Backyard Springtime Fun

We've enjoyed plenty of beautiful springtime weather, perfect for playing in the backyard.  Once again, this year, we've planted a vegetable garden.  By far, this has been our most successful gardening venture yet.  I've already made over a dozen salads out of our prodigious Romaine Lettuce, we've had a strawberry already and the tomatoes and peppers are almost there.  As usual, especially in the beginning, the kids loved to help water the baby plants.  One evening they even watered the plants after their baths, in their pajamas.

Daddy was full of projects this spring.  Besides organizing, planning and planting our very successful vegetable garden, Scott also made a soccer field in our backyard.  First, Scott invested in soccer goals with some of his gift cards.  Then, he researched the dimensions and shapes for regulation soccer fields, did some math and created a quarter size soccer field using a line striper he'd already purchased for a master's program service project. When Scottie does something, he DOES it!  The results were amazing and Elijah LOVES his soccer field.  Our cerebral boy often prefers spending his hours inside, so we always welcome any outdoor diversions.  This soccer field may be our best outdoor diversion to date.  He will ALWAYS play a game in the backyard if given the opportunity.  Both Scottie and I (and a few Kindergarten friends) have spent plenty of giggly, sweaty hours trying to score goals and outrun our boy.  So fun!

While Elijah adores his new soccer field, Keira spent many hours on her playground and especially enjoyed playing in her sandbox.  Keira always loves playing in the sandbox, but with the warm weather we were able to add buckets of water to the sandy fun and she's play happily, quietly and independently for hours.  I especially loved watching her surrounded by a canopy of Dogwood Flowers.  One day she was talking about what sounded like "puffy flowers."  I couldn't figure out what she was talking about, finally I realized she was saying "puppy flowers."  I had told her about the Dogwood Flowers the day before.  :)  So, here's our girl playing among the "puppy flowers."