That Waskiwy Wabbit!!

I was so excited this year for our garden - we planted a bunch of sweet peas (yummm... nothin better than eating sweet peas right out of the garden!!), a bunch of corn, and a bunch of carrots, among all of the other things, but those were the three I was most excited about... 

And one by one, they all met their demise... when the corn first popped up, it had the misfortune of looking just like the weeds I had shown Sarah when we were weeding in the early weeks.  One day, she came in so proud to tell me that she had just weeded a whole bunch of 'weeds' in the garden...  

I have to give her credit - she was extremely thorough and got every last one...

We also have a little rabbit colony somewhere in the neighborhood, but I haven't done much rabbit protection since we have our own little rabbit chaser in Bailey, who has pretty much kept our backyard clear of our long-eared friends...

That is... until we decide to leave on a mammothly long cross country trip, and board Bailey, leaving the backyard wide open to a rabbit feast...

... and feast is what they did... first on the carrots...

... and then on the peas...

... the squash did survive the rabbit frenzy (I guess they don't like squash any more than I do!), as well as some peppers and basil.  

Where is Elmer Fudd when you need him??!

How Sweet it is...

Jerry had the kids be involved in every aspect of my birthday... 

And it made the day so very sweet!! 

-- from donuts and chocolate milk for breakfast

-- to a fun lunch with great friends (thanks girlies!)

-- to fun dinner together at Mexican Restaurant 

(complete with the 'happy birthday song and free dessert) 

-- to coming home for cake and ice cream

-- to the opening of the gifts... 

(that Jerry let them pick out all by themselves...) 

... an apple slicer from Ben 

(hey, he loves sliced apples, so that just screamed 'mommy would love this!' to him)

-- measuring cups from Seth

(he loves helping me measure to make things in the kitchen,

 and with an extra set, he won't even have to share with Sarah!)

-- and an "isn't this so cute, mom?!" sleepware outfit from Sarah

(in size TRIPLE X... "well, mom, you're belly is REALLY big" as quoted on our trip...)

I couldn't have asked for a better day!  

Thank you so much!!

Pregnancy brain strikes again...

... at least that's the excuse I'll use for the next two months, anyway :)...

Here's how it went down:

I got a bunch of SUPER yummy peaches, and after canning, freezing, and eating, decided to make the ULTIMATE FRESH peach pie...

So I got the recipe from my gourmet-esc neighbor, and decided to put it together for our Sunday Dinner.

Here's how it turned out... seriously mouth watering, right??

I mean, really, you can't wait to sink your teeth into that piece of peachy heaven, RIGHT??!  

But Please, WAIT... the story continues...

... so the recipe gave directions on the pie crust, and then at the end stated that to save time you could just buy a ready made frozen pie crust.  Great - that just cut down a bunch of time for me... especially since I have yet to master the art of the 'perfect' pie crust...

... I mean, c'mon, a store bought pie crust is FULL PROOF, Right??!

So, on Sunday, I mixed up the peach pie filling, got the pie crust out of the freezer, smeared it with cream cheese (one of the 'secrets' in the recipe...), poured in the filling, and put it in the fridge to set up... 

The time FINALLY came to break out the pie... and Jerry did the honors of cutting the first piece.

... he looked closely at the piece and here is the conversation...

Jerry: "Umm, honey... did you bake the crust??"

Me:  "No, I just bought it"

Jerry:  "...yea... but did you BAKE it??"

Me:  (thinking, didn't I just answer that question??)  "No, honey, I bought a ready-made crust"

Jerry:  "You mean..." (I'm sure trying hard to let me know of my brainless-ness without actually pulling a 'say brainless, doncha know where coconuts come from??!' line)   "... the kind that's frozen DOUGH... that needs to be baked??"

Me:  "No...  it's the ready made.... ohhhhh, yea... "  the light FINALLY comes on as I realize that I have only made hot pies in the ready made crusts, so the 'baking' part was pretty obvious...

He did manage to swallow at least the 'filling' part...

... and I learned that the reason why the frozen pie crusts come in two... for people like me... who need that 2nd chance :)

... so the [second] crust was baked... the filling [re]filled... and the [un-doughy] pie partaken of... 

... and there was much [belated] rejoicing in the Brewer Household :)

Sarah Needs a baby sister...

Really...

REALLY badly!

Always go with your gut...

So... this morning was our "welcome back to reality check"... and how many times do I have to learn to go with my first instinct??

... So I usually teach a class on Wednesday mornings at the gym... but I have had subs for the whole vacation time (all SIX weeks of it... which is another post in and of itself...).  I thought we'd be getting back late last night, so I had a sub to cover this class today... or so I thought...

We ended up getting back on Monday, so I debated about calling the sub and telling her I could do the class.  Since my house is still in disaster mode, I thought it would be nice to have an extra day to try to get a handle on everything... so I didn't call.

This morning, I woke up with the thought, "What if she doesn't cover the class and I'm just sitting here at home?"  But she is a really reliable girl, so I thought she would for sure have it covered.  I let the kids sleep, we had a lazy wake up time, and I just kind of meandered around, wondering where to start on my nuclear war zone-buried house...

As time grew closer, I thought, 'I better call, just to make sure'... so I called... and got her voice mail.  I left a message saying that I'm sure she had everything under control, but I was here to do the class if she didn't want to do it after all.  

Time went on, Sarah got in the tubby, I sent Joshy to get in the tubby with her, and the other boys still hung around in their jammies.  About 8:55 (class starts at 9:15), I called the gym, just to make sure she was there... no sight of her.  Still, she lives far out, so she was probably just driving in... 

I had the thought, 'you better get ready and get the kids ready just in case'  dismissed the thought... meandered around more (you can see where this is going, can't you??!).  At 9:05, I get a call from the sub, saying, "I'm in the cities, I didn't agree to take this class!"  (which I have an email confirmation of her stating she will, indeed, take the class... ).  I hang up, and make the motherhood megahorn announcement that everyone is to be in the car in 30 seconds.  Sarah yells something from downstairs, to which I reply, "Just come up and get in the car!!"

... being the obedient child that she is, she did, indeed come up... wrapped up in a towel with 1/2 the bottle of shampoo still lathered all over her hair...

... We rinsed hair, dried bodies, grabbed clothes and shoes and got into the car 1/2 naked to dress on the way...

Yep, re-entry into normal life - never fun... especially when you ignore your gut!

PRICELESS...

Tickets to Sea World:  $200

Fun Souvenirs, lunch, and fast passes for the great rides:  $150

Sarah's Comment, "My favorite part of the whole day was swimming in the Ocean!" (which we did for all of 30 minutes on our way to Sea World, and cost us $0):  PRICELESS

Mom, this one's for you!

Mom - When we passed by the Flamingo Habitat at Sea World, Jerry and I both stopped dead in our tracks, and just started snapping these pictures for you... they were beautiful!!

Ahhhhh.... Zion!!

... so we have just finished another leg on our ubber long, incredibly crazy summer extravaganza... and yep, Idaho is just as incredible as ever!!

... just to fill in a wee bit, since I have pretty much been out of cyber-world for what seems like eons...

   We took off on July 10, drove across the country, stopping to take a gander at Mt. Rushmore (can I just say, AMAZING??!! - it literally blew me away... but that's a subject for a whole 'nuther post!...)... then ended up in Vernal with Jerry's parent's for a few days.

   From there we were onto Utah for the anual WEPR, minus the WE part (which we missed GREATLY, mom and dad!!!).  (Translation: WEPR is the Walt and Eileen Petersen Reunion, for those outside of my crazy clan...)  We can't wait for next year when you get to be in on all of the family happenings!

   After the reunion, Jerry flew back home to fullfill his 'providing for the family duties' and I stayed behind to fullfill some of the 'fun recreational activities' duties, staying in Utah a bit more, (Julie and her fun ideas had the kiddos all excited to have a 'real' Movie night!!  Your creativity astounds me, Julie!!)  and then heading up north to the land of ZION (aka Idaho!).

   We did a TEN day stint in Idaho, and can I just say, Janie, you are a SAINT!!!  The fact that you can take in 5 MORE bodies, besides the EIGHT that you already have under your roof for that long, and STILL have a smile on your face on day ten is truly an incredible feat in and of itself, but more then that she had activities for us to do pretty much every day, from splash park spashing, to carousel riding, to water park venturing, to zoo gandering, to early morning gym sweating, to temple attending, to back yard pooling, to fire pit s'moring, to yummy ice cream making, to garage big screen movie viewing, to YELLOWSTONE wandering, to birthday celebrating, to education week attending (with your kiddos and hubby graciously brewer baby watching!!)  WOW what a time!!!  I hope you got one HUGE nap when we finally removed our clan from your abode!!!   Phew - that was a truly incredible 1 1/2 weeks!!  (Oh, and Seth is STILL pretty bitter that we can't just 'run' back up to Rexburg to play with Michael and Sam!)

    ... Jerry flew back in to Idaho Falls, and we finally left the Fishers in peace on Saturday, heading to Utah once more, and stopping off just long enough to leave the kiddos with Steve and Nat (again, HUGE thank you!!!) to head to a Peter Breinholt Concert - the first one we have been able to attend in TEN years, since we attended our first concert of his together on our first date after our 'break-up' phase... (did you get all of that?!)... and even (thanks to a little pre-concert emailing), got his song "Grow Old Along With Me" dedicated to my incredible hubby!!  Fun night all around!!

... then we got up bright and early and headed SOUTH to ARIZONA.  Okay, don't ask me why we thought it was such a good idea to leave Beautiful, Plush, Green, Temperate, Minnesota in AUGUST to spend a few weeks in Arid, Hot, Brown, did I mention HOT?!  Arizona... but here we are... and actually having a great time!   ... then again it helps that the pool is a whole 20 feel from our apartment here... and the air-conditioning cost is covered by Mayo :).

    So that's our not-so-little update for now... just hangin loose, and LOVING summer!!  Hope things are great in your neck of the woods... :)