Improvements

When we bought our camper in August, we decided the place to store it would be on the side of our house where there's always just been firewood, weeds, and dirt piles. So, we've been clearing that out and researched the best way to have access to it. It was behind a chain link fence, so we had to go with a gate so we could have easy access to our camper. Being the finance guy he is, Jason waited until the right time to put the first payment on the gate and have them put it in just before the weather starts getting questionable for digging holes in the ground, and then make the final payment. We had cleared all the brush away from the front of the gate in July, even before we bought the camper. That was the project Jason's dad helped us with and I got a bad case of poison ivy.

This was taken 3/2014 of the area from the back, since I forgot to take any before shots.

This was taken in 9/2014 of the front, again, no before shots. 

Here's our house today, 11/2015, with our new gate!

Here's the front, but I haven't taken one of the back yet. We'll finish clearing it in the spring and bring the camper home then. It gets free storage right now somewhere else.

 While the weather does it's winter thing, before we finish clearing the side yard, we started our indoor project. Our basement. It had some mold on the carpet. No floods, just a little moisture covered up for too long. So, we took out the carpet from the main area and are painting epoxy on the floor. (It's water resistant and pretty too.)

Bare bones after clearing everything out.

Ugly!

Austin helped up suck up the water we used in one of the cleaning processes to prepare the floor.

Erik helped scrub.

What a team!

It's not finished yet, but here's a sneak peek!

We will finish the walls within the next month too. Then, Jason can put up my long-awaited shelving unit!!

For a Laugh

I don't have much to blog about, but I do remember a funny experience that happened with Erik in June, if you need a laugh.

It was the last week of school and I had taken him to the library. He was playing with the toys and then started to look at some books. I was reading and letting him have some quiet time of his own so I could enjoy mine. I noticed that he was really engrossed in the same book for a long time. He was so involved, that I took these pictures of him.

You can see a slight smile on his face. He had that same look on his face throughout this whole book he was looking at. I could tell the book amused him. When he was done, I wanted to know what book it was that he so enjoyed, so I looked through it. He had me read it to him.

Now I wish I had taken a picture of the actual book, or the title. It was a book about a town of people who lost their butts! Yes, a children's book about people who woke up one day without their butts. All the butts went on a vacation together. You can kind of see the pictures of the people with nothing where their butt is supposed to be, but unfortunately I didn't get any picture of a page with all the butts. They were just like flesh-colored heart-type shapes, crack and all, with clothes on, except when they went to the beach. they had bathing suits on there. It wasn't crude, just really weird. I think a woman wrote the book too. I took the pictures only because I was so proud at how engrossed he was in this book, not knowing that I should have documented this weird book. When I found out it was about a bunch of butts going around on vacation, I couldn't control my amusement with him! I completely forgot to document the title.

So, if you're looking for a children's book to catch the attention of someone, there's one out there!

Too Much Halloween!

Halloween being on a Saturday this year meant that we had many opportunities to participate in Halloween activities. Not only did they get to wear costumes to school the day before Halloween and enjoy their parties in class, but they got to dress up again to trick or treat the next day. Not to mention the week before when Miller hosted its first annual Haunted Hallways after school on a Thursday. The kids got to dress up and experience the "haunted" hallways of Miller, put on by the teachers, including candy given out and cookies at the end. This was a tradition of the previous Gallimore teachers. They want to successfully embrace the traditions from both schools to make everyone feel at home at Miller.

Two days after Haunted Hallways was the church trunk or treat party with our awesome Scooby costumes. Two days after that was Erik's preschool party, held at my house. Phew! There was a lot of Halloween around here!

This was our attempt to get all the kids in the same picture. 

This is what had to happen in order for Erik to cooperate, in turn helping the others too. 

The boys helped clean up the leaves in the front. 

They love our pull-up bar.

Besides parties at school, the day before Halloween which I did not participate in, I got to go to the parades at both schools. Luckily, the kids didn't get much junk at their school parties, just fun experiences in class.

Karissa and her BFF Olivia at the Gallimore parade.

Austin's class.

Evil Cat.

Grumpy old man again at the Miller parade.  Some of her friends didn't know who she was! Notice that Karissa and Austin made a costume change. It was too cold for short-sleeved Shaggy and Karissa didn't want to be Velma without the rest of the "gang".

Halloween morning was the perfect time for us to try out a cider mill called Franklin's that we've wanted to try for a while. It's sort of near the Detroit Temple. They have been reported to have the best cider around here. With dance and ice hockey in the late morning, we had to go first thing to the cider mill. So, the kids got to have donuts and cider for breakfast! Actually, I really enjoyed being there before the crowds and bees. It was cool, crisp, and quiet in the little town of Franklin. The kids enjoyed being outside and watching the ducks. The donuts were a German recipe. They are made with the cinnamon sugar on the inside instead of being covered on the outside, so it made for cleaner donuts that had a more sweet bread feel to them. They were warm and very good. The cider was excellent! I couldn't say if it was the best, since I didn't have any other to compare it with at the moment.

Franklin's Cider Mill

Trick or treating was different for me this year. Erik didn't ride in the stroller up to each step this time. He walked with the big kids the whole 45 minutes and was happy to carry his big heavy bucket at the end, especially if it meant he would get more candy! I got to stroll on the sidewalk the whole way with my friend and neighbor, Cathy, and talk to all the other parents I came across. The weather was chilly and wet, as usual, but it didn't rain too hard on us, thanks goodness! We finished the night at the church on the corner (our neighbor's church). They invited us to their party where the kids played some games and got more junk, including hot dogs. Erik was home with Jason by then, enjoying his loot and a football game.

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Trick or treating with friends. Scooby became a bucket-head for the picture. 

I decided the next day that we had had too much Halloween!

Busy, Busy!

Our busy weekend started on Friday with Victoria’s first “real” babysitting job. It was at our house still, but she was in charge of 9 month old Kristen and got paid for the job. I did help a couple of times and went to book club toward the end of it, but it was about a 3 hour job, so she definitely did some good work!

Saturday, it was the usual ice hockey and dance, but I was in Dearborn for a clothing drive at one of our church buildings. Jason worked at it on Friday at the end of his work day. The building is across the street from his office.  Luckily, our friends were able to drive Victoria and Austin so Jason could get some projects done and Karissa was in charge of Erik.

When I returned, we had to get ready to get our family pictures taken. My friend did them two years ago and I loved them, so I wanted her to do them again. Of course it turned out to be a very busy day, but the kids had fun outside where we were shooting the pics. Too bad Erik did not want to cooperate, at all! I worried about him being a goofball, but I didn't think he would just shut her down! He did end up warming up to her (his friend's mom who he knows), but it was a lot of work!

After the photo shoot, Jason snuck in part of the Nebraska game. We ate a quick dinner and got ready for the Ward Trunk or Treat. My kids had planned, back in August, to go as the Scooby-Doo gang. Victoria wanted to be the villain, holding to the tradition she has of being some creepy character. She ended up being an old man. It worked out well. She wanted to hang with her friends the whole activity anyhow, so the rest of the "gang" stuck together. Karissa kept making sure we all did, too!

Our neighbor Bethany, Tessa, and Victoria

If that wasn't enough pressure to look good and act good for pictures, then dress up for the Halloween party, the Primary Program for Sacrament meeting was at church on Sunday. We didn't get to church early enough to make sure we sat on the side where we could see all our kids. In fact, we couldn't see Erik, for his first Primary program, at all! He was totally blocked by the organ. After sitting through the program, though, I realized it was probably a good thing. If we had sat on a different side, he would have been more anxious or worried or whatever it is that gets to him in public situations. Also, if he could see us smiling up at him the whole time, he would not have stayed on the stand, or worse yet, he would have made a scene. I don't know if he sang, but everyone I asked who could see him said he behaved well. When it came time for his to give class to say their parts, he walked up to the podium with them, looked at Jason and I, then dropped to the ground. We didn't see him, but I could see Austin smile and roll his eyes at whatever Erik did on the ground. I guess he got back to his seat all right. Victoria, Karissa, and Austin did well and have always enjoyed using the microphone. They sang the songs beautifully too. 

They got glow sticks for doing well in the program. 

If that wasn't enough, Austin was assigned to give the scripture and prayer in Primary sharing time and Erik the talk. When asked if it would be more difficult for Erik on this day, I really didn't think it would make a difference. I figured if he actually said his line for the program in Sacrament meeting, then he would just think it was microphone day and do the same in Primary. I wrote a quick, nice talk about temples with a picture of our family outside the Indianapolis Temple. He had told me he didn't want to go up and that he wanted Jason to do it for him. Well, that's what happened. He didn't even want to hold the picture. Jason gave a nice talk in Primary! Austin did well with the scripture and prayer. I'm glad he can read so we didn't have to practice a ton. 

To finish off, the missionaries came over for dinner and Jason had a meeting Sunday night to attend. No wonder I was so tired on Monday! 

Soccer

Karissa surprised me this fall and said she wanted to try soccer. She has never really expressed interest in a ball sport, ever, so I was excited to let her try something new. She did the program that Austin and Victoria did last year, DACA. They would have done it again too, but Austin's ice hockey (free) and Victoria's dance class are a little too close to the same time for my comfort, even though we did manage to get Victoria to dance last year, somewhat on time. They are doing the one at their school, which is easier to manage. Since Karissa isn't at Miller Elementary to be there on time after school and I really did love DACA last year, it worked perfectly for her.

Karissa surprised me again by getting into it! They practiced for a half hour, then played a game for a half hour. She put forth effort and stayed with the game. She had a friend on her team and a friend on the opposing team, also making it enjoyable for her. After the end-of-the-season party on Saturday, she said she wanted to do it again in the spring- another surprise!

Team picture day. 

You can see Karissa's yellow shirt heading toward the ball behind purple-shirt guy. 

She was excited to get her trophy!

11 Years

Victoria is now 11 years old and turning into a wonderful young lady. In case you didn't know, she is a people person. She wants to have someone around her, always. This past year she has really wanted to have a friend over any chance she could. Sometimes I get overwhelmed, not at having a friend over, but the process of trying to organize a playdate with friends' parents or grandparents. A lot of them work and it's hard to get a hold of them, so I started to encourage her to set up playdates at school.

 She has great friends and they help her to fulfill whatever it is she needs for her social self. It is for this reason, and many others including the fact that we don't have a landline phone for when she babysits at home, that she got a phone for her birthday. Actually, it is the same phone as mine, lucky girl! She will be a working girl with babysitting jobs and that might also help her fill her social needs. Yesterday, she texted her friend and set up something for today after school, so nice! I'm not quite sure how many of her friends really do have their own phone. According to Victoria, it's everyone, but I do know that not many of them have landline phones either and she feels intimidated calling parents' on their personal phones. Well, now she can just text them herself, assuming she has my permission, of course.

She had already bought the phone with Jason on Tuesday, but opened it yesterday on her birthday.

Now I have to worry about phone abuse!

Being in 5th grade, I've been encouraging her to do some of the challenge activities with her homework so she's ready for middle school next year. She has more homework this year which makes it easier for me to say, "No friends" on certain days. She's progressing really well on the piano, enjoying her tap and ballet classes and the work-out she gets there, and she's taking a 7 week after school sporting class with Austin. It's right at their school and includes coaching for soccer, baseball, and basketball. She has been playing basketball at recess with her friends and the boys at school and this was an easy, inexpensive, introduction to learning some better skills with these popular sports. She really enjoys anything athletic. She still loves to write and draw as well.

Her birthday party was Saturday evening. We streamed the latest pop songs, the girls hung out in the basement and played air hockey and twister, and we had a hot dog bar with all the fixings. I had to incorporate a craft or two, mostly because I can't stand giving out goodie bag junk. Having them make something to bring home is less expensive than buying nice take-home gifts. This year, they made leaf print cards and bat headbands. Some girls really got into it and did a great job. Others, not so much, but they went outside and jumped on the trampoline and ran around in the really nice weather we've been having. We played "I've Never", ate "spider" cupcakes, and she opened many nice gifts. We ended with a fire outside, since it was dark by then, and more running around in the backyard. It seemed to be a great party for this 10/11 year old group.

The whole gang. I guess I didn't take another group one. 

Erik had to help blow out the candles, of course.

This is the one I made.

She added extra bows, so it didn't look as much like a bat, but still super cute!

We love Victoria and are excited for more adventures with her as we enter this different phase!

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

I feel like every year I keep posting the same things, but every year I have my children's eyes to see things a little differently than the year before. Fall is by far the best season here in Michigan. Sometimes it's shorter than I would like, but this year has been good and it's supposed to continue to be a nice long fall because of the good temperatures. Mid-60s, on average, most days. Not much rain, but just enough.

As has been the case since we moved here 9 years ago, I took my preschooler on his field trip to the apple orchard with his preschool pals. We have two preschool groups from our ward this year, so we all got to go together. I guess the only downfall to autumn this year is that there were less bees in the spring because of some late cold weather, so there were less apples on the trees. That meant the kids couldn't pick their own apple from a tree, but had to pick it out from a bin of apples that had already been picked. Lucky for us, we have our own apple trees, so Erik picked one from our tree the other day. Less apples also means more expensive cider- $8.50 /gallon this year from the cider mills. At least it's not $10/gallon like it was 3 years ago. That was the winter/spring we went to France and had summer weather in March, followed by another freeze. It threw everything off!

Here's this years' pictures of the Plymouth Apple Orchard.

Erik brought the thermometer from the dr kit for some reason...

The four in the back are in his group. 

Anna, the only girl in both groups, and Victor, a friend we helped out that day because his mom had to stay home with a sick sister.

Pretending to be bees pollinating the apple tree.

The apple bins. I guess I didn't get a picture of the trees...

Wagon ride back to the play area.

New this year- hay bales to play on