If planted it will grow...

Hi family,

I miss you all terribly. I wish I had lots of money and could fly out to see you at least once a month. Alas my children insist on being fed and diapers must be bought so in Virginia I remain. One (possibly the only) great thing about being in Virginia is that I was able to plant my VERY FIRST GARDEN!! Oh boy I was so excited. And then I was slightly nervous because I had no idea what I was doing. Mom insisted it wasn't hard. I still don't know that I spaced everything correctly, but it is growing. It is so fun to see the progress. Here is the picture of the day it was planted...

can't you just see the potential?

Here we are a couple weeks later.... 

And these pictures were taken today!

My zucchini hill and crookneck squash hill

broccoli 

 sweet potatoes

cucumber hills

 tomato plants

onions 

red potatoes

In total we have planted

12 tomato plants

12 sweet pepper plants

2 cucumber hills

7 sweet potato plants

a handful of red potatoes

4 broccoli plants

15 onions

5 jalepeno peppers

1 cucumber hill

1 zuchinni hill

1 crookneck squash hill

1 watermelon hill

and to top it all off... 2 PEACH TREES!!!

We even have some fruit on them!

I will officially invite you all out when I make my first pan of Tea Ella all from my garden. I am sure you can't wait!

Vera Belle DeLong is grandbaby #8!

Vera Belle has joined Ayla in the DeLong family. We love her!

Independence

The boys are becoming more and more independent. This is hard for me because it means they will get messy. But I have come to realize that they do need to learn skills and the only way of learning is trying. So... here are their latest accomplishments:

I was sweeping the other day and they wanted to give it a shot:

The other night Cooper wanted to feed himself spaghetti. He was doing pretty good.

And this afternoon the boys would not let me spoon feed them their Cream of Wheat. They insisted on doing it themselves. I'm pretty sure more got on their bibs and trays than in their tummies. But they were happy.

Vera's Stats

Congratulations to our winners!

Grandma Sharp guessed closest time (8:15am) actual: 8:14am

Jill guessed closest weight (8lb 10oz) actual: 8lb 15oz

Mom and Jason guessed closest length (21 and 22 inches) actual: 21.5 in

Here's a pic of the little sweetie-pie, for your viewing pleasure:

Last Day

Ayla's last day as our "baby"

Guesses

If anyone wants to guess vera's weight, length, date and time of birth, comment here. My c section is scheduled for 7:30am on thursday, so you should be able to get pretty close on that one ;)

Kisses from Ayla

Ayla had just given me a whole bunch of big sloppy "kisses," and luckily I was able to get a couple more on camera :) Love this girl. Can't believe she's only going to be my "baby" for a couple more days!

Mother's Day breakfast in bed

Thanks, Hunter, for bringing me breakfast in bed!

Gotta love it!

Have a Soup Pie!!

On our way to Arizona to hike to Havasupai Falls! More pictures to come in a week if I survive! Prayers are appreciated :)