Swimming, Sweet Treats, Sunflowers & Summer

Summer is in full swing at our home.  The flowers are blooming, the kids are doing a lot of swimming, and I am taking advantage of a slower month, to just enjoy these HOT summer lazy days.  There isn't much left to do in the garden, but wait for harvest.  We've been enjoying potatoes, onions, peppers, peas and lots of cabbage.  My beans and tomatoes will be ready soon, and then I will be busy!  The carrots and corn are slowly, but surely growing.

What would summer be without swimming?  Every year we put up a small pool for the kids and they usually spend the afternoons out in the water.  Well in the last few years, the kids have been hard on our pools.  The every day wear and tear of 5 kids in a pool is hard on them, and frankly, we are tired of buying a new pool every year.  Then, last year we moved in here, and set up our one year old pool, to discover we had LOTS of iron in our water. Our filter couldn't keep up with it, and it just wasn't worth the time and energy we had to put into it.  We were out of options, but knew we needed something for the kids on these HOT days.  Leave it to Brent to come up with an idea.  He bought a blue poly stock tank and set it up for the kids. 

The kids have been loving it.  It's 9 ft wide and almost 3 ft deep, so not too big to be worrisome, but big enough to be fun for my 3 youngest.  They play for hours everyday!  As for the iron in our water, I am learning how to keep it clean without a filter.  I do have to use a few chemicals, some chlorine tablets, and I just purchased a small spa vacuum, so I can get out the iron that settles on the bottom.  So far so good, and a lot easier to take care of, and the kids can't destroy it.  Plus, when they out grow it, we are thinking of digging it down into the ground and using it for a pond.  There are lots of fun ideas out there for stock tanks, where as a pool, just goes in the trash.  Plus it has a drain, for easy clean out.

I also love the fact, that it fits on our patio, keeping out a lot of grass, and well, we just don't have a lot of flat surfaces to place a bigger pool.  It's great having it by the covered porch as well, so I can sit out and watch them in the shade.  Ahh, the comforts of home!

We have been enjoying a lot of fruit this summer as well!  We've been blessed with LOTS of raspberries from friends, and now I have a few growing in my garden.  We have had blueberries, cherries, and strawberries.  I found a fun recipe on pinterest that I wanted to try out for the 4th of July, as my kids LOVE fruit!

So simple, just layer blueberries, cool whip, and strawberries.  But, of course I had to take it one step further.  We have a family favorite fruit dip, that I thought would be great, as a substitute for the cool whip.  Here is the recipe:

1 tub of cool whip

1 package of instant vanilla pudding

1 cup of milk

1 8oz container of sour cream

Just mix all together and chill!

My kids LOVE this dip, and would eat it all by itself as a pudding if I let them.  I added a little extra cool whip to the recipe, when using it for these fruit dishes, because the dip tends to have a more yellow tint, and for the 4th, we needed Red, White & Blue!   

So, there it is, a peek into our summer so far.  Hope you enjoyed!

♥  Shannon