Tomatoes!

So on a whim I bought 50 lbs of fresh tomatoes. I've always wanted to try canning them. I use them in so many recipes (spaghetti sauce, curry, soups, salsa, chili...) and figured I should learn how to do my own. So on the day after watching the midnight showing of "Eclipse" I decided to give it a whirl. Not my best idea. It turns out that canning tomatoes is a HUGE amount of messy work. I've canned peaches before so I was familiar with the process of quick boiling to slip the skins off. Then they were quartered, boiled, poured into jars and processed for 45 minutes. It doesn't sound terrible and it wasn't that bad. But at the end of 6 hours of steamy, sticky work I only had 10 quarts to show for it. Just not enough. I paid $26 for the tomatoes and used a little more than half for my canning efforts. I can buy a #10 can of diced tomatoes from Costco for $3...
Buuuut, I am glad to know how to do it. And if I grow my own tomatoes (someday) and get a bumper crop, then I would probably do it again.
For now I'll stick with jam, which I am completely addicted to and have to make b/c it tastes SO much better than anything at the store. Anyone else canning much these days?

Pan Handlers in Training

The other day I was driving and saw a bunch of kids and moms holding signs at a street corner. I figured they were advertising for a nearby carwash, but as I got closer I realized that the kids were asking for money for their baseball team. Just. Asking.

Am I just a grouch? It totally bugged me. I know that sometimes everyone gets tired of selling wrapping paper and other fundraising junk. The car wash market is probably saturated too. But I think that just asking for money, on a corner no less, sends the wrong message. So anyway, I didn't contribute.

Some of the kids at church earned money for a big trip by delivering and laying down mulch. Sweaty, messy work. But I bet they felt good after doing it. I've seen the same thing with my own kids. I ask them to do chores around the house or in the yard. They usually complain for a bit but when it's all done they feel great. In fact I actually put them to work whenever they're all being squirrelly and crabby and it's amazing how much happier everyone is after working a bit- mom included.

I actually think that we're designed that way and there's something a little divine in that whole "sweat of their brow" concept. So back to the baseball kids, it's not just that they're learning how to beg, but that they're being robbed of the good feelings associated with an honest effort. In a culture where so many people feel they just "deserve" the things they want... I think we need to teach the happy principle of hard work. I can just hear my mother's voice whenever we would complain about helping around the house: "I am not raising a bunch of aristocrats! We work!" (Thanks mom. :)

Am I just one of those "no pain no gain" people?

PS: The above pic is of my kids detailing the minivan after a road trip. They did such a good job with minimal threatening from mom and only a handfull of fights. :)

Skirts

Here are a few of the skirts Lucy wears around town. They are very simple to make and have made dressing her fun. I've had a few girlfriends over to learn how to make these skirts and we're meeting again this week. We sort of feel like nerds lugging sewing machines around but it is SO fun to get girltime and come home with something cute and homemade.

We started swimteam in May- meaning swim practice M-F after school from 4:30-7:00. Yikes. It was pretty crazy but we had a bunch of friends from church on our swimteam and it was SO much fun to do it together. There were always people to hang out and share food with. The kids were good at bringing games to keep them occupied. BTW we're still holding out on any kind of hand held gaming system. I've almost caved a few times and still may but for now it's great to see them reading, playing chess or running around rather than glued to yet another screen! (Incidentally they're playing Mario as I type... the battle continues). Once school let our our practices moved to the am. We were there for 2 or 3 hours Tues-Friday.

More on swim team... Our meets are about 4 hours long and SO busy. I finally understand how all the events and heats work so I enjoyed it a lot more this year. We are in a less competetive (smaller) division, which I actually love b/c the meets are shorter and everything is a little more chill. Our team was terrific this year, winning all but one meet (and we lost by 6 debatable points). I was a wrangler for Daniel's group, the 6 and under boys (which basically entalled keeping them corralled between their events and lining them up when it's time to swim.) LOTS of my swimmers were scared to get in the water and there was a lot of hand holding but overall I really enjoyed it. Curtis was on Lucy duty. The bad news: he missed some of our boys' races, the good news: Lucy officially adores him. (She cries every morning when he leaves for work and races to the door when he comes home. SO cute!)

As for the boys: Daniel worked so hard this year. He hated swimming last year and I was so nervous that he would just refuse for this year but he did such a great job. He can do 25 meters of free style and backstroke. Of course he prefers to bob and float but it's good to know that under duress he's a swimmer! He has a ribbon in almost every color and even made it to the Meet of Champions.

Isaac struggled this year b/c he was in the 7-8 year old age group, meaning he was younger than many of the other swimmers. He had gotten a little cocky last year as the oldest of the 6 and under swimmers. :) But he worked very hard and made it to the Meet of Champs for his Butterfly and Free. He is such a hard worker and will be formidable next year I'm sure!

Jonah swam with the 9-10 year olds, which meant he was one of the oldest in his group and he had a terrific season. At the Meet of Champs he came in 2nd place in our entire division for Butterfly. He was also a part of a medley relay (4 boys working together to do Free, Back, Breast and Fly). They came in first in our division- it was such an exciting race! It was wonderful to watch his confidence grow as the season progressed.

So I definitely see more swimming in our future. I love that it is very individual but you are also part of a team. It's a sport you can do preggers or when you're 80, and with a pool on every corner here in Texas, it's just so accessible. Hey- I'm not complaining about Texas!! Yea!!!

Save a Turtle!

We were eating dinner the other day when our neighbor came to tell us about this friendly visitor in the road right in front of our house. He was huge, more than a foot long! Last year I found one about this size digging in my flower beds, presumably to lay eggs. She left after she noticed how crazy our house is. Smart turtle. I almost ran another one over a few weeks ago- it was right in my driveway behind my car. ArghH!




Anyway, the kids were excited and immediately started on "Operation Return Turtle to Bayou." It was successful.

String Block Pillow

Found a great tutortial here for making string blocks using the paper pieced method. I used pages from an old phonebook and it worked like a charm. String blocks are perfect for those fabric pieces you just can't part with. (I have a LOT of trouble in this area- throwing away fabric causes me pain!) Anyway, this was a quick, satisfying project. Not sure when I might consider attempting a whole string block quilt but this one makes me want to. :)