Hot as Texas

Honestly, compared to last August, the weather has been almost balmy. The highs have been in the low 90s, the lows have dipped into the 70s. It has been almost pleasant.

However, just as the temperature threatened to go back to triple digits, our a/c went on the fritz. It has been warning us for awhile. It started blowing hot air a few weeks ago. Mr. Kittle, the a/c man came by, found corrosion in our 40 year old thermostat, cleaned it up and pronounced it all okay.

A week or so again it happened again. This time DH cleaned up the thermostat and tightened some wires. It seemed to have worked again.

That is it worked until Monday. Mr. Kittle has been by our house no less than 5 times in the past 3 days. First he replaced the thermostat. It lasted an hour or two. He came back and pronounced it the fan motor, promising to be back in the morning. First night without a/c.

DH did some investigating and decided it was not the fan motor, but the contacter. Mr. Kittle didn't agree but replaced it. It lasted an hour or two. DH called FIL, the electrical contractor, and got his and his co-workers opinions. He went into the attic and tightened some wire connections. It lasted an hour or two. (Notice the trend.) Mr. Kittle came back and found that the new contacter was closed tight and not opening. (Whatever that means.) He promised to come back in the morning. Second night without a/c.

Mr. Kittle couldn't come today until about 3pm. All day without a/c.

Mr. Kittle and DH investigated, went in the attic, investigated more, decided it was definitely an electrical issue and that the rats' nest of wiring to the furnace and the coil made it an impossible task to fix. We have to replace the two very old units up in the attic with one unit. (Whatever that means) Because we're replacing two with one, we have to re-do electrical, gas and the duct work. Not easy and not cheap.

Mr. Kittle can't do all of that by himself, he needs his helpers. He's hoping that they are available on Tuesday. Third night without a/c.

We're making do. Luckily after the first night without a/c, I bought clip on fans to blow directly onto boys' faces. They are happy.  Well, happier, it is still hot.




The Osark came out in DH. He rigged up his "homemade swamp cooler" for our bedroom. That is a laundry basket with computer text books (finally coming in handy) with a fan, behind a chair with a big box and a roasting pan full of ice water. It didn't work. The ice melted almost immediately.


Luckily we have plans for Labor Day weekend. We'll only have to suffer through a bit longer.

getting in the groove

You would think after a week of going to school we I would be in a groove. The routine should be back, muscle memory kicking in.

Nope. This afternoon J came across the street to the park and informed me that I didn't put a sandwich in his lunch today.  I put a sandwich container in his lunch bag, but it was empty. All of the sudden I realized that I didn't make anyone a sandwich today. I put empty sandwich containers in all of their lunchs. At least they had apple slices, carrot sticks, and candy for dessert.

B was the smart one.  He told his teacher that his mother forgot to give him a sandwich and they let him buy lunch from the cafeteria. The other two came home and ate a second lunch.

Hopefully, I've made that mistake and won't do it again.

41st

Yesterday was my birthday.  The kids had half day at school so we went out for a birthday lunch with the younger two cousins and my mom.  We came back to the house for cake (that A made!) & presents.




I got another random assortment of stuff picked out by the kids.  I got new tennis balls since the dog chewed up the ones I got last year before we ever had a chance to play tennis.  I also got a stylus for the ipad, which is cool, but causing fights over whose turn it is to use it.


After cake & presents, MIL took the kids for the night.  DH & I headed out to a concert at House of Blues.  The Old 97s is a band that we used to watch long time ago in our post-college, pre-dating, we're just friends period of life.  Actually I saw the Old 97s with my girlfriends way more than I did with DH.  He bought front row seats in the balcony so I didn't have to stand and be squashed and not see.

the crowded floor & I'm not there



The concert was great.  They even played one of my favorites, St. Ignatius. We were up until 2am.  I'm tired.  I have a headache.  The children are back home and squabbling.  Birthday is over, life is back to normal.  At least I had a good day.

DIY DYDH

This past weekend, DH went to the lake with FIL, BIL and several other guys for guys trip to the lake. He was gone for 5 days. It was an easy time to be a single parent, there wasn't much going on. I did have to get J to baseball practice at 8:30am on Saturday morning.

Lucky for me, J is an early riser so getting him up and dressed was not an issue. He is however plagued with the "I swear I put it there and it isn't there anymore and someone else moved it so it would be lost just when I need it because I absolutely know that I put it right there" syndrome. At 8:10, J was ready to go except for his baseball bag, that contained his hat, glove and bats. We searched DH's car, we searched DH's truck, we searched the bedroom, the playroom, the garage. I sent DH an angry email because his phone was turned off and he isn't allowed to go out of town and turn his phone off while he's sleeping anymore. Finally I told J to get his father's glove and his brother's bat and we were leaving. He was practically in tears as he headed out the front door to check the front porch one more time, when he turned to look beside the front door behind the stroller.  The bat bag!

Crisis averted, we made it to baseball practice on time with all equipment.

However, the whole event stressed me out.  It does every time it happens, and it happens all the time just replace bat bag with shoes, hats, soccer balls, water bottles, etc. I decided to take matters into my own hands.  Saturday afternoon, I cleared out the junk that was piled up next to the garage door. I found a scrap piece of wood and some extra hooks.  I went to the dollar store for a nine volt battery so I could use the stud finder.  I was ready to make a place to keep bat bags.

Until my first attempt to put it all together and I didn't hit the stud.  I gave up. I didn't want DH to come home to a bunch of holes in the wall.

Today, we were both taking a break from work and I asked him to help me with something.  I had him use the stud finder and he got the same results.  Even though I didn't hit a stud, the stud finder said one was there. DH took over. He found the proper sized drill bits and the correct length screws. He did it all. He put a couple of screws in the wall and eventually hit a stud.

Although I would have like to have DIYed this project, it was nice that he took over and finished it much faster I ever could have.



The boys have absolutely no excuses for not knowing where their bat bags are. That is if I can actually train them to hang them up where they belong.

First Day of School 2012

Today was the first day of school.  I was mostly prepared. I didn't sleep through my alarm and the kids were up with plenty of time to get ready for school. I made lunches with mini chop fruit salad as requested.  (It is S#2's special recipe.  Basically it is fruit salad cut into a teeny, tiny dice.) The kids had clean uniforms and A's skirts was hemmed the way she wanted.

What I failed on this year was pictures.  I haven't used my big camera in a while.  I didn't bother to check the battery on it.  I was only able to get one picture.  Even the pop the battery out and back in trick didn't work.  I went searching for my cell phone and finally found it in my car, uncharged.  It could hardly turn on let alone take a picture. At least DH had his blackberry.



Seventh grader


Fourth grader


First grader


Not the best pictures but at least the day is documented.

Day Trip 2012

I wasn't as good about planning day trips this summer. Monday is meet the teacher, Tuesday classes start, so Friday was our last day of summer, our last chance to take off for the day.

I knew were I wanted to go on the day trip.  Last year at the State Fair, the Nocona company was in one of the buildings giving out keychains and mentioned that they give factory tours.  It is located about 2 hours northeast of Dallas so I had to come up with something else to do the rest of the day. I spent an evening researching what to do and found there isn't much to do in that part of Texas.  There are no other tours, no great landmarks, no state parks with interesting tours.  It is pretty boring.

My mother and her quilting friends helped out.  You see there are 254 counties in the state of Texas. Thank heavens they don't make us memorize them all like make school kids in Indiana. There are people out there, including my mother's quilting friends, who make trips out of visiting county courthouses, with the goal of visiting all of them.  Mom started going on courthouse/quilt store trips with some of her quilting friends.  I started searching on courthouses and came up with a trip.

Our trip to Nacona or how our mother tortures us by making us pose for photos.
First stop, the Fire Station Museum in Denton, Tx. This museum was tiny. It was not much bigger than our kitchen, but it had some cool stuff.

The posing begins


Nozzles, should have crop the silver suit out, oh well


A piece from the World Trade Center


B wanted a picture of the scary mask.


Onto the Denton County Courthouse. There was a small museum inside, but they were in the middle of moving exhibits so there wasn't much to see. The boys liked the cases of rifles and guns. I liked the pecan art.

Pecan boy scout and statue of liberty


Posing with the rest of the pecan art


From Denton we drove west to Decatur. I found the Petrified Wood Gas Station on the internet. It was once a working gas station and motel. Now there is the Whistle Stop Cafe in one of the building.

The station


Making J cry because the sun was so bright


petrified wood


The cafe was quaint. The food was fine, could have used more salt, everything was a little bland. The pies looked wonderful, but we decided to save room for later.

From the Whistle Stop Cafe, we drove into downtown Decatur to the Wise County Courthouse. The building was nice but we didn't go inside.

Another posed picture


Chisholm Trail Sign


The courthouse at an angle


From Decatur we drove to Nacona. We got there just in time for the tour. There was a large group of 16, another group of 5 and our group of 4. One man took the large group through. We waiting in the lobby with Bobby Storey waiting to take our tour. He is the grandson of the founder of the company and he ran the company for 30 or so years. After lots of waiting, the other tour came out.  The man realized that his father hadn't started our tour.  He meant for him to give the other tour a 10 minute head start. At least he told some interesting stories. Unfortunately, he was also a very soft spoken man so once we started the tour, it was almost impossible to hear anything he said. It was interesting to see the baseball gloves being made.

J with a $200.00 baseball glove


Mr. Storey rubbing the Indian head for good luck


The kids posing (only slightly smiling because the father of the other group basically made them stand for a picture.)


Nocona banner


After the tour, it was only 3:00. The next thing I had planned was dinner, but it wasn't close to dinner time. What else could we do but visit another courthouse? We were going to drive through Gainesville on our way home, so we made a detour to the Cooke County Courthouse. The courthouse wasn't anything special. We walked by and went to the Morton Museum down the street. It was a nice little museum. The docent shuffled through and told us about every piece. She seemed to know everyone and what family had donated each item to the museum. She was very happy to have someone stop in. It was small because even with the guided tour, we were only there for 20 minutes and that included bathroom stops by the boys.

the courthouse


the museum


I couldn't bribe the kids to pose for pictures at this point. We took a driving tour of the Victorian homes of Gainesville and then headed to dinner at Hard Eight BBQ in Coppell.

I threatened them to make them pose in front

the pit


that's a lot of meat!


A!


J!


B!


dinner done


no we didn't eat it all, the leftovers

After dinner, we stopped at Dairy Queen for dip cones.





While eating our ice cream cones, we realized that on our first day trip last summer, we ate at Hard Eight in Stephenville and went to Dairy Queen on the way home. The kids have decided that it needs to be a tradition. It seems that Hard Eight has opened a location in Roanoke, so I guess our next day trip needs to head that way.

Family Meetup

Post cruise S#2 went to Houston to drop off BIL#2 and pick up our niece from S#4. M got to spent a few days hanging out in Dallas with her cousins. S#2 & S#4 decided to meet half way to drop her back off. B was busy spending the day with MIL, so A & J & I decided to join them for the ride.

Don't they look excited for a road trip


We made it to Woody's in Centerville


Kids waiting for food


chopped beef sandwich


bacon wrapped quail (yum!)


Goodbye to S#4 & family!

Did you notice that the building changed. There is a Woody's on both sides of the highway. We met at the southbound side. It is smaller and all the seating was taken, so we drove across the highway to the northbound side and ate over there. It was a much bigger place with lots of stuff to buy. We left with bread, venison sticks, pie slices and a cream cheese kolache. It was all good. We'll definitely remember this stop on our next trip to Houston/Galveston/College Station.

Trip with the cousins - At sea

When we weren't stopping in ports, there was plenty of fun on the boat. S#2 & I did lots of reading.  The adults played euchre. DH, S#2 & BIL#2 played blackjack, I kept intending to go with them, but never made it. We sat through some rather risque but not very good dance shows.

The kids kept busy.

putt-putt


waterslide


setting off all the dancing/singing animals in the store


Annoying their mother by wrestling in the tiny cabin
We watched the tv.

Grease


Mr. Bean at the Olympics Opening Ceremony


More Olympics in the sports bar


We ate lots of food.

free ice cream 24 hours a day


more ice cream


the kids tried sushi


and liked it


and escargot


after dinner every night, the kids danced with the wait staff show




We played trivia.

cheering for M at the game show


intense cartoon trivia

J managed to get called up on stage at the juggling show. He was a star. Someone pointed him out in the hallway later, "Hey, there's John from the juggling show!".










The kids attended the towel animal folding class










Overall it was a great vacation.  Everyone got along, there was stuff for everyone to do, we only lost B once or twice on the ship, so it was a very successful vacation.

I think everyone is looking forward to the next cruise someday.