So Sweet...

I haven't really talked about this yet but school is going fabulously for Chloe this year. I had an endless list of frustrations with last year and one of the big ones was the amount of homework she had. And hour to an hour and a half per night- really. It was especially frustrating because her teacher said it would be 15-20 minutes a night. This year, however, she's gotten a teacher that seems to be anti-homework! Really. When the year started she had a substitute- for the first 5 weeks. I was very disappointed and thought it would be awful, how would Chloe cope with the change, would she cry for 6 months again? But it's actually been good. She didn't like the substitute teacher (who made her cry more than once in class) but loves her permanent teacher. She hasn't cried about going to school at all and I'm so thankful.

And we'll be leaving in just a bit for dance class at church. Chloe didn't do dance last semester because the first semester we just had too much going on. I was in choir and so was she and when we added that plus dance it was just too hectic. So she's in dance and I'm not doing anything- and I'm happy about that. I am doing the second semester in Freedom in Christ so I'm anticipating personal and spiritual changes in me. That's a good thing.

And I finally have a wee baby pumpkin blossom. Or female bloom. It hasn't actually bloomed yet although I look for it every morning. I counted 5 others on the plants so I'm crossing my fingers for more than one pumpkin.

Most of them look like this or smaller, if you can believe it. I was a bit neglectful of the plants thinking that they would get the nutrients that they needed from the ground. But they were a very pale green color and looked pitiful. Until I added some organic choice fertilizer and bone meal. They really like bone meal.. (sorry for the blurry picture)

but so do cats. I didn't really know that until a couple of weeks ago. Last week I saw a cat (that looked just like Phoenix) on the patio around my garden cart. He ran off and later in the day I was going to do some gardening and I saw the bone meal like this. I've since put it in the grill to keep the cats away. I feel bad and wouldn't mind feeding them but it makes them dependant on people and they would likely die if we weren't here any more to take care of them. I've got all sorts of things running around in my head for our cookout this weekend and I'm going to finalize the menu tonight. Mary offered to bring the burgers so that frees me up to make a nice appetizer (bruschetta maybe?) and a dessert or two to go with the one Mary is also bringing. There will be 15 people here so I don't think we could have too many desserts, right? Plus it gives me a chance to make some without having them sitting around here just waiting for me to eat them. I'm looking forward to a good weekend.