Ready Or Not

We're still alive around here.  Sorry for the lack of updates for you far-away people who read this to keep up with us from a distance.  We are ready: ready for more spring weather, ready to be done with plaguing winter illnesses, ready to spend all day outside, ready to open windows, etc.  We're getting ready to celebrate Gabe's first birthday coming up soon. 

Speaking of getting ready. This morning after breakfast Caleb disappeared for a bit. Not long after, he came bouncing down the stairs and had clearly taken the initiative to get the day rolling. He completed his chores without any prompting, including getting himself dressed. Today he chose a pair of last season's mesh shorts and two orange t-shirts. I think he was going for the layered look. Anyway, he comes down completely dressed, puts on his boots, zips up his winter coat, and announces, "I've got some gardening to do." Grabs his watering can (stops for a picture at my insistance) and bounds out the door to water his seeds that he planted a week and a half ago.

This has been routine each morning since he planted them so it wasn't a surprise today (except for the outfit choice...that was a new one!) He went outside, filled his water can from the spicket, watered his seeds, and came back inside reporting each detail: "The dirt was still brown so I watered it until it was black.....I wonder how long my milkweed seeds will take to grow.....Did you know when they grow we will attract monarch catepillars because monarch catepillars feed on milkweed. And then the monarch catepillars will turn into monarch butterflies. And I'm growing these seeds so that we can get some monarch butterflies around here....I sure am into farming these days...." And so on. I'm not joking. Those are direct quotes. And it just gets more exciting everyday.

Well, fearing the my little man's faithful gardening/farming attempts might fail due to, ya know--less than ideal growing conditions (FROST!)--I decided we should start growing some seeds indoors. We'll see how much success we have! In any case, I have one faithful four year old boy who seems to have big plans for these flowers and will be diligent to the end.

I purchased these the other day at the store:

After going out to get a few more supplies this morning we came home and got started.  First I put Gabe down for a nap.  While I was gone, I asked Caleb to make a journal entry of what we were going to do.  And here is what I found when I came back:

His description went as follows:  "First I drew some green dots that were seeds.  Then I covered them up with black because they got burried in the dirt and the dirt was wet so it was black.  Then the seeds started to sprout up out of the dark soil so that's why I drew green lines.  Then I drew this purple x to mark it like one of those flower marker things to tell what kind it is.  And then I stamped a butterfly above it.  Cuz, Mom, I really hope that butterflies come to our flowers after they grow when we move them outside."  (And if you're wondering, I told him to write the date when I came back.  He didn't do that one his own...)  We got our planting supplies out.  I purchased this at Target.  

 

Elliott is showing you one of the pellets that goes in each compartment.

 After you place them nicely in the compartments you pour 14 cups of water over the entire thing and the pellets expand into soil.  Pretty awesome to watch and it only takes a minute.  You can see in this picture how they expanded.  Caleb is poking around just for fun here. 

 The boys each picked one of the kinds to plant.  Caleb is so excited about these hollyhocks because "THEY ARE GOING TO GROW 5 FEET TALL!" he will inform you. 

They carefully placed a couple of seeds in each compartment.

We lightly watered them again.  Take note of Caleb's serious face.  This is his "I mean business" face.

Finally, we placed a dome over the top, put them in a warm place away from direct sunlight, and we have our own family greenhouse.  So fun!  Good thing I have a little guy to remind me to water these babies or they'll be dead by tomorrow. 

 After all was said and done Caleb concluded, "Thanks for finding me a notebook so that I track our successes each day!"

I don't know where he gets some of this stuff....