Cool Treats

Alas, I know it has been far too long since I've posted! However, most of our energy has been spent beating 95+ degree heat without air conditioning! :o) (Most days I was pretty well sapped by about 5:00 . . . )

For some reason, cool treats like "homemade icecream in a bag" took on a whole new appeal! Here's out attempts at that . . .

Supposedly you put the ingredients in a bag with ice, shake for five minutes, and "presto!" you have icecream . . . we basically ended up with cold milky soup, but we had fun regardless and the kids didn't know the difference. :o)

One evening I was just absolutely beat and spent about an hour after dinner just lying under a fan. My dear wonderful husband took the kids on a trip in the air-conditioned van and came back with a blender (after managing to stretch the trip out into about 2-1/2 hours)! :o) I had made just an off-hand comment about wanting one to make smoothies and such. How fun! We've certainly enjoyed the fruits of that trip! :o)

We also enjoyed making strawberry yogurt pops! Now this recipe did work and it was super easy: Blend 1-1/2 cups fresh or frozen strawberries and 1/2 cup vanilla yogurt. Pour into popsicle molds and freeze four hours. Yummy!

However, the biggest blessing is that we now have two window air-conditioners! (And I must say that the time without them has made me appreciate them much more!) A couple from church came over Wednesday evening after prayer meeting with an extra small unit they had. While we ladies fellowshipped, the men removed the window in the kitchen and got it installed. Chris is obviously very handy, but it was a blessing for him to have the benefit of Mr. R's experience. That first AC definitely helped take the edge off in the kitchen, but it also laid the groundwork to make it easier to get a more appropriately sized unit for the main living area installed (which we did this weekend). The Lord provided a great one on Craig's List for less than 2/3 of the price of a new one (and it had never been used!) Yeah for cool air!

And, to help with sleeping, Chris retrofitted the first unit into the kids' bedroom (without removing the window)! :o) Now that he knows it works, he'll work on getting a a slightly less unique installation base, but it does the trick for now. :o) (And it would almost qualify for one of those "You know you're in South Caroline when . . . " pictures.) :o)

And on top of all of that, we hosted a "funistry" event for our Children's Church class, Hannah's come down with fifth's disease, and all sorts of other things. More on that later! :o) For now, have fun staying cool! :o)

PS - Brief Side Note: The window units are not permanent--we're just trying to make a careful decision on a permanent central-air unit in light of some future plans we have for our home. The window units will help us not rush the other decision which requires a pretty significant investment!

Happy Father's Day!

Happy Fathers' Day!

We love you, Daddy . . . and Grandpas . . . and Great-Grandpas! :o)

Hope you have a wonderful day!

Especially for Grandma

Thanks for the special new shirts, Grandma H!

We love you!

We do believe in haircuts.

Before

After

He's a new man!

Splish Splash & Swing High!

For those who may not be aware, South Carolina (and the regions surrounding) have experienced significant drout for about 5-6 years now. But not this year. We've had more rain in just the last few weeks than we saw for most of last summer! It's been wonderful--it both cools the air and waters the ground!!! The only downside is that it somewhat limits our opportunities for pool time. But, we certainly enjoyed the one opportunity we had earlier this week:

And we enjoyed the swing afterwards. :o)

In retrospect, we probably should have had the kids put on shorts and shirts. Thankfully, they didn't fall, and we'll remember for next time. But, they both had a blast regardless! (Sorry the pictures are so blurry! For some reason, they just wouldn't stay still!) :o)

Fun summer times!

Happy 30th!

Happy 30th Anniversary,
Grandma & Grandpa!

We love you, and hope you'll celebrate 30 more! :o)

Enjoy your week in NYC! :o)

Geometry & Kiddie Pools

One of the fun things we did this weekend was bring out the kiddie pool! :o) The kids enjoyed it with one of their favorite babysitters Saturday evening while Chris and I enjoyed an evening out. :o) (For the record, Hannah was so excited about her babysitter coming that when she woke up Saturday morning, she asked if we could eat lunch first so that she could come sooner!)

However, as anyone who has set up a kiddie pool knows, they quickly become an attraction for the local bug population as well as your children! :o) And so, Hannah and I used some household materials and high school Geometry this afternoon to create a very effective pool cover! :o) I'm going to include instructions here for anyone who'd like to try the same. :o)

Supplies:

1. Bubble wrap (You can buy it at office supply stores. We had put it in our yard sale pile!)
2. Scissors
3. Packing tape
4. Measuring tape
5. Marker

Instructions:

(Sorry I didn't think to get pictures of each step!)

1. Measure the diameter of your pool. (That's the distance across for those who are rusty on Geometry!) :o)
2. Cut strips of bubble wrap about one inch longer than your pool's diameter.
3. To determine how many strips of bubble wrap you need, measure the width of your bubble wrap and divide your pool's diameter by the bubble wrap's width and add one more to accomodate overlap. Our pool's diameter is 4 ft. and the bubble wrap is 1 ft, so I needed five strips.
4. Lay the strips long sides together with the bubble side down (flat side up) on your table and overlap the edges by about an inch. Secure them together with packing tape. (I used about 8-12" strips of tape and then overlapped each strip of tape by about an inch or so.) Handling packing tape in much longer strips than that becomes difficult.
5. Now here's the part where high school Geometry really comes in handy, and I almost made my life MUCH more difficult by not thinking of this!

• Once you have a big blanket of bubble wrap, carefully fold it in half (bubbles together) and then fold it in half again to find the center.
• From the center corner, use your measuring tape and marker like a compass to mark out an arc the length of your pool's radius (1/2 the diameter). For me, since my pool's diameter was 4 ft., that meant drawing little marks every couple inches that were 2 ft from the center corner.
• Cut along the marks you've drawn and unfold your blanket to reveal a nice circle just the right size for your pool! :o)

Put your new, insulated blanket over your pool! Bugs be gone and warmth/water stay in!

And here's my illustrious assistant who's very glad that the bugs will no longer be so interested in her pool! :o)

Hopefully this will be helpful to somebody! The idea for using the bubble wrap came from my husband--I just executed it this afternoon. And I love seeing such practical uses for high school math! :o)

Organization Returns!

It was bad. Very bad.

I can honestly say that I have never had a "non-construction zone" under my domain in such a state of total chaos. Ah well. The worst part was that the kids still wanted to play in there! Thankfully they always managed to find their way back out! :oP

The storeroom wasn't "organized," but it was at least navigable. Just a little tough to find things or get at that box on the bottom of the pile! :o)

However, in a household where efficiency tends to reign, the empty space on this wall above the boxes was, well, not an "efficient use of space!" (Sorry folks, yes, we really do think this way. For better or for worse, we at least think alike on the subject!) :o)

I started Friday evening with an attempt to bring some organization to the guest room. I did make some progress, but it quickly became evident that the shelving we were planning to add to the storeroom needed to happen sooner rather than later. Mainly because we needed a place to store the extra twin bed, and the top of a double-wide shelving unit seemed like the best option.

I was organizing while the kids and Chris built the shelves, so I don't have any "in progress" pictures with the kids, but here's the final product.

Peter's expression of "this isn't all it's cracked up to be" is unfortunately pretty accurate. It was a long day for them. They did really well, but playing on their own and staying out of the way of moving boxes and piles gets old after a while. Thankfully these kind of projects happen once and then they're done. Maintenance is so much easier!

Here's the vast majority of the storeroom moved out and stacked in the basement area . . .

So that we could position the new shelving.

And many hours later, I now know where all of my storage boxes are, what's in each of them, and like items are generally sitting in the same area of the room. :o) And it's MUCH easier to get to them! :o)

And . . . ta da!

Our guest room! :o) Hannah is very excited about her "dolly corner." She has her dolls, cradle, stoller, and rocker all set up in one spot. :o)

And here's the kids' play area. :o)

Whew. It's done. We probably bit off more than we should have tried to chew, but we all survived (including the kids), and it's so much nicer to have that done! :o)

Happy Birthday, Grandma!

Happy Birthday, Grandma!

We love you and hope you have a wonderful day!

Four People

"I can see out the window from my feet,

and if I lift up my feet" (i.e. stand on tiptoes)

"Because I'm four

and four-people can see outside windows."

Gotta love it!

Have a wonderful weekend! :o)