Third Post in One Sitting AKA Gus turns 9.

Yes, I'm making up for lost time and toasting myself by the fire. We went for a walk today and I have not been warm until now. One of the reasons no posting happened in the earlier or even Ides of March, is that it was birthday time. Having 2 birthdays in one week always takes me a few weeks to get ready for and a few weeks to recover from. Gus did turn 9, and with Gusto. He wanted a mystery birthday party, and Eleanor was my partner in secrecy and planning. The story goes something like this: She was so fed up with having two siblings with birthdays in a week that she stole the cake, the presents and the whole shebang, and left 'clues' by which the rest of us could find it. We had a bunch of fun hiding the clues and figuring things out. What we did NOT plan for is the super sleuth DOG named ANNE who decided to eat the lovely 8 layer birthday cake while it was on it's way to the hiding place. So, if you look carefully at that photo up there you will see a cake with sort of a grand canyon cut into it. Good dang thing I made 8 layers and not the normal 2. After some hysterics by both me and Gus, we managed to have a mystery birthday party. We even had secret agent badges. I highly recommend checking out birthdaypartyideas.com for lots of easy fun birthday party ideas. We didn't use one idea word for word, but it was great food for thought. And, I think despite the mishap, everyone had a good time.

What everyone has really been waiting for:

I know 'everyone' is a relative term, because I really have no clue who reads this thing, but I know also that you probably aren't really interested in my prattle about my garden. I was writing that while waiting for all of my photos to download from various cameras. I had 172 photos on my iphone! whew! That daffodil photo came from there, not great color, but it will have to do, because my other camera was out of batteries. Here are some more updates from this past month:That's Lucy. She's 6 years old now. She is nearly as excited about being 6 as she was about being 5. She has lost 2 teeth, and another one is wiggly. And, she can also ride her bike with only 2 wheels and without wiping out. at. all. She loves to ride her bike:

She has also started her acting career outside of home. She's moved on from her role as the Shoemaker's wife, to one of 'A Butterfly' in the story Coyote and the Butterflies. She is flying in this photo, that's why she's so blurry. She has also been acting at home more, and played 'The Strawberry Fairy' in a recent show starring herself and Eleanor as 'The Lavender Fairy'

She spent yesterday on the couch with a fever of 101.6. All I can figure out is that she was teething. Six year molars are a pain in the mouth. I remember my sister saying, "I have a stick in my mouth, Mom!" (or at least hearing stories of this.) I have to get me some more Hyland's Teething Tablets.
She was absolutely thrilled to receive a real Dorothy dress from my Mom, the sewing whiz, for her birthday. Here she is, sweetly sweating in it yesterday:

Sping is sprought.

One wonders how we bring and brought but do not spring and sprought. Must be more of the weirdness of English. Nevertheless, the daffodils, even on Slow Lane are blooming and that means spring is here. Of course, I knew it was here several weeks ago, when, after having sent the kiddos out of doors they came racing back in (with me thinking--you just went out!) to say, er, scream: "CROCUSES!" It's just one kind of floral abundance after another around here, starting at the beginning of March. I actually SAW my first hummingbird today while I was out moving a pile of debris that seems to have been sitting in the same spot in our yard for along while. They seem to arrive with the blooming of the Indian Plum, a sweet native bush that has hanging down flowers. I'll take a photo sometime. I will, really. Anyway, I figure the hummers can get the au naturale nectar for a while before I start pumping out the c&h for them. I still have a bunch of 'hummingbird sugar' in the freezer from last year. That would be the plain, white, non organic variety.
Lots has been happening around here since the 15th of February, my last post. Sometimes I think, well, no one is reading it anyway, as evidenced by lack of comments, but then I hear otherwise. If you want to comment, you just click on that little thing below the post that says 0 Comments and then, when I see that you have made a comment, I can write one back to you, and we can have a pseudo conversation about all the interesting stuff you are reading about on my blog. If not, I guess I will keep believing that no one reads this stuff and exist under the impression that I write it just to hear myself type, or to keep a record of some of the stuff that goes on in my kids' lives, since I'm not a scrapbooker, or maybe just so I can say, when I'm in THAT kind of a crowd that I have a blog.
Another happening in my garden is that I have a Daphne bush. I keep saying that if my last name wasn't Doggett I would probably have a kid named Daphne, even with Scooby Doo, because a Daphne is the most heavenly scented flower that I have smelled ever, with the possible exception of a scented rhododendron that my friend Jenny has. Whenwe lived in Bellevue, there as a row of Daphes right outside our back deck, and it was the best thing ever. So, when my friend was tearing this one out of her front yard ("You can't eat it.") I said, "Hey, that's a Daphne!" and voila! it was mine. I have an 'ever blooming' one too, but it doesn't smell as much as these lovely spring blooming daphnes do. yum yum yum. Come by and have a sniff. You will not be disappointed.