Time flies when you're having fun!

Wow, it's been a while!
Zach's birthday party went really well, and I hope that everyone had a great time. When Zach woke up that morning he came into the kitchen and gave me one of those great big "I love my Mama" hugs and I started crying. I am tearing up just thinking about it. I never in my life have realize just how fleeting time is -- then my baby boy turned 18. I still remember with in exact detail of the moment that he was brought to me for the first time in the hospital. His first steps, his first tooth, his first day of kindergarten, his first crush--- He is a good man, and I am proud of him.

Thursday I went with Mom to her chemo appointment. Everything went well, and she has tolerated it better than we were expecting. I will be taking her to Houston in April to see if it is working on the mets in her liver. She continues to make her own blood cells. We will also see if there is a treatment to get her eye muscles relaxed so that she can stop seeing double. She has come a long way since her initial diagnosis in June '08. She is the strongest, most persevering person I know.

I finally finished the afghan. It looks and feels great. It is so soft and warm. I was kind of glad we had some chilly weather. We all snuggled up under it and relaxed. The littles want to use it when I am reading to them, even though it isn't really that chilly any more. Now I am crocheting a doily, and working on a crewel embroidery project that has been hanging around for half of my life. My Mom bought it in the '80's at a garage sale, and gave it to me for something to do. I have messed around with it every once in a while, put it down, packed it up, found it, and the cycle continues. But this time dang it, I am going to finish it and have it framed. It is the Irish Blessing (May the road rise up to meet you...etc) and it has some pretty cool cable work to do. I am looking forward to seeing the finished product.

Last weekend, we put in some fruitless mulberry trees. They are pretty impressive trees. It will be nice when they get big. The give off a lot more shade than Mesquites, and grow very quickly. It gets hot here... really hot, and I want to have a few nice shade trees around so we can still enjoy the outdoors during the summer without burning to a crisp. I also revamped my watering system, put automatic timers on 3 areas, and we put in four grape vines as well. It was windier than heck, and that made it not as enjoyable, but it still felt nice getting some stuff accomplished. Now if only I would get the watering system set up in the garden...

Tomorrow I am going to post some .pdf files of my weekly menus. Just because I really like to see what other people are planning (I get some great ideas!) Ry and I are going to town to run some errands, and we are up to our elbows in mixtures and solutions, watching sublimation and condensation. We are also enjoying learning about Cadmus, the inventors of our alphabet, and Greek myths. We read about King David today. Ryan was surely impressed. Ian is immersed in fractions and writing proper paragraphs. Ryan is learning how much knowing how to read can change a person's life. Jilli is just being cute and driving everyone insane singing "Mary had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb. Mary had a cute little purse cute little purse." etc etc and on and on and on...

Good Night, Sleep Tight, and don't let the bed bugs bite! ;^)