The Harp Family

2011 Festivals

Matt — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 23:06:10 +0000

Summer is ending unfortunately, so wanted to quickly recap the 2011 festival circuit.

We hit several festivals this year, most of them while Julie was working so she didn’t get to partake in all of the good times. Ava really loved them, and sno cones and cotton candy were helpful while her jaws were wired shut for a couple weeks last month. Kids booths were weak at Little Flower, rides were expensive at Visi and everything was free at the Electricians Picnic at Stricker’s Grove!

Cassie, Driving the Helo	Ava, Riding Merry-go-Round at Visi
Lots of "Merry go Arounds"	Riding the Turtle Coaster at Stricker's Grove

St. James Festival (2011)

Matt — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 01:31:17 +0000

Julie and I volunteered to chair the Goldfish booth this year, our first time volunteering at the festival. We both worked it on Friday, Julie went to the Reds game with friends on Saturday and then had the kids on Sunday. So I was pretty busy… The booth was a blast though, we had an awesome group of volunteers all three days which made the whole weekend go well. I’m exhausted, should have taken today off to recuperate; was breaking down the booth until almost 1 this morning.

Not the prettiest booth, but it gets the job done

The UC Bearcat was a winner!

Put In Bay, 2011!!

Matt — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 02:54:38 +0000

Family vacation #3, and we made a repeat visit to Put In Bay and stayed about 4 doors down from where we were last year! Mom & Dad have been bugging us to go on an extended Harp family vacation for a couple years now, and thankfully we talked Mom out of Gatlinburg

We had a lot of fun, with lots of golf cart rides, ice cream and swimming! Mom & Dad took the kids one night so that we could do some bar hopping with Elaine & Kelli which was good. Cassie took the following weekend to recover, they all got to bed late and she was unable to function as a non-annoying person after only sleeping for 10 or so hours.

The Harp Family (click for more pics)

Soccer, Ava’s First Season

Matt — Thu, 12 May 2011 02:13:56 +0000

Early in the spring, before monsoon season struck, we signed Ava up for soccer with the WOAC. She waffled between excited and nervous but in the end we think she enjoyed it. The cost was annoying, $90 for essentially 3-4 practices and maybe 4 games because of all the rain.

Our most popular piece of advice from the coach was (said during a game) “Ava, stop playing with your hair. You can do that after the game!”

Yep, she's really into the game!

Ready for action!

Container Gardening (2011)

Matt — Tue, 03 May 2011 23:23:17 +0000

I tried some halfhearted gardening last year, and it did not go well. I think there were 2 problems. First, I didn’t make a dedicated space for planting, just kind of planted along the side of the house in some areas. Second, the soil around here is full of clay and I didn’t invest in any kind of fertilizer or planting soil.

Fast forward to this past weekend, we were up at White Oak Garden and I saw an Earth Box for sale and thought that might a better way to ease into the gardening thing. But they’re kind of expensive, which goes against my idea of “easing into gardening,” so I started looking for ways to build my own and voila! Of course, ours are pink!

The pantyhose-wrapped tupperware containers filled with dirt go in those 2 holes

Here's the whole thing, minus a lid

Still need to cut holes in the lid, but otherwise ready to roll!

I actually built two of these, one for Lily and another for Ava. We’ll go pick plants this weekend or next and get our green thumb on!

Picking Our Plants

Ava's Garden - Bell Peppers & Cucumbers

Lily's Plants - Tomatoes & Bell Peppers

Early June Update

Things are growing well!

Dyeing Easter Eggs

Matt — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 21:42:43 +0000

We dye eggs every year, something to do for a couple hours on a rainy weekend this year.

Pink Egg	The Whole Crew	Another Pink Egg
Two Eggs	Waiting on the Eggs	Checking on the Eggs

DIY Drainage Pipe Repair

Matt — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 01:25:08 +0000

I’ve noticed what look liked a snake hole in our garden for a couple years, and thought it was odd but never really investigated it. My father-in-law looked at it last summer and pointed out that it was actually a broken pipe. I didn’t know this, but the downspout empties into a PVC pipe that runs out to the street. At some point, that underground pipe was busted and water running through it was causing the ground to wash away and cause the “snake hole!”

I took this week off work to get some work done around the house, and this seemed like an easy enough task.

Step 1 - Dig a big hole around the pipe

Step 2 - Cut out the busted part

Step 3 - Bring a good helper!

Step 4 - Extract cut-out pipe & clean edges

Step 5 - Insert new pip, make sure to use PVC cement!

You might be wondering why I used a Y connector. Part of our back yard gets a bit soggy, and it’s been hard to keep grass growing in that area so I have plans to trench that out and put in some corrugated drainage pipe. So the plan is to connect that up with this drainage pipe so that everything runs out to the street! That project (the trenching) was actually #1 on my list for this week, but it’s been raining just about every day in April and hasn’t let up this week so no digging unfortunately.

Easter Egg Hunts

Matt — Sun, 17 Apr 2011 01:05:08 +0000

We hit the Mercy HS egg hunt and then the one at Harvest Home. The latter was pretty weak; they didn’t have enough eggs, we picked a bad starting spot and Lily and Ava went 0-fer. They did have the creepiest Easter Bunny costume I’ve ever seen!

Cheep, cheep!

More tattoos!

The whole crew

Great Easter "basket"

Creepy Easter Bunny

Waiting on the egg hunt