Long overdue and just plain long

I've been neglecting this blog for a very long time now and as I was getting ready to blog, I kept finding more and more pictures I forgot to post, as far back as last fall. Soooo, get ready! Let's see if I can get everything in order.




Here is a lovely fall bouquet I gathered on a walk last fall, along with some pumpkins I picked at a local farm.






Later Chuck and Melissa came over and carved Jack-O-Lanterns. Chuck is so good at carving pumpkins, he can do it with his eyes closed!




Here are the finished pumpkins.





And the reverse sides.




And on to Christmas! Here is the cardboard tree we have had every year since we moved to Vermont. I can't believe this was it's fourth Christmas!!!




This year I made ornaments for everyone in my family, which means I made a lot of ornaments. Here are a few of them. Almost all the ornaments you see on the tree went to my family.




Presents. We mostly give each other a lot of little things we would have bought anyway but wrap them because it's more fun that way.




Christmas day I made verenika, fried potatoes, zwiebach, corn and pie (not pictured). I have to say, it was pretty delicious, but still not as good as Grandma's.




For New Year's Eve, Chuck and Melissa invited a few people over to the house they were house-sitting at (with permission, of course), and cooked some delicious food for a delicious potluck.




I think Melissa was trying to figure out which clock was right, since they were all different and we didn't have a TV.




Here's me and Amanda Ann. Isn't she cute?




A couple weeks later, we got to go to Kansas to celebrate a late Christmas with friends and family there. Here's my Mom.





And Dad.




Luke right after his bath.





And Timo. As usual though, I didn't get decent pictures of everyone, and I got a silly amount of pictures of Luke. He's such a little ham, he just demands all the attention.





Luke loves many things in life but three of his favorite things are hats, Veggie Tales, and Papa. Here he's got all three. He has made his usual demands of his Veggie Tales watching companions that they must always wear a hat. Unfortunately for Dad, my parents only own two Veggie Tales videos, which explains my Dad's glazed over expression.




Luke got this little cowboy hat for Christmas and promptly made everyone take turns wearing it. My head is a little too big.




Here is the only not-terrible picture I have from the Bartel Christmas. Grandpa reading the traditional story while everyone listens, takes lots of pictures and the kids act cute. It's so nice that they are able to "schedule Christmas" for when we are home and it's always great to see everyone and to eat waaaay too much verenika.




When we go home I sleep in my old bedroom. The first few mornings we were there, before I adjusted to the change in schedule, I woke up fairly early to see a beautiful frosty, foggy morning.




Another misty morning. I have some silly videos of Luke but I haven't uploaded them yet, so those will have to come later.




Back in Vermont, my aunt sent us this awesome quilt she MADE for us. I was pretty excited to get home from work to find such a great surprise waiting for me on the porch. This is the top.





Here is Mosley posing.




This is the bottom of the quilt which is lovely soft flannel, and which we use as the top most of the time, as Mosley finds the ties on the top very tempting to chew on. Thanks Annette!





Melissa and I have been going on walks lately since it has been really nice here the last couple weeks. We made this awesome diorama mostly out of things we picked up on our walk and a few other odds and ends.




It all started when we found these tiny little pine cones.




Meanwhile, Mosley has spent most of the winter being cute and snuggly.





And silly and snuggly.




And some more cute and snuggly.





I didn't bother to clean up the leaves this fall, somehow thinking some of them would blow away or something. Clearly they didn't and as the little snow we got quickly melted, our yard looked seriously horrible. I started raking a little before I remembered I wanted to take pictures so the flower bed in this "before" picture is already mostly raked. This is the front of the house.





And after.





House side before...





And after.




Garage side before...





And after. Clearly I didn't get all the leaves out. Some still were frozen together with chunks of ice/snow. Some were in places I don't care about and I figure some of them can decompose and help the garden out. It's sooo much better than it was though. It took a long time and Joseph helped me haul all the leaves back behind the garage, which was a huge job.




I knew some things were coming up but I was amazed at how much green stuff was hiding under all those leaves!




Last fall I dug out that long garden in the front of the house and lined it with bricks I dug out of the other garden (don't ask me why there were so many bricks in my garden). I planted all kinds of bulbs and they are starting to come up already! Here are some tulips.




And some crocuses! I also planted daffodils and miniature irises and they are coming up too. It's supposed to be pretty cold tomorrow so hopefully it won't set them back too far. I'm soooo excited about spring! Also, for those of you who care, I'll be at Winfield this year for the first time since 2004!! It's been way too long and September seems like a long way away still but I'm sure it'll be here before I know it!