Friday, July 17, 2015

Pickles, Swim Lessons, & Dancing Fools

It's getting close to the start of school (yikes!), and we've been squeezing in some fun things this month. I wished for this hot weather, and my wish came true. Now, I'm not going to complain because I asked for it, but we have spent a little more time inside the past few weeks.

Meme came to visit last week, and we made some bread and butter pickles with a few of the million (almost accurate) cucumbers I have picked from the garden. I found a recipe on Pinterest for pickles made from scratch, but my mom found this handy little pouch that has all the spices already mixed. Yay for Meme! I cut the cucumbers the night before to let them dry out a bit. Then we got busy mixing and boiling and stuffing cucumbers into jars. We had so much fun, and the pickles turned out pretty good! P.S. Sorry if these pictures look ginormous...my computer is playing tricks on me...


We stuffed the jars pretty full, but once we got the liquid in it looked like there were no cucumbers in there.
 
 
I think the pickles would taste much better to me if I didn't have the smell of this concoction stuck in my nose. Strong stuff...
 
 
This supposedly helps seal the jars so you can keep them fresh forever (or a long time).
 
And this is the finished product. A few hours in the fridge and you've got yummy, crunchy bread and butter pickles.
 
I cooked a recipe I found on Pinterest for lunch. You put chicken breasts, salsa, and a taco seasoning packet in the crockpot for a few hours. Delicious chicken tacos! I also made these yummy key lime cupcakes from a recipe I found on Betty Crocker's website. I had my little helper ice them for me. They were a great summer dessert!
 

These little munchkins ate the icing then asked for another cupcake.
 
The day Meme came happened to be half priced cones at Sonic. As if we hadn't eaten enough, we loaded up and ate some yummy ice cream.
 

I was starting to see zucchini and squash in my sleep, so it was time to start freezing it for the winter. I have to say, it is nice to cook with food you grew yourself and didn't have to buy at the store. I just wish everything we planted did as well as these suckers. I learned that you have to blanche the vegetables before you store them. That's just a fancy word for heating them up. Today I ran out of ziplock bags which means I have 35 bags of zucchini and squash in the freezer.
 
This little fish started swim lessons this week! Luckily I found a place in Fayetteville that offered them. The only downside is that the parents are only allowed to watch on the first and last day of lessons. She seems to be having fun; just not sure how much she is learning.
 
This was at the end of the first day. They end each lesson in the "hot pool", aka hot tub.
 
Colt man has learned how to play Avery's Leap Pad, and this is what he did while I watched Avery's lesson. Thank goodness for technology.
 
One afternoon when it was about 200 degrees outside I was watching a rerun of Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. I was trying to get Avery interested, but she said she wants to be a ballerina when she grows up. We brought out the tutus, and someone else wanted to be a ballerina too...
 
He's going to kill me for this in a few years.
 
My little ballerinas. Avery said she looked "ballericious". I thought that was a pretty good word for a 4 year old!
 
We've got a busy few weeks before Avery starts school, and I am looking forward to spending time with her before she becomes a big PreK girl. Where has the time gone?

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