Mr. Sandman

Though I wish he’d come and bring us a dream, I’m not talking about that sandman.  I’m talking about Jack!

Daddy built us a sandbox this weekend. He used lumber he already had, the cheapest white exterior paint I could find, and a LOT of sand.  This project probably cost more than getting one of those little plastic turtle sandboxes because they don’t hold as much sand, but we wanted a nice big sandbox for Jack and Daddy wanted to build something.  He loves to build things.

A long time ago, he invented his own paint can stirrer.  He made it out of a coat hanger. 

He plugs his drill in, attaches the stir-bit as I call it, and then stirs the can of paint.  It’s like using a hand held electric mixer.  It works great. I told him to market that idea and make millions, but he figures it’s already been done.  And if it has, we can see that anyone can make their own, so it’s not all that impressive anyway, right?

Jack helped.  Kind of. 

He loved using the hammer and screwdriver when Daddy wasn’t using them.  I guess this chair looked like it needed some tightening.

Here is our beautiful new sandbox!  Rick put it directly in the sun, which is hard to find in our backyard.  He said it was so the sand would have a chance to dry out whenever it got damp.  We originally thought to put it under the trees in the shade, but for a few reasons, like acorns and hickory nuts dropping down our heads, we thought that wasn’t going to work out so well.  As you can see, if it’s a sunny day, I’m never going to get a good picture of Jack in the sandbox. 

We hadn’t figured out what to do as a cover yet, but since it was scheduled to rain for the next couple of days, we had to think of something quickly.  This junior size tent fits perfectly over the box.  We’ll see if we were geniuses or not after the rain clears.  It looks like it should work, even if it looks a little silly.

I think he’s going to love this sandbox. 

Foto Friday: Old

Today’s challenge at Foto Friday is OLD.  While I originally was going to post a self portrait, I decided I’m not THAT old, and I should post a picture of my dear husband instead.  (He just had a big birthday this month and is feeling really old)

Then I got my act together and figured out what I can take a picture of that is actually old and also has sentimental meaning to me.

These are my grandmother’s old recipe file boxes.  She died just 9 days after my wedding almost 6 years ago.  She was the sweetest little *really little* woman. I’ve ever met.  It still makes me a bit weepy to think that she’s not here anymore, but I’m looking forward to the day that I get to see her *and Granddad* again in Heaven. What a great celebration that will be!

Speaking of celebration…Whenever we would all get together as a family, Grandma would bring her famous Grandma Brownies.  They were Chocolate Marshmallow Brownies, and she was the only one who even tried to make them. They are pretty hard to master. She would fill a tin full of these brownies (two layers if it was the right size tin!) and give each family a tin to take home.  The understanding was that if you don’t return the tin the next time you saw Grandma, you don’t get any more brownies.  Needless to say, we always returned our tins!

When we were going through her house after she died, I was allowed to take home her recipe tins. You know, I’ve gone through these tins a few times and I think I’ve found 7 recipe cards for those brownies! She knew when she had a good thing going.   I am now making it my mission to be the maker of ‘Grandma Brownies’ in our family.  It takes a lot of practice.  I don’t think anyone’s complaining about that though.

Go check out other photos that are “OLD” today at Mom Tried It.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE Kim’s photo today.  It’s a beautiful old barn and she’s done an amazing job editing it.  Go see it!!

 

Girls Trip 2011

The weekend before Mother’s Day, I took a trip.  I went away for the weekend.  8 mommies got away to a cabin in the woods and did whatever we wanted and had very little responsibilities.  It was wonderful!  I took my computer with me to jot notes about what was going on.  I had a quirky, interesting, “don’t forget these moments” draft started in my Live Writer. 

Then, my computer crashed.

Foto Friday: Out of Place

Remember when I showed you the before and after pictures of my laundry room?  I’m proud to say that I’ve kept it clean!  I even added some colorful labels and a colorful tub to corral loose items. 

When I went into my laundry room yesterday, I saw something that was out of place. 

Can you see it?

No, not the spatula sticking out of the tub.  I use that to push down the diapers into the water when they’re soaking. 

There it is.

Mater wanted to help out with the laundry yesterday. 

Thanks for your help, Mater!

(Don’t forget to visit Mom Tried It and see other Foto Friday submissions for today’s theme Out of Place.  You can see last week’s theme BLUE here. )

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On a completely unrelated note, I wanted to share with you that I lost my hard drive two weeks ago. It was rough, but God saved all my pictures, so I’m not crying as hard as I could be.  I also figured out how to get my music files back onto my computer from my iPod, so I didn’t loose my 2, 250 songs!  So, in the scheme of things, it wasn’t that devastating. 

One thing I did loose that is more of an annoyance than anything is my Live Writer.  That’s the program I use to write my blogs.  All my posts are saved online with Blogger, but Writer had all of my posts listed in it’s storage so I could easily link to a previous post with no fuss.  I had even started a post on my Girls Trip 2011 but lost it in the crash.  Oh well.  I’ve since downloaded Live Writer again and it will store all of my posts from here on out.  No biggie I guess.

I hope you all have a great weekend! We’ll be celebrating Rick’s birthday with his folks coming down to visit tomorrow.  Happy Birthday Wonderful Husband!!