Work Progress

We got up the first coat of stucco last week. The recipe for stucco is simple, but it still took us awhile to get it to the right consistency. Jim and I worked for a couple hours, finishing up in the dark. Sometime later this week we will put up the second coat, and possibly the top coat. It all depends on the weather - and our schedule.








This past weekend we used our Smithsonian Museum day card to visit the Calvert Marine Museum. It is an enjoyable museum. The kids really liked the ray tank and the hands-on play room.











After the museum we stopped by the Ensminger's house for a few hours. Our kids love to play with their kids. They hit it right off last time, and were so excited to see them again. They never want to leave!











But leave we did, because it's good to get home early on a Saturday, especially when you have to teach Sunday School the next morning.
So, back to the weather. We had such a rainy weekend! We awoke on Saturday to a downpour. When we left at 8:30 there was standing water in our yard, and a small rushing stream alongside our house. It tapered off throughout the morning, but continued to shower occasionally.
Okay, now back to coming home "early" on Saturday. As we were driving back into our neighborhood I thought, "How nice! It's only 6pm. I'll be able to clean up the house, get dinner ready for tomorrow, and maybe we'll be able to have someone over after church!" That was a nice thought. Too bad that the basement was soggy. All that rain had caused a bit of a flood in our basement - the bathroom was soaked, along with half of the the sewing room and laundry room. Most of our stuff was up off the floor, and was salvageable, but we still threw lots of stuff away. I have a pile of laundry to do yet - rugs, etc. Jim and I quickly grabbed dinner and went to work cleaning up the mess. Thankfully we have a steam cleaner - it pulled up the water from the carpet, and put down a nice bleach/detergent solution to combat any potential mold/mildew. By 9pm we were exhausted and disgusted with ourselves. After turning on a fan we jumped into the shower to wash off. The kids went right to bed without a fight, and we followed shortly thereafter.
So, how was your weekend?

Less damaging than my sister

Jim let me know that this was my year... and that I will not be of as much importance as my younger sister was a while ago. I'm only subtropical, while Katrina made history as a hurricane. Oh well.

Christmas list addition

I clicked on this link, showed it to Jamie, and he promptly declared, "I want that set!"

Christmas lists

Jamie thinks that Christmas will never come - it's so far off! So many days! Adults know better... it's time to get to work on buying gifts so we don't have to fight last minute traffic at the mall.
Here are some ideas for us:

Jim
money
shawl-collar cardigan (in blue, grey, or tan/brown)
please email for his book list (it is much too long to post here!)


Laura
King Arthur Cookie Companion cookbook
Rolled hem foot for my sewing machine
Masterpiece Theatre Sense & Sensiblity dvd
any vintage sewing patterns (pre-70's, dresses and tops preferred)
Bible story pictures: Jesus miracles and parables and Early church
(these can be found on Amazon much cheaper)


Jamie
Hammer & Nails set
r2d2 keyring
(He'd be happy with just plain R2D2 as well. Toss in C3PO and he'll be ecstatic!)
StarWars legos, especially the people!
(specifically, Darth Vader and Droids)
*Anything* star wars
Webkinz stuffed animal (Lil' bluejay, dalmation, seal, charcoal cat)


Dorothy
Webkinz stuffed animal (chocolate lab, black lab, seal, black poodle)
a blanket/quilt (twin size) - blue, green or purple preferred
books
money

Nordine Baby Quilt

Congratulations to the Nordines on their new baby!
Now that it is on its way to its new owner, I can safely post a photo of the latest baby quilt I made.








Jim thinks this is the best one yet. I took my time in working out the pattern - this site has a series of coloring pages for the most common quilt blocks, so you can actually see what your quilt will look like. I used the Antique tile block, with blue, 2 shades of green, and a froggy green fabric. I colored the pattern four different ways, hung them on the wall for the afternoon, and asked for opinions at dinner. Amazingly, the same block and the same fabrics can work out into very different quilts. Unfortunately, I threw away the "losers," so you won't be able to see just how much better this option was!

Labor Day 08

Jim and I really overdid the labor part of Labor day. We started out by doing yard work, then took the kids to a park for a nice hike. We planned for it to be short, less than an mile. If you have heard our history of hiking, you will not be surprised to hear that we went the wrong way and ended up hiking for a lot longer than we had planned. It was a nice hike, though, and not too strenuous, so we didn't mind too much. (see more photos here - the same ones are on facebook)








After lunch we let the kids have the rest of the day off while we did more work. The trim boards along the side of the house were rotting off, literally. We had prepped some new boards, so we headed out to do the work of replacing them. Again, it turned out to be more work than we had planned. The underlayer also needed to be replaced! Some of our stucco will also need to be replaced, but that is a job for another day. For now, the prepped boards are the underlayer. Eventually we'll put up another run of trim boards and repair the stucco.
On top of all that, we didn't have a working refrigerator, so dinner was a little tricky. It was also trash night. So, the moral of the story? Plan less.