Cooking fun

Over the summer we cooked outside a bit.  We did buddy burners and Altoid tins made into grills.  Neither was particularly successful, but the kids had fun anyway.

Curtains

I really, really, really dislike vertical blinds.  The ones by our pool are long, and the first thing you see when you walk in the house.  I've wanted to make curtains since we moved in.  I bought the material and curtain rods about 4 months ago and never did anything.  I am now somewhat systematically going through and finishing projects around the house.

In my mind the top looked a lot better.

This is what I ended up with.  Way better than the blinds-trust me.

Ben GRADUATED

Well, he graduated Aug 13th.  Unfortunately I couldn't make it.  Thankfully my parents got to be there.  Here are some pictures of the day.

Here we are wishing him luck and telling him how proud we are.

(Nope, not a cougar-a Nittany Lion)

First Day of School

Sorry buddy, not yet.

Really didn't want his picture taken.

Henry is Safety Patrol this year.  (He is also in gifted, and contemplating doing 6th grade reading online.)  He is such a hard worker.

Yes, I know it's late (and truth be told, these were taken on the 2nd day of school).

More and More Lego's

Over Labor Day weekend we had both Aunt Jennifer's come visit.  The above is the only picture I took-sad!  Sadie talked Aunt Jennifer (Gillis) into putting together the Hogwarts Harry Potter castle.  I think it took her about 7 hours.  It's so cool, it's still sitting on our entertainment center.

Here are some of the mini-figures Samuel came up with at the last Lego build.

Last week Ben went home to go hunting.  Ever since we left UT in 2002, Ben has said he's going to go home and go hunting.  This year, he finally had the time and the frequent flyer miles to be able to go.  While he was gone we had Family Home Evening.  The activity was Lego building.  The kids insisted on taking pictures of everything and sending them to Ben so that he could be part of Family Home Evening.