royalmom

I think I might be affected by seasonal affective disorder more than I realized. The Spring sun made me so happy and the realization that this is only the teaser we get every year, that will be crushed with many more days of rain and cold, got me depressed again. It’s still sunny out and I am sad just knowing it won’t last.

Actually, I’m realizing I’ve been in hermit mode ever since I gave Facebook the boot last summer. Now, instead of the limited social interactions online, I’ve reduced myself to interacting only with my family. I don’t reach out to friends and, in turn, they don’t reach out to me.

Maybe unschooling, co-sleeping, cooking from scratch, trying to be super-attentive-awesome-mom is zapping it all out of me. I do know, getting off of Facebook made the other things more do-able. Are we not allowed to be supermom *and* have a social life?? I apparently don’t have the energy for it. Ha!

The sunshine is making me so happy! The backyard is getting some play every day with swinging competitions, trampoline games, tricycle rides on the deck and hot-tubbing. I am looking forward to getting the deck cleaned off and having my morning coffee out there again.

Lotus surprised me with reading her first word in public today. I couldn’t believe it! In her THREE YEAR OLD(!!!) way, she saw the word ZOO on a business sign and said “S, zero, zero…that spells zoo.” I asked her to repeat what she said and she said, “S, zero, zero…that spells zoo. You know, the place with all the animals?”

She brings me and Jason books to read many times a day and recently started focussing in on specific letters and words, instead of just asking what entire word groups are. She is soaking it all in and connecting the dots!

Our sweet little Simon turned 7 and is excited to have reached the age requirement for parkour class. He starts the next round of classes with his brothers in a couple weeks.

He’s growing up but still our little guy!

Here he is on a most excellent art piece at the Winningstad theater in Portland. We recently saw Zombie in Love, put on by the Oregon Children’s Theatre.

His celebration with all the cousins and a few friends. His cake looks a little boring but it was the applesauce cake with a dollop of freshly made cinnamon whipped cream. They all ate it up and approved. Whew!

Next up for birthdays is Isaac, turning the big 13!

I saw a clip of Silver Falls on the Oregon Field Guide special on OPB and HAD to go…NOW. The kids were onboard and we all headed out to stay a night in one of the campground cabins and check out the trails and falls.

It was fantastic weather when we got there but we weren’t sure which section of trail to take. We hiked a small bike path and played close to the campground, planning to hike the bigger trail in the morning.





We had the entire campground to ourselves. Pick of the cabins!



It started raining in the night and never stopped. We checked out the North Falls trail (tiny) and never did find the trailhead for the South Falls. It was raining so we didn’t want to investigate too much more.




This little waterfall was NOT the reason I wanted to come. However, we did have a great time and plan to come back again with better weather.