Camping with Young Children - Craziness or Courage?

We recently went camping for a weekend at a state park nearby with some good friends and their two kids. It was great to get away into God's creation, but "roughing it" comes with some challenges for all of us...less sleep than normal, more fresh air and tiredness, the long process it is to cook anything for a meal. But we came away with some great memories and are hopefully training our kids to handle these situations with more grace each time we go. We especially enjoyed a great family-friendly hike and the kids loved the craft time made possible by my friend who had the foresight to bring along some craft supplies for the kids to enjoy. Oh, and of course the s'mores.

Seizing the End of the Summer

We had a fun family outing last weekend, trying to squeeze in some fun before the summer comes to an end. We went to a city park with a sprayground which was very fun and refreshing, and as an added bonus also free (except the gas to drive there, of course). We'll definitely make this a regular outing next summer! Pictures are included for dear grandmas to our sweet kiddos.

Budget Backyard Improvements

Over the 4th of July weekend my husband was able to take off an extra day making it our first 4-day weekend in a LONG time in which we haven't been traveling or been adjusting to a new baby. We had some very nice family times in the area, attended a neighbor's BBQ and worked on the project below. I wanted to title this post "Budget Backyard Beautiful" but then thought better of it since the dead grass remains. We are under rather drastic outdoor watering restrictions and no sod permits are being issued this year. When you combine that factor with us trying to sell this summer and not wanting to invest much, monetarily, in the yard, the result has been that we haven't done any improvements to the yard. Looking out at the yard didn't have a very pleasing effect so I set about using lots of what we had on hand to make it better.

Here is an in-process picture. I took leftover bricks from our patio project, some weather treated boards, newspapers from our recycling bin to use in lieu of landscaping fabric, a bag of mulch and dianthus, petunias and volunteer squash plants from our garden and some failing planters to put into the area. The black tub you see actually did stay...that's our budget compost bin, which we usually have a metal lid on and usually isn't visible from most areas of the yard or house.

And here is the finished project with about an additional 5 bags of mulch, 10 bricks and a can of spray paint to revive the kids' bench. Total cost: about $25.


As so often happens with me, one thing leads to another and then I wanted to work on this area by the patio. Unfortunately, I had pretty much run out of leftover materials so needed to start from scratch on this one. I bought smaller bricks for the edging, the cheapest landscaping fabric I could find, about 9 bags of pea gravel, 5 stepping stones and one bush and spent about $50-60. We still need a couple more bags of pea gravel to provide better coverage, but of course, Lowe's had run out of it by the time we discovered we needed more. We always seem to underestimate our needs with rock, mulch, etc.

The market umbrella was a free find on CraigsList, which seems to complete the patio a bit more. And look how much the sunflowers have shot up in the few days from start to finish!

Although these projects are far from perfect, they were a reminder to me of the concept of "do what you can with what you have where you are". Sometimes it just does my soul good to just do something, even if that something is low budget and imperfect. I am delighted that my little 4'x8' garden behind the patio is doing so well this summer. We have 5 tomato plants there, along with 3 huge squash plants, 3 sunflowers (Thanks for the seeds, Gigi!) and a couple other flowers, just for the fun of it. From that area I also removed the 5 dianthus, and 8 volunteer squash plants (I think we must have gotten some seeds in our compost in the fall) which were transplanted to the new planting area.

Now if only I could do something about that dead grass....

Can We Build It? Yes, We Can!

Sportster would know this is what Bob the Builder would say. He really enjoyed helping Grandpa and Daddy work on building the patio in our backyard. We are so thankful to my father-in-law for his know-how and hard work. We can't wait to get out there and use this new space as the weather permits.

Hooray, no more big yard projects!

The Laundry Line

One of the ways we have cut our energy bill recently is by drying most of our laundry outside. This is certainly not a new concept, but has its challenges when living in suburbia with a tiny backyard and not particularly wanting to air your laundry for the whole neighborhood to see. My solution was to loop ends of a clothesline rope around fence pickets at a diagonal. The laundry then hangs low enough to be out of view for the neighors. I placed our rope on the side of our house in a section of yard that is otherwise unused. With breezy and dry Colorado air, I am able to dry up to three loads per day this way. I think I paid $1 for the clothesline rope and a couple bucks for a few sets of clothepins several years ago. And I love how fresh this laundry feels and smells!

For more frugal ideas, visit Biblical Womanhood.

Treasure Hunting

This seemed to be a weekend of treasure hunting for us, both on Craig's List and at our MOPS garage sale. Here are a few fun things we found for a real bargain that have already been put to good use. I'm learning to look for secondhand items for our family instead of always thinking of buying something new. I also found a very nice high-end pan with a lid for only a buck. It almost makes me want to cook more. But even with garage sale finds, I'll need to use some self-control in not buying things just because they are cheap, but because we actually have a need for these items or will really enjoy them.

Friday Night Fun

We were blessed with yet another snowfall this week, so when Daddy came home from work on Friday night he went out with the two older kiddos to make some snowmen. Although we've had lots of snow this winter, we haven't had the opportunity to make snowmen since it has also been bitterly cold at those times, we've been gone, or the snow wouldn't pack well.




Then they came in to some fresh hot pizza, a Friday night tradition in our home. I almost always make this myself using a sourdough crust, this recipe, or the Fast & Easy Pizza Crust from this book. We do use a variety of toppings, but we usually always have some part of a pizza that is only pepperoni and cheese, too. This night we enjoyed fresh pineapple & ham on one half.