After stumbling upon some dry ice the other day (more on how later), the kids learned a little about gasses and magic potions. The pictures honestly don’t fully show the awe and wonder in their eyes at this stuff. (Please excuse the dirty dishes…)
While the temperatures outside don’t seem to agree, Fall is approaching quickly. Which means that kiddo activities are back in full force!
The girls are both dancing with Amanda Dalton this year. Nicole had so much fun last year that we all agreed Faith would love it as well.
Nicole is continuing with ballet classes and doing very well. Faith is giving hip hop and jazz a go this year. Both of the girls are so excited!
Rachel and I have been doing the P90X exercise videos the past month. In all honesty, Rachel has been doing a whole lot more than I have, but we’ve both really enjoyed the program. There is just one problem – the videos are an hour a day 7 days a week, except for the hour and a half yoga.
With all the other stuff in my life, I selfishly have been wanting to find a similar program that only takes 30 minutes a day or so instead. With the kids and all, I just don’t have the time. Plus, I refuse to get up at 4:30am like Rachel to do the videos. Rachel is pretty enough to miss some beauty sleep, but I just can’t afford to lose any more.
The first two are offered by the same company that puts out P90X, which is nice since we enjoy P90X. The last one seems a little military-like to be honest, but could be adapted to work as well.
Then, as I sat in my house staring at the filthy state that it has become something occurred to me. A new program. A free exercise video. I like to call it: Clean Your House, Jack*ss!
The principles of the program are simple and you are free to use them without charge:
I think the idea is foolproof. Come on! Join me and together we can change the world! Save time… Save money… And, clean your house. If you commit today, I’ll even throw in a second money-saving, waist-shrinking idea: Mow your yard, Dumb*ss!
With temperatures soaring, we headed to the lake for some swimming and water fun.
See, when we first bought our sailboat we had visions of anchoring and letting the kids swim and splash about in the lake, camping overnight on the boat, and cooking burgers on the water while watching the sun go down. But, honestly, the closest we ever got to any of these adventures was camping on the boat while sitting in our slip.
After meeting some new folks at the marina, we learned of a great swimming hole on the lake. So… off we went. First, we anchored successfully and then swam. The kids jumped off the boat countless times while Dylan floated on Tyler the Turtle. Good times…
After some good swimming, we sailed back to the marina at sunset. Not too shabby…
I’d like to introduce you to the newest member of the family: our 2011 Jayco 26BH.
We really enjoyed our last trailer (Jayco 23B), but the set up on it was more than we were up for so we looked for simplicity. The 26BH allows us to pull into our camp site attach the water hose and electricity and start camping. Whew…
The 23B was much bigger on the inside so we had to make some trade-offs in that department, but not having to fold out the beds and make them every time we went camping was worth it. Plus, we have real ducted air conditioning now. Woohoo!
The kids have bunk beds now and are enjoying them so far, but the tent is still their favorite. And, Mom and Dad have a real bed. We’ve only had the trailer a couple of weeks and have already taken it out twice. On the horizon is a trip to Galveston and Destin, FL. Gotta get some sand in it, ya know.
The Kelley side of the family decided to get together for a weekend of camping and family fun. So we headed to Jellystone Park in Burleson for a great weekend. This was our first time camping in a “resort” camping facility and we were really impressed! Full RV hookups, two pools, doggie park, and activities for the kid. Sure beats the state park!
All the Kelleys are doing great and enjoying life. Catching up what everyone is up to was great!
As a bonus, we were able to celebrate Rachel’s Dad’s 60th birthday together.
Worms… Yeah, I like composting with worms. The downside to the worm – even the 5 tray worm factory I use – is it is pretty darn slow. It can take months to turn food scraps into compost. So I looked for an alternative and found the black soldier fly!
These little black soldier flies – or more specifically their grubs – can break down food scraps in just days! Right now I’m adding a large salad bowl of scraps each day to these little guys and they are eating it all!
The BioPod houses the little guys and makes life a little easier for me. Before my BioPod, I built a house for my little friends and it worked pretty well, but I wasn’t able to catch them when they would make a run for it. See, these little dudes are much like humans. Once they hit puberty, they sneak out of the house to procreate. It is at this time – much like the father of a teenager – that I want to catch ‘em.
Why?
Well… I feed them to my chickens. The little grubs make a perfect protein for the chickens. Besides, at this stage of their life they are ready to morph into a fly, mate, and die. Then, their short little life cycle is compete. As for me, I let some escape to sow their royal oats and keep the life cycle going. And, others become chicken food.
I love these little guys so much I’m thinking of letting my worm factory go completely. The black soldier fly composts so much faster and easier – not to mention my chickens love ‘em. Sorry worms. It was a good run.
Learn more about the black soldier fly at Black Soldier Fly Blog and Wikipedia.
After hitting the Lakewood Parade in the morning, we headed to some friends house for some fireworks fun in the evening. First, we had the kids play with some small fireworks and then headed to the high school for a big fireworks show.
This 4th of the July we took the kids out to the local parade. While rain threatened to halt the festivities, the parade wasn’t not deterred. Instead we had a great time!
The summer has a whole ‘nother routine around here. Most days we eat breakfast and run Faith up to swim team practice. Then, come home for more swimming followed by lunch followed by more swimming. Yes, swimming is pretty much the event of the summer. With the heat bearing down on us, the parks are too hot after 9 or 10am. So…. we swim.
Sorry for not posting more, but honestly there isn’t a whole lot going on ’round here.
