Sunday Fun....

Sundays are my chill day, family together time and hopefully something fun kinda days. Last week a friend at church told me about a hiking place I REALLY wanted to go check out this week, but I did not manage to save enough gas for it, so I was sort of unsure what else I wanted to do with this Sunday. But when we pulled into the driveway from church I decided that we really needed to make our yard look a little less like hill billy hell...

As you can see, there were toys scattered everywhere, weeds growing rapid, and the flower bed needed some serious attention. So the kids and I decided to team up and get it done!

Now, just to be clear, yard work is SO NOT my thing! I really don't like it at all. For years I would see pictures of pretty gardens and ponds and stuff and I would say "I want to do that." But I have come to the conclusion that I don't want to DO that, I just want to HAVE that! But beings as I am broke beyond words having a beautiful yard is beyond my reach, so we decided to go for a clean yard!

Audrey "mowed" the weeds first, then I went back after her and got the rest. She was cute as can be pushing the mower, just not so very effective! But she got big points for trying!

I managed to convince Nathaniel to help me pull the weeds out of the flower beds while Audrey mowed and took pictures.

I was very happy that he actually even DID some of it, not just standing there sulking like he usually does. Some of this behavior modification stuff must be working :)

Audrey with the camera is pretty funny....

She decided to take pictures of all of the team so we could have a team roster..... where does she come up with this stuff???

And this one she actually took of herself! Talented little girl!

After the mowing came the raking, which Audrey did an awesome job of!

While Audrey and Nat were raking and getting the cuttings into the green waste can I decided that the little flower people needed a make over.... see how dull and rusty they are???

I got the wire brush after them, then found some brown spray paint in my paint collection. I gave them each a once over with the paint (because once over is as far as I got before running out of paint!) The freshened up some of the details on them, like the flowers and outlining the hats...

Not perfect (which is good because perfect would look out of place around our house!), but cleaner and a little fresher... I like how they came out!

Sometimes all it takes to freshen something up is a few minutes and a little creativity!

After we got the mowing done, the flower bed weeds pulled and the planters freshened up Audrey decided that we needed some flowers to finish up. Beings as I had no flower funds, Audrey called her Papa and begged to have some of his flowers. I guess he wasn't will to give up any of his flowers because he showed up with some plants from the store for her. But it is all good, she got to plant and that is what she wanted!

I think it is so cute that my kids are so into planting things... I just wish I didn't have such a black thumb and could do it better with them!!! So you see the little purple shovel in Audrey's hand?? She was just dying to plant plants with that shovel so that the plants will turn purple.... Interesting theory, purple shovels make plants bloom purple flowers. Should be interesting to see if she remembers this!

Years ago the romantic in me had this vision. A vision of working along side of a strong caring man doing these sorts of chores. I actually love improving my homes, even if I don't love the chores themselves, I love the feeling of accomplishment once it's done. I have always had visions of working along side of someone with a common goal. The work might be tedious or even bothersome, but it would be fun because we are achieving something together to enjoy together. The work would be fulfilling because we were doing it together.

Working in the yard this weekend actually had me in tears because I realized that being there with my children was and is the closest I was ever going to come to the dream I held. And the crazy thing is I didn't realize how much that dream meant to me! For years I tried to live with the fact that Mark would NEVER help with anything. There was always so excuse or some thing he felt was more important and I let him get away with those excuses. The J came, and he blessed me so much with all of his help, but he like to work alone. As much as I loved everything he was doing for us, it was just that, it was FOR us, not WITH us. I appreciate it all, but I still had that little hole in my heart. Now I am all alone again, and realize this is my reality. Wow. What a shock to my system and my dreams!

And then I see precious team work like this.... It's not often my two children work TOGETHER without fighting and with smiles on their faces. This brightened my mood considerably!

Two proud and happy little helpers showing off a cleaned up yard!

So the clutter making the yard look like hill billy hell is all put away.

The weeds are all pulled and cut down.

Audrey has pretty flowers in her planters to take care of.

And Nat has access to his basketball hoop again.

And mommy has a clean yard, and rashes all over her forearms to show for it. (Why oh why do I have to have such sensitive skin???)

Such fun! Maybe this week we can walk more and drive less so next weekend we can head up to the hiking place that we were told about... it still sounds fun to me!