Tuesday's Tip-A Harvest of a Different Sort

Last Saturday TL was dutifully doing his "honeydo" list, as every good husband does on a frequent basis. I had asked him to check the vent opening to my dryer. I was worried that it was leaking hot air because my laundry room/pantry seemed to be really warm while the dryer was running and of course since lots of my food storage is in that room, well, I was concerned about the extra heat floating around the room while the dryer was in use. He made an interesting discovery.....

UG! The dryer vent was clogged with about 5 pounds of lint! Not my usual "harvest." All this gunk was clogging up the vent and preventing the outflow of the warm air to the outside, where it should belong!

So here's my tip for the day-go have your significant other, main squeeze, man about the house help you clean out your dryer vent. I'd be interested to know what you find! I told him I bet our utility bill goes down $10 next month! We've decided this will be an annual event at our house-the cleaning out of the dryer vent......

See what a hard worker he is?

He has worn the bottoms off his shoes......Awwww. What a guy!

There's Carn in them Thar Hills!

Seeing's how AZ is such an overachieving state......(aka HOT!) the corn is being harvested as.we.speak.

And...because I'm basically obsessed with food storage and preparedness.....

My hint today is about how I prepare fresh corn for future use, when there is no fresh corn to be had.

After the corn is shucked and washed, I cut it off the cob. An old bundt pan works perfectly for holding the corn steady while my electric knife easily slices off the corn kernels.

It takes a lot of concentration not to slice off a finger while doing this, hence the mouth position.There's a camera hog in every situation.After the corn is cut off the cob, it needs to be blanched, or dunked in hot water. Basically what I do is steam the kernels for about 3 minutes.....Then plunge the container in ice water to cool it quickly.Then I bag up the corn in ziplock bags and pop it into the freezer.

I don't know if this is the Better Homes and Garden method of doing this, but it's easy for me to do. I know you can freeze it on the cob, but this takes less of my precious freezer space. I did 3 doz ears today. I got about 25 cups of corn, which divided by my cost is about 57 cents per cup. I don't think this is more economical than a can of corn but boy howdy, it tastes way better!

Now I only need to do about 20 dozen more.......

P.S. I love the way that people from Cache Valley, Utah say corn...carn, ward, narth...etc.etc.

Wet!

Summer is all about water!

And when you have wet little kids, you have wet bathing suits....

So when I was surfing the internet not too long ago, I came across this website:

http://littlebirdiesecrets.blogspot.com/2009/05/wet-bag-tutorial.html

And being the OCD mother that I am, I decided that my grandkids needed wet bags too! So I followed the directions, super easy, and spent a minimal amount of money, just enough for two zippers and a vinyl shower curtain liner... (which I have a ton left over for more wet bags)..just some fabric scraps......and we have this:

P.S. They could also be useful when there are other times involving "wet" things.....Mommies-I'm sure you know what I mean!

So Help Me....I'm Trying to Have Patience...

But my kids at home are driving me crazy right now!!!

I know-this photo is enough to frighten anyone!

No school.
No jobs.
Having to ask them 5 times to do something for me, and then they get annoyed and wonder why I'm nagging them!
Sleeping in until 10 am.
Except for the one who has to get up at 5 am to get to swim practice (she gets herself up)
But then I'm awake until 1 am the night before waiting for the oldest kid to get home.
And it's only June 4th.
Nice.
Don't tell me to ground them. More than half of them are legal adults.
These guys are good kids, really........I'm telling myself this 100 times a day....
But then I see this:
Or this:
Or this:

Gosh, dang-it, how can you get mad at that cute face?

And Steve just got accepted to BYU for the summer.

So what's a mother to do?

{sigh}

The Perfect Marriage

Take some of these:

Add some of this:And Mix some of this in:

YUMMMM.

A Little Piece O Heaven

I wish that my blog had smellovision or touchovision.....

Because then you could inhale the scent of a newborn baby....

Or feel their squishy softness....Or hold them close when they curl up into their little balls of sweetness.

Sorry, this is the best I can do....Just take my word for it...

It's just a little piece of heaven on earth...

My Very First Digi Scrapbook Page!

I'm making the change. Don't worry kids, I'm not getting rid of all the stuff...yet.... and I still love the fun of creating pages with paper, but I'm thinkin' this is going to be reallly fun!