Scribble and Scrabble

Category Archives: Andy

4th of July

by Heather | 0 comments

This year we went to my mom and Paul’s cottage on Lake Ontario to celebrate the 4th. We camped out Tuesday night and Ben slept in the guest cottage out back. It’s not that we didn’t want to introduce him to camping…it’s just that it was so much easier to have him sleep in the quiet cottage!

Andy setting up the tent. And yes, I took pictures instead of helping ;-)

He actually had to fix a problem with his truck when we arrived. It turned out a little stone had just gotten jammed somewhere it wasn’t supposed to be. Paul handed him a hammer as a joke, how helpful.

Tuesday night we hung out with my mom, Paul, Justin and Kate. We played darts in the garage and the girls won. I may have cheated…

Mom and Aubrey watching the game.

Paul has all these fun things hanging up in the garage. One of them is a t-shirt from a band he used to be in.

Beautiful sunset on Tuesday night.

Aubrey watching the sunset. She’s SO cute!

My mom and Paul had a party for their cottage neighbors and friends on the 4th. We didn’t really hang out with people much as we were baby wrangling ;-)

We ended up not staying for fireworks because Andy had to work the next day. We definitely had fun at the lake but a holiday with kids isn’t entirely relaxing ;-) Ben’s such a good boy, he’s just SO adventurous and there was the water, rocky cliff, steps, road, dogs, cars, people, oh my! I don’t know if next year at almost 3 will be easier than this year’s almost 2, but here’s hoping. Even though it was a lot of work, we really enjoyed the time with family!

Surprise!

by Heather | 3 Comments

This weekend we went to a surprise party for Andy’s Aunt Bonnie. She retired from teaching English and we wanted to honor her and the years she’d invested in kids. A bunch of friends and family got together at Dan and Bonnie’s beautiful log cabin home (pics from Thanksgiving).

Bonnie was really surprised! She thought friends were coming over to see her son who drove up from SC. She had no clue everyone was there for her until she walked onto the porch.

(As a side note, I’m kind of mad at myself for not getting a better picture. I had the camera all set up for inside their warmly lit log cabin and then everyone raced outside and silly me forgot to change camera settings.)

Luckily, Andy was recording the whole thing. The video is kind of long, and probably won’t mean much unless you’re family…but enjoy ;-)

There was a beautiful cake and gifts.

Sisters :)

Andy’s cousin’s youngest daughter (how do you like that explanation?) All the kids had fun playing together.

Andy’s cousin’s kids were excited to see Ben too. They remembered him from Thanksgiving!

Ben was fascinated with the four wheeler! We didn’t ride it, but he was so excited to just touch it and sit on it.

Finally, the really cool moth that was hanging out on their porch.

We were so happy we got to the spend the day with you guys! And Aunt Bonnie, we’re excited for whatever is next for you! Whatever you do and wherever you guys end up, we love you!

Father’s Day Weekend

by Heather | 0 comments

Saturday night we went out for ice cream to celebrate Father’s Day. Ice cream for dinner that is :) Sunday was pretty low key too. Andy’s Father’s Day gift was to pick out a hammock. I didn’t exactly know what kind he wanted, I just knew he’s been wanting to clear out an area of our side woods for a hammock for quite a while. We checked out a few places, but unfortunately everyone seemed to be sold out, so he’s going to have a look online. I teased him and asked “when do you have time to lay in a hammock?” but I think he’ll definitely enjoy it!

Playing with trucks together in their pajamas.

Andy even let Ben play with the little car that had been his favorite as a kid. When you push the front wheels down it lights up and plays a little song. Very cute!

Memorial Day Weekend

by Heather | 0 comments

For the past few years on Memorial weekend, Andy’s parents have come to help with house stuff. We actually didn’t do any demolition this time and instead focused on little details of past projects that never quite got finished.

Last summer we switched the house from oil to gas. We finally got rid of the 250 gallon oil tank this weekend. Andy cut off the old pipes and with his dad’s help, moved the tank outside. There is SO MUCH more space in the laundry room now.

“Ok, now what?” Haha, they managed to get it out to the road somehow and within a few hours it was picked up by a scrapper! Andy scraps stuff too, but this monster was just not worth the effort.

Andy’s dad built shelves for the storage room off the office. We don’t have an attic or basement so every space needs to be used efficiently. I would love an attic, but honestly we’ve built so much storage into the house that didn’t exist before that we’re doing alright. Plus, I’m not really tempted to hang on to everything!

Andy installing the pergo floor we picked out. We were just going to go with linoleum tile but this flooring was on clearance at Home Depot. We ended up only having 1 piece left over, crazy!

Camping stuff all nestled in its new home. We’re just leaving the drywall as is, there’s wiring and pipes that might need to be accessed so it doesn’t make any sense to finish-finish the room. Our storage freezer is at the opposite end in a cubby we made for it.

The windows in my office finally have trim too! The boys measured, cut, nailed and caulked while I filled nail holes with wood filler and put the first coat of primer on. Hopefully I’ll get back to painting them soon!

Andy’s dad installed a mirror and its edging in the downstairs bathroom.

He also put up glass shelves in the bathroom. With details like this I’d have to call that room totally finished. A far cry from this bathroom of 4 years ago.

Andy’s mom was so helpful through all of this. When she wasn’t working on a project, she was watching Ben so the rest of us could work on a project. Here, they’re enjoying Sesame Street with some graham crackers.

Jack was tremendous help.

As was Colby the Supervisor.

It was a really warm weekend too. We had some copper pipe in the garage so Andy made a sprinkler for Ben.

It even included an old kitchen sink sprayer that we used to squirt each other.

Maybe Ben doesn’t have such lame parents after all.

Next year Andy’s cousin is getting married Memorial weekend, so we’ll be all fancied up instead of grimed up. Thanks again mom and dad for helping this weekend, you’re probably as sore as we are, huh? :) And most importantly, thank you to the men and women who gave their lives so that we could enjoy the freedoms we do. So that we could be together as a family, safe to live without fear in this country. To the military families that have lost someone, my heart goes out to you. I am so humbled by your sacrifice.

There is no greater love than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13

Testing 1 2 3

by Heather | 0 comments

image

We biked a few miles of trails today, it was gorgeous out.

And I got a new phone! It takes nice pictures and it’s a smart phone so i can upload everything and blog right from it. I’d been contemplating one for a while since I always carried around my regular phone, ipod touch and camera. I used several apps on my ipod (calendar, shopping lists, meal planning, etc). My regular phone camera was terrible, so I toted the camera around. And then there was the gps to bring when I traveled places too. I really wanted to consolidate everything, so a smart phone was the way to go.

I’d always assumed I’d go with the iphone, a lot of my friends have it and rave about it. After a ton of research though, I decided to go with the Droid Razr Maxx. I stalked verizon for weeks waiting for the price to drop and it finally did. Features that sold me were the stellar battery life, 16gb onboard memory and 16gb removable microSD card, 8MP camera and front facing cam I could use for skype. Also, as much as I love apple products (I use one every day for design work) I didn’t want to be stuck with only apple apps. I really like that I can just click and drag music to the phone instead of dealing with iTunes.

If I have to rationalize with myself, sometimes mama needs fun things too. I don’t go out and get my nails done or have spa days. I don’t pay someone to dye my hair. I don’t really buy things for myself (save the occasional Iced Cap at Tim Horton’s or new camera lens). Speaking of camera, while the phone’s camera is pretty great for a cell phone it’s not going to replace my DSLR and love of photography. So those photos will definitely still be on the blog. I do really love the convenience of being able to grab my phone to get an in the moment picture and then being able to share it with you right away.

I’m still trying to figure the phone out and set everything up! Now, if it only cooked meals, cleaned the house and did laundry… :)

Whatchamacallit Answer

by Heather | 0 comments

Andy’s mom was right, this is a trap for carpenter bees.

Every summer carpenter bees start drilling little round holes in all the trim at the top of our house. We thought painting it would seal things up so a few years ago my entire summer project was to fill up all their holes with caulk and then paint over the wood. It didn’t work so well, they came back with a vengeance and just drilled new holes. Although our house had a lovely new shade of green trim so all was not lost.

Andy started looking for other solutions online and found these carpenter bee traps. Being Andy, he thought why pay for one when he could just make it? He found plans for one online, bought the cedar wood (apparently it has to be cedar) and went to work. I think it looks like a cute little bird house, but the theory behind it is that the bees fly in the little holes (same size as the ones they drill) and end up getting stuck inside the plastic bottle and can’t back their fat selves out of the holes. Andy hasn’t installed it yet, but word on the interwebs is that they work VERY well. Pretty nifty little device!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...