Sunday, September 9, 2012

May 2012

Abby's ballet recital

Abby and her friend Megan

Sibling support

My Mother's Day flowers, the rose is from church and the other "flowers" the kids picked from the field across the street.  Aren't they sweet?

Molly and Leia

Brenham Ice Cream Festival May 2012

Eating ice cream

Molly riding the carousel

Thomas and Abby talking and riding

I love this picture!  Molly freaked out a little going down this slide!

Thomas going down the biggest slide!

Sisters!

Thomas climbed this rock.

Still not done with catch up

I participated in my first 5K (April) (Molly joined me for the last 50 feet)

My friend, Belin, who inspired me to work on my health.

Toby got me these flowers after completing the 5K.

Abby was able to participate in an activity for Gifted Students, they built the Great Wall of China out of Legos. (April)

One of the cool Lego displays they had there.

Old Katy (April)

Toby likes to play with the settings on his camera, this time he turned the kids into ghosts!  (April)

Molly as a ghost.

More catch up

Thomas got to go camping with the Cub Scouts.

One of the trails that they hiked.  (March)

Molly holding a chick at the Katy Folk Life festival (March)

Abby holding the chick

They all shot the bow and arrow, but since this was Molly's first time, I only included her picture

We carried on the Texas Easter tradition of confetti eggs.  (April)

The kids coming down for the Easter egg hunt.

Getting too far behind post

Molly waiting to see the Trail Riders. (February)
Blue and Gold Banquet (March)
Toby playing with the kids at Galveston Beach
The family at Galveston Beach (Spring Break)
We took along this big inflatable ball that you can get in and roll around, the kids loved using it in the water!!

Friday, April 20, 2012

Building a butcher's block and cabinet for Amy

A couple of weeks ago Amy asked me to build a small cabinet in which she could store some of the large kitchen appliances.  After looking at several designs I decided to add an oak butcher's block to the top.  For the cabinet I used a few pine stair steps that I cut into the cabinet shape.  For the block I built it out of 1x2 red oak strips.  I chose to build it in sections.  Each section was bordered by a long strip of oak and then filled in with the little blocks of oak which were laid with the end up.  The alternating end and side grain pieces gave it a nice pattern.


Close up on the block

 
The block mounted on top of the cabinet in our kitchen

Amy finished the back of the cabinet off with some fabric.  She found a nice kitchen themed material, which we cut and then mod-poge'd it onto the wood.  The cabinet is mounted on small wheels to make it easier to move it around.
The completed cabinet

Friday, March 16, 2012

Canned Food Storage

 We have been looking for a way to store our canned food that takes up less space than just putting them on a shelf.  We found inspiration on Pinterest and built our own self-rotating racks!  With just a piece of plywood and some 1x3s and some 1x2s.  Some L brackets and lots of screws we built this!!  We made sure that the cans that we wanted to put here fit in each row.  At the bottom of each row, we put this wedge piece.
 And on the wedge we screwed in an L bracket.  That way the can doesn't fall out on it's own.
 We screwed two boards with an angled cut at the top to the wall and the rack had boards with opposite angle cuts on the back. 
 Here is the first rack.  The end spot was not big enough for a can, so Toby just put two shelves and we are stacking tuna there!
 And here are both!  I love them!!!
UPDATE We had a request for more information on the canned food rack that we posted a couple of months ago.  Since it's hanging on the wall, it's kind of hard to get pictures, so I'll try to explain what I did.

If I was building it again, I'd use very thin plywood (1/4" or thinner) for the pieces that go on the front of the rack, instead of 1"x2".   They just have to be strong enough to prevent the cans from falling forward and using thinner wood would make it lighter.

The angled piece at the bottom of each row of cans was just cut from a 2x4.  My saw blade wasn't quite large enough to cut all the way to the top of a 2x4 so I cut off about 1/2" from the top of the 2x4, see Fig 1.



Then I cut the 2x4 lengthwise in half at an angle.  I angled my saw blade at around 25 deg to cut through the bottom corner and angle up to come out at the opposite top corner see Fig 2.

Once I had it cut in half at an angle, I cut the piece into 2-3" wide triangles.  These are what I attached to the bottom of each row of cans.  I glued and then drilled a countersunk hole in the angled pieces at the bottom of where the cans will go.  I then put a screw in the countersunk hole and made sure the head didn't come above the surface of the wood.  That gave me a sturdy and secure surface to attach the angle bracket.

The boards that hold it to the wall were about 1/2" thick plywood.  I cut them into strips about 6" wide.  Then, I made a 45deg cut lengthwise down the center of the strip, producing 2 3" wide pieces.  I then repeated until I had 4 3" pieces for each rack.  I marked the two halves so I knew which pieces went together, in case there was any variation in the 45deg cut.  Find the studs in your wall and mark them.  While you could use drywall anchors I think screwing the boards to the studs is much more secure. You attach two separate piece to the wall, with the cut side pointing upward and the high side of the 45deg cut away from the wall.  This creates a pocket against the wall.  If you attach it backward, the cut will slope away from the wall and the food storage rack will fall off.  I then set the other two pieces into their matching pieces on the wall.  With a second person, we then held the rack up against the 4 boards on the wall.  Quickly drive 2 screws through the rack into each of the unattached pieces.  This will connect them to the rack and make sure they match up with the 2 pieces on the wall.  I then screwed screws through the rack into both the rack mounted board and the wall mounted board to give it more strength and prevent it from moving.

Abby's Baptism

 Abby and Toby before the baptism.  She was a little nervous, but very excited!

 Family pics before the baptism.
 Family pics after.  This dress has Abby in her special dress that we got her for her baptism.  I made the jacket and flower to go with the dress.

 And of course, the silly picture. 
We are very proud of Abby and her decision to become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  She is a very special girl and we love having her in our family!