Summer

Has your summer been fun?

Mine has been very busy this year.....compared to say last year even.

We have been swimming a lot this year which is nice. Especially since it's soooo hot down here and humid.

The girls and I were swimming the other day and we snapped a few photos while we were basking in the sun. Basting really. HA! Like chickens in an oven with butter on them.

Miss Priss giving us the "Thumbs Up!!!"
"KJ and Miss Priss" having fun.....

"KJ"

"MY view of the pool"........ha!!!


Later that evening, "Italian Boy" took "Miss Priss" out for a special date to celebrate their "anniversary"....HA!!!

The "dog days" of summer are passing fast here.

Seems as if I haven't gotten to have many "lazy summer days" at all.......but that's okay.
Life is short and we have to grab as much as we can from it.....especially with our kids and our loved ones.

Tell me how your enjoying your summer where ever your at!!!

Going To The Big Apple .....

It's been a busy week with "The Cousins" here but still in the midst of it all....last week I booked plane tickets for Miss Priss, my husband and myself to NEW YORK CITY and I am sooooo excited!!!

We will be heading that way the end of September to celebrate our anniversary and Miss Priss's birthday. Two big events in October....

This was to be the year for a big trip to Europe...but the husband asked me "IF we could delay the Europe trip for at least a year and do something calmer" since we have invested so much $$$ and time wise into the remodeling of our house and other family things this year.

So I said,....."sure" and booked us a trip to New York City Trip instead. HA~!!!
We will be there 5 days....and our oldest son Gabe will come and meet us in NYC.

He's been there many times (in fact he's going there again in a couple of weeks) and my husband has been before but this will be the first trip for me and Miss Priss.

Did I mention that I am sooooo excited????

I'll have more photos of "The Cousins" later....believe me....we've been ALL over Baton Rouge this week.
I'm exhausted today.

These people look a bit tired too....
I can't imagine why.

"The Cousins"

"KJ" the "girl cousin"
"The Cousins" made it in Sunday night. Miss Priss and Italian Boy drove with me to New Orleans to retrieve them from the airport there and bring them back to Baton Rouge.

Monday, "Miss Priss" and I decided to take cousin "KJ" to our FAVORITE French restaurant here in Baton Rouge...."Le Madelines." We had.....
French Dips with Pesto Pasta salad and our FAV soup..Tomato Basil.

Love that stuff, the Tomato Basil is their trademark soup that they also sell in jars that you can purchase and bring home. Yum!
Miss Priss with her new haircut.

What do you think of it?

"Miss Priss and KJ"
Miss Priss has always looked HUGE beside her cousin even though she isn't....because KJ is so very tiny.


Tuesday we went back to New Orleans so we could show them the French Quarter and around town a bit.
St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans

"The Twins..."K and KJ" in New Orleans

"The Three Cousins" in the French Quarter

"KJ in the Jimmy Buffet 'Margaritaville Shop' wearing a Cheeseburger hat.

"K" on the phone with a friend back home in Iowa"

"Miss Priss, Italian Boy, K and KJ"

"Miss Priss and Italian Boy" at the "Cafe Du Monde."

We ordered "Beignets" there.....because you just have to if you go to the French Quarter. It's traditional!
Beignets are "Square French Doughnuts" basically...with tons of powdery sugar goodness sprinkled all over them.

"KJ and her brother K" eating Beignets...messy but GOOOOOOD!

"K, Miss Priss, Italian Boy and KJ" on the Mississippi River Levee in New Orleans.


A couple of "fun facts" really quick.

#1. Miss Priss is 5 months older than "the Cousins".......who are twins...
#2. "KJ" was born first and "K" was born LAST and is the BIGGER of the twins....can you tell??
#3. It was HOT as a BLAST Furnace yesterday in New Orleans and very humid....which we are pretty accustomed to.
However...."the Cousins" were dying. Especially boy cousin......"K" who I chided the entire time for being a "weenie."
#4. We only stayed a bit over 3 hours....because they couldn't take the heat. HA!
#5. Luke hasn't been going with us much because he works all the time...and Caleb is in Florida and will be coming home on Friday so I will have to snap some photos of them with the cousins when I can.Oh well....
"Laissez bon temps roulette" we did "Let the good times Roll"...well....basically in plain terms...."a good time" was still had by all.

Today we are getting "rain bands" from Hurricane Dolly so it is cooling us down a bit along with occasional rain.

More new later.....
And I will post new photos of the kitchen remodel at some point. It's going VERY good. Thankfully!!!!

Many Things to Ponder

"Dreams are illustrations... from the book your soul is writing about you."
~Marsha Norman~

I don't know about any of you, but my month has been very busy.
And although I am an organized person..it's been full of confusion at times. Even with my BEST planning intact. New challenges have arose that I did not expect.

As a result of all this....I have hardly had time to read or to sit and meditate or to have quiet thinking even.

Let alone to dream.
Which I dearly miss.

You have to MAKE time to do these things sometimes.

I need a moments rest and...we are heading into a long "running" stretch the next two weeks with my Twin Niece and Nephew, who my kids refer to as "The Cousins" flying down from Iowa on Sunday night.

I have "day trips" planned for us all in my head already, including a trip to New Orleans to sight see in the French Quarter and surrounding areas, next Tuesday if all goes well.
There is a lot to do and see here in Louisiana. Tons of history.

And of course....the food is awesome. Not that they care but some of us do! HA!

The "kitchen remodel" is coming along....my digital camera's chip is FULL UP so I have to go purchase a new one before I can shoot any more photos to post.

By this weekend...we should have it about 75-80 percent complete. The new "Cambria" counter tops will be installed tomorrow morning....Thank GOODNESS!!!
Cambria is a quartz material and does not hold bacteria and that was a huge reason why we selected it. Plus it is beautiful and hasn't the maintenance upkeep like granite does.

We have picked out a color called "Brownhill" to match our new cabinets.

We painted the walls the same color be had before because we loved it.
It's called "Chesteretown Buff" and it's one of the "Historical Colors" by Benjamin Moore Paints.
Here's the paint color:
We had hoped to have this More than over before the Twins arrived.
But it hasn't worked that way....gitches you know.
Lots of glitches.

Three weeks without a stove or a sink with running water. Ugh!!!
I'm nearly over the edge with all this :~)

New Family Weekday "Traditions".......

"Waiting For Dinner".....can you see the cast iron pot cooking something tasty over the flame? I don't see a TV in the room either.
This could be "my house."

In light of the "food crisis"
that is happening all over the world and due to the high rising costs of food and gas. I felt the need to do something to RAISE "awareness" in my own family.

Thus we have begun "Meatless Mondays"...and "TV-LESS Tuesdays" at our house....not a huge drop in the "world bucket" but just our tiny, tiny, contribution. Plus it is beneficial to THIS family health wise and dollar wise.
I know the "no TV" thing on Tuesdays isn't any great help to the world...however it actually does keep it "calm" in our home and encourage us to do other things than just lay on the couch and have our minds entertained by a electrical powered box....with no effort on our parts. Well little to no effort.
I mean you DO have to press the remote from time to time.

We used to do this "no TV" thing two times a week a few years ago. We had what we called "No TV Nights" where the kids could "Do their home work, play a game, read, hang out and talk to Mom and Dad, or do most anything"....except watch TV.

At first they bawked a bit....but really at some point we really we all became used to this new habit.. But then something "slipped" and we fell back into kicking on the TV in the evening to watch the 5:30 World News and before you know it....the "squawk box" is on ALL NIGHT.....until we go to bed.
As far as the "meat" issue goes.....we don't eat alot of it and aren't against anyone who does eat it. We personally do not eat alot of red meat or pork.
We do like a little steak on occasion and I do mean "rare" occasion.
Yes, pun intended. :-)


So for about the past month.....we have been doing these two "event" nights. Except for the one Monday that I forgot it was "Meatless Monday" at our house and I had chicken, our main meat source...all thawed out and ready to cook when I realized it. But I skipped it and we did it the next night instead. HA!
IT was...."Meatless AND TV=less Tuesday" that week.

Now, I have always felt that "Great Minds think alike"....in fact it's one of my favorite sayings..."tongue in cheek" of course...usually.

So I read an article tonight on a website about Paul McCartney (another "Great Mind)asking his fellow Brits "to give up meat on Mondays" as well.
Here's a quote from the article... "Paul urged his countrymen to give up meat on Mondays, as a way to cut back on their carbon emissions."Interesting.
Then once I had read the Paul McCartney thing.....I did a little searching and I happened upon a website that is called "Meatless Monday" which is part of a "Campaign" by the "John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health." Another.....ummm....place full of "Great Minds."
To quote their website;
"Meatless Monday is a national health campaign to help Americans prevent heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and cancer - four of the leading causes of death in America."

I think we are on "track" here as a family just in these two little areas.....and this may prove to be more beneficial than we realize in the long run.

If we hang in there.

Now if we could just do something more as a family about the gas situation.

Gabe's "New Ride"

Gabe and his new car.
Gabe flew into New Orleans from up north last week and bought a new car. It's not totally brand new...it's a 2003 but he has ALWAYS wanted this kind of car. So he is thrilled.

We visited with him for several days.
Now he's on his way back to his home far, far, away in a distant land called Connecticut.
Some where I have never been. Sigh.

He loves it up there....for many reasons. But one being it is so much cooler than here. Gabe has always liked a cooler climate.

We checked in with the "Connecticut Yankee" last night and after driving 17 hours straight, and going through a "scary and weird experience in Mobile Alabama at 3:30 in the morning."

I knew my husband and I had both woke up praying for him in the night several times for a good reason. I called him at 5:00am to check in on him to make sure he was still awake after driving all night.

He had finally made it to Virginia yesterday evening where he was staying the next two days with a friend and attending some business seminars for work before driving the rest of the way home.

I am a bit concerned though.

About his car that is.
I wonder how they are going to like his car up there in "U-Conn" territory...Especially since he put that LSU plate on the front has added that huge LSU sticker on the back windshield..umm....not counting the one on the front windshield. Yikes!

You would think that boy liked LSU or something......

Major Changes........

Ripping out the kitchen
We have been doing some MAJOR CHANGES in our home this year. We just completed the main hall bathroom....which is looking pretty good I must say so myself.

Then last month we had a huge DRAMA.....with this project.
Believe me it was DRAMA too!! I am not over exaggerating in the least bit when I say that.
This is what the "old air conditioner/furnace" looked like once they pulled it out from it's spot and put it on our patio. Scary.....


We had problem after problem with this project.
The A/C people started EARLY in the morning and it was to be done that night...at about 7:15pm I was coming home from work and called my husband and he told me that we had "no Air Conditioning and that they had a problem".....ugh.
OF COURSE....this was ONE of the most humid days we had experienced up to this point in this season....so our house was unbelievably HOT and humid inside when I got home.

My husband had the main A/C man....a friend of ours coming over to check the freon to see what was going on and they found a "leak in the main coil"...ugh! By then it was after 10:00pm....so we triaged the situation and decided to pull out every fan we could...and stick then in the windows and take showers to cool off before going to bed. Ceiling fans blaring of course on high speed.

We were in "hurricane mode" but with power...which we usually pull off anyway because we use a generator....we just had "extra fans" going this time.

Long story.....ummm.....longer.

They fixed all they could and we soon all realized that it still wasn't right.

THREE DAYS LATER ....still with no air in SOUTH LOUISIANA where it was/is very humid and about 80 degrees at 10:00 at night.....and where we have been running our air conditioner.....since December mind you......
(NEW Air Conditioner)

They decided they had to REPLACE the unit they had just put in because it was "defective"....our poor A/C guy who is the nicest guy on the planet...and my poor husband.
They both nearly went crazy over this......and me.....well, I was staying out of it. HA! HA!

I was already frustrated with the mess of it all.....water on the wood floors and rust and the constant running in and out...not counting all the stress of this unit not working. And the expenses.
They seemed to keep going up from what the original estimate/costs were to be some reason. UGH!

Anyhow.....now it's done and we sang "Hallelujah" when the air really DID come on and it was sweet.

That is UNTIL the next day......day FOUR....the air went "off" on it's own and we couldn't get it back on....SO we had to call our sweet A/C guy and he had to go BACK UP into the attic which is like a "coffin" this time of year....and fix an "electrical problem."

This new unit now works so much better and nicer than our old one and pulls much more humidity out of the air we can tell and hopefully will save us money.

Now we are on the "Kitchen remodel project"....and on a deadline.
My 17 year old Twin Niece and Nephew from IOWA are flying down to stay with us for TWO weeks and we pick them up in New Orleans on the 20th. Soooo...we are trying to get this nearly finished by then.
YIKES.....

Photos will be forthcoming when I get a chance to down load them all.....

The kitchen was nearly totally gutted.... the electrical and plumbing is DONE and the new drywall up and about ready to be painted. We have to hurry and get the cabinets up because the counter top people are coming to do the template for them on Wednesday.

Yes....we love living "on the edge."
I think.