Happy 4th Birthday!

Happy 4th Birthday, Annalisa. She turned 4 last week, and I can't believe it. One of the highlights was Mamie coming to take her to get her ears pierced. I think she has shown them to everyone. She chose cute little Hello Kitty earrings and is very proud of them.
Another highlight was her princess dress up party. I had so much fun planning fun activities and doing a variety of crafts for it. We painted nails, got tattoos, played "pin the crown on the princess", decorated wands and crowns, and broke a pinata. It was so much fun, and I truly enjoyed it. Often I feel stressed while "playing hostess" that it is hard for me relax, but praise God this time was different. I even woke up in the night and found myself reminiscing over all the fun.
Annalisa-you are getting so big. You are such a good big sister and a huge help to me. You play well w/ Daniela and entertain her a lot. Some of your favorite things to do are play "mommy" with her, play in your bed together, and "read" books to her. You like to read her the Bible and you make me smile as you tell her God is faithful and powerful and is coming back to take His people. I know you are excited about your newest baby sister coming in a couple months although I'm not too sure Daniela is :)

It worked!!!!!!!!!!

So last year I had the great idea to plant a couple cucumber plants b/c we like cucumbers. I asked Massy about it and he kinda got into it. I just wanted to throw the plants in 1 of the flower beds and be done with it, but he had other ideas. He dug up a lot about 4x8 (about the size of a twin bed), built a raised bed, and bought quite a few plants.
Guess what....nothing came up. We planted too late:(
After talking to quite a few friends who have gardens, (I never knew until recently all these people have gardens. Every time I mention it I feel like somebody chimes in and tells me they have one too--who would have known?) we weren't ready to give up and decided to try it again this year. After asking 100's of questions to some friends...we followed all the right steps and what do you know???
This evening Massy sent Annalisa in to bring me the first tomato. I have to admit I'm a little surprised but also excited. We also tried cucumbers, strawberries (Annalisa & Daniela each have one), oregano, parsley, 2 types of cucumbers and basil.