Busy Summer

I think we are going to have an early fall. For the last 2 weeks it has only been in the 60'S. The nights are alot cooler than thay should be. According to the weather people we are 12 to 15 degrees below where we should be.

We are in the process of getting all the vegetables from our garden. We picked about 300 ears of corn on Labor day from our garden. I have frozen alot of the ears whole and then I scraped the corn of the ears and got 5 gallon bags of frozen corn. I have put up 2 gallon bags of green and purple peppers. I froze 1 gallon bag of hot peppers. I have canned 12 jars of beets and 7 jars of pickled beets. I am now waiting for the winter squash to finish ripen so I can pick them. My carrots will be ready to pick in the next couple of weeks, I will be freezing them. I wish I tomatoes would ripen a little faster, I would like to make salsa. Oh Well.

The weather rumor is that we are in for a longer colder more snow year than we have had for the last couple of years. I am prepared hopefully. I caulked around my windows. Hopefully sometime this winter we will put french doors upstairs and downstairs.

We are talking about raising our own chickens on the property we are barrowing. We are going to talk to the owner this weekend. I think that would be great.

It has been a great summer for me. A little short but productive. I was able to relandscape the front yard, finish the basement and camp once of month in our new trailer. I will be redoing my mothers bathroom in the next couple of weeks. I am collecting materials I will need. I need to do the new tile floor all in one day. So I bought mud that dries in 2 hours so I can tile and grout all in one day. I bought a new vanity that does not take up so much room. I am trying to make the bathroom more senior citizen friendly. Later this winter I will gut my bathroom and redo it. I am so looking forward to these winter projects.

I need to finish a quilt for Lisa and Jacobs new daughter. I love it when life is full. I love to be occupied.

The New Bathroom

The new linen closet is an open concept with baskets. I finished the top of the shelves with tile. It put a large tile in the center and mosaic tiles around the large tile. It turned out well.

The New Bathroom

We are finally done with the girls downstairs bathroom. Okay I still have the baseboard wood to put in. Most of its in but the small pieces need to be installed. the girls and cats are enjoying it very much. The only thing we have left today down stairs is the little things. Eric is doing those in the evenings and on weekends. The carpeting is the biggest thing we have left. It is not in our budget yet but it will be soon.

The Large Family Garden

Eric and I decided we needed a bigger garden this year. We borrowed some land from a friend of ours. So far the garden is a success. This our test year. We know what we will do next year and what we will not do. Keeping up with the weeds has been fun. The garden measures 55ft by 85ft. We harvested some potatoes for dinner last night. Very wonderful. We also have our garden at home. We harvested all the peas this weekend. We got a gallon and a half of peas in the freezer now. I am planning a second crop. When the corn is ready we will have a big corn boil and have a party.

Front Yard Landscaping

We finished phase one of our front yard landscaping. The retaining wall area and in front of it is done. I am very happy with what we did. Meredith and Andrea were big help. we all worked very hard. The next phase is the slate patio in front of the livingroom window. I am also taking the sod away from around the two trees between the sidewalk and street. I am looking forward to getting the work done.

Our family decided to meet at Kyak Point this July for a family campout. It was great fun. We got to know 2 new people. We met Kendall, Ben's friend and Jachen{sp} Monicas'friend from Swizterland. We met every night at our campsite to sit around the campfire. It was so cold that we looked like we were camping in the winter months. If you look at the pictures we are all bundled up. We also met Mallory's friend Scott. It was a great time. We did miss the family members that were not there. We missed Amy and her family and Jacob and Lisa. Maybe they can all come next year.

MOSES LAKE CAMP OUT.

I had to work at my job near Moses Lake last weekend. So we decided to make it campout and drive back and forth from Shrag. Our dear friends the Eraths decided to join us at the campground. Their trailer was parked behind us. On Saturday our dear freinds the Olsens came to see us. We had a great time. We had water front property. We weren't supposed to but it has rained so much that the camp area in front of us was under water. It was kind of soothing listening the waves. Eric, Andrea and Meredith went fishing quite a bit. They did not catch anything though. I don't think they cared, they had fun. The only fish we got was the fish our campground neighbor gave us when I traded him a bowl of dutch oven chili for it. Not bad if I say so myself.