Saturday, June 29, 2013

Fairly Fun

My kids look forward to the County Fair all year.  Then, five minutes after we get there, one of them says, "I'm ready to go home now."

When we first arrived, these four bikers were doing impressive jumps!



Can you see this one upside down?


Dexter and Trevor thought it was too loud, both the bikes and the audience, so I guess I'm glad we didn't see their whole show, but I was happy to see what we did see.

My favorite part is the hall with the creative living and home arts exhibits, or whatever it's called; partly because it's air-conditioned and there is a bathroom and drinking fountain there, but mainly, I like the quilts and other cool stuff.



I love art made from different fabrics pieced together!



This is a cool working clock:



Cool mixed media using paint and quilling paper; at least I think it was paint, now it kinda looks more like colored pencil, but the kids were trying to rush me out of there to the rides, as if that's the most fun part of the fair, sheesh.



Picture of wands for my Harry Potter fan daughter:



I love music and art and art about music:



My oldest son liked this one, cool colors and perspective:



This one's pretty simple, but the hanging cloth is a separate piece of paper, hanging on an actual string with real clothes pins. Makes you take a double take, wondering how they got it to look so 3-D!



OOh, this one has a name, so they get credit and first place, apparently. Made of metal:



Awesome melty crayon with fabric flowers! I began a project like this and never finished. Time to be inspired.



This is stained glass without the staining. Impressive!



Fancy leaf & squares quilt and pinwheel quilt and hexagonal quilt in the background:



There is always a Christmas display case and Dexter noticed something funny on this Santa's belt:

(It's a Creeper face, in case you aren't familiar with Minecraft.)

We thought this was a really well done portrait made from torn paper:


(We hope it wasn't a self-portrait, poor guy is a bit green in the face.)

My Harry Potter fan daughter is also a Hunger Games fan, so I took a picture of this quilt for her. This elementary school had kids draw pictures and write part of the story underneath it. I wish I knew how they transferred them to fabric. I suppose I can Google it.



More art of music:



Some of the place settings are very elaborate, well all of them, actually.  I don't usually spend a lot of time looking at them, but this Narnia place setting really caught my eye:



And I think this old-school wooden scooter is way awesome! 


The rest of my pictures are mostly of rides, which I've already posted on that social networking site which shall not be named.  I was happy that my number one son decided to come with me without me having to beg or plead or threaten. I was mentally prepared to only take the small four like I did last year, but since he came, I let him choose whatever snacks he wanted from the store that we stopped at on our way.  I like to go on the day that they accept four non-perishable food items as payment for admission and all rides are only $1 each.  I bought 15 ride tickets for the three kids (G, D, & T) to go on five each.  That was almost more fun than we could stand, partly because it was hot and partly because Trevor is too small for the rides Geneva likes, so we have to go from her side to his side and it just seems to take forever, even though there were hardly any lines, and partly because we were thirsty. They never had to wait through more than one run of any ride before getting on and several times there was no waiting; the beauty of going on a Wednesday.


I love their smiles as they come off this slide!  Oh, and I did offer to Christian to ride a ride, but he doesn't really care for such things.



Trevor was scared to go on the merry-go-round without me, so I used one of his tickets.  Z didn't like that I walked away, but Christian is such a good big brother, he held her where she could see us go round and round.  He liked the Cars ride, though. Dexter likes rides with both Geneva and Trevor.


And these kids found some shade to enjoy while waiting for them. I told Christian he looks like an elf in this picture and thanked him from condescending into the mortal realm to join us in our mundane adventures.



Then, Trevor still had one left after the bigger two had used all theirs, but he couldn't decide which one to go on, so I took everyone to the music tent nearby and left them with Christian, except Dexter followed me and I was holding Z, so really only Geneva stayed at the music tent with Christian.  Anyway, I talked Trevor into going on the train. He said it was too hot last year, but I pointed out a train car that had a top, so it was shaded and he was happy.

I wanted to go to one more exhibit hall, but everyone was complaining of feet hurting and my dogs were barking, too.  Christian kept asking during the first exhibit hall how long we were going to stay at the fair, so just to get him to stop asking, I said five o'clock. So, he was pleased when we got to the car and it was an hour earlier than that.

As we were walking toward the exit, I saw a family standing by a table, but their little boy was sitting on the table and the grandma was rubbing his back and his eyes were closed and he was starting to sway, he was so relaxed and sleepy.  Poor kid.

Trevor fell asleep in the car before Z did, but she followed shortly after.  It was a good day.

Then, Christian didn't want to go to Scouts that night, since he had been gone most of the day, but he went anyway, like a trooper!

Then, my hubby went to pick them up, (after going to the fair, I took a shower and put on my pjs, so that was why I didn't want to be the carpool driver), and he took the van for carpooling and left the lights on while waiting, which killed the battery. He failed to mention that he also had his laptop plugged into the lighter, but he swears it was the lights that killed it and not the laptop.  He likes to keep life interesting like that.  Fortunately, someone there had jumper cables, but Chris was a bit embarrased to have to get out of the van in his pajama pants.  Ha ha ha!  He had worked at home and hadn't gotten dressed that day.  We love summer!

Another delicious dinner

Or maybe more of a side dish, since it wasn't enough food to feed the whole family.



I was just going to sautee some carrots, but then I thought it might feed more people if I added potatoes.



Then, I thought it really needed something green, so I added some frozen spinach.



With crushed garlic and other seasonings, it was delicious!  It was just a lot of work to peel and chop all the carrots and potatioes.  Picky eater #1 wouldn't even taste it. Picky eater #2 took one bite and decided he didn't like it, but all the other kids loved it.

Friday, June 14, 2013

Chocolate scriptures

Brings a new meaning to "feast upon the word." My son's Sunday School teacher made these little scriptures of candy bars for her class.


It has black construction paper on the back, a real ribbon glued to the middle and actual verses printed. I'm not sure what book the verses are from.  I thought it was so cute and so well done and no doubt so much work that when he said I could have them, I didn't want to ruin it to eat it.



Then, I ran out of chocolate. So, I took a picture. It lasts longer that way.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Easy Peach Cobbler

I used this recipe: easy-peach-cobbler.  I did decrease the sugar a little bit, as some people said in the comments and it was still super sweet. I used fresh peaches, with the peels on, that were a little greener than I would have liked, but still with the sugar, so sweet.  I didn't measure the lemon, so I might have put more than a tablespoon. I didn't put a full tablespoon of baking powder, because that seemed like a lot.  Also, I used gluten-free flour, the kind that can still send blood sugar soaring, but celiac sufferers will be at ease, not that we have one of those here, I'm just trying to cut back on wheat. And I used Vanilla Coconut Milk, because it's tasty.

This lived up to its name, easy to make and so delicious!!


Extreme close-up! AAAHHHH!


I asked my husband if he wanted something special to eat on his birthday and he said, "I like apple pie and peach cobbler."  I already knew he liked pie more than cake. His Mother said it was a revelation to her as an adult that she could have pie instead of cake on her birthday, if she wanted to.


He approves.  Good thing because pies take a lot more effort.

Croissant Pizza

     Another post about dinner: I was going to make French bread pizza, but the store I went to didn't have French bread. Weird. So, I bought two packs of croissants instead, since there were only 9 in a pack and we have 8 at home. Toasted croissants are delicious! We already had some pepperoni and salami that needed to be used. We just used pasta sauce, cheese and pineapple tidbits and the meat and baked it at 425F for about five minutes.



Spencer liked to make his into faces.


I always catch him with his eyes closed. That's okay, he's still handsome when he's blinking.



 This was take three!


Geneva thought the croissants looked like bunny ears, so she made an entire bunny.


Too bad our plates are too small to hold it, one arm went splat when she moved it.

Another happy face!


The cutest happy face:


Picky eater #2 just wanted cheese, no sauce, no frills. Good thing this dinner is easily customizable.


Thumbs up!


He was copying the littlest one who was giving it ten thumbs up...


...there she is.


Picky eater #1 likes lots and lots of pineapple, skip the pepperoni!


I think she was giving it ten thumbs up, also.


Good times.

Monday, June 10, 2013

Dirty dishes and Awesome kids

I guess I haven't done dishes for a few days; when they are dirty, my teenage sons don't like to cook. I can't blame them, I don't either.

I also hate when I have to wash dishes in order to prepare to cook and then I wash dishes while the food is cooking and then I still have to wash dishes after we eat!

So, I tried to get them all clean today, including the pots and pans.
Then, Spencer said he didn't want to eat because all the dishes were clean and if he cooked something then they wouldn't ALL be clean any more.
Sad that it's such a rare event that he wanted to prolong it as long as possible.

Trevor was asking for pancakes all day, but I didn't want to make it this morning, because the dishes were dirty, then I didn't want to make them for lunch, because I had just got them all clean.  But, Spencer said he would help me make them for dinner, so we had breakfast for dinner with pancakes, bacon and fried spuds. Delicious!

This morning, Christian (a.k.a. picky eater #1) was pulling up his pants saying they were a little too big. He won't go clothes shopping, (like his Dad), unless forced, so I just guessed his size.  I buy him 29 or 30 inch waist pants.  I told him he wasn't doing his cookie eating duty!  Then, two or three other kids come into the kitchen saying, "Cookies? I want some cookies!"
I had to tell them that we didn't have cookies, I was just teasing Christian.
His favorite snack is to suck on an ice cube or two.

Dexter (my 7 year old) made a goal to not eat any more sweets for the rest of the year. He almost forgot when I made cookies the last time, but he compromised by taking out the parts with chocolate chips. But, he is very determined, and didn't eat any of the skittles, gummy worms or m&ms offered to him over the past few days.

His teacher at church asked me if Dexter could have sweets, and I said yes, because that was before I knew about his goal.  I'm sure Dexter turned him down. He is my hero, I want to be more like him.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Peace

I finally made it to the temple after not going for five months. Has it been that long?!
That's what happens when you keep track, then you know.
This picture was taken with my phone. It turned out pretty good!


I'm thankful to have a temple so close to home. My baby missed me though, which is why I hadn't been in so long.  Good thing she has loving big brothers with which she will cuddle, because I have big plans for going often this summer.




Our Prophet, President Thomas S. Monson, said about the temple, “As we go to the holy house, as we remember the covenants we make therein, we will be able to bear every trial and overcome each temptation. The temple provides purpose for our lives. It brings peace to our souls—not the peace provided by men but the peace promised by the Son of God when He said, ‘Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.’”  (emphasis added)

You can read more, or watch a video here.