This & That

More From the Cabin

A few more things about our Saturday adventure.  There is frustration that the work isn't moving along as fast as we'd like.  We plan on spending a good deal of the time that DS#2 and DDIL (and baby girl) are here, up at the property, and it's hard because we have to haul everything up and then everything back out of the worker's way.   I know we're going to forget some crucial piece of equipment and then we'll be stuck because if it isn't there, it isn't there.   And it's not like you can just run down to the store and grab one when you're 45 minutes away from the nearest very small town.  Despite that, we spent some time this evening working out menus that can be really flexible.   We're "supposed to" have a stove and fridge hooked up, but we have to plan for the contingency that we won't.  So anything we cook has to be able to be done on a grill or Coleman stove, if the regular stove isn't hooked up.  We also have to have blocks of ice for coolers if the fridge isn't working.  I'm really feeling like it will be Swiss Family Robinson.  We have a portable propane shower tent thing if we get feeling too grungy...and I'm a woman whose day doesn't really start until I get my shower, so this could be a critical piece of hardware.
So let me show you around a little more....There's DD peeking up through some wood on the temporary deck.
We have a couple of little streams that run through the property.  We've had a good water year, so they are turning up where we haven't had them before.  The menfolk are usually pretty chivalrous when the ladies need to cross.  They'll look for the skinny place, put a log across if needed and are willing to lend a helping hand or a walking stick to help us out.  This is really nice, because I'm a total klutz.  I trip over any little thing and have a really hard time finding sure footing over these streams.  I have been known to unceremoniously land in them and get very cold and wet.  Sometimes in the summer that's a welcome thing.  Other times it's not. In any case, my boys are good to help their old mother.  I am the one who feeds them, after all...and I didn't raise dummies.

How We Spent the Day

Well, we finally got DS#2 and DDIL here from back east.  They spent the night with Grandma and arrived on the first flight here.  It was so great to see them...it seems like forever since we have.  We didn't give them much time to get settled in, but trundled them home, unloaded their suitcases and climbed in the truck and headed for the cabin property up north.  It's almost exactly a two hour drive from front door to front door.  We've got that timed now.  In the winter on snowmobiles is a little less exact.  We are really starting to see progress between trips to the cabin. Some of the interior walls are up, the cabinets have arrived, but aren't in yet.  The really big hurdle is getting the well drilled.  It was supposed to happen two weeks ago, but I've discovered with building that "supposed to" and "does" are mutually exclusive terms We dragged our grill up there and BBQ'd burgers for lunch and sat in the shade on the temporary deck, enjoying the 10 degrees cooler temperature up there.  I have a feeling we'll be heading for the hills regularly once we get this project finished.   We have a "supposed to" date of Labor Day for a finish time.  We'll see if that works any better than the well going in.  Some pictures of the day:
#1--You've seen this view before...it's out the top floor window
#2--Interior walls are up and doors are hung.
#3--The temporary deck
#4--Our bit for the environment...this shed houses the solar system that will run most of our electricity.
#5--DS#2, DDIL, (and baby girl), along with a very mature looking DS#3.
More pictures tomorrow....

Pretty in Pink

Yep, when DDIL#2 had her ultrasound this week, the Dr. says it's a 90% chance that it's a girl.  I'm going to have a tiny, squeezable grand-daughter sometime close to Thanksgiving.
Now, dutiful grandma that I am, I'm planning on doing some serious baby shopping while the kids are out here for the next couple of weeks.  As a rule, I really don't enjoy shopping, but there's something about those little newborn-sized baby clothes that tickles a grandma's heart....even one that doesn't like to shop. I was hoping to have ultrasound photos to show you as proof, but remember how I told you DS and DIL would be getting here last night?  Well, as I expected, they were delayed along the way and missed the last connecting flight here from Salt Lake City.  They stayed overnight with my mom and will be arriving today.....sometime.....I hope. So no ultrasound pictures for grandma yet.

Quarter Help

The search for the quarter on my counter has turned into a bit of an "I Spy" activity....lol.  The quarter is slightly left of center at the top of the photo. It blends very well with my counter top.

#10

#10 layout from my Baker's Dozen class.  I don't find it very easy to scrap with purple products.  It's probably my most difficult color to work with.   But when faced with pictures like this, what are you going to do?  The prompt today was to use 2 personality photos and a chipboard number of that person's age, along with 10 brads.  OK, so I couldn't do all 10 brads, just like I couldn't do the 20 buttons the other day.  Maybe I'm a minimalist at heart. This is done with a Scrap Addict kit.
DS #2 and DDIL will be arriving tonight from back east.  I can hardly wait. And if you check in tomorrow, I have a big announcement about the SBG#2.  Anyone want to take any bets? (And those of you who know already, just keep it to yourselves....)
As an aside....we've gotten a couple of letters now from SD Boy and he's doing very well.   

A Random Day

Random thoughts for today, beginning with:
I'm a Survivor.  Yes, that's what this poor hanging basket needs to be singing right now.  To start off.  I love having flowers around the house.  And I usually give the assignment of watering them to DD.  Except for this basket.  I got it for Mother's Day this year.  Now there's a fact about South Central Idaho.  The wind blows in the spring....and it blows hard....and it blows often.  My brave hanging basket has suffered through many a wind storm this spring.  It's hanging on a hook that screws up into a metal casing under the eves.  I noticed that with each successive windstorm, the hook was coming further and further out of its casing.  So, I thought to myself that I could just twirl the plant and have the hook go back into place.  And in my mind I started the whole "Righty Tighty, Lefty Loosey" mantra and began twirling my pretty basket.  Imagine my shock, horror and dismay, when I unscrewed the whole thing and my beautiful Mother's Day gift ended up upside down on the rocks below.  Accckkk!  So I scoop everything back up and back into the container as best I can and leave it on the rocks for DH to fix when he gets home from work.  When he does and I tell him the whole story, he asks me which way I was turning it.  Yeah, well I wasn't lying on the ground, looking up, to make sure my "Righty Tighty" was correct and I "Lefty Loosey-d" it right out of its hook.  Sigh.  You can see a few bruised leaves, but all in all, if you want hardy hanging basket plants, go with that fuschia geranium and the drapey white flower thingies.
A Rose for the Nose.  This is a photo of my current favorite rose.  Don't ask me what variety it is.  I don't know.  All I know is that it smells good.  I have a thing for smelly flowers.  When I buy rose plants for my yard, I look at the descriptive tag and the fragrance level has to be "very".  This one is right outside the window of the room where I do most of my hobby work and I love to have that window open and smell this "very" fragrant rose.  During the summer months, I almost always have one cut in a vase by my bed as well.  Love it.
And lastly,
Guess the Project.  Here is a box.  A plain wooden, Michael's-purchased box.  It's the start of a project I'm making for my sister, whose birthday is this coming Sunday. I'm not too worried about getting it done on time, because she's in California.  Her DH is an attorney for a travel company and they go some interesting places.  I'll show you the progress when I get done with it. This is also a slice of my life.  I have this box on my kitchen counter.  Nice backdrop for the photo.  And when I pulled it off the camera, I saw the neon green post-it note reminding me to check on the stove for the cabin, a Montana quarter that one of my kids needs to put in their state quarter folder and some packets of seeds I'd like to plant in the back flower bed...Chinese Lanterns on top there. See?  A very random day.

My Favorite So Far

For my Baker's Dozen class.  The prompt was to use three photos of our spouse with 4 pieces of ribbon.  I changed the design, taking out 2 of the ribbons and adding a small photo strip of my kids.   The photos I picked of my DH all had my kids in them and my journaling naturally evolved from there and prompted the then and now comparison photos of my kids. I created the photo strop in Photoshop  and away I went.  Love it when it all comes together easily...and the best part is that once I got the type set where I wanted, the whole thing took only about 10 minutes to do.
It's another hot day here, but not as hot as it's going to get over the weekend.  We're headed for triple digits then. College Boy is working hard at his manual labor summer job, Preemie Boy is enjoying music camp, DD is enjoying having the house sans boys for a good share of the day.
We are preparing for the arrival of  DS#2 and DDIL  on Friday. They will be in the area for a couple of weeks which will be wonderful.  It seems like forever since we've seen them....Christmas time for DDIL and Mustache March for DS#2. One of the best things is that I will get a look at the SGB#2 Baby Bump that is coming right along and the ultrasound takes place the day right before they get here.  Hopefully SGB will be cooperative, give us a good fanny shot and we can do some baby shopping while they're here. :)

It Was One of Those Days

And, incidentally, one of those nights as well. 
The day?  I call them gerbil days.  Picture one of those pint-sized rodents on one of those running/exercise wheels, running as fast as they can but never really getting anywhere.  Uh-huh.  Then equate it to how my day went.  No real progress, just spinning my wheels.  I volunteered to help at registration for the local music camp and actually that part of the day was really fun, but after that, it was groceries, the office supply store, Michael's for a birthday project for my sister....just one thing after another until I had to turn around at noon and go back to music camp where Preemie Boy was singing in the noon recital and I had to accompany him. Now, after being left alone to fend for herself all morning, DD was feeling like she needed some "amuse me, Mom" time, which extended well into the afternoon, when College Boy made it home.  He'll be here for the rest of the summer, but he also needed Mom time so he could bend my ear about his life.  Then it was time to get dinner going, which moved right into Family Night.  See what I mean?
Now the night was another story entirely.  I don't know about the rest of you, but there's a golden "window" of time for me to fall asleep.  I can't fall asleep earlier than that, and if I miss the window, I get a second wind and can't make myself sleep.  It doesn't happen that often, but when it does, it makes for a really frustrating night of tossing and turning and then finally convincing myself that it's not going to happen and making myself get out of the bed to go take a Tylenol PM.  That's what happened last night.  I actually had almost fallen asleep and then one of the dogs started to bark.  DH got up to yell at him, but it continued on and off until the window was past.  I did end up in the kitchen at around 1 to take the Tylenol.  Last time I looked at the clock last night was quarter to 2.  Needless to say, my rear is dragging this morning.  The kids have all been warned that life needs to run smoothly today.
I did get an hour to myself late in the evening to put together my latest Baker's Dozen layout.  The task was to put 3 photos of a person we love...this happens to be College Boy, with 20 buttons on a layout.  I tried to use all those buttons, I really did.  I even had them all adhered with glue dots, but in the end, I just didn't like how it looked and then had to figure out how to get all of them off and not tear my background paper. I'm much happier with the end result.  This is the Basic Grey Periphery line.  I bought the whole thing and have used it for 6 or 7 layouts so far.  Love it for boy photos.  It's only slightly dirty, but the colors are really great for boy pictures. Now, here's hoping that the day runs smoothly.

I Like It.

There are those great moments when you make something or accomplish something and you stand back and look at it and something just makes you say, "I LIKE it!"  And that's the way I'm feeling this morning.  It's Monday, so there are some fresh challenge over on the Scrap Addict message board.  I've got to say, I gave you ample hints about today's layout edge challenge.  That spring layout was one of those I looked at when I got done and said "I Like it...." 
There's a new sketch challenge for this week as well and this was another layout that  was just really satisfied with.  I like those Basic Grey papers....they look so nice and dirty and just go with the whole theme of the layout. When you have lots of boys, you tend to seek out the dirty looking papers. I struggled with early-on Basic Grey, but I'm liking the more muted color schemes of the recent lines. I like that I was able to break out of my straight-line-in-the-box mentality long enough this weekend to actually fussy cut a wavy line out of the patterned paper.  I may just go nuts with this, you never know....hold me back.  You may see nothing but wavy lines for the next little while until I get it out of my system.  I have a whole 12x12 sheet of this paper, you know.  For some reason this paper reminds me of 70's era lava lamps...I have no idea why.  I also like how the journaling fits with the photos and the dirty paper. 
So this week, why don't you pull out the last layout you did that you really liked....and lift it.  See if you like the results just as well. :)

Just a Little Whine

I'll just start off with it and then be done.  It's just waaaaay to hot!  We were up to 95 yesterday and that's no fun in my world.  Is there somewhere that lives at an ideal 68?  That's my idea of the perfect temperature. When we hit temperatures that high, I have no desire to do anything other than sit in my air conditioned house.  And speaking of air conditioning, who ever invented it should get some kind of award....like a Nobel Prize.
We got our first written letter from SD boy yesterday.  He is still in the MTC and will be there for another couple of weeks.  He says he's getting along well with the guys on his floor.  It was great to hear from him. :)
Another Baker's Dozen layout I finished off yesterday.  Dug around in my scraps for the patterned paper at the top.  Loving the simple design concepts for these layouts.  Makes for a quick finish. Hope you have a great day....I'm anticipating another very hot one, which makes me a little cranky just thinking about it.