July 29, 2008 The dreaded garden

We've been watering it weeding it, picking things and it has gone crazy. The corn has been blown over and managed to stand itself back up more times than we can count, but we'll eat good this winter. The beans have been producing like they are on steroids and we've got tomatoes that I kid you not have to weigh 4 to 5 lbs each. I should be able to get 1 jar of salsa out of 1 tomato. They are really starting to turn red. We've got 30 some plants and guess what. I'll be canning them this weekend. I'm getting sleepy just thinking about it. We've been getting a few here and there but there are a ton getting ready to turn. Hopefully I'll have more peppers by this weekend too. What am I thinking. LOL I'm sure I'll have more peppers. If not, I'll use the ones that I canned the other night or the ones that I'm going to be canning tonight. I'm going to give bell peppers a try. I found what sounds like a yummy recipe for them.

July28, 2008 No more fish

I know you are wondering what happened to the rest of the weekend. It went by too quickly. LOL We spent Friday in the garden picking more beans and pulling up dead plants and tilling etc..... then that afternoon we broke beans to get them ready to can. Saturday was Michael's work picnic which we HAVE to attend since he is salary now. So we spent the day at the Carroll County Park/Pool. It was fun but too hot. Sunday Alex, Aimee, Mom and I went to Frankfort shopping while Michael slept in. When we got home I ran the pressure canner for 3 hours canning more beans. The aquarium has been sitting in the house waiting for a strong back to help me move it to the garage. I finally suckered Dad into helping me get it out of the house and into the shop. We are going to have so much room. The computer desk is leaving as soon as our laptop comes in. Yippeeee!!

July 24, 2008 Dolly's aftermath

Well, got a call from Dad today that they managed to get off the island this morning and are going to take their little PT cruiser rental car with unlimited mileage and get the heck out of dodge and away from the coast. It's still raining in the aftermath of the hurricane and there is no power. No place to go and get eats or drinks or even gas for that matter. They made the executive decision to drive home. Hopefully if all goes well, they will be home Friday night . Late I'm sure. :o)

July 23, 2008 Tired Alex

Alex is tired of getting up at the crack of dawn with me. Especially considering that he is up til God knows when at night. Here he is relaxing on the couch for a bit. This doesn't happen a lot so I'm enjoying his down time. LOL Most of time I am looking for key that keeps him wound tighter than a drum and going non stop. :o) He never stops talking and never ever sits still for very long at all anymore. Especially if he catches me trying to take a break then he HAS to have something be it a drink, snack, you name it. No rest for the weary or is that wicked??

July 22, 2008 Hurricane Dolly

Well, Mom and Dad are on South Padre Island and Dolly is heading straight for them. They've closed the causeway to get off the island and they are stuck at their hotel now. Dolly is supposed to make landfall tomorrow. They've been to Wal-Mart to purchase hurricane supplies as they are most likely going to be without power and water. EEK!! Looks like they are going to be in for a rough couple of days.

July 21, 2008 Hmmmm

This was a good plan to begin with. LOL Michael was given a cabinet with countertop, sink all faucets and plumbing stuff from his work. We got it home and unloaded it and it's been sitting by the shop waiting to move in. LOL It was going to become our deer/fish/rabbit/any other critter that needs cleaning station in the shop. Well, a storm came through last night and blew the crap out of it. Now we have to either haul it to the end of the road for the trashman to pick up or burn the stupid thing.

On another note. Mom and Dad left for vacation today. Aimee and I dropped them off at the airport this morning. They ended up having to deboard the original aircraft and get on another due to it being "broke". This is Mom's first flight I hope things get better. LOL When they called to let us know about the flight we also discovered that there is a hurricane heading for Texas which is where they are headed off too. We'll see.............

July 18-20 Taylorsville

This weekend we went camping. It was miserably hot and humid. We stayed in the water for most of the weekend. Michael rode on the tube after we tried to drown a couple of the kiddos. Literally. They didn't weigh enough to ride the big flat tube and the boat drug the tube and the kiddos under the water. It was quite scary. Michael on the other hand, seems to think he's funny riding the tube. Little did he know that crazy redneck wife was driving the boat. hehehehehe I tossed him off several times and he proceeded to tell me that I was driving the boat too fast. Guess I hurt him a widdle bit.

July 17, 2008 another night of beans

I was up until 2am canning beans. We are supposed to be going to taylorsville this weekend. I haven't even thought about packing and we are leaving in the morning. Luckily friend Amy came and helped me break the beans and brought her trusty pressure canner with her. LOL We finally finished up at 2. We's will be tired tomorrow.

July 16, 2008 What is it??

This thing was sitting behind my car this morning. I guess it's some sort of moth. Alex tried to squish it before I got the picture taken. I'm sure it would have made a terrible mess on the bottom of his shoes. UGH! We've got some strage critters that make their way into the garage. Last night it was a giant beetley looking thing.

July 15, 2008 pickles

The garden is producing like crazy. Dad is here to help this week with it but he and Mom and going on vacation next week so I'll be flying solo. I made 12 quarts of sweet lime pickles. They take 3 days to make so they are a bit time consuming but sooooo worth it. :o) Alex will still not even think about trying one. I keep trying to tell him that they are pure sugar. LOL Still no dice. I guess we should just feel lucky that he will eat the squash out of the garden and the green beans. Corn is another subject all together. He used to love corn on the cob and now he manages to get all the skins off of the corn and pack them in his jaw. It's a talent that Daddy and I wish he would loose. I tried to get him to eat zucchini bread and I do believe that if he hadn't seen me put the zucchini in it, he would have eaten it. LOL

July 14, 2008 Green Beans

We've been picking beans like crazy. The first picking we just cooked up and ate, this last picking resulted in 21 quarts of beans to can. :o) I don't have a pressure canner of my very own so Amy has been kind enough to share hers with me. :o) Other wise it would take 3 hours to do 7 quarts in a hot water bath. ACKKKK!!!

July 13, 2008 More Blackberries

Tonight Amy, Robbie and I picked 12 pounds of blackberries. Robbie is going to be making wine and since I'm picking and giving up blackberries from the house I get some wine. Whoohoo.

July 12, 2008 Fun with the cousins

Today we took off for Taylorsville Lake to meet us with my cousin J and and his wife A and their little one. We just pulled up in a cove and swam all day. The boys had a very rough start. Nothing to do with the other but they were both just cranky as all get out. As the afternoon progressed they were having a blast. It was a much needed break for everyone. Although I kept getting these looks from the boys like would you please put that camera away for awhile!!! A is also doing the blog and her little one is getting very tired of the camera as well. We are trying to venture off and take pics of different things to help and ease their pain. LOL

July 11, 2008 118 square bales

Michael and Robbie decided to go ahead and bale the hay today so that we can go to the lake tomorrow. They initially figured we'd get 40 bales off the front. I knew when I pulled in and say the wind rolls that it was going to be a lot more than that. By the time it was all said and done there were 118. We had them picked up and on a trailer in record time and when Dad got home we went ahead and put them in the loft in the barn. I'm sure that none of us will be able to move tomorrow.

July 9, 2008 Hay again

Today Michael is trying to get the hay out front mowed so we can bale it on Saturday. Nothing ever goes right. The mower broke 1/2 way through the field so he had to go and borrow a good buddies mower to finish up. Killed a huge cow sucker in the process. UGH! Glad that I didn't have to see it. Alex was riding the tractor with him so I won't be surprised if he isn't traumatized from the whole thing. Of course I was at work and guess what don't have a picture. LOL Oh, well at least everyone will know what we've been up to. hehehehe

July 7, 2008 Blackberries

Yesterday afternoon I picked about a gallon of blackberries and proceeded tonight to making jam. So far I've got 7 pints going. It's really easy to make and crushing the berries is good for frustration. :o) They are on in full force so I'm sure that the rest of my week will be picking more berries and making more jam. I had a picture but I guess I've deleted it from my camera.

July 6, 2008 back to same old same old

Well, vacation is over and it's back to the same old stuff here at the house. :o) Gardening, weeding, goats, laundry. You name it. We got really spoiled last week not doing anything at all. Work related that is. Fun stuff, YES!! I don't have a pic for today. The camera is MIA somewhere in the midst of camping stuff that has now encompassed the house. Michael has already gotten crusty over having to go back to work, not that I blame him.

I promise!!

I am going to update the blog tomorrow at work. How bad is it that work is the only place I have a free minute to spare. :o)

July 5th, 2008 Vacation is over. sniff sniff

Well today vacation came to an end. Check out time wasn't until 4:30 but once you get started packing up, you just want to get home. Michael went out and caught one last limit of trout before we packed up camp and headed home. It 's been a great week of relaxing with friends and family. Can't wait until next year!!!!!!! As you can tell, Alex was plum tuckered out.

July 4th, 2008

Happy 4th of July! We went out on the boat today. We have decided that we don't like this lake for the boating. All of the weekenders showed up today and the water was ridiculous. It was even rough riding on the jetski. We just headed to a nearby cove and anchored there for the afternoon. It's our last full day here and we're trying to make the best of it. Alex has been becoming more and more testy as the week has drawn to a close but all in all it's been a great vacation. We think next year we'll hit a lake that isn't so crowded with pleasureboaters. Especially ones that it takes 400.00 to fill up their giant cigarette boats. LOL Michael and Robbie ran into a guy at the gas station that said his boat was 1/2 full and it was going to take 200.0 to fill it up. Can you imagine??? I thought it was bad enough to fill up a 36 gallon tank on our boat. Guess we should be thankful.

July 3, 2008 More fishing

Michael and Robbie seemed to loose track of time fishing today. We didn't get to go out on the boat but Amy and I got more scrapbooking done. Dad had a good time but had to leave early cause their cat Tigger got hit on the road and needed to be buried. He left after breakfast much to our dissapointment. The dogs have really enjoyed themselves this week as well. Much better than being left at home I'm sure. Tonight after dinner the guys want to try walleye fishing in the tailwaters but from the bank. Since they felt bad for leaving us at camp all day they decided we should come along with them this evening. How exciting! (yeah right LOL) They did end up catching a few trout but no walleye. Michael swears he had one on but it got off. We'll never know. :o)

July 2, 2008 Out on the boat.

Today we finally decided that Hey, it's 1/2 way through vacation we're gonna have to take the boat out. It was terribly hot but the water just wasn't warm enough to want to stay in and swim for very long. We took our boat and Robbie and Amy took their jetski. Since it's the middle of the week the weekend pleasureboaters haven't arrived yet and we had a very nice day out on the water. Dad is coming down tonight to stay with us. We're going to cook fish and cornbread for him. He's so excited. We're also going to be eating the bears berries in a wonderful cobbler. LOL I forgot to mention that it was also bath day for Michael and Alex. The rest of us are quite O.K with using the bath house to shower in. Not the hubby and son. They feel like they're not camping unless they are bathing in the lake. Here they are scrubbing down.

July 1, 2008 You guessed it Camping LOL

Still haven't been out on the water yet. Michael and Robbie did get up this morning and went out on the lake trying their hands at Walleye fishing. No luck. :o) Amy and Alex and I went for another short walk. This time Alex rode his bicycle. Our plan was to really work with him this week to ride without training wheels. It's just not happening. He doesn't get to ride enough at home and we don't have a good place for him to even try so no training wheels isn't looking good. We took him to the playground for a bit and then Amy and I headed back to camp with Alex of course to do some more scrapbooking. The weather has been so great and it's not been miserable to sit at the campground we've just been scrapping our little hearts out. Alex likes the different scissors and he cuts and glues paper while we make works of art. LOLOLOL

June 30, 2008 Fishin'

There is a trout stream here at the tailwaters for the kids to fish in. They release fish from the hatchery every other day if I'm not mistaken so it's usually a really good place to fish. Alex still just likes to cast and reel so he's not doing to well in the catching deparment but he's having a blast. Michael and Robbie decided to fish there also since they weren't having any luck wading the tailwater. They did end up catching a limit each out of the stream. We'll be eating fish tonight!!!!!!!

June 29, 2008 more vacation

Today we still didn't take the boat out. The guys went fishing and Amy and I took Alex for a walk. That was fun let me tell ya. We weren't gone 5 minutes and he was crying that his legs were hurting. This went on the entire time we were walking. Let me back up for a second and say that when we checked in to camp on Friday they gave us a flyer about not feeding the bear. What Bear???? Apparantly there is a bear that has made his home in the campground. I didn't read the entire paper so I missed a very important part. :o) Amy and I had been picking blackberries like crazy for 2 days when Michael and Robbie finally told us that the paper said to stay away from the berries. LOL The bear likes them too. We didn't see the bear on our walk today but we did see a skunk. YUCK! Stopped us all in our tracks for a second while it crossed the road, giving Alex his much needed break. This is my friend Amy that went camping with us and Alex reading about all the wildlife.

June 28, 2008 Happy Anniversary

LOL Yeah right. Michael or I neither one realized that our anniversary was today. Not until Sunday that is. We were sitting around the fire and it hit both of us that we missed our anniversary. Here's a self pic of myself and Michael squatting by the cooler eating strawberries. We didn't do much today. Michael and Robbie went fishing in the tailwater and Amy and I took a 2 mile bike ride around the campground. Alex hung out with Michael fishing for a bit but that didn't last long since he wasn't catching anything. Happy 11th anniversary. :o)

6/27/08 Vacation is here

Ok, I know I skipped a lot of days in there for this week but with Michael on 12 hours a day everyday I'm keeping quite busy in the evenings taking care of the garden, a roudy 4 year old, 22 goats and 5 dogs. LOL The camera has not been on my top priority list. The last couple of days have been making preparations for vacation. A week of fun and relaxing at Lake Cumberland. We left after I got off work on Friday afternoon. It was late when we got there but here's a pic of Alex in his fishing vest. He was ready to go. :o)

June 23, 2008 McDonald's

We never thought we'd have one of those kids who everytime you went out had to go to Micky d's. Well guess what. We have one. LOL If he spies the golden arches you'd better bet he's gonna have to have a happy meal. He's also very fond of the playland. I was going to take him to Henry's Ark today but we drove all the way to Prospect only to find that they are closed on Monday's. So we ended up in Middletown at the McDonalds playing for quite some time. Aunty Jo Jo went with us. I had a Dr. appointment that afternoon so she will keep little man occupied for me while I see the Dr.