What-What?! Week of April 17th

This past week was kind of a slog, like the week before it (and the week before that...).  This weekend, we've mostly just worked on household stuff.  Last night, we ate dinner outside on the patio, because the weather was just too lovely to waste.

Lowe's Build and Grow - Bird Feeder

Thought I took pictures of all three kid's feeders, but apparently not.  This one is Saffron's.  She put a lot of time and effort into painting it.

Last weekend, the kids made and decorated bird feeders.

Reading the directions?  Why yes!

Building...

Reading the directions more.

Painting, which was very popular with Saffron and Oz.

Corwin decided to go play with a big stick instead.

But eventually he came back.

Then they played with bubbles.

What-What?! Week of March 13th

This week was terrible.

A good friend passed away on Wednesday, so there's been all that.  Then work was pretty awful the entire week as well -- nothing was working like it was suppose to.  I spent two and a half days testing a feature that should have taken no more than a day to do.  Granted, it involved 7 browsers, 3 data sets, and 4 tests per set for a total of 84 individual tests, but it still should have been faster than that.

Lowe's Build and Grow:  Monster Truck Series

So by the time the weekend came 'round, we needed something else to do.  The husband and I took the kids to the Lowe's Build and Grow event, where they made themselves monster trucks.  We actually have another monster truck set that we still haven't put together, but that will happen... sometime.  For now, they have these to play with.  The kids all did a good job building them and seemed very into it -- sometimes when we sit down to do these, they'd really just rather play than build.

This coming week, I'm going to a Home Depot workshop and building a two shelf vegetable holder thingy.  I'm looking forward to that -- it'll be a weekday evening, so a bit crazy to get to, but probably a nice break from the grind.

That's it for this week.  Next week the weather's suppose to be good, so we might go hiking or out to Marysville's 125th anniversary festival, but we'll see.

What-What?! Week of November 15th

Not too terribly much happened this past week.  It has been pretty cold here, with highs in the upper 40s and lows in the mid 30s.  And living in a plain 60s era house, this means that it's cold in the house as well.  Blah.

Lowe's Build and Grow

The kids did the Lowe's Build and Grow project yesterday, which was a pull back racecar.  Oz finished his first, then proceeded to drive it all over the rest of us while the big kids did their own.

I taught the kids how to play Checkers.  They've been having a good time with that.  It's also a nice change from the other games we have which use a million little cards, like Candyland.  Those always turn into a huge mess.

And now, how about some Legos?

This is Osric's robot, which is remarkable because it's the first robot he's build with moving parts -- he bends at the waist!

A tiny robot Corwin made.


And a catapult thing, because why not?


And his missile system, which features frequently in his robots.

Hopefully next week will be better.  It probably won't be warmer, though. :P

What-What?! Week of October 18th

So, recently I've taken to not writing my blog post until Sunday morning, rather than a day in advance.  This is nice because it gives me more time on Saturday to do things, but not so great because I've been sleeping in until 10:30 or later on Sundays.  This week, I've really been dragging and needed the sleep.  I feel SO much better now.

Anyway, so this past week, we had friends over and made the last Lowe's Build and Grow project, which is a haunted bird house:

We haven't put them up outside yet, but we will.  Possibly on the back fence or something.

I also made "quicksand" with the kids (a mix of water and cornstarch, along with food coloring), which was a lot of fun, but extremely messy.

Mixing in the poor creatures who fell in.

Saffron opted to use all ponies.

The huge mess.

 Yesterday morning, the husband and I took the kids to the thrift store to shop for costume clothes and pajamas.  Had to buy PJs for the kids, since they've outgrown last year's.  Corwin actually cried earlier in the week, because he was so disappointed about the selection of pajamas in our house.  We also bought books, like we always do, including the Lego Star Wars visual dictionary, which is a pretty serious thing:

 

Oh, yeah, and we also have a massive mushroom in our backyard:

Okies, that's all for this week.  I'm gonna go grab breakfast, and by breakfast, I mean lunch. :P

What-What?! Week of August 9th

Oh my goodness, I am so embarrassed!  I totally forgot that today was Sunday. >.<

Thursday, we picked up 75 pounds of peaches from a local farm.  It was a screaming good deal, and I'm sure we won't run out of peaches for a good long while.  Today, Saffron and I blanched 25 pounds of them, and then the husband and I cut 'em up and froze them.  It is so convenient to have a kid who's big enough to help out in the kitchen.  I'm not at the point of trusting her with a paring knife, but she was fine washing and stacking peaches for me.  Eventually these peaches will be turned into cobblers, jam, crisps, put on top of ice cream, and so on.

Yesterday, the husband barbequed us some beef and chicken... and peaches!  We ate them as dessert, with brown sugar and cream.  I have been wanting to try this forever, and we are totally doing it again.

Lowe's Build and Grow

Saturday, I took the kids to Lowe's for the Build and Grow event.  We wound up taking them home and doing them here, because the local Lowe's just has an abysmal setup.  This week's project was the Hulk's tank, though Osric kept referring to him as "the ork".  I blame World of Warcraft and Lord of the Rings. :P

Must... not... eat... truck!

In other news, last week we planted flowers and cucumbers, and now have flowers sprouting by our front door!  The kids have been helping, and are really excited.  No sign of cucumbers yet, but I'm sure we'll see something soon.  Next week I'll see about taking some pictures of our planter box and flower sprouts, for sure. :3

What-What?! Week of July 12th

This week was okay.  We spent mostly just doing the normal stuff.  The husband worked a bunch of overtime and had other things, though.  Friday, he left the house at 9:45am, then didn't come home until after midnight.  He had a dental appointment, then other errands to run in town before going to work.

Lowe's Build and Grow

Rubber Ducky stands guard in the background.  Osric's has no stickers, because they were too eager to put it together. :P

Yesterday, I took the big kids to the Lowe's Build and Grow event, where I met up with another mom, and we took all the children over to her place to play and put the kits together.  Only Corwin built his, though, because Saffron was too busy playing on the trampoline. :P  The mom I met up with also homeschools in the same style, has kids the same ages as mine, and conveniently lives across the freeway from us.  So we're planning on doing some more activities together.

Corwin built this maze, filled it with monsters, then put a hero character at the beginning.  All he needed was some dice and character sheets for full DnD nerdity. :D

Next weekend, my parents are visiting!  It will be the first time we've seen them since we left in June of last year.  Everyone here is quite excited. :)  I gotta think up some activities for us to do, though.  I'm sure that the kids will beg to play some board games, though, so we'll do that for sure.

What-What?! Week of June 28th

This post is late because I was sleeping.  I have no regrets.

It has been legitimately hot here.  In fact, I think that this is the first time since we've moved that it has been this hot; mid- to high-80s.  By Thursday, it's suppose to be up to the 90s.  Happily, it cools down pretty quickly at night, but we have an old house; leaky windows, and no A/C make it uncomfortable during the day.  At least it's not 100 degrees or whatever like in California.

Yesterday, I took the big kids to Lowe's for the Build and Grow thing.  The project was Captain America's motorcycle, and the second part of a six-part Avengers set.  This was probably one of the poorest designed projects we've done a these events; there were various parts that came glued together, and in the course of hammering everything else together, they tended to fall apart.  Otherwise, the kids had fun.

The husband picked up a little kit to do with Ozzy, so they made a pirate ship together:

It has a retractable plank.

The husband also picked up a Viking hat from the thrift store:

He insisted on yelling "BLASTOFF!" the whole time I was taking pictures.

When we were playing with water yesterday, the kids started to fill it up and dump water on people.  Well, actually, no, that's what the husband and I were doing.  To Oz.  But he paid us back for it; he surreptitiously filled the hat up with water left over in the hose, then snuck up to us grown-ups, and dumped it!  It mostly got me wet, but the husband's arm got a bunch too.  But we deserved it, so you know. :P

Found some pictures of the big kids too (just in case you thought Ozzy was my favorite :P ):

There were other things I was going to post, but I have forgotten them all.

Oh!  Lego has announced another set of female scientists: LEGO Reveals Female Scientist Minifigures.  I'm pretty excited about the paleontologist, but then I would be, because dinosaurs are awesome.

What-What?! Week of June 14th

Where did this week go?  What did I even do? It felt very long, but was pretty unproductive.  I suppose that, since the house hasn't burned down, the kids have been fed and schooled, and work has been worked, we'll count it as a win. :P

Iron Man, hanging out with the baby wipes. :P

I did take the big kids to the Lowe's Build and Grow clinic yesterday, where they built themselves an Avengers jet.  This is the first time we've gone to the Marysville store to do this, and it was certainly different than the Everett one; at Everett, there are stacks of wood that are used as tables, while in Marysville, you sit on the floor.  This was a bit annoying at times, but it did seem like the kids spent less time trying to run a hammer into their faces, since the project was farther away from said faces.  The poor mom sitting next to us was really frustrated by the subpar instructions, but I did find this to be one of the easier projects.  The next one is in two weeks, and the project is going to be Captain America's motorcycle.  I might have to sign Ozzy up for that one, too, because he is just crazy for motorcycles.

Oh, I forgot to talk about what the husband made for my birthday dinner!  It was a tri-tip roast, barbequed Argentinian-style, with chimichurri sauce.  The chimichurri sauce was especially delicious, with earthy flavors and a good amount of heat.  It was extremely green.  We ate it on pretty much everything, it was that good.

This past Sunday, the husband and I cooked German food; he made pork schnitzel and cabbage salad, while I made spaetzle.  It was a great comfort food meal, perfect for a Sunday night.  And we cooked together, which is always fun. :)

Oh!  I know what we did!  We got a baby pool:

Fill 'er up!

And... relax!

What-What?! Week of March 1st

Last week was crazy, while this week was just a grind.  It hit Wednesday, and I was ready for it to be the weekend.

I spent most of my time at work this week reading drivel from sexist, racist, homophobic websites (usually any two, but some had all three!).  It has been a huge reminder of how repugnant people can be.

I have also read many conspiracy theories this week, but thankfully the people who frequent those websites seem to be far less offensive.  Sometimes quite strange, but probably harmless.

I still have it way, way, way better than the people who work as internet content reviewers.

Anyway, on to happier things.

Took my daughter to her second Girl Scouts meeting.  She had an excellent time, though it was a bit disorganized.  This is a new troop, though, and no one has ever been a troop leader before.  So, yeah.  It'll get better, I'm sure.  They learned the pledge, and the law, and some songs.

Yesterday, I took the two big kids to Lowe's to do the Build and Grow project.  For various reasons, we've missed the last two, so it'd been a while.  They both seem to have improved their hammering skills a lot, and did a lot more without help this time.

A Visual History of United States Spacesuits via Imgur

I saw this through Reddit, and it is a fascinating read.  All the facts that I checked seemed to be right on, so it's pretty accurate, too.  It was interesting to see how the boots changed over time; sometimes looking like plain old leather boots (that first one!), sometimes looking suitably astronautical.

There's also some interesting discussion and links on the Reddit thread here, though watch out, as Reddit can be vulgar.

What-What?! Week of November 9th

This week has been good and bad.  The husband got a raise, but I spent the middle of the week terribly sick.  It was only a cold, but what a cold it was. D:

My job is going well.  The cool thing about my job is getting to look at bits and pieces of other peoples' interests.  I have now seen a lot more boutique clothes, sports equipment, shoes (lots and lots of shoes!), and obscure parts, like turntable platter mats.

Music:  Chopsticks... on a Tuba?

I ran into this piece of music through work.  It is variations on Chopsticks (the classic piano piece) as done by a tuba quartet.  A tuba quartet!  How awesome is that?!  It sounds like it should be in a cartoon of some sort.  Something with Bugs Bunny.  The piece is only 3 and a half minutes long, so give it a listen. :)

Lowe's Build and Grow: November's Science Lab

This month's Lowe's project was a science set, complete with project ideas, a beaker, and a flask.  It was a bit of a disaster at the store, because I had all three children with me by myself.  Luckily, this project doesn't have a lot of pieces to manage, and the big kids got through it.

That afternoon, the husband and kids did one of the experiments -- make a volcano.  This is pretty classic stuff, with vinegar and baking soda.  The kids used strawberry Jell-O to make the foam red... smelled good, too (better than straight vinegar, anyway).  All three of the kids enjoyed watching the foam explode out the top of their flasks, and watching to see how long it would foam for.  Corwin's flask went on for quite a while -- ten minutes, at least.  Later today we'll do another experiment.