Applesauce Impulsivity

We have an apple tree. I think they are Macintosh apples. They have never been very good (because they are really sour) and they always have lots of worms in them *shudder*. I haven't really done much with my apples for these reasons. I had just kind of planned on not doing anything with these ones either and I hoped to get some free golden delicious apples from some neighbors. Well, I was picking up some fallen apples off the ground today and I was thinking that there were actually a lot of pretty decent looking apples at the top of the tree. I decided to pick some. Then I decided I should be frugal and domestic and not let my free (wormy) apples go to waste. I decided to can some applesauce.

At first I was cutting the apples in quarters and then cutting all the wormy cores out. I decided that I'd distract myself from all the gross worminess by counting how many worms I saw so I could blog about it. (My IBV has finally been speaking again.) After about about 5 mintues and 3 and 1/2ish worms I decided I didn't want to count anymore. I didn't even want to LOOK anymore. So I started just cutting off the sides that looked worm-free and not even going into the core. Much better plan.

This one got away. I am not sure how. It did have to die of course after I discovered it.

The finished product. Not all of them are pictured but I canned 12 quarts of applesauce. It only took me 5 hours. (What was I thinking???) My house is now a complete disaster. It was messy before but after letting the kids run free and wild (plus the extra kids I had over this morning) it was even more trashed. But at least now I know that when the end of the world comes (which could be sooner than later with the way things are going), I will have 12 quarts of applesauce for my family to eat. And it was free (well, it only cost me 5 hours). My goal this fall is to fill up all my empty canning jars with food.


I also got a few pears from a neighbor this afternoon to add to my applesauce. I found Adele eating a pear and I took it away from her. I turned it over in my hand and look! Ewwwww!

Killing Two Birds...

Erm, I mean destroying 2 things with one careless act.

Last night I decided to go to yoga. I haven't been all summer because the teacher had a baby and had a couple of months off. After dinner I hurried to get things cleaned up while Kent took a short break. I was running a bit late and I jumped in my van and backed out about 2 seconds before the garage door finished opening. After I backed out of the garage I tried to shut the door but it wouldn't close. I figured I might as well go to yoga and then worry about the door later. I got to the gym 5 mintues late and there was a sub who was going to do some "yoga stretches and some pilates". I decided to just do some treadmilling instead. I didn't really get to enjoy my little break because I was thinking about the whole garaged door incident.

The damages:

I was surprised and happy to find out that it only cost $45 to fix the garage door. Certainly not the most fun way to spend almost 50 bucks, but it could have been worse.

I used to have a very fancy spoiler on the back of my van (because spoilers make mini-vans cooler, you know?). It is gone now. I need to take the van into the body shop (sometime) and find out how much it will cost for them to take out the screws and cover up the holes. At least that isn't something urgent. I am just glad more damage wasn't done, and I didn't hurt anybody with my stupidity.

Birthday Pie

Look at me GO! I can't believe the crazy-blogging-mania that is going on here! I guess I am making up for all the time I didn't blog this summer!

So, as you all know (because you faithfully and daily read my blog), it was Kent's birthday yesterday. We don't do too many birthday cakes around here because pie is so much better. I made Kent a (fabulous g-free) strawberry/peach/blueberry pie for his b-day.

I am not sure if this is an "ow" moment or a playing moment. It sure looks like several of the people in that picture could or should be saying "ow!". Emilia looks like she could have some spinal damage from that tight embrace.

3 candles. That stands for 33.

First Day of School

I am a little late posting this but here goes:

Usually my kids want to ride the bus on the first day but this year they wanted me to drive them. I think they are getting smarter. They realize that they will be riding the bus everyday and this is their only chance for a car-ride to school. Last year we planned to have them ride the bus but they missed it on the first day.

Elise came home the first day and said she had a great day.

Emilia came home in tears and said it was the worst first day of school ever. She lost her lunch bag at school, she couldn't remember her mulitplication facts and didn't finish the test. She didn't get to do anything fun. Sounds like a bummer of a first day. The second day of school was much better. Her very best friend (Tamara) is in her class again this year. I think that makes the last 3 years. She is really excited about that. (Oh, and she found her lunchbag on the second day of school.) It is a big change going from summer vacation to full-day school. I have to hand it to these kids for hanging in there.

Ian was completely bouncing off the walls at home on the first day of school. He had to stay home with boring mom all day. He is used to playing with (read: pestering) his big sisters during the day. Well, since they were gone, who is left to play with? MOM of course! Today we had a friend come over for a playdate. I think we might do that a lot, at least until preschool starts.

Zion

My in-laws made the long trek to come visit us last weekend. The kids had a great time playing with Grandma and Grandpa. On Saturday we went to Zion. Here are a few pics from that trip.

Grandpa and Grandma

Happy Birthday Kent!

Today is Kent's 33rd b-day! Happy B-day SB! Thanks for being such a great dad and husband. I love ya!! (Kent no longer has the goatee but he was sportin' some facial hair for a couple of weeks. He finally shaved it off. The better to kiss you with my dear!)

Kent Saves the Day

Remember the other day when I deleted all my photos of our trip? Well, Kent had actually already put them on his computer so I can post them! YAY!

Picnic Dinner in Nephi

Demolition Derby

By the end of the day Elise was sportin' a "Polyg" do (minus the French braid)

Hiking at Bridal Veil Falls

Emilia and cousin Erica being ninjas (or something like that)

Another Self-Haircut

Three out of my 4 kids have now given themselves haircuts. And now that I think about it, it must be a 4 year old thing because I swear all of my kids who have taken the scissors to their own heads have been right around 4. Maybe Elise was 5.

On Sunday I gave Ian a haircut. It turned out pretty nice I thought. He kept asking me to buzz him like his friend Caleb. I told him we'd buzz him another time because I just finished his haircut and it looked good.

Later I saw him. He had big chunk of hair cut out of the front. I asked him what happened and he admitted to cutting his hair. So we ended up buzzing him anyway. I took pictures of the pre-buzz 'do' but unfortunatley they were accidentally deleted by Adele and me. (Doh! See post below for that story). Here's a pic of Ian's buzz. You can still see where he chopped it. I decided against going totally bald even though you can still see the line where he cut his hair.

(Gotta love THAT face!)

At least boys' self-haircuts are easier to fix and they grow out faster.

Quick Trip

We took the family went on a quick getaway trip last weekend. We were just trying to get a little trip in before school starts. We went to Utah County to visit my sister and parents and to do some of the fun Provo things like hiking and swimming at Seven Peaks. My sister Linda let us stay at their house for the weekend and she was a really good sport about it. I know we brought a lot of chaos with us, but we had a great time. Thanks Linda. Kent took the big girls to the demolition derby at the Utah County Fair. They had a lot of fun trying to catch the flying stuffed Dora toys (my kids hate Dora) and the footballs with money in them. They also got a kick out of the crashing cars and the car that was on fire.

I was just about to post a bunch of pictures from our trip. I was uploading them when I noticed Adele pushed some button on the computer. She must have canceled the upload of pictures. I just deleted them off the camera too. So, anyway, we had a fun trip last weekend and took lots of great pictures. I was GOING to also post pictures of Kent's goatee and Adele's cute pigtails. Darn. For the record though, we DID go on a trip this summer. I guess I'll have to double check things before I delete all the pictures off the camera.

New Blogging Record

I haven't blogged in over 2 weeks. That is a record. Not a good one, but a record. I keep thinking I need to write something but we have been busy and my IBV just hasn't really been giving me any inspiration.

It is hard to believe that school starts tomorrow. I always start the year with mixed feelings. I was telling Emilia about "mixed feelings" the other day and now when anyone asks her if she is excited for school to start she tells them she has mixed feelings. It is exciting to get some structure back and to give the kids something to do. They have been fighting so much and I think they are just together way too much. It is always weird at first when they are gone all day. We all get over that pretty fast though, and soon it is on to homework and projects and PTA stuff. Life just keeps rolling on.

Water

A few weeks ago we went "Down South" and let the kids play in the splash pad. They had such a fun time and we got come cute pictures. (See, we have done a FEW fun things this summer. I do feel guilty though that I haven't been able to do the things I would have liked to. I feel like I have been a bummer of a mom lately and my kids have missed out.)

Some Cruise Photos

The scuba divers.

Gotta love the origami towels they make for you every night.

Me and my honey.

Biking around Catalina

All my sisters and sister-in-laws. It was so fun to see all the "girls".

My family. Mom and Dad and 10 kids.


My bike was awesome. The kickstand broke off when I was parking.

The "Elation"

My dad wanted to take all his kids and their spouses on a cruise, kind of like a kid-free family reunion. We had a GREAT time! It was a nice break from life and the kids and cooking!!! Thanks dad for the memories! We had a wonderful time! Let's do it again sometime!