Say Moo

All the kids were great apricot helpers, but Neil was the one I got pictures of.  He jumped right up on the chair and pitted and pitted apricots for Ken to blend up.  Jessie was even a great helper when she got back from camp and the rest of us were getting sick of apricots.  She pitted a whole box for me.  It was really nice to have the second kitchen downstairs to make the leather in because then it didn’t make the upstairs even hotter while the fruit dryers ran.  And it was nice not to be tripping over the dryers.  Ken’s mom and David let us borrow their dryers and for most of a week we had about 24 trays drying – night and day.  It’s kind of amazing that 50 to 75 lbs of apricots dry up to fit into five 1-gallon ziplock bags!Mark was practicing his his bow and arrow and got a bull’s eye right between the card board flaps.  Too cool.Rachel stopped by to tell us about Chick-A-Filet’s cow day.  The two babies were sleeping, so I didn’t want to go, but my other kids were pretty excited (Mark needed a little convincing, but he had fun too).  So we cut out cow spots and ears.  Jessie painted noses and we attached tails to belts.  This is my FAVORITE picture!  Abbie and Spencer turned to the side to try and show us their tails.  Jessie’s sign says “birdees, eegles, chikin”.Rachel took them up by way of her apartment so she could change too and I just love the picture of Spencer checking his tail while he walks to the car.  The kids were excited to tell me all about their free meal and the other people they saw, although most weren’t as head to toe as they were.We celebrated my birthday with family and friends on Friday.  Addie made this totally AWESOME hamburger cake to celebrate along with the chocolate cheesecake I had made.  I got quite a few new white bath towels which is what I really wanted.  We played some Hobbes Ball in the backyard – boys against girls – and the boys won again.  It was so fun to have people over.