Monster Crochet

It seems like forever ago that we last did a bit of crochet. 

It is a great activity when the sun has gone down and you are curled up under a cozy blanket. 

Not really a summer activity. 

But there are some exceptions...

Our neighbors just had their first child this week. Such an exciting time!

One of our favorite pastimes with them is to come over and watch Walking Dead together, so it came as no shock as to what they chose for their baby's room theme.

Monsters!

Googly-eyed, multi-armed, multi-colored cute and cuddly monsters!

So in honor of their first born, we decided to create a truly cuddly monster for their soon-to-be 'lil-monster'. 

We used their baby shower invitation for inspiration. Since we had no instructions or templates, it took us a little over a week to create, but we really enjoyed doing it.

We hope the 'lil-monster' next door will like it too.

Cannot wait to meet you little guy!

Here are a few photos of the finished product:

We used the monster at the far right in the back as the inspiration!

Last Minute Plans

So this past weekend, we were supposed to help a friend of ours with a bash at the beach. We were tasked with staking a claim to a fire pit in the morning and hanging around all day till everyone arrived. We have several beaches in our area with fire pits so you can do a bonfire at the beach legally. (Though not for much longer due to some recent California law changes, but that comes next year.) You can only have a fire within the concrete rings provided at the beaches, in order to keep things from getting out of hand with the crowds. We decided on a smaller beach in Corona Del Mar, thinking that it would not be super-crowded. It was only going to be about 70 degrees out, which is downright chilly for August in SoCal so we thought there weren't going to be any issues getting a fire-pit. We drove up at 9:15 am with another friend in tow and discovered that all of the rings were already claimed. Just our luck.

Not wanting to miss out on all the s'mores our friend was bringing and with some quick thinking by the hubby, we came up with an alternative plan. We offered up our home for the party and since everyone was expecting a fire, we would offer one of those too.

Our backyard is currently in transition from a yard full of weeds to our own personal playground, but we are a few years away from full completion. One thing we have a lot of is open dirt and concrete chunks. The concrete was from the patio that used to sit just outside the back doors that we decided to jack-hammer out one day. We have been slowly trying to recycle or trash the concrete chunks. They actually constitute most of our pathways at the moment but making big chunks into little rocks is hard and tedious work. Needless to say, we have extra.

The day of jack-hammering... It feels so long ago.

Since we had so much concrete left, my hubby though that it would make a great material for a fire pit ring. Armed with nothing but some gloves and our wheelbarrow, he set about making the ring in our large expanse of dirt whilst I set about prepping some food and drinks for the party.

In little under an hour, he had everything set-up, including a little cooking area using a leftover grill from an older camp stove.

After everyone arrived and the sun set, we started up the fire and settled in. There were plenty of s'mores for everyone because what is a bonfire without s'mores?

Everything may have smelled like a camp-fire once it was all over but at least the party went on!

We hope everyone had a great time! We did!

Shade Structure

Our backyard is quite a large space. Once covered in a small concrete slab and lots of knee-high weeds, we have since started transforming it into our own personal playground.

 This whole transformation is only about half way done. We have the vegetable and herb garden and earlier this year we put in a lawn for the pups to run around on. One of the first things we did, after finishing with the garden, was to plant some fruit and nut trees. We are in desperate need for shade in this yard since only two years ago nothing was growing back there taller than 3 feet from the ground.

The trees have since taken off, especially our pecan tree, but we decided to get some more help in the shade department. After a quick look on Amazon, we found a simple square shade sail that fit perfectly between the house and the edge of the lawn. 

We knew this would be a great addition to the backyard for all of our get together's.

We started by embedding some landscaping posts into the ground and mounting some eye-screws to the tops of them to create the other two anchor points away from the house.

Add a couple of carabiners and we are in business!  

Ain't she a beaut? Only took us a few hours (and we only had to buy one auger attachment from Lowe's to dig the holes). 

FYI, the shade you see in the photos are from our neighbor's yard. Thanks guys!