplates which branches to break off during the next big windstorm. They've nearly missed the car a few times now.

Drops of Sunshine

Look what I found outside of my house today!

My little drops of sunshine to give me hope for Spring and nice weather.

Also some little soldiers of daffodils starting to line-up to make the place cheerful and fun.

Ah, I needed this cheerful reminder as I'm beating my cold into submission and dealing with cabin fevered family members.

The sun is shining, there's NO wind, and the birds are chirping cheerily away in the massive tree, which for once I don't mind.

In fact, it's in the mid-40s right now, which feels balmy after so many chilly days. I almost feel like sunbathing! Almost.

ADD leaf raking

Wednesday was one of those gorgeous fall days that I could not stay inside, so I took advantage of the kiddies nap time and decided to rake some leaves.

I happily started a pile, only to see in my peripheral a better grouping of leaves to rake, so I'd start on that one, then get distracted again in sweeping leaves off with my big broom onto the sidewalk into the lawn to then rake up, etc, etc, etc....

I've concluded that I get ADD when I rake leaves.

Once the kiddies woke up from their naps, they thought my ADD piles were just for them, so who am I to burst their bubbles?!

Eliza enjoying her very own leaf pile...which she then "blended" in to "Seth's" after running back and forth between them.

Since the last post on the tree , I've had a neighbor fill 4 big bags full to spread as compost on their garden, gave juevenile detention kids something to do by raking our leaves and our widow neighbor's, and had the kiddies test out the piles. It's pretty easy to figure out which group had the most fun.

It's raining leaves, hallelujah, it's raining leaves!

Seth's display of sweet karate moves to prove to the leaves who's boss. And yes, that's the broom in the background I used during the ADD raking.

Scooping up the leaves like big brother!

Seth thought it would be cool to bury Eliza, and not suprisingly, she was all for it!

The funnel of leaves in our driveway even brought over one of the neighbor kiddies because it's so fun! Our neighbor friend calls it the "swimming pool" and informed me not to rake it up...yeah, it's still there.

With all the volunteer work, one could conclude that the leaves are almost off the tree and the fun is nearly done. Nope. Still lots of potential leaf piles, service projects, and compost for gardens left to be had!

It has begun...

These are images of our widow neighbor's gargantuan tree and all the leaves that will soon be dropping.

I had to get an image of the lawn before the downpour of leaves causes me to forget it exists.

My little cottage's roof is dwarfed by the tree's limbs (bottom left). I'm just glad we have homeowner's insurance!

Leaves completely cover our whole lot about 4 inches deep (at least, I plan on measuring this year!), some of which are so large they had to have been mutated by some vengeful autumn sprite. It makes keeping the house clean super awesome until the snow covers up any piles we forgot about.

One thing's for sure, the kiddies will have the COOLEST leaf pile to jump into!