Playhouse Progress

We made a lot of progress this week on the playhouse getting the roof, trim, windows, air vents and door all installed! I found myself learning how to use a table saw and nail gun so that I could help Curtis during the week when my dad wasn't there.  I never thought I would learn to do those things or at least not yet. It was a little scary at first but it didn't take too long to get used to both. I'm glad I was able to learn to use those things during the week so that by Saturday I was able to help things move even quicker when my dad came to help again.

This was Thursday night learning how to cut pieces for the trim around the door.

By Friday we had the door trim on and had hung the door.

Even though we got the door hung it wasn't closing properly. My dad was able to figure out a way to fix it while Curtis was working on the roof Saturday morning. After getting the door fixed I moved on to working on the window trim in the back and my dad worked on installing the windows.

I asked Garrett to take a picture and I thought I said from the side but this is the view he got of me using the nail gun.

He even got this shot, proof that what I was holding was indeed a nail gun. It was heavy!

After I finished the window trim I went up to the roof to help Curtis. It seemed to take forever and both of us had jello feeling legs after we were done, him especially.  Right toward the end of nailing down shingles both Garrett and Jack hopped up there with us so they could hammer in a few of them.

Hanging the door handle.

The view from the back window.

The view from the front window. My grandma dropped by to see the project. I think this was the first time she saw it in person.

The door was built by Curtis's dad and is almost completely done. I just need to spray it with a sealer to protect from the weather. I was able to pre-spray most of the trim boards on Friday while Curtis was working in the office but we did not get the trim around the door sprayed yet either since we installed it on Thursday night.

Here's what the back looks like finished.

And here's the front.

The girls love it! Actually, all of the kids love it.

Let the Summer Fun Begin!

Sunday night while Curtis and I were on our walk Nikki was back home looking for something to make. When we got home she was apparently mixing up some "Frog Bread". I have never heard of Frog Bread until now and it makes total sense when you see how the dough is shaped! However, it took a lot longer to make than she thought so we were up until at least 11:30 that night waiting for it to bake. Here are some pictures of how it turned out.

It looked so cute before going in the oven!

Not so cute after coming out of the oven but it still tasted good! The eyes had fallen off so she put them in place with toothpicks. The middle of the eyes were chocolate chips.

Ever since this experience Nikki has been on a baking/cooking high. The very next day on Memorial Day, we were invited over to my sister's house for a BBQ with our two families and mom, dad, and grandma. We were asked to bring salad but Nikki also wanted to make the Frog Bread again except this time she made them into little turtles. They turned out so cute before and after. We were in a hurry to get over there and had to bake them at Tamara's house. I didn't get a picture of before but they looked and tasted so good after.

She enjoyed finding and baking this recipe so much that on Tuesday she decided to look up some other recipes to try. Nikki found recipes for crepes and chow mein, wrote down any ingredients that we might need, then got some money from Curtis and walked down to Walmart with her friend Angie to buy them. She was too impatient to wait for me to drive her as I was waiting for friends to come pick up the remainder of our dirt pile, leftover from digging out our patio. The weather was in the 80's that day and so when she returned she was hot, exhausted and had to take a little nap. We decided that crepes would be easier and faster to make than chow mein so we had crepes for dinner that night. Neither of us had ever made them before but they turned out pretty good. Unfortunately I did not get a picture but next time we make them I will. Last night we made the chow mein for dinner and it was a lot of work but we both enjoyed working on it together and it turned out pretty good. First time for either of us making this too! Amazingly we both still had plenty of energy afterwards and Nikki really wanted to have dessert. Since she bought way more carrots than we needed for the chow mein I told her to find a carrot cake recipe. So she did!  Since we were nearly out of flour we had to make a quick trip to the store. Then got straight to work baking it when we got home. It turned out to be another late night but it was worth it! The chow mein and cake were very good and I'm not going to lie, this is a dream come true for me. I have been waiting for the day when Nikki would want to willing help me with cooking and baking. Not only did she do that but she's the one that found all of these recipes!  We're both loving this time we have shared together!

We worked together on cutting and prepping ingredients before we started cooking.

We doubled the recipe so it made a lot and almost didn't have room in our pan.

Charlotte kept telling us that she didn't like Chinese food and that she didn't want to eat it. I told her she needed to at least try it. She ended up chowing down on it and ate most of it without me coaxing her to keep eating so I think she kind of liked it.

Garrett had his friend Austin over so he ate dinner with us as well. I think they all liked it for the most part except Jack didn't want to eat the green veggies in it like the celery and cabbage. 

We didn't have two round cake pans and when we tried borrowing from the neighbor there's was bigger than ours so reluctantly Nikki said to use our two square pans. The carrot cake turned out delicious anyway! Everything she's made this week has been from scratch. She's finding out how much fun it is!

Yesterday all of the kids turned in their electronic devices to the schools (laptops for middle and high school, Ipads for elementary). It was our last little good bye to school for the year so I decided we needed to get some fun summer activities to do for the kids especially since it has felt hot like summer this week. The boys went to Walmart with me and helped pick out some stuff.

Garrett is hooking up a sprinkler toy that sprays water and toy balls out when attached to the garden hose. It is also anchored into the ground with a spike.

The high light was the new plastic pool that we bought. Last year we had gotten an inflatable pool and it popped after the first or second use. Not worth it to buy those kind. We bought the biggest plastic pool they had at Walmart. The kids even put the end of the little slide in there and would slide into the pool. 

The girls are ready with their water guns.

All these kids had a blast.

I was so hot by the time we got everything set up and sun screen on the kids that I decided to cool off with them.

We also bought a bubble blower machine.

Garrett invited his friend Austin over so they could have a water fight. Playhouse versus the ground! Even I got in on the water fight. I took Jack's place and at one point there were 4 kids (Garrett, Austin, Charlotte, and Alice) against me but that's okay. I would hide underneath the playhouse and continually come out and shoot them and they would shoot down at me. Good thing I had sunglasses on so I didn't get water in my eyes! It was fun!

Later Garrett and Austin decided to use the water guns to shoot bubbles.

Curtis spent most of Memorial Day (Monday) and yesterday evening working on the playhouse. Here's the progress he made so far.

Getting the front walls nailed on.

Cutting out the window.

Attaching the roof forms.

Our friends Monica and Seth were in town visiting so they came over to hang out Monday night after we returned from our BBQ at my sister's house. Seth jumped right in and started helping Curtis. 

Last night Curtis got the roof boards on.

It's coming along and the kids are loving it!

Last Week of School

I thought this week would never come! Finally the kids have finished with school and having to do distance learning from home. I'm really hoping they go back to school in August. I think all of us like it better that way.

Earlier this week Nikki created her first resume and took in an application to hopefully work along side her cousin Ellie at Subway this summer. Ellie had told her to bring in the application herself and to do it when she and the hiring manager were there. So that's what she did. I drove her over there Tuesday morning and waited in the parking lot while she took it in. She felt it went really well because not only did she get to meet the hiring manager but she had an interview right then and there. Nikki said she felt it went a lot better than her first interview that she had with Sonic a couple weeks ago. She still hasn't heard anything from Sonic or Subway unfortunately and she has submitted applications online to several other places. No luck with anything so far. She really wants a job this summer so she can start saving money for a trip she and her best friend Angie are planning for after graduation in 2 years.

Jack had submitted a video of himself playing the song from Tetris for a school talent show. We found out last week that he was selected to be in the final talent show video. The music teacher, Miss Keller, said she had a lot of editing to do on it to cut clips from everyone's talent videos who made it so Jack has been anxiously waiting to see the final video. We still haven't received the link for the video. Hopefully it will be done by Tuesday since tomorrow is Memorial Day.

Garrett was also anxious this week to find out if he had made it into jazz band for next school year. He had to submit a video audition by the 14th. His band teacher said he would let students know early this week. Well, by Wednesday he was feeling really anxious. And finally on Friday he emailed his band teacher to find out about it. His teacher emailed him back and said "You made it". He was SO excited to get that news and emailed his teacher back and said he was excited and see you in jazz band next year! I told him I expect a lot more practicing out of him this next year. We slacked of this past year because the grading changed in his school to where they were no longer grading his practice time. They just took weekly playing test and see how well they are doing. Either way, he's excited!

This is the drum set Garrett got for Christmas this year. Apparently it's missing another type of cymbal, the ride cymbals. He now thinks we have to get them since he made it to jazz band.

We had a lot of rain this week and my flowers that I had received as Mother's day gifts were loving it.

I really love these flowers and the color combination. I planted these in the spot where our yellow flowered bush died out in front of our porch. Can't wait to see what they'll look like this summer.

This year we received a flower for Mother's day from our ward. It was delivered to our front door. Normally we get chocolate, which I love, but I was actually pretty happy to get a flower this year. I planted this in our little planter box we built on the side of our shed. We haven't really been planting anything there the past several years. The only thing that grows in them are the chives we planted years ago that come back every year on their own. Now that we have a nice patio to go sit on over there we want to create some nicer looking scenery.

On Thursday I saw a post on our ward facebook post that Brother and Sister Lakey were giving away a large table. Our current table is only meant to sit 6 people but we squeeze all 7 of us on it. We have been wanting a bigger table but just weren't ready to make a purchase yet. So when I saw that this table can sit up to 12 people and came with 8 chairs, I jumped on it. This table is definitely bigger than our old one. It's almost a little too big as it is not only longer than our old table but also wider. I was not liking it at first because it's so big and because it is an old table but I think I'm getting used to it. Nikki and Jack are the only kids who say they don't like it. It's hard to complain since it was free though.

Sister Lakey had started to paint the chairs but never finished because Brother Lakey said he liked the natural look better. It would have been nice if they had finished painting the chairs though since they painted half of them already. Oh well.  

Since we finished the patio project we moved on to our next project, a playhouse/play set. We started this the beginning of this month and we're only about half done but it's looking really good. It reminds me of the playhouse my dad built when I was a kid.

The placement of the main posts. Curtis and my dad dug holes and cemented the post in place with concrete.

Starting the floor frame.

Placing brackets for the beams.

Garrett loves helping.

Any chance Garrett gets to use a hammer he's all over it.

Laying the flooring on. We used a special kind of decking that is weather proof and looks nice.

We made it tall on purpose because there's an irrigation thing behind it in the corner that the city guys have to be able to get to every year. So we'll be leaving it open underneath as well.

We got all of the kids up there and then they decided to bring our cat Sage up there too.

She liked it for a little while but then was ready to come down.

This is our concrete pad for the base of the ladder. The night we did it and left it to dry, one of the cats left their mark, or should I say footsteps. Kind of cute I think but they are so light I know they won't last long before they rub off. We're pretty sure it was Stardust.

Yay, the ladder is finished!

The view I have when sitting  up on the edge of the floor of the playhouse. 

Friday night Curtis, the boys and I went to Home Depot and picked up our siding, stain, and other materials. So while Curtis and my dad were working on the wall frames we were busy painting stain on all 9 of the siding boards we bought.

Building the back wall frame, which includes a window.

This is what it looks like now after working on it all day yesterday. I'm so thankful to my dad and husband for working so hard to build this for the kids. 

The girls are loving it but all of the kids are excited. The boys were talking up there saying how they can have a clubhouse up there. We're planning on getting a couple of hammocks to hang up underneath and Nikki's excited for that. I'm not going to lie, I will be excited to use them too. Then we'll have a slide on the right side of the balcony. I can't order one right now due to the COVID 19 restrictions so not sure how long before we get to add it. We'll also have a post coming out the middle for a swing set. It's turning into a much bigger and more expensive project than we originally thought but I think it will be worth it. They will have so much more fun on this than they did the trampoline. We gave away the trampoline last Fall to our niece Aubrey because our kids were hardly ever using it. That's when we got the idea to build a playhouse instead.

Today was a nice day. We did our usual Sunday services at home in our front room with Curtis blessing the Sacrament and our son Garrett passing it to everyone. We have been using medicine cups to serve as our sacrament water cups. Who knew we'd be using them for things other than medicine. After our short meeting we quietly did other things while Curtis put our pork in the Instant Pot so that we could enjoy some delicious pulled pork sandwiches for our dinner later. Right after dinner Curtis and I decided to go on a walk but we wanted to drive to a path to walk on. It happened to be over by where his parents live so after our walk we stopped in to talk and play a game. I also got to see the door for the play house that Curtis's dad is making for us. It's a split door where the top and bottom can open separately. It looks really nice.

Nikki had her bird, Neptune, out of the cage and put him on my shoulder. He started to nibble on my hair and my cheek so I took some selfies with him. It was cute.

Curtis and I drove to a path neither of us had been because we wanted some new scenery on our walk today. We saw parts of town we had never seen before. We have both lived here our whole lives and this was an older part of town. It's called Stoddard pathway and a big portion of it used to be railroad and was now a gravel walking path. The first part of the path was the prettiest with an asphalt path and long tall grass and trees. We walked from Greenhurst Rd clear over to 2nd street and back.

I look forward to going on walks together without the kids where we can talk and keep walking without stopping multiple times. It doesn't happen as often as I would like so I enjoy while I can.  The weather was nice too. It started off with a nice breeze but on the way back the breeze died down and we started to get hot and very thirsty. It turned out to be about a 3.5 mile walk.

This was a really beautiful spot.

We watched a Book of Mormon video and had a small discussion for our Come Follow Me lesson this evening. It's hard to do too much when you have kids who have short attention spans. Today we watched the video about Alma the younger and his conversion. Now we're going outside to enjoy another little camp fire on our new patio.