Opa is good at everything

Our first floor toilet had a water trickling sound every few hours. I decided to fix it. I replaced everything inside, and I was pretty proud of myself. 

After I did that, though, the chain was getting stuck under the new flapper, causing even more water to run. I tried to adjust the rod attached to the flushing lever, but the whole thing cracked off. I bought a replacement, but the old one was so corroded I couldn't get it to unscrew.

I, once again, ended up calling my dad. He's done most of our repairs for us, especially things at the cottage. And, this summer, he's fixed up every repair I originally thought I might be able to handle myself. So, here we are again! 

In the mean time, I rigged a string through the hole of the flushing lever and a clothespin so the string didn't get pulled in too far.

This morning, the twins were asking if they could go to the bathroom. I said, "Yep. Just make sure that the clothes pin is up against the toilet so that the flapper closes.

Luke went to the bathroom and came out and said, "Mom, I don't think we can just flush the toilet with a clothes pin for long. It's embarrassing!"

"I know," I replied, "Opa is coming to fix it tomorrow." 

Ally shook her head, full of pride,"Opa is good at everything! He's a good plumber, a good woodworker, a good engineer. He's so smart!"

Totally, Ally! I agree!

The clothes pin Luke didn't like. I don't understand his issue it was so fancy...

My dad fixing the cottage bathroom earlier this summer (after I'd attempted it on my own).

Dave made brats on the grill for the game tonight. After grilling them, he soaked them in a mixture of stadium sauce and beer that he’d reduced to a thick sauce. I obviously can’t have beer because of my gluten intolerance, so I kind of wiped the brat off. 

When I was nearly done eating, he was talking about how good his sauce was, and he tried to scoop more sauce onto my gluten free bun. 

I said, “I actually can’t have that, because there’s gluten in the beer.” 

He said, “I cooked off all the gluten. I boiled it.”

I said, “It doesn’t work that way.”

He continued, “Yeah, I cooked it off.”

I said, “You cooked off the alcohol but gluten doesn’t cook off.”

I think he realized then he was wrong. But, he was now being annoying, so he started to insist that it was such a high temperature it cooked off. I pointed out that he boiled it, but pasta is also boiled in water. And how most items with gluten are baked at a minimum of 350 degrees, our pizza recipe is 450 degrees.

He continued and he was driving me crazy, so I was like, “Amazing! It looks like I can now eat anything as long as I bake it at a higher temperature.”

I reached into the cupboard and started tossing everything into the oven, bread, buns, pasta, cookies and I exclaimed, “I can’t wait to eat all this!”

Kate was cracking up.

The other three were staring at me.

Then Luke said, “Oh, my gosh. Dad broke mom.”

 Taking a break 14 miles into our 18 mile bike ride yesterday

Twelve!

 These two amazing kids turned 12 this summer.

On their actual birthday, they got a quadruple scoop at the Hamburger Haus, something they'd wanted to try for years. That's not four scoops. It's seven. We kind of hoped they'd be piled up high like on the picture, but they were split between two cups.

Because they wanted their parties up at the cottage and summer availability can be tricky, Luke had his party in June. Ally was supposed to have hers in early August, but she came down with Covid the day before, so her party wasn't actually until September.

The kids swam, tubed, jet skied and grilled hotdogs and s'mores over the fire.