Come Monday

A fleet of backhoes, loaders and workers will be showing up at our house to dig a hole for this:

That’s right.  We’re finally biting the bullet and getting our own swimming pool!!!  We couldn’t be more thrilled.  The boys are going to loooove watching the construction process.

This project has been a long time coming.  Having our own pool has always been on our wish list but neither of the two homes we’ve purchased in our 9 years of marriage has had one.  No buying a home with an existing pool has probably been a good thing since we haven’t had to deal with the maintenance and/or repair of an older pool that was not our design.

Now that we have children (one of whom is an excellent swimmer already) it’s almost a necessity.  It gets too hot in the summer to go outside and play on the playground or in the yard.  Everything we do seems to revolve around water in the sweltering summer months.   Summer in Central Florida lasts 6 month or more…  Not having to pack up all of our swimming gear and intrude on friends and family every time we want to go for a dip is going to be awesome.  Our friends and family with pools have always been most gracious about letting us come over (which we totally appreciate) but it’s not like we can just show up any time we feel like swimming.  We have to plan and schedule and, more often than not, we just don’t ask.  I hate bothering people.

Anyway, the photo above is the artist’s conception of our backyard.  The graphics are not super stunning but you get the idea.  Free-form pool, hot tub, waterfall, planters, pavers…  We’ll be adding a fence all around our yard and then a child-safety gate around the pool deck.  Our ghetto patio screen is coming down before it falls down on it’s own.  Everything is going to be wide open.   No screen room over it.  Without a screen the pool will stay warmer, we avoid tacking on a large chuck of money to our budget, we won’t provide the spiders with a nursery (you would not believe how spiders like to lay their eggs in screen rooms) and our insurance won’t go up due to potential hurricane damage (screen porches are really vulnerable).  Sure, we’ll probably have to deal with bugs flying around but that’s okay.  We don’t live in a really buggy place anyway.

So, there you have it!  We’re so excited for construction to begin!  I’ll be sure to take and post photos of the construction process for your viewing pleasure.  I’m sure you’re thrilled.

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Rainy Day Activities

Ahhh, right now Cutie Pie is in bed.  He fell asleep at the dinner table.  At 6 PM!  That’s what no nap and 5 hours of swimming with the cousins will do to a 2 1/2 year old.  Wildman in quietly playing blocks in his room with J.  It’s so peaceful here.  It’s been a good day.  Luckily, we had a wonderful afternoon of sunshine again.  Steph and I made the most of it by letting the kids go wild in the pool all afternoon.  By the end of the afternoon all four boys were completely naked and diving into the pool.  So, so fun!  The rains came back as soon as we got home.  But that’s okay.  At least we got to enjoy some quality outdoor time for a while.

In my previous post I mentioned the week-long monsoon that we experienced last week.  It was difficult being stuck indoors for that long.  The kids were bored.  I was crazy trying to keep them happy and entertained.  We were all crawling the walls in a daze of cabin fever.

One of the fun activities I let the kids partake in to get their minds off of the fact that they were stuck inside was painting with squeeze paint.  They loooooved it.  Both of them love to squeeze stuff.  Glue, paint, toothpaste…  You name it, they love it.  I had a roll of craft paper from IKEA stashed away so I tore off a big piece for each of them.  We went outside to the back porch because I don’t have a tiled craft area big enough for two preschoolers and their paint supplies.  Paint and carpet do not mix, after all.  I let them squeeze and squeeze the paints until the tubes were empty.  It was awesome.

The other fun thing we tackled last week was baking brownies.  Peanut butter cup brownies with chocolate fudge icing and sprinkles!!!  Calories, schmalories…

My little goofballs were so excited to cook with mom!

Here is a photo essay of the creation of brownies…

My boys were so helpful.  Especially when it came time to clean the batter bowl.

I’ve got to come up with more fun cooking projects for them this summer!

Memorial Day

Firstly, let me say thank you to all of our ancestors, family members, neighbors and friends who have given the ultimate sacrifice for our country and our freedom.  Our flag is flying proudly on the house and we spent some time reflecting on what Memorial Day means.  Saying “thank you” is not enough…  Without our heroes I shudder to think what life would be like.   I profoundly respect our military personnel past, present and future.

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Thankfully, we had a break in the week-long monsoon for Memorial Day.  The sun shone brightly all morning until about 3:30 PM!  It was wonderful!  After 7 straight days of rainfall, depression was beginning to creep into my soul.  It’s not a feeling I particularly enjoy.  Life is too short for feeling down.  Last week’s weather just confirms that the Pacific Northwest is not the place for me.  I need sunshine!!!  Maybe not the heat but definitely the sunshine.

We took advantage of the awesome weather by taking the boat out in the Indian River to the small spoil islands down South.  It was such fun!  It’s a cross between the Redneck Yacht Club, a family reunion and an elitist boat parade.  Needless to say, there are all kinds of people out at the islands on the weekends!

We managed to find a section of land that would accommodate the six boats in our party.  Two grills were fired up to make hot dogs and hamburgers.  The children had a blast exploring the island and the shallow sandbar.  The adults enjoyed lounging around in chairs and chatting.  To me, this is what most summer holidays are like here where we live.  It was a refreshing change of pace.  It’s like pressing the pause button on the mundane weekend tasks and it was awesome.  We needed that.

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I’ve also been busy working with J to set up our Zumba website.  It’s pretty basic right now but I’m proud of how it turned out.  I designed the logo myself.  We’ll be adding more and more fun stuff to it so check back often 🙂