It's only been a week since I blogged last, but you see, I am a little weird about the right blog being listed in the right month. Like, if we were someday like 'what DID we do for Asa's birthday in 2019', I'd go right to 2019, March. But, if I wait another day it'll be over there in April. And that just cannot be allowed.
So, I don't actually have a ton to report, but for the management of future Corinne's sanity, we're going to go ahead and tell you all what we've been up to the last week or so!
First of all, I have way less pictures. You see, I've been trying to use my phone way less. It's just not good for my anxiety, and isn't super productive. So, I've basically given up Facebook and endless amounts of aimless phone usage. But, it also means I don't carry my phone around in my pocket all that much. And, that means I miss some pictures, and if I miss pictures, I probably miss blogging about it too. I mean, how am I to remember all of what we did in the last week? I barely remember what we had for dinner yesterday. (Oh, wait... we got Asa's free Moe's burrito, but still. Two nights ago, I'm lost.)
I can tell you Peyton went to take his college entrance exam. He scored pretty well on it, certainly well enough to enroll. He'll have to do a little better on math before he can take those classes, but he can either re-take the PERT later, or score better on his SAT. Speaking of the SAT's, Peyton and Calib are both taking it in May, and my mom is coming the last week in April to help cram for the math portion. I booked her flight for tutoring sessions this week.
But anyway...
Onward to Asa's birthday weekend. Saturday morning Asa and I headed off to the library for a Foundry class. Usually this is a thing for the boys but they were making flower boxes, and I knew Asa would like to have a couple of those. It was a 16 and up class, and I tried to get Peyton and Calib to go too, so we could make four boxes. But, getting them to commit to being at the library on 10 AM on a Saturday just isn't happening.
So, we made our flower boxes (and I got to use a nail gun for the very first time! It was lots of fun!). I love our library, they have such great classes.
The flower boxes were perfect timing too. The church down the street was having their annual native plant sale, so we just plopped our boxes in the car and walked down to check out the plants to put in our boxes!
We found a couple- a shiny blueberry bush (they produce smaller blueberries which you can eat, but are also pretty loved by birds, and a climbing milkweed to attract some butterflies. (We didn't actually end up putting these in our flower boxes, instead I planted some green mix seeds I had.)
By then it was lunch time, so it was off to Red Robin for Asa's free birthday burger at Wiregrass. We went and nosed around Barnes and Noble (and got some books super cheap since we had some Verizon Up Rewards we could use towards free gift cards and I get my homeschool educator discount), and over to Panera for a free pastry I had waiting for me in my rewards.
We stopped by Earth Fare too, so Asa could collect his free birthday cupcake! Have I told you all how much I love Earth Fare? I get it, the prepared foods are a little pricey. But I adore the bean salad. We were just there last night nabbing all kinds of great stuff, since we had a $10 off $75 coupon. Then, upon checkout a $5 off $40 printed on our receipt!
Asa arrived home to a birthday card and some hot sauce from mom. Thanks mom!
Sunday we headed out to watch Captain Marvel. Peyton stayed home, he wasn't that interested- we had four free tickets anyway, and that way Etta doesn't have to go in her crate.
Sunday night Asa requested a cookout, and I told him I would make Nancy Reagan Mac & Cheese to go with it. He was thrilled at the prospect.
I mean, chili dogs AND Nancy Reagan Mac & Cheese? The family was thrilled. I also threw together a bunch of fruits and veggies to balance it out a bit better.
Monday Asa took the day off work. I was like, 'awesome... what do you want to do?' His reply? 'Absolutely nothing'. Now, this would not be my ideal birthday (AT.ALL.) I love to do as much as humanly possible on my birthday and around my birthday. I would be so disappointed if we sat at home on my birthday. So for years, I would hound everyone about what they wanted to do for their birthday. But, Calib and Hayden are only half into going out for their birthday. And Peyton and Asa? They prefer to stay home and have NOTHING expected of them. Just, do whatever you want, all day, no interruptions. So, I obliged Asa this year (spoiler alert: I'll also oblige Peyton- but we have big plans the weekend before his birthday).
I did say I would make whatever he wanted for dinner- and he said 'how bout an all day long taco bar instead?' Now, usually these are reserved for football Sundays, but they can be requested at other times of the year.
We had to wake Peyton up for the picture... look at the poor kid. He wanted to grow his hair out, but come on Peyton this picture was taken at like noon.
The taco bar is great because it's so customizable. You can have things like a nice healthy taco salad, and then later you can put all of those toppings on french fries because you had that salad earlier!
Also on the list of things people in this house hate on their birthday- having 'Happy Birthday' sung to them. So, we didn't do that either. I did make him have a candle in his piece of cheesecake though.
I mean, he had a great day. The boys and Asa watched movies all day. (I can only sit through so many super hero movies in a weekend- and I was really out when they decided to watch Monty Python.
But between movies and video games, Asa filled his non work day and was thrilled. (Notice the french doors closed- per Asa's request he turned the air down really low all day).
In other news, we've been watching March Madness. You guys, I got SEVEN of the Elite Eight correct. Sadly, Gonzaga didn't make it into the Final Four, but Virginia is still there, so it's looking like a trip to Goody Goody Burger is in our future.
In other news, yesterday Asa and I went over to Lowe's while Peyton was volunteering at the shelter, since I had a coupon and we decided to pick up some stuff to see if we could construct a simple raised garden bed. I really want to play some cucumber, squash and zucchini, but I'm afraid Ellie will just trample them since they spread on the ground so much. I thought if I could raise the bed and make it narrow enough, she might stick her nose in it, but I don't think she'll climb up into it. We don't have a saw of any sorts around here, so we had them cut some wood down for us at Lowes. All in all, we bought for pieces of wood, had one cut for the sides and one for the 'legs' (to help level it out), and two for the length. If it worked out, we'd have enough cut wood to just go buy two more long pieces and make another one (spoiler alert: so far so good).
In fact, I contstructed the whole thing in limited space in the garage, by myself, in about ten minutes. We haven't placed it in the backyard yet, so I'll let you know how that goes.
We did plant some more stuff in the last couple weeks. Pepper season is approaching, and I have a whole row of pepper plants that I am super excited about. I want like 8 bell pepper plants. Keep those coming! But we also have some other peppers going. I think right now we have about six plants. I affectionately refer to it as 'Pepper Row'.
Oh, and I finally got to plant my sunflower seeds. The side yard doesn't get full sun all day, but things seem to grow pretty well there. I think maybe in Florida, full sun ALL day is a little too much. It seems like anything I plant in the sun like that gets a little scorched mid-summer. Anyway, my sunflowers are already popping up!
Oh AND my orchid is finally blooming again!
I guess that's it from here. I don't even have any dog pictures this week. That's how little I've used my phone. I actually snapped the last pictures just before I wrote the blog, specifically for the blog. So, there's that. Anyway, happy last day of March everyone. Onward to April!
Next Up: We actually don't have anything on the horizon, but I'm sure we'll figure out something!
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