TTT: Season 4, Episode 10

- This past Wednesday, the boys, my parents and I took a trip to the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. Our only previous experience with fairs/rodeos was the South Plains Fair in Lubbock. Not to slight the South Plains Fair or anything...it was always fun when we went...but the Houston Rodeo is just something else! It's the "real deal," so to say. Very well run, very clean, very educational and entertaining. We arrived around 10:00am and stayed till after 2:00pm. And really, we could have stayed much longer, but we did have one sleepy little twenty-month-old on our hands who could only be pushed so far, figuratively and literally. I'll let the pictures do the talking:

Two adorable cowpokes.

They had a little shop that sold these neat ride-on horses. You pressed your feet up and down and it propelled the horse on little wheels.

And of course I had to give it a shot too.

Had to stop by the Texas Tech ag booth!

My favorite part (animal-wise) was the birthing center. They had many different kinds of animals who had either just given birth, were laboring, or were due within days. So fascinating! These little lambs had just been born a few hours prior.

Hiya, there, Lady Cow.

Ru on his pony ride...no hands!

Lookin' like a true cowboy!

My heart went out to this poor mama pig. She had ten piglets who just would not back off! Every time she tried to get up they knocked her back down. Life of a mom, I tell ya.

This poor baby, he was such a trooper! He was stuck in the stroller most of the day but hung in there and didn't put up too much of a fuss.

The super slide!

Pa and Kolbe on the ferris wheel. 

The boys LOVED the spider swings.

No, this is not Kolbe, but he has vowed that it will be next year. He and Ru loved watching the mutton bustin' competition and swear they're going to sign up next year. They've been practicing ever since Wednesday on the arms of our couches. 

My Rudy riding a motorcycle.

- As I mentioned previously, our biggest resolution for the year is healthier eating. No fad diets or trends to follow...just healthier eating choices. Period. As part of that, we decided to start our own vegetable garden in our backyard. Last weekend we built a raised bed in our side yard and then later in the week filled it with veggie plants. We're starting very basic and hoping to grow from there. Tomatoes, jalapeños, bell peppers, cilantro, and a few other herbs as well. Can you tell we like Mexican food!?! Our neighbors that share a fence with our vegetable garden have an entire backyard full of raised beds with both flowers and fruits/vegetables. We figure if she can grow them just two feet away, surely we can too! I took this picture the day we built our bed. I need to get another one now that it has plants in it but it's rainy right now so that will have to wait. Hopefully I'm not writing mid-July with a photo of dead plants and dried up soil. Wish me luck!

Our humble little un-finished veggie bed.

Maybe if we're successful, our produce haul from the store with shrink in lieu of fresh-from-the-yard!

Tantrums, Treasures, and Tidbits

- I'm thinking it might be easier for me if Three Thought Thursday turned in to a weekend thing instead of a Thursday thing. I'm quickly finding out that as we get busier and more involved, the less likely it will be for me to pull of a blog post every week in the middle of the week. The weekend affords me a little more flexibility. But then it wouldn't be Three Thought Thursday, would it. Ugh.

- Yesterday morning a little bit of coolness occurred. I woke to a few shop orders in my inbox. This is nothing out of the ordinary. But upon closer look at my totals at the top, I discovered I had reach my 2000th order. Two thousand. That's a lot. Two-and-a-half years and two thousand orders. I'm a proud little shop owner.

And I'll leave you with this. Maybe we should attempt to grow corn!