a productive day...

I have to say I am feeling pretty good about today went. Recently I have been feeling overwhelmed with the amount of work that needs to be done around the house/farm and that overwhelming sense of not accomplishing anything wears at you. But today was a good day. I had a really hard time falling asleep last night which is usually a sign that the next day isn't going to go well but we got up and going early as James had his one year dr appoint this morning (updates on that and his birthday party in a late post). So we went to his appointment, went to the grocery store for a milk run (in an effort to simply our lives we took milking out of the equation and are going to focus on a beef herd and until I can find a supplier of fresh milk it's store bought for us- blech...), and then hit the pharmacy for some new vitamins for the big one year old boy! And to stock up on motrin in case the inevitable fever post shots set it. We headed home after that and went straight out in to the garden where we picked raspberries(4 quarts), zucchini(probably 20 or so none smaller than my arm), and summer squash(again a bunch of huge honkers...). Back into the house for lunch and naps, at which point I dyed my hair- time to get rid of the grey! Of course the second I mixed the color both kids were screaming but Xander's issues were resolved with the quick changing of a diaper and I think James was just crying because Xander was! After hair dying I took the raspberries we picked and made a batch of raspberry jam- mmmmm, James and I enjoyed the extras once he got up from his nap! Then it was onto shredding zucchini for relish and slicing cucumbers for pickles. 2 gallons of relish fermenting in the fridge and 14 lbs of sliced cucumbers soaking in lime later it almost time for bed. Now I just have to clean up the mess I made in the kitchen so the flies don't go totally beserk and pack the diaper bag for tomorrow b/c we are leaving first thing to head over to the seacoast to visit Pop, Nan and to get James' 1yr pictures done- followed by a shopping excursion to Kittery and I need to be home in time to can that 2 gallons of zucchini relish- yikes! It's going to be a LONG day.