Happy Birthday: Baby A is 1

 Happy First Birthday to our little bundle of joy!  He gets away with things -- like sticking his fingers in the cake for a sample. 

He agrees with the rest of the family that cheesecake is delicious. 

He was pleased to unwrap some presents. Thank you Grandma S and Grandpa J!

His crinkle nose face:

This is so fun.

We are so blessed to have friends who let us come anytime to enjoy their beautiful pool.  We had a pool party for baby A's birthday with another family in our pod. 

It's hard to believe it has already been a year since our first Covid pool party right after A was born. 

Brood X: Cicadas in Maryland

 The cicadas are officially here! We did not see noticeably large numbers of them until around May 20th. We've had cool weather for the last couple days and they are fewer in numbers.The kids stayed out late one night watching them emerge. Beardy thinks that they are delicious and it is giving M's dubia roach colony a chance to grow for a bit. There has been a gradual increase in numbers over the course of about a week. Their exoskeletons are everywhere!

The ducks and guinea fowl have not been eating any regular feed, just gobbling up cicadas until they are stuffed to the brim.

They emerge very slowly from their exoskeletons. 

Some of them have a fungus that makes them deformed, but they still try so hard to get out and up the tree for mating. 

A lot of them are on the barn wall.  There used to be a big tree on either corner there, so I imagine that they are confused. 

Kid Projects: Pollinator Waterers, Bird Houses, Baking and Photography

 Baby A is a happy guy and keeps us all laughing with his antics. The kids love giving him foods to try, like pickles.

He is also learning to be a good little forager. Here he is helping himself to some anise hyssop (naturally sweet like licorice), while I was weeding.

We visited Beiler's Gourd Farm while we were on our most recent Lancaster trip.  They are a wholesaler of gourds of all shapes and sizes.  They had all the materials on hand to make fancy bird houses and carved gourd lights.  We went for the birdhouses this time.  Maybe we'll try carving some lights later in the year. 

Here is brother M using the leather dye method on his bird house gourd:

Big Sister A used a combination of the ink dye and leather dye to create a beautiful pattern on her bird house.

Here it is mostly finished.  We still need to spray them with a couple coats of lacquer to protect them from the elements and then hang them up with strands of leather. 

Another craft project that the kids put together were these pollinator watering stations. It's so sad to find them drowned in the duck pool. This way bees and butterflies have a safe place to land for a drink of water. 

We put three of them in the high tunnel since I want to attract lots of pollinators to come in, despite it being under cover. 

Brother M loves his Beardie. He does a great job caring for him and is very responsible about gathering bugs for him every night. 

Brother M also loves watching and taking pictures of bugs. Here are some of his recent bee pictures:

We did some deep cleaning projects this week and one of them was to pull everything out of all cupboards and drawers in the kitchen and give the cupboards/drawers a scrub. When we did that big sister A discovered some baking supplies that she'd forgotten about (fondant and cutters for fondant).

That got her in a cake making mood and she made this rhubarb vanilla cake for us.

Not to be out done the boys made this excellent pickle car. 

Family Fun: Lancaster Dairy, Radishes, and Ropes Course

 We have started to notice a gradual increase in the number of cicadas around.  I found this one in the garden the other day.  I'm still waiting for the full invasion, but I feel fairly prepared with all the trees netted. 

I am so grateful for my kids willingness to do an hour of "garden chores" every day.  It really adds up to a lot of help. And they are getting so good at doing things like planting, weeding, and harvesting! Harvesting is the most fun of course. They asked me this week whether harvesting strawberries will be our next garden chore. I don't need to ask anyone to do that though, everyone is anxiously watching them turn pink. Harvesting/thinning radishes is still a chore though, and Miss L got her turn this week. Next week is Brother S's turn. Harvesting is a very sought after garden chore in the spring. As we roll into summer and it starts to be an every day project, they get less and less excited about it. 

We visited Shenk's Ferry Wildflower Preserve on our way to Lancaster.  I think we missed the peak bloom time, but we still had a beautiful hike and fun playing in the creek. 

It was a warm day -- perfect for some Butter Brickle at Lapp Valley Farm. 

First calf licks for Baby A. 

Big sister A went with the youth from church on a ropes course Saturday.  She had a wonderful time. 

They wore harnesses the whole time and did different levels of challenges.