Family filled weekend

My parents came up Friday night to visit with all of their children that live "up north". They came here first since Tennille was at enrichment. Ray’s parents also came up. Ray’s grandpa passed away on Thursday so they came up for the funeral and to get things sorted out with his estate. It was fun to visit with both sets of parents at the same time. Around 7 p.m. Tennille and Whit came to get my parents and Ray’s parents left so we went with my family up to Cabela's. We just wanted to do something other than sit at home. Mike, Ashlee and Jensen came as well. The kids enjoyed looking at the fish in the giant aquarium and looking at all the other animals – mounts is that what you call them? They especially liked feeding the fish over by the mountain and shooting the fake guns in the shooting gallery. We left a little before 9 p.m. On the way home there was a bad accident and luckily we saw that the freeway was not moving and exited before getting caught in it. We took State Street and I dropped Ray off at our favorite auto mechanics’ to pick up his car that has had A LOT of problems lately. It is hopefully fixed and will not need any repairs for a long, long, long time.

We ate dinner at Tennille’s on Saturday night with all of my family and Ray’s and Whit’s mom and step dad. It was a lot of fun. Thanks Tennille and Whit! It was Jack’s birthday earlier this week so we sang to him and had cake and ice cream. This is Jack in his cool dude sunglasses. I took my camera and didn’t take as many pictures as I should of.

Today after church we ate over at Jenny’s with all of Rays family (even Brad made it up). Thanks Jenny and David! Then we went to the mortuary for the viewing. Grandpa didn’t want a funeral so they are just having a graveside service tomorrow at the cemetery. Here are the 4 grand daughters on Ray’s side of the family.

Apples

My friend Anna that lives down the street was put on bed rest because she is expecting. She has a apple tree that was LOADED with apples so she said that anyone who wanted them could come pick them. We grabbed some buckets and went and picked some. I think the boys had fun and even Kara helped. I bought a dehydrator like 6 months ago and had never used it, so I got it out and dried a batch of apples. I just sprinkled some cinnamon and sugar on them and they turned out really good. I also made crockpot applesauce from this recipe. I just doubled the recipe, but personally it was way too much lemon juice. I normally do not like applesauce, but I added additional sugar (because it seemed to sour) and it was really good. The boys liked it too. I also made some apple crisp – yummy! Later in the week I decided that I wanted to get some more so I could dry more and bottle some. So, Christina brought her ladder and we picked quite a bit. I plan on attempting to can them this week. I didn’t have any canning equipment, but my mom brought some up to me, so I am going to give it a try. I think it is going to be a lot of work, oh well! Thank you Anna for sharing your apple with us!


Ever since we moved here I have wanted to plant some fruit trees. We just never seem to get around to doing it. Well, Ray’s friend at work gave him some golden delicious apples and he thought they were the best apples he has ever had, so he wanted to get a golden delicious tree. I have always wanted a peach tree, so Ray went and bought one of each. The peach tree is very small, but hopefully in a couple of years we will get some fruit on them both. This is the apple tree. It is a lot larger than the peach tree (I still need to take a picture). There used to be a hazel nut tree here, but after 4 years, and no nuts (and the fact that it gets suckers and looks pathetic) we pulled it out (with Ray’s truck) and planted the apple tree.

Entrepreneurs

So, Trent is going to be my little entrepreneur. He is always asking me what he can do to make money. He also always wants to make things to sell. He decided to make some Halloween decorations and sell them out side. He colored an empty yogurt container black and then glued a pumpkin that he had made on top of the upside down container. He made two, but sold one to Tyler. Tyler seems to always buy the stuff he makes. Anyway, they got some boxes and made some signs. At first they just sat on the porch, then I told them that I didn’t think anyone could read their signs from there. So they moved to the driveway. I helped them make some bigger signs, then I tried to think of something else they could sell along with the single Halloween decoration. I grabbed a box of granola bars, and made a sign for that. The kids were all out of school, so a neighbor lady was walking by taking her kids to the park. I heard her ask Trent what he was selling and for how much. I went out and helped him, because he didn’t have any change. She sent her daughter home to get her purse. She picked up Trent’s decoration and said she had to buy it because it was so awesome and she got some granola bars. She gave him a dollar and he was in heaven. They had sold everything so I told them to put away their shop so they could come help me get apples.

just call me Teri the tipster

Well, I have been learning all kinds of stuff this week. Like don’t take your child to the ER for an ear infection unless you want to pay (out of pocket) $375.00 after the insurance adjustment when you have a super high deductible, dumb dumb dumb!!!!!!!!!

Today I was cleaning up dinner and realized Kara was in the back of the house being very quite which means she is into something. I walk into my room and she has my very red "cherry crush" fingernail polish and she is painting her toes, along with her shoes, pants and the carpet! She said to me as I walked in "paint it toes?" I freaked out.

She kept saying "wash it hands mommy", because it was all over her hands. I got it off her shoes with fingernail polish remover, but that didn’t work on the carpet, it actually made it worse, rubbed it everywhere. I got her all cleaned up, and by that time the little drops had dried on the surface of my shag carpet so I was able to cut those out. But I was left with one large spot of cherry crush. I googled it and people talked about using men’s shaving cream and Windex. So I gave it a try, I just used Ray’s Gillette shaving cream ,rubbed it in and waited a few minutes then squirted some Windex on it and low and behold, it came off! You can’t even tell, I am absolutely amazed. I wonder what is in shaving cream that would get it out, and how it would be safe to use on your face? Anyway, just a tip to remember for next time you or your unsupervised child get fingernail polish on your carpet. Here are my before and after shots for you.

first what it looked like, Okay it could of been a whole lot worse. She could of spilled the whole bottle on the floor.

after I cut the little spots off

after the magic shaving cream.

Peach Jam and kid entertainers

I made several batches of freezer peach jam today. IT is so good! Thanks Leanne for the peaches!

I tried a new kind of pectin - Ball Fruit Pectin, I just got it at Walmart - it was the cheapest at $1.41 a box (which is still a lot) but anyway, there is a coupon inside (in the instructions) for 50 cents off your next box, that will make them 91 cents, that seems like a good deal. I also liked that this kind doesn't require a cup of corn syrup like the MCP kind. You add water to the pectin and cook it. The recipe also required less fruit, but same sugar (minus the corn syrup so maybe a wash?) It really streched the peaches. MCP called for 3 1/4 cups of peaches the Ball kind only called for 2 1/4 cups. It seemed way faster than the MCP kind too. - my two cents!

So I saw these on PYP, seemed like they were cute, don't know if my kids will actually do any of them, but someone sure put a lot of work into them.

General Conference packet #1 for kids

General Conference packet #2 for kids

Last Sunday the kids wanted something to do and I showed them these. It entertained them for a good hour. They would just click on each chapter (on the side bar, the window's media player) I couldn't figure out a way to just play the whole thing. They listened/watched the whole Book of Mormon Stories and then started over. They were quiet as can be. I am going to show them the other books and they can watch them on Sunday if they won't watch conference, so I can listen to part of conference in peace and quiet.

Happy General Conference!