Happy 13th Birthday, Caleb!

This boy is light to every room he enters!   He has brought so much laughter into our family with his goofy, fun personality.  We won the lottery back in 2011!!!

Happy birthday, sweet boy of ours!

Schmitz 2018 Vaca, Post 20 - Niagara Falls

The last post from our 2018 summer vacation, Niagra Falls! Lesley and I were here some years back and we fondly remember the morning of driving into, not Niagra, but Hamilton, Ontario.  The sun was just coming up as we had got up and left our campground in London, Ontario which is about 30 - 40 miles away.

It was truly one of the most beautiful mornings we have witnessed and nearly impossible to describe.  The other morning that I recall something similar was on our honeymoon and we were driving from, I believe Powell, WY, along side the Shoshoni River and we were in the shade of the mountains, but a bit higher than that, all of the mountains were illuminated by a very bright sunrise.  Beautiful indeed.  And if you've never driven along side the Shoshoni, you should probably plan too! 

Anyway, back to this vacation.  We'll never be back here with the boys and so, after a co-worker had told me about spending money to get a "room with a view",  we decided that would be something we would splurge on since we did some tent camping along the way, which helps to save some bacon for rooms like this!



This was the view from our hotel room.  The picture is limited by the blog host for how wide it can be if you really want to see the whole thing at a decent size.  But not too shabby of a look of Horseshoe Falls on the Canada side.



Slightly to the left of the picture above, is the view of American Falls on the... uh, American side, along with Rainbow International Bridge that we waited on for nearly an hour while needed to go pee.

The next few were taken on our walk from the hotel down to where we boarded the boat... can't remember if we were on the Maiden of the Mist or the other boat that does the tours.

The boys in their garbage bags getting ready to hit the high seas!

More waiting to board...  we gotta wait for all of those hoodlums up top there to get off of our vessel!!

We're off!

They get you right down into there, mist, maidens and all!  My shirt was wet all the way down the front, and pretty much my pants too as the wind from the crashing falls blows your garbage bag up like a skirt.

Cool shot o' the bridge.

I'm not sure what that was for but it was inoperable during our visit and we were all hungry, so we didn't care!

Skylon Tower.

The Falls at night from our room.  You can tell by the skies that there was something brewing...

The fireworks over the falls.  It was raining pretty good at this point.

More fireworks, which were really cool but in the case of all fireworks, they suck in pictures.

And that was the end of vacation.  We got up the next morning, had breakfast at the hotel and then drove back home, which was a bit of a long day but we were all happy that we did it in one day.

Gardens 2020, Post #1

So after the boy had a great day of mowing for the first time,  I figured I'd zap some of the good feelings away by having the boys weed the three gardens as they were being overrun non-essential plants.  Caleb jumped right in and started tearing it up.

Even got the larger boy involved who did good work but I would call it a bit less than "tearing it up".

After I ran the tiller, I have Caleb go back and collect some of the dirt that spills over the edge and then re-rake everything.

The chives are going to town this year!!

The rhubarb is up in the big garden too!

TKD In Quarantined Times

Caleb doing private lessons thru ZOOM with Master Sledge.

King's Corners

Caleb and I like to play King's Corners, a card game that is not very hard to learn, but very fun to play!  We sat down to play to the first person hitting 100.  You don't want points in this game, closest to zero wins.

Being goofy...

So nearly two hours later, the boy finally got a good hand and stuck me with a bunch of points right off of the deal.  LOL!

Homeschooling: Science and Shop Class

I'm not gonna lie...  I'm a friggin' genius!  I'm clever with my cleverness, which I don't believe that many people can claim. 

So last Spring,  when we were going thru the previous Armageddon (pre COVID19),  the flooding, mostly down the Missouri river and washing out the fold around Omaha  and South of there,  I was told by a co-worker that it would be a good time to buy beef since so many head of cattle were being washed away.

Made sense to me and we put in an order for some beef as we were pretty low anyway.

In that, there were two briskets that have just been killing me since I no longer have a smoker.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, the utter and complete nonsense of NOT owning a smoker ended TODAY!!!

Caleb and I built one today and I'm about to take you on the magical journey that will provide us with magical meats!!!

Remember metal coffee cans?  Well, they were great for a number of reasons, and here we have one.

The hinge.  This will figure in later.

The hole.  Which will figure in later.

The old masonry blade with an L bracket screwed to it will figure in later.

The "Tool Box Grill" that will also figure in later but is also the focus of the hillbilly-like post.

Another angle of the same sexy beast!

My fearless and loyal helper filing down the sharp edges of the "smoke holes".

The very-nearly-finished product being inspected by my partner in crime.  This boy was 100% in from the first time I told him of my silly-arse idea.

The fire chamber with an old saw blade as the door.

Pretty much a finished product at this point.

The Great T.P. Trickage...

We were blessed with a toilet paper during the great hoarding epidemic of early 2020.  The Griffith clan supplied us with (I believe) a 24 pack!!  Can't argue with that!   Caleb was distributing them around the house while I was.... uh, preoccupied.  When I exited my temporary-self-induced quarantine in the potty room, I found this!  He had managed to balance the TP delivery upon the top of the closet door. His giggles as I exited were great!

And the dork drew happy faces on the packages...

The proud boy....

Self-Sufficient Sustinence

This boy!  He got up this morning right as my morning meetings were about to begin.  Not one to wait around for much, he went out to the kitchen, and following the instructions I gave him Saturday morning, he cut up ham, red onion, and made himself an omelet with some added cheddar cheese.  He had to come in and show me, and give me a bite!  It was yummy!!!