Soup Can Lanterns

     My newest addiction is Pinterest. I have found so many great ideas on that network that I can't stop searching for DIY projects that I can use from simple objects in my home. I love adding things to our backyard the most. We seem to be there a lot, so I want it comfortable. About a year ago, a friend of my mother's gave me a fantastic idea for an old patio umbrella frame. It was to plant a vine and make a natural canopy from it. Still having trouble getting the vine growing good, so I decided to move on to the lighting for it in the meantime.
     Since we are a family of five, we go through lots of food. I recycle pretty much everything unless I can find another use for it. Again, I was searching and found another great idea, soup can lanterns. I read through many of the pics and gathered my info on how to make them and how I was going to use them on the umbrella.

 

     It was a simple project to make. The soups cans were first cleaned.  I then filled them about 3/4 of the way with water and froze them standing up. This is so that when you are hammering in your design the can doesn't crush with the pressure. After frozen you may notice the bottom swells. You can hammer that easily back into place. I then hammered my design into the can, remembering to place holes at the top of the can to hang them. Next step was to paint them. The vine on the umbrella is a purple Passion Fruit, so I went with a light green and yellow spray paint to compliment the purple. I have eight cans in two sizes, so I split the colors evenly. I used a piece of wire clothes hanger to make the handle for the lantern. I also painted a design on the outside so they are more attractive during the day too. Now it is ready for the tea-light candles. The best thing about the whole project was that I only had to buy the candles. Love that! Now my umbrella lighting is complete. The rest of the umbrella depends on Mother Nature. Hopefully as the new season arrives it will explode with growth. Have a healthy day!

Historic Florida

     I haven't been on a field trip with my kids in forever so finally one came up. It was to the Barnacle Historic House in Coral Gables. The trip was with my youngest and his classmates of fourth graders, 53 to be exact. I was looking forward to this for over a week. I have lived in Miami my entire life and never knew this place even existed. Right smack in the middle of the Gables sits this beautiful Historic House of the famous sailboat builder Commodore Ralph Middleton Munroe. It sits on 40 acres of land on Biscayne Bay. Doesn't get better than that! Sure it does. He only paid $400 for it. Today that is nothing, back then that was expensive.

 

     When we first arrived, we walked down through the hardwood hammock to the covered patio to hear a bit of history about the house. There was half an hour worth of so much information. In fact, it was too much for my brain to take in, I can't imagine if all the kids got it! LOL Either way I am sure they remembered something. After the introduction, we were taken into the house to check it out. It was amazing. I just love to see things from the past, especially here in Florida. I love my state and hearing about it's history, is awesome. Inside the house were so many antiques. The furniture, the books, cameras, radio, refrigerator, stove, and much more. I can't imagine how simple life was then. Must have been nice. At least they weren't running around everywhere with a phone on their hip. Times were simple back then. People worked hard and they appreciated what they had. Things were not taken for granted. It must have been wonderful.
     Once we were done inside the house, we traveled back outside to have lunch. The school provided lunches for the kids. I was impressed with what they got. I myself had a few oranges and apples to snack on and some water to drink. The kids ate a bologna sandwich, apple, milk, and a orange-pineapple juice. Pretty good if I don't say so myself.
      After eating we got ready for a scavenger hunt. The kids had to form groups and walk around the grounds to find the answers. It focused on the different trees found in the hardwood hammock. After about five minutes with no answers to be found, the kids were giving up. I could see that they were guessing just to get it done. I am a puzzle lover, so I decided to get in on the hunt. I scanned over the questions and it dawned on me, the guide mentioned earlier where to get all the answers. Guess that is one thing I remembered but the kids didn't. Haha I walked up to my son and his group, they were frustrated. I offered to help them get the puzzle complete. As that was going on another group of kids wanted help too. So I took all 6 of them on a walk to find the answers to the questions. We walked all the way back to the entrance of the grounds. As we walked I pointed out the little pedestals with information on them. I showed them a few and they picked it up from there. It was exciting to see them realize that the answers were now right in front of their faces. We ended up running around to try and get all the answers the fastest. So far there were no other kids that completed the hunt. I for one was not going to let my group give up!!! We found all of our answers and completed the riddle at the bottom. Awesome team! They were all so excited that they ran around to the other kids saying how they completed the whole puzzle. Haha Gotta love the feeling of success.
     It was now time for the kids to randomly play. Our trip was ending soon so the teachers allowed them enjoy the rest of the time. A break from all the information cramming into their brains is more like it. The guides provided them with chalk, and soccer balls, jump ropes and hoola hoops. It was great watching all them play so well together. No fights, just fun. A few boys fell and scraped themselves...boys! Girls were dancing together and laughing. All the teachers and volunteers sat around relaxing themselves and enjoying adult conversation before time to get back to work.
     The bus ride was about an hour long. I thought nothing of it because I was socializing with my son's teacher. We were discussing how many kids we thought would fall asleep on the bus. It was hysterical. Some of their heads were bobbing up and down as they fought the sleep. One even had drool coming out of his mouth. Gross but funny! In total there were about 6 that fell asleep. The field trip wore them out. I was pretty pooped too. I was a great day with a great group of kids. I really felt like a kid around them. I enjoyed their company as much as they enjoyed mine, so I was told by my son. I really love children and appreciate the great times with them. Makes me want to volunteer more often. Have a happy day!

Ghostly experience

     I know not too many people believe in ghosts/spirits, but I for one do. I have had many, many experiences in my life since I was a little kid. Luckily for me, there have other people around to witness such instances. A few times it has been my brother Jason. In fact, the first one I experienced as a child was with my brother. I think because I have an open mind to these type of things, I am lucky to be able to experience them. So this brings me to what happened today.
     I was at my brothers house doing the dishes. I clean his house for him on occasion and today was one of those days. It was just him and I there, the kids were in school. So as I washed dishes, he was at the stereo setting up his iPad so that I could listen to some music while I cleaned. All of a sudden I heard a slight noise. I looked up at him and asked "Are you texting?" He answered no and asked me why I asked. So I told him that I heard something like a text. We both paused for a second to listen if it happened again. Sure enough, with both of us listening, it did it again. I walked over to my phone and watched as letters were being pressed on the touch screen. Jason had said that maybe my phone was malfunctioning, until he got up to check it out for himself. There was no way this was a malfunction. I had left a text conversation with my daughter open because I was expecting a text from her. In fact, I had just answered a question from her. So the phone sat there, face up, waiting for her reply. Instead of her reply the phone started to text on its own. I know this is hard to believe but I was there and I honestly wouldn't believe it either if I didn't witness it myself. As we stood there watching the phone go crazy, the hairs on our arms started to raise. There was a presence in the house for sure. I knew the feeling from past experiences. I was covered with goose bumps, even on the back of my neck. Jason and I couldn't believe what we were watching in front of our face. The text was really odd also, it contained different letters and symbols. Which, if there was something malfunctioning, would it be random letters or one repeatedly??? Who knows!!! Well because it was so weird, Jason asked a question aloud to the entity, "If you are here, move the water bottle." Nothing happened to the bottle, but after a brief pause more letters appeared on my phone. This continued for about 5 minutes. In fact, by the time the texting stopped, it had pressed a total of 250 characters which makes up two messages on my phone. After everything stopped Jason and I walked into different rooms to experience goose bumps in certain areas of the house. Someone was there and we know it. After doing that for a while, it all stopped. 
     So what kind of characters did it type? The text didn't start till the 5th line down, as if enter was hit 5 times. The first line read:  twc;ppp ppp ;p or something very similar. So we figured that the letters twcp were pressed. Also a semicolon. How the hell did that happen?  I don't know about anyone else's phone but to get to the semicolon on mine you have to hit the symbols/number button first, it's not on the main text screen.There were about 5 or 6 semicolons in total. It also hit the space bar and the enter button. Also, by trying to recreate it later, I realized that after a space a new capital letter will appear. All the letters were lower case. Weird? I think so!!! The letter p showed up a lot in the text, so my first guess was that it was Pauline, our Great Grandmother who had passed many years ago. I thought she was trying to communicate with us. We called her name out but nothing happened. 
      Jason had her hutch in his house so we just assumed that this was her because there is no other person we thought it could be. Crazy awesome! His kids and him have experienced some oddities in the past, so in his mind, this is just what had been happening. He was just as thrilled as I had been. I love this kind of thing. He sorta wants to get rid of the hutch, but I think that would rid him of Great G'ma too. He is the only one right now that has any contact with her, even though it may be a little creepy. His kids are a little unnerved by this type of stuff, so we couldn't say anything to them about it. JT, his son, had an experience where he was walking toward the kitchen at night and he saw a shadow in the kitchen. JT ran back to the room and told my brother about what happened. Since then, JT is a little scared. My kids have also seen/felt weird things in his house. So all I can say is that....someone is there!!!
     Things like this happen and no one believes it. In my family, we all have experienced things similar to this so I know I can talk to them about it. Imagine my excitement of wanting to share this. I called my mother whom happened to be with her father. My Papa is Pauline's son. I told my Mom about what my brother and I witnessed. She told my Papa as I spoke to her. She then told me that an hour earlier, her and my Papa were talking about Great Grandma Pauline. Were her ears ringing? LOL Maybe she knew they were talking about her and had a message for them. I told my Mom what the text had in it. I questioned her and my Papa to see if anyone in the family had the initials TWC. He had said that he didn't know of anyone that did. This sort of disappointed me but it is what it is. The excitement of what happened was awesome enough without an explanation as to why. I hope that I continue to feel something at my brother's house. I have hope that it is my Great Grandma and we have this opportunity again to chat with her.

Happy Birthday to My Little Girl

     Today is the day, 17 years ago that my life changed forever. My daughter Shy-anne was born. It was the happiest day of my life. Well, ok, painfully happy. LOL I won't lie but her labor was the worst out of the three. But she was my first so I take it for what it was. I became a Mom and that is all that mattered. Some people grow up wanting to have these luscious careers and such. Not me, I just wanted to be a Mom. It is a very difficult job, but it has the best reward, unconditional love. I was only 22 when she was born. To me that was young, but older for some. I was not really ready for her but I knew that I couldn't live without her. Now, as time nears, I fear the same as all mothers...loosing her. It kills me to know that in one year she will be leaving to go to college somewhere. I won't be able to see her everyday. :( I won't hear her annoying whining either! Haha, it hasn't been a perfect 17 years.

     I has been a joy watching her grow up into a beautiful young lady. I still remember her as a little girl, those memories will never disappear. Learning to talk, oh boy that came early. Then from walking to running. She hasn't stopped since.  From braces to chasing boys. Now driving and dating. She always has kept me on my toes. It hasn't been the easiest 17 years but all worth it. As I sit here and cry writing this, I wonder if she will be ok. I sometimes have doubted my abilities as a Mom (I think we all do at times). I just hope that I have taught her what she needs to know to take on life when it does come her way. She is a very strong minded individual so she will probably be fine. :D But that won't even stop me from worrying about her, as my Mom still does for me. The closer it gets the harder it gets. I will enjoy her as much as I can until that day comes. I love you kiddo! You are one of the best things that has ever happened to me! Happy 17th Birthday!

Dirty Little Rat

     A few weeks ago I told you about my little garden pest. Well, here we are still battling this little pesky critter. Up until now I have just been using plain old traps and bait to try and catch him. I didn't plan on injuring the poor little animal, I just wanted him gone. Well....the tide has turned. Now, sad to say, I want him caput! You are probably wondering why all of a sudden would I want to intentionally harm this little guy. Well, here it goes. I was planting new seeds in the seed pots that I have. I planted a good amount of different vegetables, somewhere around 30 pots. It was a bust ass type of day in which I got so many things accomplished. Everything was great and I was excited to have more veggies growing. Pffttt, yeah right! Not if he could help it. The next morning as I was having my coffee, my hubby screams out. I go outside to see what was going on. He walks up to me and says, "I have bad news". Well, that is never good. I asked him about what and he said the seeds. Huh? How could he possibly have bad news about seeds. Well, he did. Low and behold the little pesky critter had dug out the newly planted seeds and ate them. There were empty seeds everywhere. I turned furious immediately. I know you think, why so angry. I guess you could say that at that moment is when my patience in dealing with this little bugger had run dry. I had no more patience available. He has not only eaten some of my plants and harvests, but now my seeds too! Is he insane, does he not know who he is dealing with here. That is MY food. I understand the little guy is hungry too but enough is enough. I also have a family to feed and I am not going hungry because of a little rodent. Now instead of the snapping type of trap we also bought the sticky traps. They are baited with a delicious tomato, so his last meal will be great! Sorry little man but I just can't take this anymore. I know you will understand, or not! Either way I don't care! I love my veggies too and you can't have anymore. Let's just hope the traps work....they haven't so far. He is so lucky that someone is on his side. I just don't know how long before his luck runs out.