This & That

Around Here This Week

So around here this week.....

Yeah.....summer's here, and it's not my favorite, so I'm sitting on top of my AC vents. We made a quick trip to the cabin for an overnighter, where it was blissfully in the mid-60's.

This was my view when I came out of church last Sunday. It reminds me of all kinds of good things.

It was our "on" week for family Sunday dinner and I got this shot of my mother feeding Ephraim. 

It's been a while since I've done a "keeping my hands busy" post, and that's coming, 

....but in the meantime I thought I would post the last few weeks of Project Life app pages. 

You can probably just pretty much scroll through them since you've seen most of the pictures.

But I'm holding myself accountable for getting them done and staying current.

Sent to me from the kids and grandkids...

Eric's family went cherry picking at an orchard near their new house. Emmett ate his share of cherries.

All three of them had fun doing it.

And this one came from Collin, who is getting ready to leave this place and head to the opposite coast.

In the Garden

My sis is having a birthday today. I don't think she reads here any more but on the off chance she does, I wanted her to see in print that I hope she has a happy day doing exactly what she wants, and that I love her.

I wandered into the garden earlier this week. It was nice to be able to do that, since last year at this time I was limping pre-surgery. Kneeling is another matter entirely, but walking is awesome. 

I love the garden at this time of year when the jungle that happens when things really start crawling around hasn't happened quite yet. You can see Evan's garlic patch there on the left, and the squash-type things on the right. No sign of squash bugs yet, but you know they're lurking....just waiting to devour the plants.

The peas are just starting to come on. I don't think everyone else in my family would necessarily choose to plant peas. It's not that they don't like them, but they're kind of labor intensive when it comes to shelling them, and the pile of peas you get is so small in relation to the amount of pods you start with. 

But I'm such a fan of garden peas. They are so sweet and tasty. 

They're sweet enough to eat right out of the shell. So I'll plant my garden peas as long as we can get the garden put together early enough in the year to do it.

The lettuce is still soldiering on, mostly because we haven't had lots and lots of really hot weather yet....thank the jet streams for that. Taco salad this weekend, I'm thinking. 

We're Wandering....and We're Not Alone

There was some cabin time recently, right before my husband left to try his hand Alaska salmon fishing. You know....a once in a lifetime event....that happens every single year. I don't fault him too much for it, though, because of all the critters he brings home, salmon is probably my favorite. It rained for a good share of the time he was there, but the freezer has some fresh-caught wild salmon in it. 

The morning after the gorgeous sunset I showed you a bit ago, we woke up to a fog settled in low around us. That burned off enough to wander a bit....so we did.

The critters have been enjoying the salt lick.

We took this trail into the woods. Yes, if you look closely there is a trail we were following. 

Apparently, we're not the only ones who follow it. Can you see the deer tracks in the dirt?

There was something a little bigger than a deer on the trail as well, and if you remember the Poop 101 lesson from a couple of years ago, you might be able to identify it as belonging to as moose.

We came across an old stump that a bear has torn apart. A squirrel has also been eating pine cones here. 

We headed over this rusty bridge.

It's the same bridge where we've taken pictures before.

The water was considerably lower then. Now it's several feet deep and running pretty fast.

The access to my favorite cabin view was destroyed by the mega-runoff we had last spring, which made me really sad. I've photographed this view in every season of the year, and just loved it.

But this might be able to take its place. We'll see.

Things are really starting to bloom.

It always amazes me to see the variety.

Some I see every year,

And some are totally new to me.

Gus actually has his own spot to sleep, but after the walk he must have decided he needed some companionship. Poor guy must have been exhausted.

Food for Thought

Around Here This Week

So around here this week...

Bryce, my mother and I drove down to Utah last weekend for my nephew's mission farewell. His cute, tall, blond self is going to the Philippines. I got to spend some time with my siblings, which doesn't happen very often. My sister and her husband have started working with a couple of beehives in their yard and gave us each some honey they harvested, which was so fun, and very yummy. I'm much more of a honey person than a jam person, truth be told.

This is my nephew and his brother right before they left their house to drop him off at the MTC (Mission Training Center). My sister-in-law sent these pictures to us the day he left.

I loved this one of my brother and his boy. 

This brought back a lot of memories for me of watching my kids head out on this really great growing experience. I remember this particular part of it being really hard, though. 

Monday was the funeral for my friend, Carol. It was the perfect tribute to her, and I made it through the song without crying. That happened after I sat down.

We had a couple of days of fairly heavy rain early in the week.

Heavy enough that I had mushrooms growing in my lawn. It's unusual for us to have rain this late in the year. We will often go from the first part of May until October, with maybe one rainstorm somewhere in July or August just to make it interesting. Of course, we were in the upper 80's by the end of the week, with any kind of rain a distant memory.

These were the roses I cut from the yard this week.

I turned them into a couple of bouquets that made the whole kitchen smell nice.

My hodgepodge of back patio pots are coming along.

I also picked some strawberries off the plants, but I'm having to race the slugs for them, which is a little frustrating.

Still, I feel a little bit Farmer Jane when I can go out and pick a few berries for breakfast.

And canning has officially begun for the year with this batch of strawberry-rhubarb jam. I had to buy the berries for it, but the rhubarb came from the garden. 

My husband has been in the wilds of Alaska this week, risking life and limb to bring home fish on his once-in-a-lifetime annual salmon fishing trip. Not really risking life and limb, but it sounds a lot more dramatic that way. Bryce and I have been in charge of the critters and keeping the pasture growing for the horses. Thankfully the rain has helped out some with that, but it's surprising how quickly it dries out. Anyway, he sent me these....he's pretty good about timing things like that.

I can't quite decide if it's so I'll miss him while he's gone, or to insure I'll let him back in the house. I liked this view of the arrangement with those cute tiny roses and daisy-type flowers.

Sent to me from the kids and grandkids were these 2 pictures of James at his first dentist appointment.

His mama tells me he did great, and James tells me they "painted" his teeth.

Buried Treasure

Rachelle, Isaac, and Levi had to go home a little early to be there in time for Marc's birthday. There were rumors of cake with M&M's on it.

But before they left, we wandered up the main road to a little group of Ponderosa pines. Most of the trees by the cabin are Lodgepole pines, with a few aspen thrown in for color. The Ponderosas are very few and far between.

They have the best pine cones, though, which the boys enjoyed picking up and passing off to various adults.

Levi, Grandpa and David wandering back home. He's a really good grandpa.

We took care of a few maintenance chores while we waited for the next wave of company to get there. The solar panel is now in the proper summer position.

My daughter and son-in-law came up and spent an evening looking for bears. 

My girl is pretty comfortable in camo, especially if it keeps her warm in the mountains.

The last wander for the week was what I call bushwhacking. Sometimes my husband just likes to blaze his own trail...in life as well as in the wild. We followed a deer path to this sandbar next to the river. Those deer have an easier time navigating through the brush than I do.

While the boys were occupied throwing some rocks, Grandpa buried a couple of wrapped candy bars in the sand for them to find.

...and it was pretty exciting to dig those out and then eat them. Because sandy candy is the best!

I saw this on the way back....that big flowering plant growing out of a rotting log. Nature at its finest, people.

Skunk Creek

One of our mornings at the cabin started out like this:

David was really fascinated with both the dogs. He doesn't call them by name yet, but he would look at them and say, "Woof, woof, woof....." He does that on Face Time, too, to let me know that he's had enough of Gramma Honey for the moment, and wants to see the dogs. I'm happy to report that they were very well behaved around him. (Unlike this week when Gus peed on the kitchen floor and Ollie pooped in his crate during the night.)

So you might remember this picture from Memorial Day weekend. These big gouges in the road have prevented us from getting to one of our favorite hiking trails. It's the prettiest one in the area near the cabin, in my opinion. Not to be deterred, we found that we could take the rhinos on the side of those trenches, past them, and onto the regular road. We were in business.

There are a couple of springs that come down the hillside in a place or two and flood the trail. It makes walking a little tricky in those spots, but it's sure pretty.

With the little boys in tow, we didn't hike too far up the trail. 

We found a great place to sit in the shade while Grandpa doled out some chocolate. He's really, really good at that.

My keister was situated fairly comfortably situated on a rock and there were a group of nearby plants looked kind of ferny near me.

So I zoomed in on them. Not earth-shattering, but I thought they looked cool.

Collin took this picture of the stream from a slightly different angle.

Some pretty sweet faces.

While I sat on my rock, mamas and dads were a little busier...

...making sure kids didn't end up head first in the stream.

This was one of the rare moments I caught James sitting still. I thought I'd better document it.

David on my lap in the rhino. Cabin time look-->no make up and a funny-looking hat to keep off the sun.

We had to stop and get a picture of the boys in front of the mega, huge Ponderosa pine tree.

That was the end of our hike, and the rear end of David as he tried to crawl back into the rhino on his own.

"If I Can Just Get a Few Days at the Cabin...."

The title to this post was heard from Collin on several occasions as they planned to come visit.We do try our best to please, especially when out-of-town kids come, who only get occasional visits to the cabin.

 It took us a good chunk of the day to pack and get up there, though. When you're looking at 6 days up there with a large group of people, it's a process. And then of course, there was this, which makes me want to go to the cabin, too.

It was so hot that the Hershey bar Grandpa had in his truck was liquid, and James had to drink it out of the wrapper.

But at least we did make it. We unloaded enough stuff for the Children of Israel to move to the Promised Land, threw some burgers on the grill for dinner, and then wandered to the river.

Because...sticksandrocksandsticksandrocksandsticksandrocks.

We held a little impromptu Family Home Evening about our beautiful world next to the river, and then it was time for the main event....

.....treats. I found some "fireworks" Oreos among the myriad of experimental flavors they're putting out there to try. (Kettle corn?! No thanks.)  These have red and blue Pop Rocks in the filling, so that was the patriotic excitement. Levi just likes the filling in his Oreos.

Gus and Ollie were most interested in the treat part of the evening, but they weren't allowed to have Pop Rocks.

The next morning after breakfast, we wandered around, looking for a different place for the boys to do their rock throwing practice. The water is still really high in the river and there just wasn't a really accessible place for them.

We found this one and those boys went to town.

David was tremendously impressed with his dad's ability to throw really big rocks.

And Gus got in some more fetching practice. 

During the little boy's nap time we put together some pinecone/peanut butter/birdseed feeders that we hung in some trees around the cabin. We had to do this while the little boys were asleep because Levi has a severe peanut allergy.

I took pictures of them this past Friday, and sent them to the boys. Every speck of peanut butter and birdseed is gone, and two of the pinecones had been hauled off. Isaac was pretty surprised that squirrels and birds might eat peanut butter.

Mine had been flipped over onto the branch, presumably for easier eating.

And a 3-generation shot to end the day.

Food For Thought

First off, Happy Father's Day! This is going to be sort of combo post...a little food, a little food for thought. No new recipe this week. In all honesty, my husband, Bryce and I spent a good chunk of the week working our way through leftovers from last week at the cabin. If there's one thing I can say for these trips, we eat well. Thank you, obsessive meal planning gene. While we were there I was feeding between 5 and 12 adults, and 2 to 8 kids, 3 meals a day plus dessert and snacks. We had some unplanned company show up during the week which necessitated a total re-vamp of the menu for the rest of the week, and a trip to the very questionable grocery store in the small town 45 minutes away, and some texting to my daughter to grab some things from home when she came up, because as I've always maintained....I cannot pull magic food out of thin air. But with a team effort we made it work. Cabin fare included, but was in no way, shape or form limited to: Zucchini Bread, using frozen, shredded zucchini from last year's garden, Strawberry Muffins, Copycat Kneader's French Toast (Ironically, several of us have never had this in the restaurant), some Garden Orzo, and on the really big days...Mexican Haystacks and Bowtie Pasta.

Now in case you were thinking I was a total slug this week in the food department, I have a family event to attend this weekend and am bringing some Orange Dreams, because my brother likes them, 

...and these chocolate cookies, which are So. Darn. Good. I made a batch of bread, too, since there was none in the house. So yeah. I cooked.

And your food for thought.....

Around Here This Week

So around here this week.....

Not this week, but the 2 1/2 weeks before that, we had a revolving door of family coming and going. We spent a week up at the cabin with Collin's & Marc's families and various other family members rotating through the time. There will be stories next week. I wanted to get them up this week, but there was just too much to catch up on around the house and no time to sit down at the computer and make it happen. Because....well......laundry....and cleaning.... Like this nice pile here. This is just the sheets. There was another pile of towels about the same size. It's always great to have them come, and when they go there's always some catching up to do.

We arrived home from the cabin to find The Big Rose Show was on.

Here's another view on a different day.

I went out early Sunday morning and cut a big armful of them...

....and put them in various places in my house.

If I have to have warmer weather, this is a nice little positive to go along with it.

I took out the pansies in the front pots and replanted them with something that will do a little better when the brain-baking temperatures hit.

I went outside just before dinner on Thursday and found this on my driveway. It's a line of an LDS children's song. It kind of made my day. One of my good friends passed away this week from colon cancer and I've been asked to sing at the funeral on Monday with a small group of ladies who knew her. I've never sung at a funeral before, except in a larger choir and I'm really afraid my emotions are going to get the best of me...because I loved Carol, and I will miss her. I have no doubt that she's fine and happy now, and with people who love her, but I will miss her. So if you're the praying sort, I would appreciate any good thoughts and prayers that I can be strong enough to get through "A Child's Prayer" on Monday without my emotions detracting from the spirit of the meeting.

Anyway, this made me feel happy. Frederick wanted to know how we knew it was them that did the driveway art. Well, Roger signed his work. :)

Isaac and Levi also Face Timed me earlier in the day saying they wanted to cheer me up, so they did their best roaring for me. :) Then Isaac said, "Do you feel happy or sad now?" I told him I felt a little bit of both...sad because I will miss my friend and happy that she was with Heavenly Father now. He got very excited at that point and yelled, "And she will be resurrected!!" The plan of salvation in a nutshell from a Sunbeam. I love my family. And everyone, please get your medical screenings done.

Sent to me from the kids and grandkids this week.....Collin got his cast off! He's in a brace and still needs a CT scan to make sure his scaphoid bone in his wrist is really doing what it's supposed to, but there is progress.

I also got this picture of David at the piano. Never too early to start....

My DIL, Rachelle, actually sent me this picture of Isaac getting some serious air a couple of weeks ago, but I forgot to put it up. This is pretty much our Isaac. He's a very physical boy.

We had one day this week that was like this. Not my favorite.

So my husband, Bryce and I made a quick run into the cabin for a couple of nights... (no filter) 

...where this was waiting for me.