Adrian in New York for the Week

So mom and Jess have to find fun things to do after school. Last night we decided to stage our own Nash version of Project Runway. We used toilet paper as our challenge and got to work. Carroll made Jess a supermodel dress only suitable for a magazine fashion shoot. Jess decided to make mom a more 'covered' cocktail dress since mom 'is not built like those fashion ladies on the show.' We had many huge laughs and now Jess wants to do it again with something other than TP!!!

Well duh!

FIRST DAY OF THIRD GRADE

Oh just rip my heart out and show it to me as I die!! Jessica started third grade this week and I cannot believe she is this old. I pretty much got a lot of 'DON'T bring your camera into school and embarrass me.' And 'DON'T start crying until you get out to the car.' Big sigh. Isn't this what all moms do?! Jess was very excited to start 3rd grade this year and we're hoping for another great academic year. I'm already thinking of ideas for our, I mean HER, science project. Two years at second place . . . this year we CRUSH the opposition and go for NUMBER ONE. I mean, hopefully we can do well, and have a good learning experience in the process. (And Ali wonders why we Americans like the Olympics.)

Last Week Before School Starts

Summer finally had to end and for our last week off we had a great day out with the Heffernan clan (sans Bren) to see the Peacocks at the Pasadena Arboretum. VERY hot, but great fun with the kids. I've got some peacock shots around here somewhere, so I'll dig those out and get them up shortly. Trying to get this blog updated a bit before Adrian beats me for doing something other than TPT work. (Only where the bruises won't show!!)

What a Summer!!

So it started with bees making a huge hive in the crawl space above our living room. Then inside plumbing issues made us finally face our mostly collapsed sewage line from the house to the street. We've had a great summer of home improvements that cost a ton of money, but can't actually be SEEN. The sewage line was fun and I snapped a nice pic of a chunk of pipe that was so filled with tree roots they could not even cut through it until they dug 6 feet down. Part of the pipe was so eaten away by tree roots it had just collapsed. No big surprise to us, the sewage pipes were the original from when the house was built, so now we're set for another 20-30 years. If only we could redo the damn bathrooms!!!