The End of August

No, this is not a passport photo - this was just his first haircut with the black cape, and his first haircut using the clippers. It was his fourth or fifth actual hair cut - this boy has hair, let me tell you! The clippers seemed better in the end than the scissors, mostly because they were quicker - get it over with sooner! It also helped a lot to have Josh hold him! 

  Man, I love that little boy!

 And his Daddy. :o)

 Saturday finances has become a bit more relaxed and interactive since we got the receipt scanner, because Hope is very good at running it, and Joy is learning. I'm happy it is something they can do together with their Daddy! :o)

 Up on all fours, not quite crawling yet. Him and his four little teeth. :o)

 Taking advantage of the end of the summer, with a few last picnics on the lawn. Hope had picked her own outfit that day, and we had gone for a nice long walk/trike ride together. :o)

 Ho-ho - a stuck son! :o)

 My Mum gave each of the girls some flower seeds for Christmas last year, and these were some of Joy's mini-sunflowers. :o) We will definitely be growing those again. :o)

 A visitor - Josh's Aunt Rita from Guatemala was in the area, and stopped by for dinner and a visit.

 It was a gorgeous evening, so we ate outside.

 Johnny, her adopted son, was able to accompany her, and he had the girls laughing and running up and down the deck while we did dishes - it was great!!!! I am guessing it was Joy's idea that Johnny wear her sunglasses. :o) Who knows? :o)

A big day in our year

Late August brings anticipation of BC peaches and all their goodness. Home canned peaches are well loved by all of us, so we make time to can some every year. This year, the girls really wanted to help and experience the process with Mommy, because they love eating them out of the jar so much. :o) 

I don't recall this from previous years, but this year, every-single-peach had a sticker on it. And when you buy 100 lbs of peaches, that's a lot of stickers to remove! Good thing I had my happy helper Joy-Belle on hand. This proved to be a great job for her! 

Meanwhile, Hope did different jobs, like measuring the correct amount of lemon juice into the bottom of each jar for me.

Joy was ready to help me fill the jars with peach pieces.

And Philip was a very good little boy, and played happily with his toys at our feet. :o) Mercifully, it was a cool rainy day, the day we canned peaches, which made the job more pleasant than if it had been a stifling hot day.

Hope had enough patience to help me skin the peaches after they were blanched and cooled. I was quite impressed.

The girls had had enough after a while, and happily went off to play, each claiming an empty peach box to use as their "car" or something. It was a great idea, and kept them marvelously entertained and contained. 

Unbeknownst to me, however, was this sticky glue on the peach boxes, that basically melted due to the humidity in the house from the canners boiling on the stove, and therefore it became very spreadable, and I spent two days going around the floor with Goo-Gone, cleaning up it's mess. Needless to say, it was bye-bye to those boxes! (the glue was on the top of each case, so I did let the kids keep the bottom half.)

 When it came time to clean up, I literally ran out of counter space, so I made a makeshift drying station. :o) Frozen pizza to the rescue for dinner... I had to laugh at the irony of it all - home canning all day and frozen fast food for dinner. Yup. That was how it happened. :o)

The fruit of our labours, and some to share too!

A few days later, we processed the rest of the peaches and froze them for smoothies. This time, Joy decided she was brave enough to try skinning some. Good thing those ones were being frozen for smoothies - they didn't look too pretty, with little finger holes dug in to them all around. :o) "Mom, I can't get it ooooofffff."

I'm thankful for the blessing of having good fruit put up for the winter, and for the grace to do the canning by myself this year. I've always had a mature helper before, but God had it all planned out this way for this year, and it was good!