Bathroom Floors

Remember this????

It's been sitting on Taylor's side of the bed so that every time he gets up he trips over it or scrapes his leg. He hasn't been procrastinating. This was the first weekend we have been home since we put down the floors. His crazy wife likes to be on the go in the summer. So finally we had a free weekend.

This is how our bathroom looked before. Not horrible, but not great.

We probably wouldn't have spent the money to put down new floors, but since we had them....

Taylor did this.

The kids' bathroom had a similar floor to ours. Since we have replaced every floor in the house except the carpet in the kids' rooms, we thought why not?

Taylor had been looking at these tiles during our many trips to Lowe's this summer. They are new and much easier to lay than ceramic tile. It was a very inexpensive way to do such a small space so he decided to go for it.

You really can't tell that it isn't ceramic tile.

Look at that precision around the toilet. After totally moving the toilet out of our bathroom and then resealing it, he worked really hard to just make the tiles fit around this one. I was very thankful for this. Helping to move the toilet is the only role I played in this project since the kids were home, but I hope to never do that again. I got that gunk stuff on me and wanted to throw up. It was not a pleasant experience.

I must say that Taylor continues to impress me. I did not marry a handy, do-it-yourself guy, but I have watched him evolve into one. Our combined cheapness, but desire to have a nice home motivates him. I am convinced he can learn to do almost anything (if he has his you tube videos). He has worked so many hours on projects to make our house beautiful and I love my home even more because of that. He finished these two projects this weekend even though he has a million other things to do - paperwork for refinancing the house, tons of reading for his D.Min., church projects. He spent his weekend doing this and swimming with the kids because he knew those things were important to us. Then got to church at 6:00 this morning to get some of his D.Min. reading done before the day began. I am thankful for all his hard work.

Adventures in Grilling Part 3

Thursday night was Sophie's birthday meal and our friends, Victor and Courtney, were coming in from Waco. I talked Sophie out of the frito pie suggestion and we decided on quesadillas. We were almost deterred by the rain, but real grillers persevere.

We started out with an appetizer, number 9 on the list, grilled guacamole. We consume a large number of abotados (avocados) at our house so this was right up our alley. I halved and pitted some avocados and halved a red onion and Taylor threw them on the grill.

I chopped up a tomato and chopped the onion and a garlic clove in the food processor.

Then I mashed the avocados and stirred it all together. I added lime juice, cilantro, and some salt. VERY yummy. This one we will be doing again.

Then for the quesadillas (#88) I got the kids on the corn again. Then we grilled it and cut it off the cob. I chopped up some more of the red onion and mixed it with the corn, chili powder, and a little bit of mayo to bind it all together. Then I put it on a tortilla with some grilled chicken and cheese and we threw that on the grill for a few minutes.

It was really good, too. Once again I was busy talking to company and didn' t take a picture until I had started eating it, but I would recommend numbers 9 and 88.

Adventures in Grilling Part 2

Wednesday night we had the Peacocks over and since they're such good friends we decided we could experiment on them. I had a chicken in the freezer so I decided to cook it in the crock pot in this Caribbean Jerk marinade. Of course it made me think of fruit so I went to our trusty list to see what they suggested for grilled fruit. I found number 20 on the list that said to grill pineapple or any fruit and then make up this interesting dipping sauce. So I chose pineapple and mango. I had to watch a you tube video to figure out how to cut up the mango and found that there really is an easy way. It was very helpful.
Then it was time to make the sauce. It was peanut butter, soy sauce, chili sauce, basil, and warm water to thin. We couldn't get it the right consistency so Carey added some toasted sesame oil and then we just kept throwing ingredients in there until it looked right.
I didn't get the pretty grill pictures this time because I was too busy talking. I had never had grilled mango, but I really liked it. Taylor thought the sauce with the fruit was a wonderful combination. Carey and Bill thought it tasted like salty peanut butter, but they liked it. I, not being a peanut butter fan, didn't care for it at all. The grilled fruit alone was really good though, and blended well with the flavor of the chicken (and I added in some rice).

Birthday Girl!

Yesterday Sophie turned 6. Since we had already had her birthday party we had a pretty calm day. Taylor got her a balloon bouquet and her presents were out when she got up.

The was the year of the American Girl doll for Sophie. Her face in this picture says it all.

Grammy and Bumpaw got her the doll and everyone else got her clothes and other accessories to go with it.

The doll, Sally, has not left Sophie's side since she opened her, much to Spot's dismay. Up until yesterday morning Spot was the one who went everywhere with us. Unfortunately, Spot has been sitting on the kitchen table where Sophie left him when she got up yesterday. Poor Spot!

Sally does everything Sophie does. She has watched a movie with Sophie, eaten snacks, gone to multiple stores, had a broken arm fixed with band aids, gone out to eat, and had her clothes changed over and over. Sophie tries to make sure her clothes coordinate with Sally's and their hair must be done the same as well.

We let Sophie pick where we went out to eat for lunch yesterday and she chose her favorite place - China Garden. You can get all the shrimp you can eat right off the buffet. It doesn't get much better than that. Sophie's friend, Avery got to come to lunch with us, too (along with Sally of course).

We always make sure Sally is buckled in nice and tight. After all, she did cost about as much as Sophie did.

Last night we had some friends come in from Waco to visit. Sophie wanted quesadillas and you know out of 101 grilling recipes there was one for quesadillas. We'll cover the meal in another post. After dinner we has cake and ice cream.

Then both the girls were worn out.

If you are not a family member you might want to stop reading at this point because I'm going to gush and it might get a little long. Sophie blesses our family every single day. She has a sweet and sensitive spirit and longs in every situation to do the right thing. She is learning to deal with her imperfection as she grows and sometimes it is hard on her little heart.

Sophie has a real thirst for knowledge. She loves to read about animals, insects, and nature. She likes to study about places we travel to or would some day like to see. She loves to draw pictures and do crafts. She is a neat freak and likes order. She has a hard time having friends over to play because they often mess up her room. We are learning to be more generous with our friends in this area, but it is a real struggle for her. Her room is always neat and picked up, without any prompting from me. If only this were true of every family member :)

My girl has a very tender heart towards God and his Word. She has not "walked the aisle" in a formal sense, but I believe God has a hold of her heart. She loves to sing songs to him and write about him during church.

Almost a year ago when I was sending Sophie off the kindergarten, I was really struggling with letting her go. On the first day of school I was sitting on my swing on the back porch before everyone was up praying for her and her first day. I can remember telling God that she was mine and I was scared to let her go. I'm not one who says God speaks to me often, but immediately I remembered she isn't mine. I had her all to myself and been blessed by her for 5 years, and I felt like God was telling me it was time to let her bless others. I have to trust Him with her life. This letting go of control is the hardest thing I've found in my life as a parent. And yet God proved faithful. I saw over and over how Sophie was blessing the lives of teachers and students at her school. I've had teachers tell me that she is the first one to notice when a child is left out or upset and she always stops to comfort them. I've had teachers I don't know stop me in the hall and tell me what a joy she is. My biggest prayer for Sophie is that she will have courage to continue to be this little light. Right now it is easy to do the right thing, but it won't always be. I pray she'll have courage to stand up for those no one else is standing up for, courage to try new things without fear of failing, courage to follow God even when it's hard, courage to help right the injustices of the world. I know those are big prayers for such a little person, but I guess my job is to pray those big prayers.

I could go on but I know this is getting a little long. There is my Sophie update. She is blessed to have many people who love her (including most of the people who read this blog) so to you I say thank you for investing in her life.

Adventures in Grilling Part 1

A few days ago Taylor found an article from The New York Times entitled 101 Fast Recipes for Grilling. He posted it on his Facebook page and wrote that even if we only try a few it will add some variety to the menu. I decided not to take offense at that even though I do 98% of the cooking. Instead I decided we would dive right in. On Monday we all went to the grocery store and created a masterpiece of a meal that night. We tackled numbers 10, 44, 48, and 72 if you're following along.

The kids helped prepare the corn. I just put butter, salt, and pepper on it to begin with before it went on the grill.

This next picture is just for my friend, Carey. The sardines were Taylor's idea. He was solely responsible for preparing, cooking, and eating these babies. The rest of us stuck with the shrimp.

This was the part of the meal I was most unsure about. Skewer lettuce wedges and tomatoes and grill them. The tomatoes were good. The lettuce wasn't bad. It looked pretty anyway.

My grillin' man

So here it all is on the grill. The shrimp was tossed in olive oil, salt, and cumin.

The finished product. We squeezed grilled lemon over the fish and shrimp and sprinkled parsley over the shrimp.

We drizzled blue cheese dressing for us, ranch for the kids, over the lettuce and tomatoes.

To the corn we added mayo mixed with minced garlic and parsley.

The meal was a huge success. Sophie even said it was "the best". Stay tuned...tonight we're going to grill some fruit on the list.

4th of July Fun

We joined a lot of Southland folks out at the Barrons' house on the lake on Sunday night. The kids had fun running around, playing and catching bugs. It was the perfect spot to watch the fireworks over the lake.

Pre 4th Celebrating at the Lake

On Thursday afternoon we headed to the lake house in Granbury with the Barkers and stayed until Saturday. It was a wonderful weekend with just the right combination of sun and rain. The kids got to play in the water a lot and then they came in to do crafts when it started raining. Brandon brought his kayak and they took the kids for rides. The adults enjoyed sitting on the porch and listening to the rain fall. It was a fun and relaxing weekend.