Day 364: Kid Camping

We slept off the wine party, and narrowly avoided hangovers.  I drove home in the crazy pouring rain last night because I deemed Eric one drink too many, or more so I had just not had a drink in an hour and a half and he had one right before we left.

This morning we took our time getting ready for an awesome day of camping.  This is our third camping trip this summer, and we're hoping to go again at least one more time.  This round was "kid camping" because Jen brought her kids along.  Cameron, Caleb, and Colin hit every mark on the fun scale from crying and pouting to giggling and playing.  Campers included Brian, Jen, Cameron, Caleb, Colin, Heather, Seth, Phil, Eric, and me, and camping *visitors* included Hackey, Paul & Deb :p  We'll get them on an overnight camp trip eventually!

Activities included swimming in the lake, sitting in the poison ivy conversing, and cooking steaks, potatoes, corn, brats, hot dogs, burgers, and tons of marshmallows.  After the kids went to bed and Paul & Deb went home, the rest of sat around the campfire discussing A..., B...., Cars, Dogs/Divorce, Eggs/Eves, Fantasy/Fiction, Gambling, Hell, Ice cream, Jokes, Kites, and Leprechauns!  Eric and I missed the A and B topic starters.

All day today the weather app said we had a 40% chance of rain on the hourly forecast.  There wasn't a cloud in the sky until after the sun went down, then we started feeling a few minor sprinkles as we were cleaning up before bed.  As soon as we got into our tent, the sky split in two and dumped torrential rain on the campsite until nearly 5am.  Luckily, our tent held up really well and we were totally dry!

The boys took up wood chopping as a hobby.

Hackey speared his steak on a stick he cut off of a tree, then cooked it medium-rare on the fire!  What a man!

Eric and I shared a HUGE (and delicious) steak

And baked potatoes!

Caleb, Colin, and Cameron roasting marshmallows - and I finally know all of their names and can tell them apart without thinking about it, haha!

Awe!

Swimming at the lake - totally dirty water, but fun.  Cameron kept finding tiny snails and floated them around on her floaty ring.

Caleb was enthralled with the Jiffy Pop - he probably ate half of the bag.

Day 345: Andrew is Visiting!

This was the last day of my summer break - it was filled with reading, napping, laundry, napping, dishes, and some more napping.  Eric spent another day on "the route" )Time and a half for Memorial Day, wooo!) and will be sad when his boss starts scheduling him for in town deliveries again.  He really likes the pace of the route and the hour of overtime because he doesn't have to take a lunch break.  Woo!

After he got home from work, Mom and Alan brought Andrew to our house for the week.  They stuck around for awhile to get Andrew settled, and to mingle with the cats - but then they headed out to enjoy their baby-free night.  Eric and I had been hoping to watch Andrew for a few weeks to help Sarah out financial and time-wise to help her get a job without the worries of scheduling babysitters and such.  That didn't end up working out, but we are really glad to have him visiting this week!

We started our night with a walk to the park, playing with other kids, playing at home, making/eating dinner, then some quiet play and stories before putting Andrew to bed at 9pm.  He went to sleep like a dream, which is lucky for him because we've got to wake up at 6:20 every day this week for jobs in Olathe!

One of our photo screens (the ones that were behind us during our wedding ceremony) fell over while I was napping today because the wind coming through the window was so strong!  So I tied a ribbon to them, nailed it to the wall, and went back to sleep.  Voila!

In the past two weeks since we've started recycling, 2/3 of our waste is recyclable!  Yea!

Andrew made some girlfriends at the park, it was too cute!

Peek-a-boo!

The pavilion was covered in broken glass, and Eric cleaned it up.  What a great guy!

 Andrew played "Here, have a wood chip" with Eric.

Going for a bike ride! (Just for the photo op, no actual bike riding occurred :p)

A yummy, healthy dinner - pasta, green beans, mashed potatoes, and rolls.

Andrew's pseudo-high chair.  He stayed on the sheet the whole time.  When he tried to stand up and walk off of it, Eric turned on his serious voice and said "Sit down."  Andrew promptly sat and kept eating.

When we thought we would have Andrew for most of the summer, I planned on cloth diapering him.  I bought a few cloth diapers on craigslist - and here is Andrew in his first ever cloth diaper!

Day 333: Our Active Life!

Eric was off work today, so he finished preparing my Mexican pinwheels for me!  I made them all last night, but I didn't have time to slice them all up this morning.  He was off work today - so he was able to send some mail, withdraw budget money from the bank, cut and deliver the pinwheel snacks, starts a load of laundry for me, and gets busy with his tax final.

I brought these yummy treats to school because we had a going away party for two retirees and 5 of the staff members who are transferring to other buildings/out of state.  When I got home from work I hung out the laundry, and then Eric and I went for a really long roller blading bike ride - 2.5 miles!  I think this is our new favorite kind of exercise!  I'm starting to pick up stamina and not get tired as quickly...though I did have my first blading wipeout today...

Then Eric grilled a burger for him and some barbecue chicken for me, and we spent the rest of the night working on our separate computers while watching "In Plain Sight" at Katie's recommendation.  Eric finishing a project for his tax class, and me updating this darn blog.  Only another 32 days to go!!!

Mexican pinwheels - refried beans, Rotel with green chiles, olives, and nacho cheese sauce - yum! 

Today Eric called and asked "Do you just line dry because it saves energy, or do you really like the process of hanging it?"  I said that I really do like it, handing them is really relaxing and a nice experience.  I just wish we had line space to dry more than one load at once!  Doesn't it look nice?

I was feeling pretty confident in my skating today - I was flying down a hill, in the street because there was no sidewalk.  After an intersection, the sidewalk started back up again and I went to roll back onto the sidewalk.  However, in Eudora we have those red bumpy bricks at every curb cut - probably as an alert to walkers and strollers that they are about to go into the street.  Well these bumpy bricks also do a fantastic job at throwing roller bladers off their feet!  I knew I needed to dive for the grass in order to avoid a bad injury on the concrete, and barely made it in between two small electrical boxes.  My blades hit one of them with a loud bang, and Eric though I had smashed into it.  


The breath was knocked out of me because I landed first on my hands and then on my chest.  Minus some grass cuts on my legs, I've just got a sore left wrist, left shoulder, and neck.  Not too bad for something that could have been a lot worse.  From now, on, I'll be riding with a helmet.  And as soon as I can find some affordable guards in an ADULT size (apparently, only children need protective gear!), I'll be wearing that too!

Day 317: Loving Springtime!

Today started with a MAJOR case of the Monday's.  Things just didn't go well for Eric or me.  Luckily, the evening was so much better!  Eric heard back from the boss at O'Reilly - the background check looked good, and now they needed a urine test, to make sure he's not a druggie, before giving him keys to a company truck. It sounds like he's got the job as soon as all the procedural dust settles!

We both got off work about the same time and pulled into our parking lot one after the other.  It was a really nice day, and Eric suggested going for a bike ride.  After working on our bikes for 20-30 minutes, I gave up on mine and decided to roller blade instead.  I might actually take up roller blading this summer, I'm not too bad at it and it's a great workout!

Naturally I started off the day by filling my keyboard with orange juice...  So I had to pry off all of the keys and clean the whole thing out.

Luckily, I'm an excellent keyboard cleaner - ta da!  Brand new!

We had Mexican Chicken Casserole with RICE tonight, it was better than usual.  Yum!

Eric and his two wheeled toys!

Don'tfalldon'tfalldon'tfall...

Eric was amused that I cocooned myself up while watching some "That 70's Show".

Day 315: Just Rice

We bought a giant bag of rice to save money and encourage more home cooking a few months ago.  Mostly we forget that we have it, but lately we've been incorporating it more often.  Tonight we didn't have anything planned for dinner and figured we would scrounge.  I got a little more creative than usual and invented "Baked Potato Rice".  I topped my rice with butter, cheese, and bacon bits, and then ate it all with chop sticks.  Delicious!  Eric chose to top his rice with steak marinade.

We keep our stash of rice in a cleaned out cat litter box, yummy!

Day 314: Grilling Out, Picnic In

Today I went with my second graders on a field trip to Science City - everyone had a blast!  Before I went home, I did some shopping for dinner.  I got us some steak and corn on the cob to grill.  I got the corn cooking, and waited until Eric let me know he was on his way home to throw on the steaks.  I used a new garlic and cracked black pepper marinade, and they turned out perfect!

The Playstation Network has been down for a few days because it was hacked - the biggest hack in recorded history, actually.  So this means that we can no longer watch movies and TV shows on the Playstation in the living room.  So tonight we threw down a sheet in the office and watched a movie on the Wii.  Our picnic dinner was accompanied by "The Other Guys", a pretty ridiculous movie about Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrel as crappy cops.  There were definitely some good laughs though!

Kids getting hypnotized!

My kids exploring the wonderous world of electricity.

I also bought some baby proofing stuff for when Andrew visits us this summer - it works.

Mmmm, grilled corn is awesome!

Addy stole the straw right out of my drink so she could play with it!

Day 307: Buffalo Wild Wings Date Night

We had some extra money left at the end of our food budget for April, so we decided to go out for dinner.  We were set on going somewhere on Mass St, and wanted to go to Jefferson's because we hadn't eaten there before.  However, Jefferson's is closed for remodeling or something right now!  Lame!  So then we went to Bob's BBQ, which was just about to close for the night!  Finally we ended up walking from the north end of Mass to the south end and finally settled into our Mass St. favorite, Buffalo Wild Wings!

Though, it wasn't a Tuesday or Thursday wing night, so we had to branch out and order off the rest of the menu!  We had a great server - the cooks forgot the sides on our wraps, so we ended up getting an extra (FREE) side of potato wedges, our favorite!  Wahoo!

Then we went home and I got started on my Easter preparations... Orange Jello Wedges!  I found them online a few weeks ago and thought it would be really cool to do.  It ended up taking a lot more work to scoop the oranges out of their peels, but worth it in the end!

Yea!  Buffalo Wild Wings date night!

Delicious teriyaki wraps, fries, potato wedges, chips and crazy hot salsa!

Scooping out orange peels!

 We ended up with a ton of orange pulp and two tall glasses of orange juice...and a slice of orange for my Blue Moon!

Jello oranges!

Day 301: Parallel Lives

Today was pretty typical of Saturday's, Eric worked at 9:30 and I got up at the same time to get on my day's work. I was your typical ADD housewife, switching between cleaning, blogging, dancing, and relaxing every few minutes. I was incredibly productive in getting the house ready for our family's pre-Easter next week. Then in the evening I went to a classmate's house to work on a project. While there, a kid stopped by doing school fundraising. He said, and I am quoting directly "this card is $10 and good for 5 free medium pizzas from Wheat State Pizza, more than a $50 value!"  I literally ran to my car, got the money and paid the boy for one of the cards.

Before I left my classmates house, I called to order a pizza to bring home to Eric when I actually read what was printed on the card... "With the purchase of a large or extra large pizza at regular price, get a free medium pizza!"  Yes, the "regular price" was underlined.  This kid scammed me into a BOGO that I would never have bought knowingly - when do Eric and I buy pizza?  Never.  Lame lame lame.

As for Eric's day - he woke up with me in the morning and headed out to work straight away.  It was a hard day at work because one of their new hires decided to quit by just not showing up, so they were short handed.  He ended up working an hour late, booo.  But then he got to hang around the house and play while I was out doing school work.

We finally got to have some dinner, watch some Scrubs and That 70's Show, and spend an hour or two together after I got home.  Woo!

Addy is the naturally occurring gargoyle in our house.

Day 298: Grilling Out!

We've been torn on whether to open the grill that we got for the wedding for awhile now.  We know that grills aren't allowed, but 4/5 porches in our apartment complex have one out in plain sight.  We finally came to the conclusion that we would use ours, but keep it stored in the storage closet when not in use.

Tonight we grilled dry rubbed buffalo chicken legs and veggie kabobs.  The kabobs had red baby potatoes, red peppers, garlic, onion, and zucchini.  The garlic ended up being too strong for me to eat straight, but it added a lot of flavor to its neighboring veggies.  Eric was a man about it and ate all of his garlic cloves.  We also watched Predators which was better than I imagined it would be.  Eric's favorite part was when the predator pulled out the inmate's spine - yuck yuck yuck!  I liked the twist with the doctor being a bad guy.

I also got my flip video camera, case, and tripod from Best Buy today, funded from some awesome people at DonorsChoose.org.  I'm really excited about using it!

The sun is in our eyes, but everything else was great!

Eric making the fire - burn, baby, burn!

Mystic escaped more than a dozen times while we were going in and out of the house.

So good!!!

Day 288: Awesome Sunday!

I've got to start this off by saying that we had to skip church this morning so we could extend our time with Steven and Leslie, but I fully think it was worth our while today!  We slept until 10, or so, and then woke up at our leisure and had some cereal.  The best decision came when someone suggested we go for a walk.  We took a frisbee down to a clearing and realized that it was far too windy for that to be successful.  Then we headed down the trail and found ourselves at a storm drain, which was at the end of a creek that was about 15 feet wide. 

We decided to explore down the creek a little bit - and each "little bit further" led us on an advendure that lasted over an hour.  There were places in the creek where it wasn't easy to hop over rocks and we either had to climb up to the bank and walk around, or carry stones the size of shoe boxes to make a rock bridge.  It was great exercise and excellent fun!  I was the most adventerous with bridge building and ended up with completely soaked socks and shoes, oops!

By the time we made it back to their apartment, I had decided that ice cream was in order.  We all decided to go to Sheridans and grab some frozen custard.  We had perfect timing and were their second customers of the day.  Within 5 minutes, the line was at least 15 people deep!  All four of us enjoyed a mini sundae with various combinations of toppings.  Leslie was craving hot dogs, so we went to HyVee to buy some SmartDogs, buns, ketchup, and chips.  Paired with Steven's mad grilling skills, we had a delicious lunch!

Next I dropped Eric off at the JCCC gym and went to Mom and Alan's house to unload our garage sale stuff.  While I was there, Alan showed me his pen making shop, and made me a wooden mechanical pencil for my Dave Ramsey envelope system wallet!  Then I picked Eric back up from the gym and we returned to Mom and Alan's house to pick up Eric's (Alan's) motorcycle.

It was Eric's first ride of the season, and after he rode up and down the street once, he picked me up and we rode to Paul and Debs house for dinner!  The ride went great and Shannon was really excited for Eric to give her a ride around the neighborhood.  We made pita pizzas and watched some Scrubs on Netflix before heading home and enjoying the remaining time of our eventful Sunday! 

 The boys skipping rocks.

 Leslie and I on a sunny (humid!) day.

 Eric and I crossed the creek on this fallen tree, while Steven and Leslie found a safer route.

 Mom and Alan escorted Eric and me to Paul and Deb's house, just to make sure we made it safely.

Eric and me, ready to roll out!

 Eric taking Shannon for her first ever motorcycle ride, and Eric's only passenger other me.

The night ended with two major waves of hail.  It only reached quarter size in Eudora, but Olathe was hit with massive amounts of golf-ball sized hail.