A Young Man

Jacob turned 12 on Saturday. Sunday he recieved his Faith in God award and also was ordained a deacon. What exciting times ahead...

Rules for Life

The other day Miss Jordy told me that she new the rules.

"Don't throw a fit"

"Get out of the street"

"And don't eat the dog food, its only for dogs"

Now you know....

Alcohol Stoves

I have to say while we were learning how to do these I was intrigued. I was very impressed(I am impressed by the weirdest things and people) how easy, cheap, and nifty they were so I had to take pics and share. Something a little different for Super Saturday, refreshing.
I am not a pro but will try to give some step by step instruction.
Materials needed:
2 aluminum soda cans
sharpie marker
roll of duct tape and another block or roll of tape shorter to bes used as measurment
exacto knife
block of wood
small hammer
drill
penny
less than 1/4 cup of 90% or higher alcohol
lighter
piece of dryer ducting (?)

1. We rested our sharpie on a roll of duct and another shorter block and pushed the can up to the roll and sharpie while turning to make a straight solid line around the whole can.








2. Like this :)















3. Carefully with the exacto knives we scored (not cut) around the line. Then this part was tricky. We took both ends of the can in our hands and wiggled it back and forth till the score seperated and kept wiggling till it tore cleanly apart. Cutting it across will warp the aluminum.

4. It is hard to tell in these pictures but we used a uncut can and placed it into the larger cut can and at an angle twisted it around and around trying to case a flare affect at the cut part of the can so that we could easily invert the smaller cut can into the larger.

5. Kind of like this. I guess I don't have great flare or something. :P

6. These next two pictures may be reversed but once you have the smaller can inverted into the larger one you can place a wood block on top and in some kind of level fashion that I was also not very good at, tap the block until the curved part of the can meets the top cut line of the bottom can. In other words in this picture to the left the strawberry is sticking out a little too high above that blue sharpie line. It should be a little more flush.

7. Same Picture. I'm too lazy to take it off right now.

8. Now with the Sharpie make one dot in the middle, then another dot on the other side of the can. Turn the can and put one dot in the middle and on the other side also. Whatever. Till you have 16 dots. Like the picture, because I know that made no sense.

9. Have some nice young man drill holes on the dot marks for you. Or do it yourself if you are not 1950's like me. Just be careful not to push too hard and drill down through the side of the can and make yourself start over. This is the real reason this nice young boy did this step for me. I'm not really 1950's like that. Lie. I am.

10. One more hole smack dab in the middle. This is where you will pour 3/4 of 1/4 cup of 90% or higher alcohol (from the drugstore ladies :). Put a little on the bottom and around the bottom edges too so you can light the dang thing. Disclaimer extrordinaire. Do not do this without parental supervision. Do not do this step inside. Do not sue me because you can not use common sense. The end.

11. Why the penny you ask? It will stop up that hole forcing the flames to come out the side 16 holes which will burn for about 8-9 minutes and boil 2 cups of water. Seriously? Yes I told you it was so nifty.

See. Only do this outside. Or read my disclaimer. Just don't be dumb then sue me. Thank you.

Where are you going to put your pot thought to boil this afore mentioned water? In the above picture there is a mesh cylindrical thing ;) that the teacher uses as resting spot for the pot. I don't know what kind of material that is. It's not chicken wire. I wasn't familiar with it but I was familiar with the metal dryer vent tubing stuff he had that works in the same fashion. Anyways, once you get the hang of it, you can produce a lot at once. But they are reusable too, so that's pretty nifty. Perfect christmas gifts. Don't you want to be me friend ? Jealous, I know!!

Enjoy.

Pinkberry

Catalina

Lyal is the scoutmaster in our ward and for Scout Camp this year they went to Catalina Island. Since Jacob is technically a boy scout and his dad was going he was able to go with them. All the moms worked extra hard to help the boys fundraise to get there since we didn't find out our portion of money was due till a few weeks ahead of time, let alone that we had a portion at all. It ended up being a sucess and so many people were so generous. We had been on a 2 year waiting list and were so excited that our boys could have this opportunity. The boys had a blast and they will have so many memories for years to come. Playing in the ocean, and marine biology, cool camp songs, and of course the trading post. They each earned 6 merit badges or more and worked hard while Lyal and their YM counselor that went pushed them and helped them. Their YM counselor bought them all camp shirts while they were there because he was so proud of them that they worked hard and deserved it. These are a great group of boys!

What to do in the Summertime??

We've been getting wet for free or cheap. This is the Porterville Pool. Love it. Thanks Alma! We've(well the kids under 10 that are still not too cool to be there) have enjoyed the splash pad in Visalia. We also are so grateful to our friends the Andersons who have let us enjoy their awesome pool anytime. This is just a little more stressful for mom though as the Jackson is constantly doing flips off of the cliffs. I swear my heart jumps out of my chest everytime. We better get that kid in a diving club next year.

Staying Local. Besides our one trip to Southern California for the Fourth of July we are sticking around home. No vacations for us this year but I'm super excited we found a good deal. We went as a family with 4 other families to a Fresno Grizzlies game last Monday and got 2 tickets, 2 hot dogs, 2 sodas, 2 Mini golf tickets, 2 storyland, and 2 wild water adventure passes for $32. Super cheap boredom buster.

Jarom turned 7 and went on a date with mom to Build a Bear Workshop and then to Cars 3D. The same thing Jacob did when he turned 7 coincedentally.

We also got to celebrate when we visited the Dalebouts and Chases on the fourth with a trip to the Temecula children's museum, out to eat, and cake with Jared. Jared (my littlest brother) and Jarom share the same birthday AND adventurous little spirits.

Joe my 10(almost 11) year old brother came to stay with us for a month.

It's been great and scary to let these two be more independent as they've been exploring all of Exeter on their bikes. It's interesting to have kids in different stages and places in life with different needs. My other 3 still love hanging out at the library playing on their computer and playing candy land. I think I've heard "I'm bored" only twice though. I don't know if they are bored or not because sometimes they look it, but they know if they say it they get one of two responses. "Only boring people are bored." or "I've got plenty of chores you cand do"

Gotta Love PreTeens! AAAHHHHH!

Free Story Time at the Children's Museum. We also attend a one day Art camp that was $2 a kid last week and made some clay sculptures. And at our house no video games or t.v. without school work done, reading, and at least an hour of play outside for an hour of computer games. If I have to hear about club penguin one more time I may go crazy.

Going to the Park! The best park times have been the Disney movies in the park in the evening. I really wanted to go to some of the KJUG free country concerts in the park once this summer but somehow keep missing them. I love small town Exeter.

Can't forget Cub Scout Day Camp that we got out of the way early this summer and sitting around on the computer for hours and hours and hours getting ready for the upcoming school year. Actually we can forget about those. At least till next year when I "get" to do it again.

Hope your summer is all you need it to be!

Take them a meal

Our charter school has a teacher in need of meals for himself and his wife who is ill and the mom who is coordinating the meals used this free website. It sends a reminder email to those that signed up the day before and shows what people have brought and are bringing. I didn't know what I was going to make yet so I just wrote that. It's so awesome I HAD to share it! You could use it for school, church, friends, family, neighbors. Our coordinator just sent one mass email and had all the days signed up for in no time...Enjoy!
*if the link doesn't work (poo!) the site is http://www.takethemameal.com/
PS. Sometimes it doesn't quite work out depending on the group but their other site www.perfectpotluck.com is also a free meal planning fun time...

I LOVE SUMMER!!

Being a homeschool momma is hard when you just love love love summer and can't control your thoughts as they drift to summer time fun. Pushing through these next 4 reporting weeks of the school year are hard as I am easily distracted and ready to move on to summer and even planning our next school year. I love the break of summer but like to keep consistent in doing something every day to keep our brains working out. I have two links I thought you might enjoy that got a thumbs up from BOTH my boys. Now that's saying something.

This website is free and fun. This guy started making videos for his cousins to help with math skills and just got a grant from Big Daddy Gates so it may be getting even better. The kids can watch videos and then perform assignments and move up levels. Kind of like Teaching Textbooks but free. And way better than a worksheet :).

This program is not free BUT you can sign up for a free week of demo and it is on sale for the summer semester. We are going to be studying french this upcoming year and since moms strengths are all spanish and a dash of italian we need to look into some major help. This program is tons of fun. My non reader can even navigate everything on his own since the "advisor" speaks to you if you choose. They love playing the games and earning money to outfit their avatar and buy him pets and sunglasses and cool shoes. It even has little Jordy going around the house saying "Je ne sais pas" and "Bonne Chance".