Happy Halloween 2012!!

 

 

 

 

 

Pumpkin Harvest!

As I have mentioned several times, I really missed having a garden over the past few years. I missed having fresh veggies outside my backdoor, and I really missed growing pumpkins. I love Halloween and the more pumpkins I have the better. I ended up with a lot of little ones, and designer ones, but not one carvable one. Hmm...I guess I need to pay more attention to what plants I'm buying next year. Just last week when were doing our fence line, we made another area for me to plant pumpkins. I went overboard with plants this year and had pumpkins planted in the garden, and flowerbeds. They were taking over the yard! My plan is to use this new area for pumpkins and not the flower beds. Yea, we'll see........

 

 

 

These Peanut Pumpkins are cool. At the boys' school the fourth graders run the greenhouse and have a plant sale each spring. I felt obligated to buy something so I got a few pumpkin plants. I had no idea what a peanut pumpkin was, but I'm so glad I got one. One plant grew 15 pumpkins and pretty much took over the west flower bed. I saw these pumpkins at Home Depot a few weeks ago, and they were $10.00 each. I was feeling pretty good about my $2.50 purchase. I will be back for the sale next year. 

Halloween Wine Bottle Labels

Besides my candy corn gourds, the only Halloween project I got around to this year was making some Halloween wine bottles. I saw some similar bottles at the store and thought I could easily make those. I made three for me and three for my sister's October birthday. I had a specific label in mind for my her :)

I used empty wine, tequila and Bacardi Silver glass bottles. I colored them with stain, Mod Podge, and glitter to make them brown. I created the labels in PhotoShop and wrapped the tops in twine. Very easy. It took a while for the stain to dry, so it felt like weeks to actually get the project done. 

Read close...my sister's special label.

After I spent weeks working on mine, Parker ran upstairs to do a craft. He came back with is own Halloween bottle. Yep, it's sitting there right in the middle of my display. 

Gourd Wall & Halloween Gourds!

When we were designing our yard, I knew I wanted some sort of plant climbing wall at one end of the patio. We had one at our old house and I loved it. We decided to put it at the west end of our some-day patio. On the west end it will provide a bit of shade, and most importantly block part of our patio from our nosy next-door neighbors. This year I decided to plant gourds on it, and I love how it turned out.

We cemented these 8' tall, 4x4 posts in and I painted them brown.
The boarder you see along the ground with the gravel inside will someday be our patio.

We then attached pieces of lattice. We left a little walkway between the house and the gourd wall so we can easily get to that side of the yard. 

The gourds grew great, but I definitely planted too many of them!

View from the west side. Nicely blocking the view from the nosy neighbors.

Harvest time. I got about 15 good sized gourds.

I painted them to look like candy corn. Well, they are supposed to look like candy corn anyway. My dad drilled holes in the top and I hung them all over our front yard. 

I like how they look in my grasses.

Kickin' Back at Bear Lake!

Ok. I've made it forward a month. Let's not mention that it really is October.  :)

Every August we take a trip up to Bear Lake. We all love it up there! Normally we can escape a bit of the heat, but with this record hot summer, it was hotter than normal up there as well. It was nice at night. It would cool off into the 50's. I would freeze everyone out of our cabin. I had all the windows wide open and all three boys would have to pull their sleeping bags up over their heads. It was great!

We like to stay on the Idaho side of the lake. Normally it is less crowded on that end, but I think people have caught on. It is a much nicer beach and for us it means easier access to real alcohol.  Hey, you've got to get the non-watered down, more affordable, liquor when you can.

 Our first night there we just hung around the cabin relaxing. The boys played in the river all day.  Parker is such a water rat. As long as he has water to get in he's happy. I have no idea what this little creek is called. It is right next to our cabin, and it keeps our campsite nice and cool. The water is freezing.

 

 Good morning big hair.

 This kid likes fire a bit too much. Scares the hell out of me!

 Roasting Burning Marshmallows!

  Water Rat found this in the river. I think it was maybe a craw fish. Not sure though. It only had half a body when we found it. Parker was totally amused by it. 

 The boys, all three of them, spent hours upon hours building in the sand.

Our little beach site. For some reason, after a record dry winter, the water was really high. It made for a great beach, but the walk to the beach sucked. Normally you can drive right on the beach, back your truck in and unload. You can see the cars at the top of the picture where we had to park this year. It is really not all that far, but when you are carrying multiple coolers, chairs, totes, the shade canopy, clothes, floaties, sand toys, etc. it made for a very long walk!

 Water Rat has a tote full of sand toys. He worried about them the entire time we were there. He kept thinking they were going to get stolen. Dude, your toys are fine. Get over it!

 Travis Kickin' back in the shade!

 Perfect water temperature & the sandy bottom makes for a perfect day to play!

 Got floatie?

 Peace, Love and Brothers!

 I love these boys!

 Travis drowning Preston and Parker is heading out to sea in his fish.

 They love spending time with their dad.

 Frisbee on the beach. Not a bad gig!

 I bought Parker this fish the first time we went to Bear Lake. He is way too big for it now, but he loves it. Unfortunately "Fishy" has seen his last trip to the lake. He got a hole in him on our last day there. Parker cried and cried and wanted me to run up to the store to see if they had another one. The store is about 45 minutes away, on the Utah side of the lake. Yea, I'll just "run" up.

 Dude, you are going to burn the top of that head.

 This is what I love about Bear Lake. As you can see we are clear out in the water. Standing here the water is about up to my waist. It is very shallow water very far out. It is so nice because you can walk out, or "go to sea" as the boys call it, and just walk around or float around. When we are hanging on the beach the boys can be out in the water, and quite a ways out, and you don't have to worry about them. They can go a long way with the water only up to their tummy. The bottom of the lake is all sand for as far out as you can walk. The shallow water also means it stays very warm.

On the last day we were there we surprised the boys and rented Wave Runners. It was a blast! I didn't have my camera with me though so you'll just have to take my word for it. Now the boys want Grandpa to buy them Waver Runners for Christmas. Come on Dad! 

Skippin' Back to the 4th of July!

Hi!

Long time to talk. I have had a few requests for our pictures from the 4th of July, Bear Lake, and our yard. No promises on how fast I'll get them up, but I'll try.

We always spend the 4th of July at my Mom and Dad's house. It is my favorite day of the year to go there. There is a lot of adult beverages, friends & family, adult beverages, food, adult beverages, fun, oh and yes, adult beverages. My dad's birthday is a few days before the 4th, and Jessa's a few days after, so we have one big bash.

Everyone this year was complaining that it was on a Wednesday, middle of the week, blah, blah. However, we loved it! Travis' day off is Wednesday so it was one of the rare times he got to come to a party on time. It was great. (Yes, he works all holiday's but Christmas and Thanksgiving unless they happen to fall on a Sunday or Wednesday. It sucks!)

So here you go...Happy 4th of July in October!

 Travis' right hand man for the day!

My nutcracker collecting mom even has a cracker for the 4th of July. Recently my parents were updating their will. I made my sister promise to take my mom's nutcracker collection! She was thrilled - not! Hey, I don't want to get stuck with them!

 My dad's beer birthday cake!

 I handed my sister my camera and asked her to take our picture. I don't think that photography skills run in the family. I also don't think she realized she would have to actually stand up to do it.

 My mom, a.k.a. Chickie, and my dad.

 Sonny

Cindy, Jessa & Sonny

 Jessa & Parker

Chickie and Cindy

Me & Preston

Stephanie, Dan & Bea (yes I know Steph's eyes are closed but it's the only one I took)

Debbie, Dottie, Mary, my Dad & Boyd

Travis and his mom, Pat a.k.a. Grandma Kitty. When Travis invited her I was nervous. My side of the family is the complete opposite of his side of the family. However she was just fine. She had a good time and sat and chatted with everyone.

 Sundee & Jessa. For Jessa's 21st birthday we both bought her a bottle of wine to celebrate. About 1/2 way through the day we were running out of yummy Sangria so Sundee stole her present back to use it in the drinks! Jessa didn't want to give it up!

Preston learning to play badminton

Parker thinks he already knows how to play.

Water balloon baseball time! Each year my sister and Sonny spend hours upon hours filling these little balloons. Luckily, I've never masted tying them so I'm never invited to their water balloon filling party. Damn! Everyone loves it though! It starts out as a very organized baseball game, then all hell breaks loose!

All day, my dad's comment to my sister, "do you need me to get you a turtleneck to put on?" Same comment year after year.

Are we white trash or what? Sipping beverages in the pool!

My dad has one pair of these safety headphone things. Every year at firework time, the boys fight over them. You think he'd get two more pair, but he never does.