April's gone

It’s been a busy month, and May promises to be even more hectic. As cinco de mayo approaches I’m looking forward to all the adventures planned in the coming months, and at the same time, wondering where April went… Sorting through my pictures, I realized we had quite a month.

We mourned the loss of a few favorite neighborhood trees, and are nervous about a new development possibly going in nearby. However it isn’t possible to halt progress, and as we work towards ensuring any new construction is responsible and sustainable, we have been working on getting our garden productive. A trip to Padulas Plants and Gardens supplied us with a few new native plants that are now happily growing in our raised beds, and on our way home Lauris spotted this familiar face…

Mater, right here in the Upstate!

In addition to getting the garden in order we’ve been working on some spring cleaning, and as American tradition dictates, had a yard sale to sell our junk to other people. The boys made lemonade and baked cookies (with only a little help from mom in regards to operating the oven), and made some money for their piggy banks.

We’ve had some great weather, and along with it wonderful opportunities to get out and explore areas of the Upstate we’re not so familiar with, including more of Lake Conestee Nature Park. But we’ve also stayed in some, especially during the week of rain and hail.

And that’s when this was constructed!

We’re having some sad moments too, as our good friends departed South Carolina for Minnesota last week. There was a farewell party with a couple dozen kids.

What can go wrong with a little game of 'red rover'?

Thank goodness the weather was nice and my mother-in-law was here to help, as Roberts was away on business and we wouldn’t have been able to fit that amount of people in our house if it was raining!

We celebrated Earth day and Arbor day, Australia day and Arts Alive. There was more than one trip to the children's museum.

One of the more exciting events however, may have been the acquisition of our new water table – a gift from another set of friends moving north, this family to Ohio. There’s one guy who is particularly excited…

Onward ho!

photo credit Monique