Cadence loves the ducks

Seriously, she's become a little obsessed. We visited the park by the lake that's close to our house one day last week. She likes watching the ducks so much, she doesn't really care about the playground with the kids and the swings - which normally would command her attention. It looks like she's feeding the ducks, but she's not. She's just eating her snack while we watch them swim. The city has very strict rules about not feeding the wildlife.

There's a little retention pond in our neighborhood that we've been visiting too. There's some ducks there, but mainly geese. They honk very loudly whenever we visit because there is a mama goose sitting on some eggs by the edge of the pond. So, Cadie calls them the honk-honks, and she really likes to talk about them whenever we are outside.

sprouts!

Today we have radish and tomato sprouts! (The radishes are outside; the tomatoes in.)

Our adventures in growing veggies begins!

Last year I was really excited to have a garden. Really since we bought our house with a biggish backyard that gets good sun, I've been daydreaming about it. But I got really serious last spring, and I read two books that really helped me formulate a plan - Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew (there's also a pretty helpful square foot gardening website) and The 20-Minute Vegetable Gardener by Tom Christopher and Marty Asher . Both books advocate building raised beds with a special mix of soil so you don't have to do lots of digging and weeding to grow veggies. Last spring we just couldn't find the time with a little baby and both working full-time. But this year, with me working at night and Matt unemployed, we could do it!

So last week with Dassa here to help entertain Cadie, Matt dug out a 4 ft by 4 ft patch in our lawn, built me this raised bed, filled it with the prescribed mix of compost, peat moss, and vermiculite, and then made a nice square foot grid with nails and twine. Cute, huh?

Today we got started planting seeds. Don't worry, Mom, I checked the frost date and we only planted the stuff that can tolerate a little cold. Here's the list of what's in the ground now: spinach, broccoli, carrots, radishes, cilantro, lettuce, basil, and cucumber. (The tomatoes and peppers are coming later.)
Here I plant carrot seeds while Cadie plays with the dirt.
She really liked the dirt. I know it looks like she may be eating dirt in this picture, but she wasn't, we promise. We did let her hold the little spade for a minute and she licked it (I guess it looked like a spoon?). We were both right next to her when she licked it and quickly took it away and said "Ew - not for eating." By the look on her face, I don't think she'll try that again.

Tomorrow is supposed to be 65 and partly sunny

So we will be planting the first of our seeds in my brand new square foot garden. Pictures tomorrow - hopefully!

Saturday - just us girls

It was just me and Cadie today and we had a great girls' day. We went to the library and played outside before it started raining. We read books - Cadie apparently likes having 2 going at a time, as demonstrated here. She comes by this honestly. (I talked to my Dado today and he said he had at least 12 books going in his reading nook right now.)

Just a bit later, she was playing with her babies, giving them water, hugging them, etc. Then, for some reason, she got a mop and went to work on the floor, while still carrying her baby. That cracked me up. Multitasking already.

Cadie's been feeling domestic...

Been pretend cooking (sorry the picture is sideways - still having some computer issues and I'm just too busy to take the time to fix it). I am on the lookout for an affordable (very affordable as we're on the unemployed husband budget around here) play kitchen, because I think she would really like it.
And, all on her own, I turned around yesterday to find her pouring tea for her babies. Cute, huh?