Garden update: Day 78

INDSIDE:

This is my indoor garden.  I have strawberries, carrots, red peppers and grape tomatoes.  I'm not seeing any growth with my strawberries.  I'm not sure why.  I'm disappointed but I'll give them some more time b/c it's only shy of a month of growth.  The carrots are doing great.  They are on day 45.  They keep just keep growing.  I need to research to see how I know when they carrots are ready to harvest.  I still have my avocado pit in the window sill in the kitchen.  It looks the same as it did almost a month ago.  I put the celery stalk in the compost pile.  It got really gross so I gave up on it.  It did grow stalks out the middle but the base rotted so badly and quickly that I decided to get rid of it.

Here's my pepper plant.  It's doing great.  I hope to get peppers.  I'm going to have to repot the plant in a bigger pot soon.  I will need to get some stakes for it to hold it up so the leaves don't get to heavy for it.

Here's my grape tomatoes.  They are so happy in the window sill.  I have to keep moving the blind up because they keep growing up.  There were some smaller plants and sucker leaves that I decided to clear and thin it out a bit.

Here's what they look like now. Must more thinner at the bottom.  Maybe now they will start to fruit.

OUTSIDE:

My potato plants are thriving!  I only have 2 left and the plants are full of green leaves.  This is day 78.

I have the potato plants, rose plant, marigolds, big boy tomatoes, squash and zukes all outside.  The rose plant had some dead leaves and dead roses on it so I took them off.  I might plant the rose bush in the front flower bed  one day.  We'll see.  The marigolds are starting to bud nicely.  It's day 46 for them.  Pretty soon they will have some flowers.  :)  The squash and zukes are doing great.  It's day 38 for each of them.  They have nice big green leaves.  I added some more soil to the pots today so the plant stay covered.  I also added soil to the big boy tomatoes.  Once they get bigger I will probably need to separate them into their own pots with a stake to keep them straight.  It's day 46 for the big boy tomatoes.

Marine Corps Half Marathon 2013

My husband, Nate ran the Marine Corps Half Marathon this past Sunday.  This is the 2nd time he's done this race.  

Here's a picture of Nate that I didn't think I got because it happened so quickly.  Nate ran by at the start and he came over to high five us and as he moved to the left the guy in the blue shirt and him almost collided.  It would not have been good.  Luckily, they didn't crash and get hurt.  I quickly snapped the picture without even looking and got this shot.  It's awesome!  :)  Nate's face says it all.  haha

Here's Nate holding his medal after running.  He finished in 2 hours, 34 minutes.  Way to go Nate!  :)

After the run everyone came back to my house for a cookout and stuffed ourselves.  

It was fun but we were all pretty tired after we ate.  Nate mentioned he wants to do his first full Marathon next year in Virginia Beach.

Oh yes, Nate has decided he wants to start blogging.  You can read his blog here.  

His first post is coming soon.

Bake Sale for Fundraiser

Nate has a co-worker who's teenage daughter Lexy was diagnosed with Leukemia in December 2012.  Currently Lexy, is in remission and just had a bone marrow transplant last week.  The community put on a fundraising benefit to raise money for Lexy this past weekend.  I decided to bake 10 dozen (120) of my Homemade Chocolate Chip Cookies for the bake sale that was at the fundraising event.

Here's my counter with cookie supplies everywhere.  I've never ever made so many cookies.  I ended up getting a blister on my thumb from all the mixing.  Yes, I could have used my Kitchen Aid mixer but I find the batter doesn't combine that well.  I just used my purple cuisinart hand mixer instead.  I love that thing!  :)

This is what 10 dozen cookies look like.  :)

Delicious cookies....

After the cookies were cooled I put 2 dozen in a tupperware container with a slice of bread to keep them soft until I was ready to package the cookies.

Here's a packaged cookie.  Orange ribbon tied on a treat bag.

I had some home made stickers that I added to some of the packages.

Cookies ready to be sold....There was a lot of yummy baked items at the event.  By the time Nate and I left everything was free so I grabbed the leftover cookies and told the organizer that I would take them to work and sell the leftovers for $1.00 each and give her the cash.  I sold all the cookies!

The event raised over $17,000 for Lexy.  YEY!  :)

Kristen's Graduation

My BFF, Kristen graduated from University of Richmond on Saturday, May 11th.  We are all so proud of her.  Way to go Kristen!  You did it!!  :)  She's thinking about going on for her Masters but she hasn't quite decided on that yet.

Here's Kristen with her husband Dave.

Kristen decorated her hat.  :)

Here I am with Kristen.  I wore a black maxi dress with a jean jacket and black flip flops.  It was comfy!  :)

We went for a celebration lunch at Brio Tuscan Grille at Stony Point Mall.  I got a burger with fries.  The burger was huge and delicious.

After the celebration lunch we stopped by to see Ashley, Daniel and Ella.  :)  Dave had his awesome camera and took a bunch of pictures.  I love this picture of Ashley and Ella.  I cropped it and turned it black and white.  :)

Dave also got a beautiful picture of Crystal and Charlie.  I turned this one black and white too.  I love this one as well.  :)

Here's a cute picture of Charlie looking into the camera.  She's growing up so fast.

Ashley and Daniel had some ideas for some pictures they wanted Dave to take for their birth announcement. Here's a great picture of Ella in a frame with wooden blocks with the date of birth.  Priceless!

Breakfast Sandwiches

We made a few breakfast muffins one day.  I saw the idea on several blogs on Pinterest.  I told Nate to pam spray a muffin tin and crack the egg into the tin.  Then bake the eggs on 350 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes or until done to your liking.

Heat up an English Muffin in a toaster, then cook your sausage (we used microwavable precooked turkey sausage patties).  Add a white American cheese slice, the turkey sausage and cooked egg onto the toasted muffin.  You can zap for a few seconds in microwave if you want the cheese really melted.

You can make these ahead of time and wrap real good in foil and freeze them.  It's best to warm them up in the oven b/c from different blogs I saw on pinterest the bread could get soggy in the microwave.  It was pretty good.  Nate said he didn't like waiting for the eggs to cook.  LOL

Onesie and headband for Ella

I wasn't able to make it the my sisters baby shower that was thrown for her.  I had my friend, Kristen save me a onesie and headband materials so I could make them for Ella.

I chose a dark purple headband and glued a white lacey flower on top and then glued a piece of dark purple felt in the middle of the white.  :)

The onesie was wrapped up all cute in burlap.

For the onesie I had to put headphones and music notes on it since I'm a Radio DJ.  :)

Welcome to the world......Eleanora

This last month has been a busy one and it's not even over yet.  My little sister, Ashley had my niece on May 3rd, 2013.  *Eleanora Linnaea* is her name.  I'm calling her "Ella".  :)  

She is beautiful!  I love her so much and I'm so happy I get to spoil her.