What a man!

We recently discovered that we were paying a lot more on our water bill then we thought we should be. Turns out, a couple of sprinkler heads were victims of the lawn mower and the downstairs bathroom sink faucet had started leaking.

Ggggrrrr!!!!

But Mr. Perfect is, well, perfect. So he replaced the sprinkler heads (we now walk the parking strips for heads that haven't popped back down before mowing). And he risked hurting his back (more or less pain free for several weeks now) by pulling the sink off the wall and replacing the old (very, very old -- according to the guy at Home Depot) faucet with this beautiful, shiny new one.

Thanks, Cap'n.

How many men can look this sexy while lying under a sink?

His reward? Besides my undying love? Fresh-out-of-the oven zucchini bread and Haugen Daus ice cream bars.

A few signs that we might be nearing the end of this phase of home improvements

Or at least the half-way point.

Kitchen before the cupboard doors went up:

The whole thing isn't put together yet, but here's what some of it looks like:

Just in case you've forgotten, here's what they looked like before:

And here's the beautiful tile in the bathroom:

Wordless Wednesday

I have discovered...

If you give a kid a cookie, he'll only want more. And he can be very cunning in his attempts to win you over and get more cookies.

I promised the Primary children cookies last Sunday. They've been doing so well learning their music for the Primary Program (it will be in October). They have also been very good during Sharing Time and being on their best behavior. The promise of cookies will do that to kids.

(I brought them raspberry cookies a few weeks ago for winning a game during Singing Time, so they've actually been asking when I was bringing more cookies for a while.)

This time I promised them lemon cookies. And they each got one. I had several kids ask me if they could have another one, but Mr. Perfect considers cookies to be one of his four essential food groups, so the answer was "No, everyone gets one cookie." There were enough for the leaders and the Bishop and I could still take a few home for Mr. Perfect and Game Boy.

One of my favorite kids was more creative. He asked if he could take cookies home for his cousins who were coming over for dinner. He only needed about 10. That one made me smile. Later, when Mr. Perfect was picking peas from our garden for dinner, this same boy came by and asked about the cookies again. You have to admire persistence. Plus, he helped Mr. Perfect guide some of the straying pumpkin vines back into the fence.

However, he still didn't get more cookies.

Harry and Percy complete their grand Coyote Gulch Adventure

When last we left our intrepid adventurers, they had just bedded down for the first night of their Coyote Gulch Adventure. The next morning, after packing up camp, we headed up the tributary and on to more amazing scenery during the 6-mile trek from camp #1 to camp #2. Along the way, we saw beautiful falls, Natural Bridge, Jacob Hamlin Arch, and the Amphitheater. Be prepared for another photo dump, but that's what cameras and blogs are for, right?

As we started our final day hiking out of the Gulch, Percy and Harry were prepared for two miles of canyon and 3-4 miles of desert. The switch to desert was gradual, which made it easier to traverse.

Harry and Percy were happy to land at the end of the adventure with Thing One and Thing Two (also known as the BC Twins).

On Hole in the Rock road back to Escalante, we blew out a tire and had to figure out how to drop the spare on Dexter (something we hadn't done before). Percy and Harry were great help to Mr. Perfect in fixing the car. Fortunately, it was a full-sized spare, and we made it back to Salt Lake without further incident.

Wordless Wednesday

I have discovered...

Virtual correspondence is a horrible way to hold a conversation with someone when trying to exchange ideas between diverging opinions.

You each read what you want into the other person's statements. You can't read body language. You can't stop them before they get too far off the deep end on what they think you meant. And they can't hear you laughing at yourself. I think this last point the is biggest reason it's so bad.

Also, I think texting makes it hard to teach kids how to communicate in the real world, away from the electronics. And you don't even want to get me started on the deterioration of handwriting skills of the rising generation...

Wordless Wednesday

I have discovered...

I love the smell of rain on fresh cut grass.

Mowing during a rain storm? Not so sure about yet. At least it wasn't pouring, just lightly sprinkling.

A bathroom update

No, not that kind of bathroom update. The walls have been painted. We love the brown. We're very excited about how quickly it should progress now. Of course, we've been thinking that for a while now...

Any who, here's a picture of the brown.

The iPod has arrived!

And it works perfectly. It's slimmer than the old one. It was three years-old -- how out-dated can you be? And here's the engraving.

It's so much fun to open new toys, especially from Apple. Their packaging is clever. The new item is so shiny.

And it only takes you about three hours to put the first scratch on the back of the pretty little thing. *sigh*

Hope you all had a great Independence Day

Or, if you're are reading this from some other country than the U.S.A., I hope that your July 4th was nice.

I love celebrating America's independence. I love learning and studying the history of how this country came to be. (American government was my favorite general ed at the University of Utah.) I love the men and women who sacrificed so much so that we could live in unprecedented freedom.

When Benjamin Franklin was asked what the Constitutional Congress had given the people, he responded with "A republic, if you can keep it." I sure hope we can.

Update on the dead iPod

Well, the iPod is truly dead. This is what I see when I plug it into a power cord:

Very sad, I know.

So, I found out today (after already ordering a new one) that you can take your dead iPod to an Apple Store for a 10% discount on a new iPod. I wonder if they will give me a refund if I've already purchased the new iPod through the online store. Worth an ask, don't you think?

Sad, sad day

I have some sad news. Okay, it's probably only really sad for me and Mr. Perfect, and only him because it was  expensive.

I accidentally flushed my iPod down the toilet at work.

I'm not kidding.

Hey, you in Maryland (ESN, you know who you are!), you can stop laughing now.

It finally came back up (I guess it was really too big to go down the pipe), but it was in the water for over an hour. I have it sitting on its end on my desk to see if the water will drain out and it will turn on again. So far, no such luck.

So, I ordered me a new one from the Apple Store.

It will be engraved.

It will forever be the silver iPod called Flushed Away.