Preschool graduation

Last thursday was Alex's last day of preschool and they had a graduation "ceremony" complete with caps and gowns. The kids got to pick what color cap/gown they wanted. The kids that turned 4 during the year so they are going to preschool again next year decorated t-shirts to wear instead. They all marched in carrying their assigned letters and then sang this big alphabet song they've been singing all year and the child assigned each letter stood up and held the letter sign up during that verse. Alex was in charge of "U" and "V". Alex's carpool buddy and partner in crime is holding up the letter "J".
I was impressed at how well all those kids sat still and paid attention and sang for the whole time. It was a long song.
After that they all got to cross over a little raised walkway and get their diploma and the teacher announced where they would go to school next year.

80

We had a couple days last week over 80 degrees. We ate popsicles, we went to the beach, Alex got a summer haircut, Maya has started carrying a "baby" with her everywhere she goes. (The water, by the way, is still only about 46 degrees.)

Lots of exciting changes

My brother graduated from college last weekend. He's got a job and moving to the UP next week! He's also engaged and getting married in the fall. We are really happy and excited about all of it. Congrats to Matt on the diploma and the job and congrats to Matt and Amy on the engagement and upcoming wedding!

Ready for Kindergarten

A couple weeks ago we got a call from Woodland School saying they had a spot open up for Alex for next year! Woodland is the charter school we really loved and where Alex had one preschool classmate and 3 other friends already going there.
We had to go that afternoon for the hearing/vision/health screening appt. He did great with the hearing and vision and the nurse filling out the health forms seemed almost annoyed that we didn't have anything she could discuss or make note of for us.
May 15th we got to go to the school for an hour for their "Kindergarten Experience" so we could see a little bit of what kindergarten might be like for him. There will be two different classes with kindergarteners and we won't know for a while which kids are in which class but it seemed like a nice group of kids over all.
Alex was really excited to see so many familiar faces there and was chatting it up quite a bit with a couple of the teachers.
A friend of mine came over and watched Maya and another friend's 2 year old for us so we could go without distraction with the big kids. Thanks! Above are the 3 little girls hanging out and eating snacks while we are at the school.

All the way back to Mother's Day

Mother's Day...it seems like a long time ago but I am behind....
I got two beautiful rose bushes, some great homemade cards and a great homemade gift (from preschool).
We broke ground on a new vegetable garden spot for this year.

Yard projects

We added this little edging in front of our house last weekend.  There was clearly at some point a flower bed here because when we moved in there was some mulch left along that walkway and the first spring a few flowers came up there.

We added some more bulbs there that were dug up from other parts of the yard and then the area closer to the entry way never grew grass anyway so we figured we might as well make it official.

This fall I will add some more bulbs to fill it in and some more decent soil or compost.

Speaking of compost we also used some garden fencing and dedicated a small area in our back corner for compost!  I wish we could find a neighbor to split garbage service with us now because between recycling and the compost we hardly have any garbage.

We have a few other garden projects going that I will take pictures of as they materialize.

I love the sandbox.

It's the greastest thing ever.  Both kids love to play in it and will spend quite a while playing happily together without any input from me.  I in turn am able to get a lawn chair, sit in the sun and read a book.  It's a wonderful thing.

I also love that close up of Alex.

Saturday May 2nd

Saturday dawned much sunnier and slightly warmer than friday.  Friday Alex and I had gone out and put some treats in the crook of a cluster of trees for the faeries.  We had read a story that suggested they liked milk so they had a small bowl of milk, two animal cookies and a piece of cheese.  He was chomping at the bit right away in the morning to go see if they had eaten them.  I was really hoping some squirrels had carried them off to keep the magic going.  No such luck, but it had been very windy so a noticable amount of milk had evaporated and that was enough for him.   It was so much fun to hear the different stories and ideas he was coming up with about the faeries and what they might look like and where their houses were.

Ben had a couple projects he wanted to start so he stayed home and I took the kids over to Beulah for the Waldorf May Day celebration.

Alex was very excited to dance around a real maypole.  We had made him some wrist bands with bells sewn on them modeled after some he had seen in a book.  We picked what flowers we could find in our yard and brought them along to make a flower crown for Maya.

There was a terribly cold wind blowing into the park in Beulah off the water so I was glad we still had hats and mittens in the car!  It was fun to see the Maypole and mingle with the other families.  The dancing itself turned out to be a bit complicated for my kids.  We made a very pretty crown for Maya.  The willow bows and a few of the bigger flowers came from the pile that everyone brought to share but the grape hyacinths and trout lilys are from our own yard.

May Day - we're going on a leek hunt!

Last friday morning we met some other families on the Old Mission peninsula and went on a hike to dig wild leeks.  It was cold but everyone was dressed for it so we had a great time.  We came home with a bag full of leeks that we caramelized and put on our pizza later that night!

Random

Yes, I have gotten behind again....it's May!

We've finally been having some real spring weather on a consistant basis (although today as I'm typing this it's 43 degrees) and have rediscovered the joy of using our clothesline and exploring our space.

We have a family of nuthatches living in a dead tree in the backyard.  It's been fun to watch them prepare their nest.

We've been having fun getting some books on local plants, trees and lichen from the library and getting more familiar with the specific things growing around us.  The microbiology/biology nerd in me is thrilled that Alex thinks lichen is cool!