April Activites

April, as is often the case at the beginning of a new term, was a month of social activities. Every weekend we had one or two, usually two, things going on from birthday parties to dinner and game nights to a lovely visit from Ben and Rachel with their three girls. It is always a lot of fun to hang out with everyone and catch up with our friends from school. Usually by about week five, which is halfway through classes for the term, everyone gets so busy with school that we don't see anyone until it is over.

Second year philosophy graduate students: Sarah, Claire, Devin, Martina, Joshua, and Bonnie (not pictured)

We finally got a picture of most of Joshua's cohort; the above was taken at the beginning of the month at Sweet Cheeks winery where we were celebrating Martina's birthday. Last weekend we hosted a second year dinner at our house. All of the above pictured people came, plus Shelley, Martina's partner. We enjoyed soup and salad for dinner and a nice evening relaxing and visiting together.

This weekend was the end of week five, so we didn't have any social events for the first time since the term started and it was nice to have a more relaxing weekend. Next weekend breaks the trend with a birthday party for Shelley on Friday night.

Garden Beginnings

We have been busy out in our yard recently. A couple weekends ago, we rented a rototiller and Joshua turned over the soil in our garden plots and we mixed in some manure. That was a big project. We have two garden beds, the above we are planning to turn into a bed for permanent plants, so we planted raspberries, blueberries, and rhubarb. Our second bed will be for a summer garden.

Last weekend, I shaped the summer garden bed into rows and planted some seeds.

This weekend we got to transplant some of our sprouts into the garden bed. It is so exciting to be planning and preparing our garden and seeing the plants sprout and start to grow.