Craftiness breaks out on fall break

A year or two ago, Ian was in a fabric store with me, and found a great shaggy, furry fabric that he wanted to make a pillow out of. I told him that would make a great project for school break, when he had more time, and then we both (mostly) forgot about it.

Until a few weeks ago, as fall break was beginning.  (One great thing about Vail School District is that they have three weeks off in the fall.)  Ian reminded me about the project, and we all took a trip to Jo-Ann's.  We had fun looking at and feeling all the different fabrics.  Finally, Ian picked out a shaggy white and Heath picked out a shaggy red material. We also bought pillow forms.

Over the next few days, Heath and Ian decided what kinds of pillow covers they wanted to make, cut out the material, and, with mom's sewing machine, sewed them up.  The pillows turned out great, as you can see:

(You can also see that working with faux fur gets really messy!)

Adam had a more ambitious project.  He wanted to make a stuffed animal out of a wild print he found.  He drew a pattern, including pieces for ears and a tail.  He came up with a way to use the leftover faux fur to make cute soft, fuzzy ears.  Then he sewed them all together to create this:

Isn't he cute?

As the break progressed, they came up with another fun project completely on their own.  Heath had bought Adam a tiny, cute, little toy dog for his birthday, and Adam wanted a house for it, so he created one using a shoebox and some sticky foam.

Wouldn't you like to live there?

Luke also had a little toy -- a fox -- who needed a home, so Ian kindly created one for him:

Foxy is sitting in his bubble bath.

And then Ian made one for his pom-pom guy:

Naturally, he has the latest electronic gadgets.

I just love how they included the details that make a house cozy and comfortable:

A warm fire

Good food

Books to read

After the busy-ness of school days, it was so nice to have some time to let the creative juices flow!

Heath's Baptism

At the church before the baptism.

On Saturday, July 28, Heath was baptized by his dad.  We are so proud of his decision to follow Jesus!

Back home, after the baptism.  Love that smile!

Summer Road Trip

We made a trip out of the drive up to Richfield, UT, for the Trexler family reunion in July.  First we spent a very relaxing July 4 in Flagstaff.  Then the next day we went to Lowell Observatory for the first time.  This is the observatory in Flagstaff where the (dwarf) planet Pluto was discovered.  During the day, we got the "Mars Tour" and explored the exhibits and beautiful grounds.  As the sun began to set, we went back to look through some of their many telescopes.  Through this telescope (in the photo below, John is helping Luke), we saw Saturn with its rings.  It was awesome!

The next day we drove through Wupatki National Monument, which is definitely worth a visit.  Don't miss the blowhole!  I would recommend against touring it in the middle of the day in the middle of July, though.

Look at those troopers!

We finally reached our destination, and had a great time with many family members we hadn't seen in ages (or at all!) at the reunion.  Here's a photo of those representing the David Trexler branch:

Can you guess why we're posed around a toy dinosaur?...

And I also wanted to share this photo of David/Dad and four of his siblings (Gerry, Sandee, Kathy, and Glenn).

It's a T-Rex!  Get it?!?  T-rexlers!

There were group photos taken of everyone in attendance, but I haven't seen them yet.  If anyone knows where they are, I'd love to see them!

The most unusual thing we saw in Rocky Point...

So, I was swimming out in the ocean with John and Adam when my leg bumped into something hard, kind of like a child's plastic beach toy.  I turned around and saw something bright blue below the surface of the water.  It was clearly a child's toy, but, oddly, seemed to be shaped like a jellyfish.  Erring on the side of caution, we got some goggles to verify that it was jellyfish-shaped, without touching it.  Then, shaking our heads at the stupidity of making a beach toy that resembled a jellyfish, we nevertheless had Wes bring over a pail to scoop it up with.

Once we got it to shore and got a better look at it, we noticed that, although the bottom (the "legs" or tentacles that you would expect to sting you) felt like hard plastic, the top of it was slimy and squishy.  And then the kids noticed that it smelled like dead fish.  And then some tourists walked by, curious about what we were gathered around, and confirmed that it was, indeed, a jellyfish.  A Mexican boat guide had picked one out of the ocean to show them earlier, demonstrating that they don't sting.

As you can see, it was a beautiful blue color with darker speckles around the rim.

After getting home, I did a little research and found that, as far as I can determine, this was a "cannonball jellyfish."  According to the Mexican "Center for Biological Research" (http://www3.cibnor.mx/iplant1.php?pagID=investigacion/pep/proy/le1_pr147c0),

"In México cannonball jellyfish is only harvested for food. The product has a crunchy texture, which is considered a delicacy in many Asian cities. It is valued for its medicinal properties which are traditionally used for diseases such as arthritis and hypertension."

If we had only known, we could have brought it home with us and maybe made a little money!  But we buried it on the beach instead.

Before and After

With the installation of sod, we are calling our yard good for the summer. Instead of spending every weekend working on our yard, we hope to spend some time enjoying it. So I thought this would be a good time to post some before and after photos of our yard. 

 
(Thanks to Alisa for formatting the photos for me.) 

This is why we had so many boys

We've lived here for over a year now, and we're finally ready to attack the back yard landscaping. First we got rid of the large, sharp-edged gravel that covered the entire yard. Then we got some steps and a ramp installed. And next we want to put nice round gravel in the playground area, create a pathway, and put in some lawn. All of this requires a lot of rock raking, weed whacking, great groundbreaking, and sharp shoveling.

The boys were out of school Thursday and Friday for Rodeo Days, so we decided to surprise Dad by starting on this work without him. I wanted to make it fun and motivate them to work hard, so I took advantage of the fact that our boys' screen time is usually very limited and offered them a deal: for each 15 minutes of hard work, they could play whatever they wanted for 15 minutes. It worked great! These boys put in several hours of hard labor, and ended up enjoying it so much that they did the same thing Friday and Saturday.

As it turns out, Adam and Ian probably didn't even need the incentive. They both really enjoyed the physical work of raking, shoveling, and especially swinging a pick. Both have requested this job every week, instead of their usual jobs (cleaning bedrooms and bathrooms).

Here are some photos of our hard-working boys:







































Dad was very happily surprised and joined us in the work Friday, digging out this huge mesquite stump, among other things:


















And by Saturday we even planted several plants (you can also see part of our new steps and ramp):













We hope to have more photos of the progress on the yard posted soon. I'm so excited!

Happy Birthday, Arizona!

From our four seventh-generation Arizonans!

It was exciting to be part of the celebration of Arizona's Centennial (100 years since statehood, for out-of-staters). John and Michelle went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir concert in Phoenix last Friday night, which was fantastic. Then we took the family to downtown Tucson for a fun celebration on Saturday. And after our snowy Valentine's Day/Statehood Day today, we'll finish the festivities with Vail Pride Day this Saturday.