iSonto #66

Such happy autumn days! We have had two weeks of school holidays which has been a refreshing change. We visited Grandma and Grandad where the children sat on pumpkins and picked plums. Their garden is glorious and they recently hosted garden tours.

In our own autumn garden we have more apples. We have found espaliers to be highly productive as well as space-saving.

Bill likes to creep under the net to get an apple or two!

So cute and pleased with himself!

More thankful things:

Dave home safely after a week away, field work completed
Warm days
"School" starts again tomorrow
Bill's love of puzzles
Happy visits with friends
Re-reading "Respectable Sins" by Jerry Bridges and getting even more out of it this time
Craft materials being used spontaneously and creatively

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iSonto #47, for old times sake.

It is nearly a year since my last iSonto post!

We are thankful for the gift of a Thermomix, courtesy of anonymous donor A.D.Mirer . . . we have our guesses, but no admissions on the part of a key suspect. This machine is proving useful for soups, curries, porridge and more.

More on the thanks list includes Gramps visiting from South Africa, a warm day, spring leaves, a preschool curriculum we enjoy, and learning the power of 5 minute tidy ups every hour.

  Elnathan was counting with beads. I love having little things like this around the house!

Mercy was always happy to go on an outing. I think we have the cutest back seat these days!

Billy was continuing his career as a dream baby. 8 months yesterday and a delight to us all.

One memory verse was "you shall not lie" Exodus 20: 16. We are still repeating the last iSonto's memory verse about pleasant words a lot . . . and it is still one of our main challenges! Any tips would be appreciated :)!

From garden to tummies . . .

Silverbeet and spinach.

A book we enjoyed together was "The Baby on The Way", a sweet library book about an African American 10th child.

Encouragement, ideas and inspiration came from "Large Family Logistics" by Kim Brenneman, a wonderful book for families of any size, even smallish ones like us! I have found this book invaluable in getting our busy little household more under control.

One funny moment was Billy laughing at Nate pressing on his tummy.

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iSonto #25

Elnathan was eager to complete a puzzle he called "the quite hard one" at every opportunity.

Mercy was amazingly happy during her "room time", playing for half an hour or more on her own. I would take a peek and she would be happily examining her toys.

From garden to tummies . . .

Here we are eating pizza with our tomatoes, basil, and zucchini on top. The chooks were eager to have some and Daisy (the boldest one) even hopped up on us.

This week we are thankful for the thriving basil crop, and the climbing beans that were stunted and stopped growing but have now recovered and begun to produce.

The sunflower poking above the corn has delighted us.

Nate said the sunflower was big and beautiful and "you made the sunflower for my birthday, didn't you?"

I have also been very thankful for Mercy's predictable afternoon naps of an hour or more. After a year of challenges, this is lovely! 

A book we enjoyed together was "You are Brave", a sweet story about the ways you can be brave. We have now borrowed "You are Friendly" and "You are Helpful" as well.

Encouragement, ideas and inspiration came from Are you happy?

One funny moment was Nate dancing with a little friend. She glided around the room with ballet-like flowing motions. He jumped up and down vigorously, providing a funny contrast!

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iSonto #22

This week we are thankful for . . .

• Harvesting baby beets and carrots
• Bright colours of marigolds in the evening light
• A few great nights of sleep
• An evening to do some sewing
• A date 
• Laughter

Mercy was incredibly cute and made us laugh lots playing peek-a-boo behind curtains and chairs.

Boo!

Bye bye Mum!

Lets do it again!

 
Some of her outfits are especially cute for toddling, such as the one above. 

Elnathan was delighted with the cooking set and tea set we purchased for the children with some money given by his great aunt. They are perfect for making a mess while practicing pouring!

We have started a regular colouring time after morning tea, which will hopefully in time allow me to do some household admin while the children are colouring. In the background you can see Mercy going off with her own paper and crayon.

From garden to tummies . . .

Right now Dave is making basil pesto using our fresh basil and garlic.

A book we enjoyed together was Cinderella. This was Nate's request before most of his naps this week. 

Encouragement, ideas and inspiration came from Maybe This Year, a blog post that reminded me to "ask God to dissolve all our hopes (however good they may be!) into a single hope: to know Christ and to be found in Him."


One funny moment was when Mum told me that Elnathan informed her that Grandad and Uncle Aidan were married.

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The winter flowers in our garden

I took these photos of the flowers in our garden so that I could participate in Blooming Tuesday for the first time!

We love our "strawberry planter" filled with pansies. In our experience, strawberries don't grow well in these and it is almost impossible to keep birds away from the fruit that do form. We have enjoyed it much more as a pansy planter!

These violas come up  of their own accord to adorn our lemon tree's pot after we planted an initial punnet. We enjoy seeing the new colour conbinations as they self seed.

Yes, I did take a photo of our potato vine! You can't see them well in this picture, but it has sweet white flowers with a yellow center. In the middle of winter, I'm grateful for any and all flowers.

This daisy bush was here when we arrived, and I love its cheery yellow.

This is one of my favourite plants at the moment. The small bed pictured used to be concrete, so I'm thrilled that I can now look out on some greenery and pretty flowers. The vine was marketed as "yellow jasmine" but I'm not sure it bears any relation to a jasmine plant, as it neither climbs well nor has a scent.

There are lots of bulbs poking their heads out of the soil, so I look forward to being able to post pictures of their blooms in the next few months. To me, the daffodil is one of the most wonderful of God's creations! They are extra special to me now because we had them at our wedding.

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Father and son time

Dave loves to hold and play with Elnathan on our lawn. Dave has also been working to improve the lawn so it is nicer for Natey to play on as he begins to be able to move.

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Sunday at the Drews

Sunday at the Drew Patch has been happy and relaxing for the most part!

Elnathan had a ride on his Daddy's shoulders. 

Dave enjoyed one of his favourite activities, which is to water and observe the garden.

 

On the 20th of last month, the corn was tiny in comparison to what it is now . . .

After observing the growth in the corn, Elnathan turned his mind and hands to other matters . . . 

He has become quite the mango fan, and can suck a lot of fruit through his mesh feeder.

He can also hold his own cup! All these things seem remarkable to his parents as it seems like only a short while ago that he couldn't even hold his head steady!

This must be one of the happiest seasons of our lives, as we enjoy the smiles of our little person.

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Watering with Daddy

I've finally cleared my iPhoto sufficiently to be able to use it at a reasonable pace! To celebrate, I am posting these cute pics of Elnathan and Dave watering the garden.

We are loving our garden right now. We have planted beans, corn, zucchini, tomatoes, and lots more! These pictures were taken last month and it is amazing to see how much things have grown even since that time. On warm days, the little plants seem to grow before our eyes!

 

 

Dave looks forward to getting home from work to greet his wife, greet his baby, and thirdly head straight out to the garden!

Elnathan also seems to enjoy the outdoors. In the last couple of days I've placed him in his rocker in the shade of the cabbages, and he sits there contentedly while I work. Pulling off bits of cabbage leaf and trying to eat them is a favourite occupation!

When it comes to photo storage, do any of you know of a good program that can be downloaded for free? If so, I'd love to hear your recommendations. My iPhoto is quite limited, and I'd love a program that stores many photos and allows you to edit them (for example, removing red eye).

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Our gem squash harvest

In April we collected all our gem squash from the plants. We had fun picking them before we pulled out the plants, looking for them amongst the tendrils and uncovering them amongst other plants where the vine had twisted its arms. We were thrilled to harvest more than 50 gem squash from only two plants, as we had expected each to produce only 8 - 12! Gem squash are a South African favourite that are rarely grown here, and they keep for up to twelve months. We look forward to enjoying them over the winter months and into spring time.

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