Mad skills...

Merril is handy and I mean really handy. I've never seen something that Merril hasn't been able to fix, or through messing around, get it to work okay. So before I bought the digital piano on Craig's List, I called Merril and said, "Hey, this digital piano is great but 2 keys don't play. Does that sound like something you could fix??" He paused and then said, "I should be able to make it work! You should buy it."

So I've had and played the piano for about a week and yesterday and I wanted Merril to look at it. We took it off the stand and pulled a bunch of screws out and cracked it open.

You can see the keys pulled out on the floor.

One white key would go up and down but not make any sound and the black key was sunk and wouldn't bounce back up. Our first plan was to yank the 2 broken keys and replace them with 2 keys on the high end of the keyboard, those ones up there that never get played.

So he got the keys out, swapped them, and plugged it in to test. The two keys work great! And to our surprise, the two broken keys on the top end work great too!! I'm guessing the two broken keys had dislodged slightly and weren't hitting the striker sensor correctly, or something like that. So now the whole keyboard plays beautifully! Yeah! My husband is awesome.

I'm so jealous...

Merril used to work for a tour company that would accompany Japanese tourists around Las Vegas and the National Parks in our area. Last week, they called Merril, desperate for some help. So Merril flew to San Francisco and boarded a bus to accompany Japanese tourists from there to Las Vegas. (Rough life huh.) They stopped at Yosemite and Redwoods National Parks and Death Valley along the way. He was gone for a few days and liked brushing up on his Japanese skills.

The tour company called again to ask if he'd take some Japanese tourists out to Monument Valley and they stopped along the way at Antelope Canyon and I'm SO JEALOUS! If you don't know what Antelope Canyon is, it's the most photographed slot canyon in the west and I'm sure you've seen the pictures.

That sandstone is wicked awesome!

All I can say is that he better be taking me sometime soon!

Craig's List deal...

"Do you know what we found on Craig's List?"

"We found this!"

I am not a fabulous piano player but I like to dabble. I'd like to get better but it's hard to improve without something to practice on. Some day I want to take actual lessons and land one of those cushy piano-playing callings. Merril and I have tossed around the idea of a digital piano for a while but were just waiting for the appropriate deal. On Craig's List yesterday, I saw this black digital piano for sale. I went over and looked at it. Two keys don't work and 2 keys down by the very bottom end have been melted (something about a candle Christmas decoration falling over on it.) When I called Merril to consult with him, he said he can probably fix broken keys. The melty ones play fine. So I bought it and paid $50!! It's nice looking, the key action is good, the bench is in really great shape, and the harpsichord button is a lot of fun. I actually prefer the sound of a harpsichord. But I've looked at harpsichords and they're rare and expensive. But I'm excited and the kids have been having tons of fun on it.

*P.S. Between the DVD recorder and the piano, I might not be getting anything for Christmas. Hee hee.*

You look like who?

Yesterday for church, I decided to set my hair with hot rollers. It's not something I do regularly because it takes a lot of time. When I'd finished getting them in, Maxine said she wanted a couple too! She looked like this:

Upon seeing herself in the mirror, she said, "I look like George Washington!" *peals of Maxine's laughter* Yep, she's not far off.

Glasses...smasses

It's safe to say that I don't love my glasses. I don't know how people can stand to wear them all day. Mine serve as a gateway of sight from the time I get up until I can get my contacts in. I'd like to have laser surgery someday but yada yada yada, on with the story.

So anyway, Juliet bent mine so bad a few months back that one of the side pieces broke. I've been holding it together with tape. At the bus stop the other morning, a neighbor leaned in close and said, "Do you have tape holding your glasses together??" I replied, "Yes...yes I do." I've never bothered to go get new frames because I just don't wear my glasses that often. Plus, Christmas is coming up and I didn't want to blow $100 on an item that I loathe.

So anyway, I was thinking about how I could mend them. I'd tried JB weld twice but it just wasn't doing the trick. (Which for me is a first because JB Weld has always exceeded my expectations.) So upon further pondering, I discovered the solution! I ran to the dollar store and bought a cheap pair of metal rimmed sunglasses. I came home and took the side piece off the cheap sunglasses and attached it to the side of my glasses. Presto!

I fixed my glasses for $1.29! The brownish side piece in the foreground is new, the orangish one is original. Hopefully I get laser eye surgery before I need to replace the frames.

Let's get outta here...

On Friday afternoon, Merril took me to Las Vegas for an afternoon/evening away from the kids! Yeah! Merril had to drop off a skid loader attachment and left me at my sister's house to gab for an hour. Then he came and picked me up and we went out to eat sushi with some friends. We used to live by a great all-you-can-eat sushi place and try to get back there as often as possible. After we gabbed with those friends and ate WAYYY too much, we decided to head down to the strip. We've always liked the Bellagio because of the conservatory and the fountain show.

The conservatory had a huge Ferris wheel of flowers in it. They're always doing the craziest stuff in there.

Then we walked across the street to The Paris. (Not the real Arc de Triomphe in the back.)

The Paris has a shop called Lenotre which houses the most beautiful little cakes, tarts, and eclairs. I saw this cake and thought of Amy's mad cake skills.

Then we headed back to the Bellagio to get the truck and drive home. We made it around 2 a.m. I took this last picture on a moving walkway, that's why the background is so blurred. I kinda like it though.

And now for a funny story (only read on if you want to feel smarter): Before we left for Vegas, my intention was to meet Merril and his Mom in town to drop off the kids. Jack was asleep when I got to the parking lot where I was to meet Merril so I left him inside with the A/C on. Merril showed up and Maxine and Juliet were playing on some grass and we waited for Merril's Mom. When she got there, the kids loaded in and I snagged Jack from the back seat of the Tahoe. I plopped him in with Grandma and jumped in with Merril. About 2 blocks away, I said to Merril, "I didn't lock the Tahoe!" Merril called a friend to go over and lock it after work.

So fast forward through our Vegas trip to the next morning at 8:30 a.m. Merril dropped me off at the Tahoe so I could go to Grandma's house and pick up the kids. I reached for the door, hoping it was locked and it opened. "Great, I hope nothing's missing.", I thought to myself. As I sat down in the driver's seat I noticed the radio was on.....and the air conditioning.......and the engine was running. We had left the Tahoe idling in a parking lot with the doors unlocked and the keys in the ignition for 18 hours. Luckily, the only thing missing was 1/3 of a tank of gas. Now, don't you feel smarter?? Have a great week!

First and last...

I am not a scrapbooker. I have lots of friends who are really great at it and even get paid for it. To me, it seems like a really inefficient use of time. I prefer albums because I need to get my history done and not worry about it anymore.

When Maxine started school, her teacher sent home a note that said, "Our class is putting together a class scrapbook. Please send a nice page by September 10th." In my head I said, "YiKeS!!!"

I put it off for way too long and meant to go over to my friend's house to use her Cricut (I mean you Jamie B.) but just never did. Maxine picked out 2 pieces of scrapbooking paper over the weekend and I just finished slapping it together. It's my first and last scrapbooking page. It is soooo not my thing. Please, no criticism.

Dead...

Since I bought a remote off Ebay for my DVD player, it finally decided to die. Nice. So I was stuck. Did I want to buy a DVD player or recorder? We decided to buy a DVD recorder, which is something I didn't want to do right now, but it's been great. I guess it'll have to be my early Christmas present.

But since having the recorder, I've burned all the little camcorder tapes I've been lugging around for years into nice DVDs. Ah. That feels nice. I guess now I'll sell that other remote on Ebay, since I only used it for 2 weeks.

Snagged a picture of Juliet...

My friend, Amy, is a brilliant photographer and snapped this one of Juliet. Then she messed with it in Photoshop and made my sweet Tahoe look about 50 years old. While I was looking at it, I actually thought, "Who's old car is Juliet in??"

Here's her photography website if you want to take a look.

Crazy or brilliant?

Last year my friend, Ang, inspired me to get a head start on my Christmas stuff so that I wouldn't be freaking out during the month of December. I liked the idea so much last year, I'm going Christmas shopping today. :) I'm thinking of working on Christmas cards next week. So instead of doing this is December:

I'll be cozying up to this scene and feeling relaxed.

You might be thinking, "She's crazy!" Or brilliant?

Fruit roll ups!

I made fruit leather the other day because I had leftover peaches. It was so EASY! I peeled and pureed peaches in the blender. I added some honey because my peaches were a little tart. Cooked the mixture to 160 degrees and spread it onto cookie sheets lined with plastic and a teensy bit of cooking spray. I set them out in the sun all day with 2 window screens over the cookie sheets to prevent birds and lizards from eating them. Twelve hours later, I had peach fruit roll ups! I cut the plastic and rolled them up becuase I like the whole roll-up concept. I ended up with 8 fruit roll ups! I think strawberry or apricot would be really yummy! Tip: It needs to be over 85 degrees and less than 60% humidity to dry fruit leather. It was fun too!

Lake days...

Last year, I blogged post after post about going to the lake. I thought it got a little boring after a while and made an effort to exclude the lake from my blogging entries. It's the end of August so I think it's fair to make one blog entry for the summer!

We love the lake! It's how I get into my Zen state of mind for the week.

Jack was extremely pleased because he just pushed Maxine in the water. (She's the big splash in the background.)

Juliet was excited that she and Jack got to share a soda.

Maxine was excited that no one was bugging her.

I'm a little sad that lake season is coming to an end. I'll miss the lazy evenings with my toes in the warm water but I'm excited for Halloween. :)

500 Days of Summer...

I was excited when I watched the previews for the movie 500 Days of Summer and then was bummed when it didn't initially come to my town. I learned from Shelly that it came to our town late and that she'd seen it and liked it! Yeah! My SIL called me up the other night and said she was in town and really wanted to see it. We had both previously watched the preview together and commented how fun it looked. So we went and saw it and I thought it was delicious and clever. It was the Sundance Film Festival's Official Selection for 2009. I really liked it! So you should go see it before this independent film skips town. :)

BTW, our lonely towel was reunited with its rightful owners. And who said blogging never amounted to anything! :)

I want to come home!!

About a month or two ago, this towel ended up in our boat. It really wants to go home. Does anyone know who it belongs to?

It's a nice, large beach towel from Target and frankly, I want to keep it for myself. But I can tell it doesn't want to stay with me. Please help us find its home!

And on a side note: I purchased a replacement DVD remote off Ebay since my original remote has been lost for over a month and I want to navigate DVD menus. It was $8 and free shipping so I felt pretty good about it. I guess I should've just purchased a new DVD player because now my player will only play DVDs when it's upside down. It makes an awful noise and skips when it's right-side up. *sigh* How dumb. I really want a DVD recorder but they're more expensive so I'm trying to hold off and save my pennies so when this DVD player bites it, and I mean really bites it, I can buy a cool recorder. Forget it. I'm just going back to VHS.

Weekend hangover...

I've taken 2 naps today. Why? Because I'm hung over from the weekend. I'm not hung over in the traditional sense but I've spent the last 2 nights in a strange bed with my kids sleeping on the floor at a reunion. I'm always paranoid that my kids are going to wake up other people's kids. Jack woke up and wimpered a bit because he couldn't find his blankie in the dark. So I sprang out of bed and stumbled around to try and find it as fast as possible. Such sleep leaves me feeling a little worn out after 2 nights.

Other than being a little sleepy, we had lots of fun. We played ping pong as a group, I think it's called "around the world," and the game starts with a group gathered around the table. A person will serve the ball and then put down the paddle and rotate around. So everyone is hurrying to hit the ball, set down the paddle, and make their way to the other end of the table to pick up that paddle and hit the ball and continue around. We usually start with 6-8 people running around. If you mess up, you're out. Once it's down to 2 people, one person will serve, put down the paddle, spin a 360, and then pick up the paddle to receive the ball. Just watch, it's fun and funny.

Merril's little sister, Megan, won that round.

Merril was resting for a bit with the kids. Maxine, Merril and I all played. Merril and I both won a couple of times. Woops, I didn't fix the red eyes.

We went swimming, played way too much Wii, gabbed a lot, and ate tons of food. There was also a talent show and an auction. We were each given $500 of play money and all who attended were asked to donate some items. We chose to donate a selection of candy bars. Maxine bought some colored pencils and a notebook. Jack got an activity book and I bought some bracelets. We pooled our money at the end because Maxine really wanted to buy some playdough. She paid $630 for it. Fun fun!

The grudge match...

Since Merril's car got stuck in his heat, he was able to compete one last time in a heat called the grudge match. Everyone who got stuck or got their car running again can compete for a chance to advance to the final round. Merril is red car #3.

The blue car #57 ended up winning the whole thing in the final heat.

So he didn't win but he had lots of fun. The derby was long but the kids did okay. Grandma C. helped out by taking Max and Jack to ride some rides between heats. Grandma G. was busy holding kids and making sure they didn't fall out of the stands. We had friends and family all over the stands. We had family and friends in the pit crew too! Thanks to everyone who showed up to support Merril!

I didn't take very many pictures of Merril because I was filming but I snagged a few of me and the kids. We made team shirts!

They were red and said things like, "We crash for cash!" and "Daddy is car #3!"

The derby got over at 11:00 p.m. so it lasted for 4 hours. There's a lot of silly down time that doesn't need to be there. We all felt it could've moved a lot faster. It took me 45 minutes to get out of the parking lot afterwards. Hee hee. All the kids fell asleep while waiting so I was content to just take my time.

Yesterday, (Sunday) I realized that I didn't even get a chance to buy a funnel cake with all the crazy derby stuff going on at the fair. So we celebrated the closing of the fair with funnel cakes and they are so delicious!! It's just pancake batter drizzled in hot oil until golden brown and then topped with chocolate or carmel sauce, powdered sugar, or whipped cream. Oh.....SO.....YUMMY!

This is for you Jared...

Merril competed in the demolition derby last night and his BFF, Jared, was unable to attend because of a reception. Merril didn't win the derby but had lots of fun! I just wanted to hurry and post a bit of video before church. This is from the heat that Merril competed in. He drove and smashed and then got stuck under another car. Merril was also able to compete in the grudge match but I'll post that later. Merril's is the red #3 car.

I apologize for being so cliche...

It's the 1st day of school and so I have to do the traditional post. We all woke up early and had plenty of time to spare. Maxine surprised me by skipping all the way to the bus stop and yelling, "I'm so excited for 1st grade!"

We took a picture on the lawn together courtesy of Jack. That's the reason the picture's slightly crooked and I didn't care to fix it in photoshop.

I think it enhances the realness of the scene. ;) But I've tried to take advantage of the free time and cleaned bathrooms and oiled the wood cabinets. We just finished lunch but I still get the feeling it's time to pick up Maxine. With Kindergarten, her bus would get to the bus stop around lunch time. I still feel like that's the case and keep thinking, "Isn't Maxine supposed to be home by now??" Nope, I've got 3 1/2 more hours. But I have specific instructions that I'm supposed to be waiting for her on the front porch.

I'm starting to sweat...

No, our A/C is working just fine. It's about the derby. I've been a little nervous since Merril's demolition derby dream became more of a reality. But I'm struggling through and just asked that he mount a fire extinguisher within arm's length so he could put out any miscellaneous fires in the cab. Do I really think he'll catch on fire??? No. I've just watched too many movies. They've taught me that cars blow up at the drop of a hat. :)

Other than that, we're just getting ready for Maxine to start school. I put some money on her lunch card so she could get milk to drink with her sack lunch. We also took some pictures together and put them in her bag because she frets about things.

I've always been really excited for her to start school but I'm just now realizing that I'm losing my biggest helper with the kids. She entertains them, she helps them get drinks and tells me when someone's poopy. Very important stuff. I hope I can survive without her.

We had to get them, they're red...

What's better than one demolition derby car???

Two, of course.

Merril will be competing in this year's demolition derby at the fair. It's coming up in a week and a half so if you've ever wanted to see Merril get pounded, now would be a good time. (Come on ladies, I know you're out there!) Car #2 is up for sale so if there's any men out there wishing to fulfill a boyhood dream, now would be the time. It's competition ready and the Starsky and Hutch racing strip comes free of charge. 1st place is $3,000.

The demolition derby has sold out for the past couple of years but tickets are still being sold here and look for ticket purchase. Children 5 and under are free.

But you may be asking yourself, "Where did Merril buy demolition derby cars?" He found this pair on Ebay in Louisiana. So Merril and his buddy, Brent, drove to Louisiana and back over the weekend. Nice. One thing's for certain, he definitely ambitious.

It's so caliente!

My garden has never produced in huge numbers. I've always had 1 or 2 tomatoes at a time and that was enough to keep me from buying tomatoes throughout the summer. This Spring, a friend told me to plant 2 tomato plants per cage. You get twice the tomatoes but not twice the foliage somehow. This summer, my tomato plants are going berserk and I felt inclined to make some salsa!

Maxine, my huge helper, is always ready to help in the kitchen. We put Jack and Juliet down for a nap and started working.

The bounty-I have lots of cherry tomatoes as well. I threw them in too. Is "threw" a word?? One green pepper came in from the garden too.

Since it's 105 outside and my A/C is always struggling to keep up, I decided to put the water bath canner outside on the grill's side burner. The sledge hammer was an essential support because the canner was HEAVY with all that water. All the heat stayed outside! I'm never canning inside again! That was the best!

The result: 4 pints of delicious salsa! I spent $.47 on another green bell pepper and $.32 on jalepenos. The onions and tomatoes came from the garden. I already had the lids so I think $.79 for 8 cups of salsa is pretty worth it!

This is my favorite canning book! Every recipe for canning you could ever dream of or imagine from spiced apple chutney to habanero jelly. If it can be preserved in a bottle, you'll find a recipe for it. Plus a complete guide to canning if you've never done it before. Can you believe it'll be August tomorrow????

A fun weekend...

We spent time at my parents cabin over the Pioneer Day weekend and had a great time! My parents have some fake deer in front of the cabin and my little kids love to ride them.

Maxine and her cousin were "fishing" off the deck.

This is my Aunt Maxine (right) and my Great Aunt Gwen (left). Gwen is the funniest lady you will ever meet and really reminds me of my deceased Grandma. It was great having her there.

We hung out and told stories.

But mostly we gabbed over a card game called pinochle (pronounced pee-knuckle). Don't worry if you've never heard of it before but my Mom's side of the family has been playing it since before I was born. I learned to play when I was 7 or 8 but haven't played for years. It was a great weekend!

And today, I got very ambitious and installed a ceiling fan!!

It took FoReVeR to get the ceiling fan ordered and shipped. I could've had a fan a month and a half ago but I wanted to it match the upstairs fans exactly. It's currently fanning me because it gets hot in the downstairs office. (No A/C just yet.) I'm pretty sure I installed it correctly but there's always the creepy feeling that one of those fan blades is gonna come whippin' off and hit me in the back of the head; or worse, poke another hole in the wall. Haa haa haaaaaa um yeah.

Productive streak...

I feel like I've been cleaning out closets and organizing a lot lately. Yesterday I bought 5 bicycle hooks for the garage and now my side of the garage is spotless. I've cleaned out under the fridge and the stove and cleaned out my linen/sewing closet. Why, you may ask? We've lost the DVD remote. By we, I mean the kids. At least I suspect the kids. I would just program the DVD player into our universal remote but it's old and their aren't any universal codes for it. I wish the player would just die so I could go get a new one but alas, it keeps on tickin'. So I've looked behind the TV, in boots in my closet, in all the cupboards in the kitchen, emptied all the toy boxes, searched under all the beds, felt down into all the cracker crumb regions of the couch but I just can't find it. Any suggestions?? :)

Alarming...

I rarely wake up with an alarm anymore. Jack is usually up by 7 or 7:30 a.m. and that's early enough for just about everything we need to get to. The other morning, my brother-in-law was graduating from Police Academy and we wanted to go. We needed to drive for a couple of hours to get to graduation so I needed to be up by 6:00 a.m. to get me and the kids ready. I DIDN'T SLEEP A WINK!! I know my alarm is going to go off, I just obsess constantly about the time. 2:36 a.m......3:04 a.m......3:17 a.m.........3:41 a.m. and so on. It's so annoying because I really need to be sleeping because I'll be getting up early. When I was waking up for school, I never had a problem sleeping all night long; I'm just out of practice. Next time I need to set my alarm, I'm going to have to do some serious Zen relaxation activities right before bed and visualize myself sleeping all night long. You are getting very sleeeeeepy......

Temple Open House...

Sunday after church, we drove to the South Jordan area of Utah so we could go to the Oquirrh (pronounced O-ker) Mountain Temple open house! Maxine was very excited.

Maxine has always wanted to go inside a temple and the open house provided a perfect opportunity. The temple was very pretty inside and Maxine's favorite part was the chandeliers. For more information about LDS temples, click here. If you haven't been yet, the open house only runs until August 1st. It's free but reservations are required and can be obtained here. There are free cookies and water afterwards too! :) This temple seemed significant to me because the city of South Jordan will have 2 temples. It's the only city in the world with 2 temples inside the city limits.

I wish I had more pictures but I forgot my camera and I forgot to take pictures with my phone. The only picture of the trip was of the kids in the back of the Tahoe. Merril's brother and his two girls came with us too so we used all 8 seat belts. I tried to get the picture off Merril's phone this morning but it didn't happen before he left for work. I'll try later!

Sparkles...

Fireworks always present a fun opportunity to mess with the settings on my camera. I wanted to capture the sparklers and in doing so, the kids came out fuzzy. I still think they look fun.

Juliet liked sparklers a lot.

Jack, not so much. He carried around a sparkler but didn't want it lit.
And a 4th of July first: no one was burned in any way this year!! Sweet!

AND...my hole in the wall has been sanded, textured and primed. I just need to paint it, and it'll be as good as new!

We hope you had fun too!

Weekend of camping and hole repair...

Last weekend, we drove about an hour to some sand dunes and camped. We took the 3-wheeler and Merril's dirt bike. The dirt bike broke down but the 3-wheeler ran like a champ! Maxine learned to ride by herself. (I know, I know. She's in flip flops, a skirt, with no helmet. Serious riding apparel. I promise we made her change later.)

Then the kids played in the fire. (We're starting a responsible parenting trend. Feel free to join in!)

And then Jack decided to be a moose.

Then the kids went to bed but some very nice people unloaded their 4-wheelers at 9:30 p.m. and continuted to buzz around until 2:00 a.m. Luckily, we are all heavy sleepers and they didn't drive over our tent.

The next morning, Merril was getting bored and decided to pull wheelies on the 3-wheeler.

This is the only picture I got of Juliet; she still has hot chocolate face.

Then we decided to go for a hike to see some Native American pictographs. The desert turned into lush forest for a bit and was a nice little hike. Only 1.5 miles round trip.

The pictographs were neat and then we headed for home.

On a side note, I'm finally starting the hole in the wall project. My colors are so awful in these next two pics but I'm tired and almost done.

Step 1: fix the hole.

Step 2: Spackle it. My spackle is pink. It dries white later but I feel like it's girl spackle because it starts pink. :)

Next...sand and texture. Happy 4th of July!!