surprises

After an additional hour of cleaning, I do have an update to the shelf crash fiasco of the other day.  But in the meantime, here  is something I already had ready.  

When we returned home from our holiday travels we had a number of surprises.

The first surprise was that a neighbor trimmed one of our big trees in the backyard. They took a chainsaw and started chopping up limbs. everyone was sick of our tree dropping limbs and pulling down the power lines.  We finally figured out who did it and to maintain friendly neighborly relations (they bring us ribs!) I had to thank them repeatedly for all their hard work.  I didn't thank them for the 4 hours of hot sweaty chainsaw work, wood stacking and leaf burning we had to do the next morning.  I also didn't thank them for the two large piles of limbs that remain to burn.  Hubby and I thought we were going to overheat and pass out and had to call it a day.  Bee's pool party is this next weekend or I'm sure they'd stay all summer.   At least there weren't limbs in the pool or crushing the trampoline like the last time we were out of town. 

A less work requiring surprise was some HUGE yellow squash. The two that look little are regular size.  The two large ones were too big.  I scooped out the seeds though and we ate them anyway.  The seeds get a little crunchy if they get this big.  I gave the little ones to the neighbors. 

The best surprise was this guy:

Two of our tadpoles are growing up and loosing that little kid tadpole tail.   The whole time Bee was holding this guy she kept whispering to herself, "Don't freak out, don't freak out, he's just a frog."

We still have several tadpoles left to go and the froglets will be released this week.  They haven't spent anytime near the water since hopping out and I'm thinking they aren't eating.

Have you ever come home form a trip to surprises?

three (plus a whole bunch more) hours I won't get back.

Today is my little Bee's birthday.  I had a birthday related post to work on last night.  Instead, I spent three hours cleaning up this mess.  Three hours.  If I was going to clean for three hours, the bathrooms might have benefited from some attention. 

Before the crash and my scream:  This picture is last week, before this weekends two additional batches of jam.  (You see where this is going, huh?)

After the crash and my scream.

Thankfully I was the only one in the kitchen when it happened.  There was a bit of yelling, some crying and a bit of swearing.

I can't even describe the mess, the glass, the stickiness, the tears.  The shelf took out everything in it's way so I also lost a large fiesta-ware pitcher and a completed etsy order.  The glass went around both corners and down the hall.  Blueberry jam was down the walls and under and in every spot available.

Jam.  Chicken broth.  Corn.  Pickles.  Spaghetti sauce.  Jelly.  More jam.  Turkey broth.   Sticky peaches.  Relish. 

After two hours of cleaning, Hubby excused himself to finish up his work downstairs and I heard a word come from him that I haven't heard in years. The ceiling was leaking chicken broth.  The floor, the kids work table, the chairs.... all sticky with peach juice and chicken broth.   I may or may not have repeated the word. 

All of this cleaning happened with a swollen hand.  I was stung by a bee about two hours prior.  I was stung in the finger and I could hardly move my finger.  My entire hand was swollen tightly.  Every move made it ache.  I was singing in my head that song Have a Bad Day the whole time.  

stuff from the 4th

Goodness it's been a week now and I've finally just uploaded pictures from the 4th of July. We were out of town for the week and then had people here almost immediately after we got home. Here are just a few of the fun things we did while visiting family over the 4th.

We are early to bed normally so we don't often see lighting bugs.  What a treat.

Oh my, this photo shows a fluffy hair day for Lou!

Grandma and Grandpa picked up a cool water slide for the kids.

We joined some friends and family for fireworks.  The house where we watched them is right on the edge of the park where the fireworks were launched.  Great seats and a convenient potty.

and entertainment to boot.

Turns out Hubby's aunt is a face painter.  Who knew?

Later, Lou fell asleep on my shoulder on our way back to Grandma and Grandpa's house, that cute little web face left a tidy print right on my shirt.

This was our first year for sparklers. Last year they were both scared of them.

There was a very nice firework show.

The lawn where we sat was closer than even the park guests were able to sit.  At times we felt sparks on our legs!

Bee and Lou spent the time collecting the pieces falling on us.

Perhaps we'll scoot back and little next year!

jam mess up and a jelly go

This has been several weeks back now, but the kids and I went strawberry picking and came home ready to make jam.  we were leaving for a trip the next day and I was packing and cleaning and making jam and I really messed it up.  I realized pretty quickly that it wasn't looking like it was going to set up properly.   In fact, it turns out that it's more like strawberry syrup.

It was supposed to make 8 jars and I think and I ended up with 12.  It's sweet and yummy and good on ice cream, so it's not a loss at all.   I'll just buy some store bought strawberries and make another batch. 

I picked up some fresh peaches and put them up too.  I forgot that canning peaches isn't fun.  It's messy and slippery and it never seems like it makes much.  Probably I'll forget that this winter when we are enjoying the peaches.

I tried a new recipe for jelly using store bought juice.  It's a little bit like cheating.  We chose blueberry pomegranate and is really delicious so I won't tell if you don't.  I've given away a few jars and am left with just a few.  I'll have to make another batch.

Here's what I have left from last summer and what I've already put up this year.  I have 2 jars left of green beans, out of the 17 from last summer.  This year I'll make sure to out some up in pints instead of just quarts.  There are a few jars of turkey and chicken broth left, the new jars of peaches, beans, one jar left of corn.  I'll do much more this summer.  Only two jars of pickles are left.  Some batches were so good, we'd eat a jar in one day!  The new jam and jelly are here.  There are 5 jars of spaghetti sauce left, no one besides me likes it.  There are 2 jars of relish left, so that's worked out pretty well.  I love it.  I have the last jar of ketchup in the fridge right now.  That worked out pretty well too and will be a must on this summers list. 

Off topic:  I just finished writing this and looked up and both hubby and my sister are asleep on the couches.  My mom went off to bed hours ago.  We got up super early this morning and had a yard sale, so we are worn out.  I think they have the right idea. 

Mr. and Mrs. Happy Food Plate

Recently I wrote about the Mr. Happy Food plate that my very craft talented friend Melissa made for Lou for his birthday. He's been absolutely loving it and giggles when he comes to dinner. She made up a few more (hopefully there's one in there for Bee!) and wrote up a tutorial for her blog.

Ribeye steak, grilled zucchini, garlic bread, pasta and alfredo sauce- this is a meal since Bee has become a vegetarian.  We all had steak, so I made up some alfredo noodles for her.  Lou eats everybody's meal.  I am trying to work with her vegetarian mood, but hubby is less than eager to accommodate. She will still eat sausage and fish.  Those aren't really animals.

She has a boy version and a girl version now!  We are very excited to get our hands on one of these or get our own made really soon.  You can make your own too.  Head on over to Mommy's Little Monkeys and say hi and get the full directions.

tricky vegetables

We've had a couple funny surprises in the garden.  One of our green pepper plants grew these:  I tasted it and it was the hottest thing I've ever tasted.  SPICY.  Those certainly aren't green peppers.

Look at this funny yellow squash.  It grew connected to a buddy.

He and all his friends were tasty just the same.  They yellow squash had been our most productive plant so far. 

invented spelling

I don't think I've mentioned it before, but I love invented spelling.  I love little-kid-sounding-out-word spelling.  God love her, Bee has inherited my spelling. She can read anything, but spelling appears to be more of a challenge. She loves making books and magazines and made some fun things this summer.  

Here's a book called The Dinosaur Bone. Dinosaur is spelled Dineusr. Illustrated is spelled ilrstratd.

Here's the first page:  Once there was a little boy.  The little boy wanted to find a dinosaur bone.  He went outside and he went in the garage and got a shovel.

 

Here a few pages later:  He didn't know what to do with it.  He went to his mom.  His mom said, You found a dinosaur bone.

Here's a magazine she's been working on .  It's a butterfly garden magazine.  Here's a page that says, Some leaves will change color.

Here's another page,  This is a woodpecker eating.

Here's another fiction story, The Fairy Who Wanted New Wings. 

A few pages in:  One Christmas day the fairy discovered that she was growing new wings.

Here's a song.  I love you, yes I do, very much, I do.  I love the whole world.  Yes, I think I love you.

Soon she'll spell things right (or mostly, as in my case) but for now, I'm going to enjoy this invented spelling. Her goofy, silly spelling.

gumballs for good behavior

 I've mentioned before that we are struggling with behavior at our house.  Certain ones of us more so than others.  We've tried a number of different behavior charts, etc, but in searching for more ideas, I found this gumball display with a sign reading 'chews wisely'.   (I'm also seeing it at a bulletin board in an elementary classroom with some behavior plan worked in).   We're really going back to basics with discipline stuff and it's stressful and embarrassment when we have to have a time out at the grocery. 

I got this idea from Wendy from Craft Goodies.   I made ours out of paper on hand in the not-being-used scrapbook supply box.  We are earning paper gumballs for good behavior.  Bee and Lou went to Bee's room the other day and started nicely playing polly pockets and batman guys together- gumball.  They both did their summer schoolwork without complaining- gumball.  We had a trip to the grocery with no crying (oh my goodness, surely we've all been there- drama!)- gumball.  Bee had a friend over and Lou played along nicely- gumball.  

We talked about a reward and rather than go with something gumball themed, the kids want to go to a nearby amusement park.  Great choice.  We've never been and were planning on taking the kids at the end of the summer anyway.  I should get a gumball for that.

Here's Wendys. She uses it for activities to do with the kiddos this summer.  It's magnetic and way fancy.