Rain...Again

Thursday morning, July 7, began with walking the dogs to the front of the neighborhood and back.  This sounds like no big deal, but our house happens to be the second-to-last house at the end of the neighborhood, and also happens to be at the bottom of a very steep hill.  So walking in this current heat up that hill with all the neighborhood dogs running out to defend their lawns is not always the most pleasant way to start the morning.

We (or at least I) assumed that moving up here would allow us to conveniently miss the hottest part of the Florida summer (I was really desperate for some positive things about moving, and still partly am...).  How wrong I was.  Most days have been in the high 80's and low 90's, with some days reaching 95 or 98.  On a few occasions, the temperature here has actually been higher than in Jacksonville.  IA sense of humor would probably lessen the scorching heat at least a little bit, but alas, I acquired my dad's negative, the-glass-is-not-only-cracked-but-is-shattered-on-the-floor-and-can-never-be-used-again genes.
:)

The heat continued into the afternoon, with the refrigerator repair guy canceling at the last minute and the tile repair guy coming to look at the master bathroom floor just as the rain started.


Side story about the fridge: One would wonder, after reading "refrigerator repair guy", "Why would they need a repair guy if they just got a brand new fridge a few days ago?"  We also wondered the same thing. :)  The whole story of the fridge has been one that fits perfectly into the mold of the stories that are just typical stories in the Moores' lives.  After mom and dad went through the painstaking process of driving onto the front lawn, yanking the fridge out of the back of the van, loading it onto the appliance dolly, lugging it up the front door steps, making sure not to scratch the walls or knock the stair bannisters out, unloading it onto the kitchen floor, and scooting it in front of the hole for the fridge..... dad went to hook up the water line and found a very old, kinked copper pipe with a worn out connector.  After many attempts to screw it into the fridge, he gave up and determined that he needed a new pipe, so he pulled it out of the hole leading down into the basement and threw it away.  Then he and I headed to Lowe's for new piping, which he brought home and installed.  Just when we thought we had solved everything and the fridge was finally working, the front LED panel for the water dispenser wouldn't turn on.  Mom then had to make a 20-minute phone call to try and troubleshoot the problem, was directed to page 22 of the manual, and finally got the panel to turn on.  When trying to test the water spout on the front door of the fridge, water ended up all over the kitchen floor, because it turned out that the water didn't come out of the middle of the cup area like it appeared that it would.  It actually came out of the very front- to get water, the cup doesn't even go underneath the panel at all.  After all this difficulty and trouble, mom decided to schedule for a repair guy to check everything out to make sure that no further problems would arise, because of how difficult it was to get everything started.  Although this long story filled with many run-on sentences about a truly mundane topic seems like it could only end with more trouble, it did, in fact, end happily ever after, with a brand new, properly working fridge and a happy family who didn't end up starving after all. :)

Continuing with the events of the day... dad got home, and the 4 of us headed to the Verizon store to solve a problem with Ben's phone (another typical Moores story which I will not even take the time to explain) :)

After all of that, we headed home in the drizzling rain to eat a dinner of baked potatoes.  The St. Johns invited us over for  game night, but dad had some studies to read, so mom, Ban, and I headed over and had a great time playing Apples to Apples.

And that was our Thursday. :)

Indigo Joe's and Groceries

Wednesday, we had planned to go to the Science Center with the St. Johns since their church was having a family day there, but that morning, Scott woke up with pink eye, so we all decided to wait to go until we could all be there.  The afternoon was pretty uneventful.

Dad came home in the mood for a good burger, so we headed to Indigo Joe's for dinner- the same place we had our first official meal.  After dinner, mom and I did grocery shopping at Dierberg's and Schnuck's.  The one down-side to the grocery stores up here is that we can't find everything we want at just one, so we head to Dierberg's for most of the groceries and then to Schnuck's for things like lunchmeat and veggies, since the brands we like are only there.

We're still continuing in our organic shopping, but mom, Ben, and I have all decided one thing we can't switch to is organic yogurt.  We tried Stonyfield Farms, and I didn't think it was too horrible (I had blueberry), but mom and Ben both didn't like the thicker texture.  We have always gotten Yoplait in the past.  The next time we went to the store, I got another Stonyfield, this time chocolate, to decide if I liked it or not.  Mom and Ben got Wallaby yogurt.  Word to the wise: don't ever get Stonyfield chocolate yogurt.  I couldn't even finish the container.  Something about yogurt and chocolate just is not meant to go together.  Mom and Ben didn't like their brand either, so mom had given up at this point and decided to go back to Yoplait.  I, on the other hand, was stupid enough to give the organic one last try, and went for the Stonyfield blueberry again.  It's really not that bad (it must be just certain flavors that are), but if no one else in the family is going to be eating organic yogurt, I'm not going to bother sticking with the kind-of-bland, kind-of-chunky organic Stonyfield yogurt.

Now that you've finished reading about the Moore family yogurt saga, you probably think we're all crazy, but I honestly just typed all that out because A: I have nothing better to do at 12:50 am, and B: the post seemed too short before I added it all in there. :)

Who knew yogurt was so important? :)

Ultimate Frisbee

Tuesday, July 5th, Lindsay invited me to play ultimate frisbee with her.  5 area churches gather from 9-10:30 and play with glow sticks around their wrists as team markers.  I'm not a naturally athletic person, but I decided to go to meet some new people and to get to know Lindsay a little better.

It ended up being a lot of fun.  Early on in the first game, despite my efforts to not be thrown the frisbee, it came at me suddenly, and I miraculously caught it (a lucky catch). :)  One of the guys quickly came up beside me, so thankfully I didn't have to toss the frisbee too far, which was a relief, because being left-handed seems too add to my already horrible throwing skills when it comes to frisbees.  The guy probably knew that and wanted to save himself from having to go out into the woods to find the frisbee. :)

We took a break for pizza about halfway through, and I got to meet a few more of Lindsay's friends.

We were in the middle of a second game when it was time to go.  Besides the bugs crawling all over our legs, it was a really fun night, and in spite of myself, I had a pretty good time. :)

Fireworks!

Some artsy-looking messups before I figured
out how to take pictures of fireworks :)

First firework of the show!

One of my favorites 

Another one of my favorites :)

Finale!

4th of July!

Happy 4th of July! (over a week late) :)

Our 4th was filled with good times with new neighbors and lots and lots of fireworks.

The St. Johns invited us to dinner at their house.  We had a really nice meal, got to meet their grandmother, and got to spend more time getting to know them better.  I got to meet Lindsay, and since then we've hung out a few times.  She's really sweet and nice to talk to, and we have a lot of the same interests. :)  I'm glad I finally got to meet her and that I met someone around my age here.

After dinner, we were planning on heading over to a grocery store parking lot to watch the fireworks at Bluebird Park.  When we got there though, the parking lot was completely full, so we headed back to an open field that we had passed along the way to park and watch the fireworks.

Sunset in the field

A toad I caught before the fireworks-
they're everywhere up here!

The field where we camped out

Fireworks in the field before the big show

We set up our lawn chairs, covered ourselves in bug spray, enjoyed some angel food cake for dessert, and the boys played a little football before the show started.  It was a lot of fun to spend time with the St. Johns.  They've become more than just acquaintances and friendly neighbors that you occasionally say hi to for us, and it's really nice to have a family that we're already spending a lot of time with and sharing everyday life with. :)

Candid shot of half the gang

and the other half :)

After the fireworks show, we headed back to our house to set off all the fireworks that dad had gotten the day before on his way home from work.  Ben and Scott, the junior pyrotechnics, had a blast setting off all the rockets, smoke bombs, and roman candles.  So did Dad, who is also a little bit of a pyrotechnic when it comes to fun things like fireworks. :)  Mom, Mrs. St. John, Lindsay, and I stood back, watched the boys have their fun, and enjoyed all the fireworks.  The house across the street from us, the Jankersons, were outside shooting off their own fireworks, so we got into a good-natured, friendly "fireworks war" with them- each group would try to top the other's last firework. :)

Ben setting up the rockets

Some of the rockets we set off

Roman candle

Scott's cast matched the green smoke bomb :)
(it looks yellow because of the camera's flash-
I'm not colorblind, I promise) :)

Flower spin-things

Mom and Mrs. St. John

Scott drumming with the burnt rocket sticks

The big finale to our fireworks show was a huge firework box that dad had seen in the store and wanted to try out.  "Thunder Guns" was a box with 9 individual rockets that, when lit, all went off at the same time.  I think it was big enough that it satisfied all the fire fanatics in the group. :)

"Thunder Guns" after explosion

The fireworks from the Thunder Guns box

Burnt hole in the grass where all the rockets took off :)

All the burnt fireworks trash

We had a really great 4th of July with our family and with our neighbors. :)

The Moore family

The St. Johns family

The whole group :)

See the next post for all the pictures of the fireworks from the Bluebird Park show- they wouldn't all fit in this post! :)

Rainy Day

Sunday, July 3rd, began with church.  The St. Johns invited us to Ellisville First Baptist Church.  Dad was able to join us but had to head to the hospital right afterwards because of being on call.  Mom, Ben, and I picked up Subway sandwiches for lunch since we still didn't have more than a few drinks and a little bit of food at home in our dorm-sized fridge.  The rest of the afternoon was rainy and uneventful.  Here in Missouri, when it rains, it rains all day, instead of just for a few hours like in Florida.

Dad wanted to go out for some Chinese food that evening, but on our way there, I spotted Genghis Grill and suggested we stop there.  It turned out to be a make-it-yourself Mongolian stir fry restaurant.

Seasonings

It was actually a lot of fun- you take a small metal mixing bowl and fill it with your choice of raw meats, dry seasonings, and vegetables.

Vegetables

Then you pick out a sauce in a separate container and take your ingredients up to the grill counter, where you tell the cooks what starches you want to add.  They take all your ingredients and mix them together on a section of the grill.  The grill looked like a giant pizza stone with wooden "lane dividers" to separate the meals that rotated so each cook could add different things to the meals.  They bring your personal meals out to your table in about 10 minutes.  I chose chicken, lemon herb seasoning, carrots, green beans, water chestnuts, baby corn, zucchini, squash, and snap peas with a light traditional stir fry sauce and rice and spiral noodles.  It was a really yummy Mongolian meal! :)

The grill

Yum!

Genghis Grill was along the route that may be the one I end up driving to school, so we decided to see how long the drive would be and check out the progress of the new school building.  I'll probably end up having about a 30 minute drive.

Progress!!

It's a really big building... I hope I don't get lost on the first day of school!

Blurry, but this is the sign with the map of the school grounds

After the drive, we headed to Dierberg's for a family grocery shopping trip.  We got a whole fridge-full of food- literally!  We will now be able to make most of our meals at home. And have more than a half-gallon of milk and 3 water bottles in the fridge at one time. :)

We relaxed with some root beer floats made with our favorite root beer- Fitz's!  Fitz's is a restaurant and bottling company in University City, where we used to live when we lived here before.  The root beer floats were the perfect treat while watching a movie.  :)

Oberweis ice cream- all of their stuff is yummy :)

Ben being a goofball :)

...and again :)

The recipe for a perfect root beer float :)

Yum!

Momo enjoying his treat- not quite a root beer float,
 but he's much happier with a bone anyways. :)

Buckeye :)

Jackson

Buckeye's more interested in sleeping than in his bone :)

Dad, Ben, and I chose to watch Food, Inc., a documentary about the horrors and injustices of America's food corporations.  It inspired Dad to go all organic, and for the past week we've been eating anything and everything that comes in an organic or all-natural form.  He firmly believes that, just like the documentary said, you vote when you scan products at the grocery store- you vote organic or not, local or not, etc.  So, although back in May I thought the prompt for the AP Lang synthesis essay on the national exam was completely irrelevant to my life (it was on the importance of locavores), I was wrong. :)  I love you Mrs. Sylvia!! Hopefully you see this. :)

As Ben and I were heading upstairs for bed, he spotted 2 deer across the street in the St. Johns' yard.  Two things we don't normally see in Florida are lightning bugs and deer, and both are hard to take pictures of.  I got a few of the deer, but they were blurry because of the darkness.

Overall, we all had a really great day. :)