A Fisher out of Water: June 2007

Thursday, June 28, 2007

Operation Lawn

Now that Kevin is home, we have tackled the idea of putting in a lawn. I had sprayed Round-Up all over the old grass, and then just sat around while it slowly died.

Then on Tuesday we rented a rototiller and set to work. Kevin's brother, Ryan (in the picture), came over and helped with the tilling. It's a good thing, too. It took us (well, them. I had to go to work) almost 6 hours to till the whole area, going over it twice.

Then yesterday, we rented a lawn roller, and Kevin raked it flat while I went over it with the roller.

Now it's pretty much flat (see below)

, but it needs a bit more work. We're waiting to here back from the dump to see how much it costs to have some compost delivered. Then we'll plant it sometime, hopefully this week. It's been super hot, but apparently buffalo grass does pretty well in the heat, so I'm not terribly worried.

I'm really excited to have a lawn, possibly one where I can actually go outside in bare feet and not worry about getting stabbed by the awful crabgrass stalks that were our last "lawn."

Saturday, June 23, 2007

It was with a certain amount of trepidation--and also an excited kind of glee--that I picked my first 4 zucchinis today. If you will notice, it is only June. This means I have MONTHS of zucchini picking left.... :D :S
I love zucchini. It means zucchini bread, double-chocolate zucchini cake, and my personal specialty: sauteed zucchini with parmesan. Mmmmm!
Ask me in a month, though, how I'm feeling about all this wonderful zucchini. Then we'll see.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

I have finally discovered for myself the wonder that is Ikea.
When Kevin and I lived in Beijing, people were always squealing about the cute stuff they had seen or bought at Ikea: furniture, cups, napkins, pillows, you name it. Beijing even had a knock-off Ikea (actually Ieka), so you know it was pretty awesome if it was worth knocking off.
And a few weeks ago, Utah got its first Ikea. I went visiting teaching last month to my friend Lonnie's house. She said we could come, but we had to make it quick because she had something going on that night. Turns out she was planning to camp out in front of Ikea the night before the grand opening. She was so excited!
Then a couple weeks ago, Kevin's mom came and stayed with me for a while, and we planned on going to Ikea to check it out and buy some kitchen chairs (all we had were random, unmatching folding chairs and rickety old wooden chairs). But while she was here, we didn't have an opportunity to go. Before she left, she gave me some money for me to go buy chairs at Ikea.
So last night I went.
And it was pretty much cool. I tried all the chairs and discovered that the cheapest ones were just as comfortable as the ones 3x as expensive, and way more comfortable than the cute ones I almost bought. So I bought

6 of the Jokkmokk chairs (which perfectly match the wood in our kitchen cabinets, btw), 6 seat cushions, a rug,

a paper lantern, lightbulbs, a cord, some cutting boards (not exciting enough to include pictures),

and an old fashioned alarm clock just like in Mickey's Christmas Carol-- all for just $204!
The biggest mistake I made in that store was to go sit in some chairs that I knew I couldn't afford. There was a big cushy leather recliner for like $120 or something. I thought it was really cute, but I had NO IDEA how comfortable it would be!!
But as you can tell from my purchase list, I left the store without it. I may have to go back and visit it sometime soon.

Monday, June 18, 2007

Hello, world!
I made it through Girls' Camp, and I'm all cleaned and scrubbed and now smell decent enough to brave it into the real world again. It took me a couple days. ;)
Camp wasn't what I expected. This is mostly my fault, but partially just a difference of expectations. I'd been to Girls' Camp for 6 years when I was growing up, and it was always a blast! And then I did Bear Camp every day all summer for 5 years, and man, I LOVED it! I always had tons of energy and sang songs and enthusiastically did crafts and dodgeball and everything else.
But fast forward a couple years, and you have me at YW camp this year: I didn't get any sleep the night before I left (I was packing and sending cute e-cards to Kevin all night), and then the first night at camp and every time I tried to take a nap, there were girls giggling and talking and NOT LETTING ME SLEEP. But I always hated it when the leaders would come around and tell you to go to sleep, so I just let them do it.
AND... I was kind of looking at camp as something to fill up my time. I knew it would be fun and time would just rush by. It did, but when that's all you're at camp for, it's not as exciting as it could have been.
It was awesome to get to know the girls better, and there were some fun times. There's this activity set up in the Confidence Course where there's a big steel rope tied around three trees, a couple feet off the ground. Basically, you and a friend start at one end where the ropes are close together, and then you lean towards each other as you walk on the ropes, getting farther and farther apart and leaning more and more against each other. I did this course with my neighbor, Deon, and she and I were the only people who made it to the end. We are so cool!
I "got" to talk in church about camp, and Deon got after me later about not mentioning the Confidence Course in my talk, so this is to make up for that. :)
Camp was nice, and time has passed, and now there are only 3 more days til Kevin gets back. Yay!

Monday, June 11, 2007

It is waaaay too late for me to be writing this, but here goes it:
I'm going to YW camp in the morning at 6:30! Crazy huh!
I'm excited to go. For years and years I went to YW camp. First I'd go for a night a year when my dad would go up. I thought I was soooo cool being the one little girl with all the cool older girls. Then I went every year as a teenager. Now I get to go as a leader! Rock on!
I still have some packing to do, and I should be in bed a long time ago. But oh well. That's how it goes.
I'll give a lengthy report once I get back.