TOFW

It's late but I can't go to bed until I can put my bread dough in the fridge for the night, so I thought I would just check in. 

I've been at Time Out For Women in Portland this weekend with great friends who are a real blessing in my life.  I don't know what I would do without these girls.  We have so much fun, lots of laughter and girls I can bare my soul to and know they will love me no matter what.  The theme this year was about Infinite Hope.  We listened to women who shared stories of their life and trials and how they clung to hope to overcome feelings of despair.  We listened, laughed until we cried and also shed tears when feelings of the spirit overcame us.  They were wonderful and very, very funny.  We started lists of what we hope for in life and what we have hope in. 

Not much sleep was had amongst us, maybe 2-3 hours at best, but what fun.  No pictures (forgot my camera), but will try to get one or two from Stephanie or Pinky tomorrow to post, just to let you in on the fun.  I think I can just about put the dough in the fridge now, so I'm off to bed.  (It's a new recipe:  Artisan bread in 5 minutes a day.)  I'll let you know if it turns out.

I'm tired, but it's a good tired of a great weekend.  See ya!

New Business logo

I finally got my new business logo up as a blog banner.  It will also be used on my labels for everything.  I love it! Now to just figure out CS3 and circles and texting in the circle (my fonts won't seem to work doing that, so I know I'm doing something wrong).  It's probably a simple fix, but can't seem to get it to work. 
Anyway, check it out, do you like it?   Look here

Which of These Girls?

Which of these girls.....

I didn't ask them to line up, seriously.

Isn't she just beautiful!

They always run to come visit when I come out.

Or these girls...

Gave us......

They're small, but they are the first ones.  Yeah!  Typically, Barred Rock Hens lay huge brown eggs, so I know they will get to be quite large.  Yum!  It is what I have been waiting for all summer long.  Guess what we're having for breakfast! 

I love chickens, love having them in my yard, love the sounds they make, I love how pretty they are, and friendly.  I just love everything about them.  Well, I don't like that they come on my deck and poop, but other than that, oh and that they get in my garden and flower beds and dust themselves, but it's a small price to pay.  Let's see.....10 hens, 10 free range chicken eggs a day, youza.  I hope some friends love good eggs! Actually, I have had quite a few people ask if I am going to be selling them, so shouldn't be a problem. 

Have I mentioned I love chickens!!!!

Kayaking

I thought I would just post these two pictures of Bill and my friend Sami while we were kayaking last weekend. See I do things, I just forget to post. We only have one kayak right now (my Christmas present from Bill), but Sami has 2 so she lets Bill come along since her husband has to work when we can go. We went again this morning, different lake, but so much fun. It's finally sunny and gorgeous out.

And Penny of course. She has her own life jacket and everything. She saw me in the other kayak and decided to come see me and jumped out of Bills. I don't know if she realized that was water between us or not, but she was pretty surprised, we fished her out and she was fine. This week she didn't do that, but did learn how to jump from one kayak to the other when we were right next to each other. I'm not sure she is having as much fun as we are, but hopefully she will learn to. I would love to have her sitting on the top and "leading" the way. We shall see. She is still a puppy.

I tried to make these pictures larger, but they warped. Does anyone know how to keep the scale correct while doing that. I thought it was something like holding down shift or control or something like that. Anyway, if anyone knows how to do that, let me know.

So Social

I thought I would put some pictures of my cute little chicks, that I forgot to take pictures of when I first got them in March or so. Ten little Bard Rock chicks. I love chickens. I can hardly wait until they are old enough to start laying eggs. Hopefully in another month or so.

These hens are the most social hens we have ever had. One of them waits every morning for me to pet her when I'm letting them out of the coup. Today she even seemed to want me to pick her up, so I did, she loved it. They even come running up to Max and Penny when they are out there with me. Don't they know Max is a cat and birds are his favorite thing to eat????? They have even come up to him and touched his nose. What is with that!!!

They love to go nose to nose with Penny too.

Penny loves these girls, but really I think she just likes to eat their poop. It really must be way yummy.

See, they love her! Way social!

So Max has pretty much had it with these girls. I'm sure he is thinking about the others behind him and how he is going to make his escape. But then....

they chase him when he makes his move. Seriously, these girls will probably walk up to the first coyote or Bobcat they see and try to make friends. NOT a good thing! I need them to grow up and give me nice big brown eggs, Yum!

Blogging? What's blogging?

I can't believe I haven't blogged for such a long time. It's not that things are going on. I am not working and at least something is going on and I completely forget to blog, or to check blogs I usually follow. What's that all about? I guess I think that nothing is really that interesting, so why blog about it. Actually, I just haven't even thought about it. But since this is also a type of journal, why not keep it up, besides it's fun. There is plenty of rain to keep me inside. So, need to take advantage of it and do inside things. Like, clean out cupboards and closets and purge all those things that I don't need and I'm tired of looking at. You should see my living room. I'm getting rid of 90% of my scrapbooking stuff since I'm mostly doing digital now. Kept some stuff since I really love the look of the paper ones with all the real layers and such. Still love doing it though. My goal is to get at least 1-2 closets done a day, then do whole rooms, then the dreaded garage. Then start over and purge more. We are going to have a smashing garage sale in July or there abouts. I keep saying that but it never really happens and we just keep gathering. This time it's happening, I'm tired of all the "stuff". I want it gone! I also need to get rid of some books. We have way to many, but books are hard for me to part with, so I'll do that last. You know, those church novels that we all read. Do I really need to keep them? Am I really going to read them again, or just be someones library. No, probably not, it's just so hard to part with them.

I'm playing my Viola again and hoping to join the local chamber group within the year. I have forgotten so much, it makes me sad that I didn't keep going. Years ago when I was playing there were very few opportunities locally to play, or people to play with. I went to Eugene for a time and played with the Lane CC chamber group for awhile, but it is just a long way. It was fun though, and of course the local Oregon Coast Chamber Orchestra. Now we have one girl that is in our ward that plays violin and another that just decided to pick it up again. Now all we need is a cello. I've tried to convince Bill to play the cello. Maybe I just need to buy him one and have it sitting around for him to get interested. That would be so fun to have a little quartet in our ward. Anyway, I should, hopefully, be able to get back what I have lost within the year, so that will be fun. I really love it. Learning an instrument is so important I think. I wish I would have had my boys learn to play the piano. When they were little they did the violin for a short time, but they hated that. Piano should have come next. David played the sax and Chip the Oboe in Middle School, but they needed to continue some kind of instrument. Really, the piano should be something everyone learns I think. I wish I would have. I can play a little bit, but not really. Does that make sense?

Knitting and hand work have all been replace with keeping a puppy entertained, throwing balls, etc. Penny has really grown, and she is a blast. We took her down to my dad's house and he LOVED her. She loved him to. When we came back from walks she would run to him and jump on his lap. When we got home and I called him to tell him we were home (and even a couple of calls after that), he would say how much he missed ... Penny. What are we, chopped liver. I thought it was so funny. He would get down on the floor with her and play and was always excited when she came back in from walks, and would comment on whatever she was doing at the time. It was fun taking her down there, but she got very used to the weather and not having to go out in the rain to do her duty, which really made it difficult when we got home. She would just stand at the door and look outside and then look at me like, "ah, no thanks". Can't say I blame her.

That same trip we went to Disneyland with David and his family. What fun that was to see Milan loving Disneyland. The weather was perfect and we all had a great time. I didn't know you could spend a whole day in Fantasyland, but we wouldn't have had it any other way. Bill and I did sneak off and go on two rides, Splash Mountain and Soaring, which is in Calif. Adventures. That was very cool. It closes early and we barely made it so we didn't even get to look around it there, wish we could have, but that's okay, next time. Anyway, Soaring kind of makes you want to learn how to hang glide. I'll put up some pictures in the next day or two.

Well, enough jabbering for now. I'll post some pictures later. I have to make a dessert for a YW auction tonight (not in YW anymore, but just contributing). I think I'll make the coconut dish with cream cheese and coconut cream pudding and coconut on top, it is way yummy! It's been a lazy morning, so better get started.

Finally

Well, I finally have a moment to post. Actually, it's probably that I have finally taken the time, not that I've been too busy, though it does feel that way. So much has been happening it's hard to believe it is already April. I'll skip the little stuff and move on to the big change. On March 14th my whole department at the hospital was laid off. Most of us could see it coming, but they promised it wouldn't ever happen, so it was still kind of a shock. They really didn't have much choice. For those of you who don't know, I'm a medical transcriptionist and have been working at our local hospital for just over 13 years. The whole corporation, which includes hospitals and clinics in Alaska, Washington and Oregon, decided to go with voice recognition. Frankly, most of us saw the writing on the wall and in late April they announced they would be outsourcing the editing. So, March 14th was our last day. They have been kind and generous to us and we feel pretty good about the whole thing.

One of the best things that came from this experience is a wonderful talk I had with one of my kids about faith. He was so angry about all of it, but I explained that if we have faith that all will be well and that our Heavenly Father will take care of us, he will. I explained to him that it didn't mean things wouldn't be difficult, that we might have to make some major lifestyle changes, but that change isn't always bad. It can open doors that ultimately are better for us. We really talked at length about it and it was a great moment. We really do have faith that all will be well and that we will be guided towards the answers that ultimately will take us to where our Heavenly Father wants us to be. Most important to me is that it's an opportunity for spiritual growth, because ultimately, that it most important. It really doesn't matter if we lose everything, it's just stuff. It's not that we think that will happen, we don't, but even if it did, as long as we have faith and we are doing what the Lord wants, I'm okay with that. Ultimately, the company that took over has asked me to come work for them, which I am trying out. I'm not sure it's what I want to do, but I told them I would try it out for a month or two, so we'll see. The job has caused some nerve damage in my ears and a few other aches and pains, so I may make a major change, maybe take some classes and try something different. We'll just have to see. I do have a testimony that if we follow the guidance of the Spirit all will be well. I am so grateful for the knowledge that I have of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and His great Plan of Happiness. I know that if I earnestly pray and ask my Heavenly Father to guide me, he will. The place where I want to be is where He wants me to be, doing what He wants me to be doing. It's that simple!

Shortly after this conversation, this same child had some major change in his life, which I think, because of our conversation, he was more able to deal with, and understand that change isn't a bad thing. He isn't a child that likes change, or deals with change easily, but it has ended up being a blessing in his life and an opportunity for growth. It's been good and he agrees. We are so proud of him. We are proud of all of our boys and how they deal with life's challenges.

Now, on a lighter side. We have a new puppy, Penny. She makes us smile all the time. Here is the first picture I took of her.

Yes, that's the picture. She moved so fast that picture after picture looked just like this, or maybe this one.

Finally I got one of her, but it wasn't easy.

Of course, she turned her head so I didn't get her face. I think she weighed about 1.3 pounds here. We are so used to having big dogs, a Golden Retriever , Rotty', that this is sooo new. But we are loving her. She is a Yorkie, but a full-sized Yorky, not a tea-cup or toy. She will never be big though, probably about 9 lbs. She doesn't shed, Yahoo!, so no one will be allergic to her. Here is another picture of her. Everyone says she looks like a bear cub.

Is she not the cutest! I think she looks like an Ewok, sounds like one too sometimes when she is trying to talk. No one passes her on the street without stopping and giving her attention, which she loves. Now she wonders why some don't.

She is so good. She has really grown, she now weighs a little over 3 lbs. Here is a picture of her on the beach for the first time. We are really having fun with her and she makes us smile all the time. She is such a kick!

She still moves fast, so not great pictures. I'll have to get a video of her and post that. I also have to post another one that Bill would be embarrassed about, but oh well. I was in the kitchen making dinner or something and he called me out one day to look at what he was doing. This is the guy that was shaking his head about getting a small dog. (I had given him multiple opportunities to get a golden again, or a lab and he wouldn't go look, so this is what I decided on)

We have a picture of David with Milan on his 4-wheeler, so this makes the picture even more funny to me. Look closely, see the green bag... Does this look like a man who minds having a small dog?

All of the boys have basically said it is official, we are getting old. But I have to tell you, she won't shed (no allergies), she is small enough to take anywhere without a hassle, she will be a breeze in the camper and traveling. We just love her to pieces. I think Milan and Eden will too!

Oh, and here is a picture of her brother, who we just saw yesterday. His name is Guinness. Not a great picture, but the best we could do. He is a little bigger than Penny, but is adorable. He chases his tail like a cat and has a great personality.

Glenda????

Christmas Trees

Just a quick note to show you my new collection. I'm starting to collect white or whitish Christmas trees. I just love these. There are a few more I'm going to make to go along with these.
We had a wonderful Christmas with Chip and Andrea, and Zach this year, though we missed David, Amanda and the girls terribly. The only thing that would have made it perfect is if they could have come. Maybe next year. It was one of those beautiful sunny winter days here on the coast, so there was some relaxing on the deck, feeding horses and playing with dirt bikes and 4-wheelers. We had Salmon this year that was delicious (and ham of course) and all the fixings we needed. Our greatest gift was spending the entire day with our kids, or most of them. How I love my family and spending time with them. Hopefully we will have everyone together next year, which will make it the best!

Love to you all and have a Happy New Year!

Beautiful

I haven't had time to blog lately, but I want to get this on for people to see. I think it's wonderful. Let's all remember to not get caught up in the hustle and bustle and to relax and enjoy the season and remember the birth of our Savior. If you missed the LDS Christmas broadcast yesterday, go online and watch it. But before you do, watch this:

A Contest

Check out my other blog for a contest I'm running, I need some fresh ideas on a name, read all about it Here

I Love Wyoming

I love Wyoming, especially Rock Springs. Now I know some of you will think I'm crazy. There really isn't a lot to do right there, though Walmart can keep me happy for awhile. I love the high Uinta Mountains and have great memories of camping there when our boys were young, before we moved away, But the absolutely, positively, most wonderful of all things, where ever you might be, thing to do while in Rock Springs, is play with Milan and hold Eden. We just got back from David's where we blessed Eden and spent a wonderful week visiting and playing and watching the girls to give some needed rest and relaxation to mom and dad. It was perfect fun and a great visit. Isn't this a great looking family!

We went to the library for story time and got to play a little bit before the story started.

Afterwards they trick or treated through the Library.

On Friday night David and Amanda were able to go to a Halloween Party while we watched the girls. Can you guess who David is?

Did you guess Mr. Clean and his maid?

Here are a couple of pictures of the girls. First, Milan in one of her many costumes. She was a cow on Halloween, nice and warm for trick or treating. I didn't get a picture of that since we had to leave, but you can check out Amanda's blog for it. She was a princess a lot while we were there and loves to play dress up.

I don't have a great camera but still was able to get a couple of cute pictures. It's hard since my camera has such lag time and so many were blurry. I really need to invest in a good quick camera!

I LOVE this picture! We really need to be closer to them. We had such great fun with the whole family! I hope we can go back soon, very soon!

September catch up - Bear cubs

I wanted to get these pictures up and finally have a few minutes to do it. My friend Ann had three bear cubs and a mom come play on their trampoline. Fun, until you think about it, then kind of scary when you have three young kids that also want to go play. It's kind of late to have such young bear cubs out, but there have been tons of them around this year. I mean tons of bears!!

I didn't get a picture of the bears on the trampoline, but here they are eating the neighbors berries. I'm sure Brian, the neighbor, didn't appreciate it. They also love his pumpkins. I think that is why he grows them. There are two on the left and one on the right, mom in front.

After this they came right up to the house, these pictures were taken from just a few feet away, inside the house however. They stayed and played for a good half hour, just while I was there, they had been there long enough for me to drive there when Ann called. I hope she posted her video of them on the trampoline, it was so fun to watch.

More Montana pictures

Just thought I would post some more of our Montana pictures. It's a beautiful place and we camped at a beautiful lake. Hope if gives you some ideas on where to go camping sometime. It's well worth the drive.

There were two lakes right together, one was called Wade Lake, but can't recall the other one. It is on the way to Yellowstone, leaving from Ennis, MT, where we had spent the night. It was gorgeous. Can you see the color of the water. It was even warm enough to swim in.

Here is our camp site. Isn't it beautiful! That's us!

This is from the camp site.

These two pictures are from the top of the hill looking down as we were leaving.

These pictures below are from Quake Lake, made by an earthquake in 1959. You can see in the second picture below where the whole side of the mountain slid down onto a campground at about 100 mph.

See where the mountain came down? I can't imagine being camping and having that happen, 28 people died that were camping along that area. Can you imagine! It's kind of weird to see all the tops of the trees still out in the middle of the lake. It is 190 feet deep and 6 miles long. Pretty amazing. And very beautiful. You find Quake Lake from traveling along the Madison River towards, or from too I guess, West Yellowstone.

For some reason I can't get all my pictures to show. If I can, I'll post more, but really wanted to get these up. That day we arrived in Idaho Falls for Chelse's wedding, a couple of days early of course.

Another Testament

Had to share this, hope you enjoy it. I did!

http://anothertestamentofchrist.com/

Montana travels

I'm sitting here waiting for Glenda to come get me and thought I would post some of the pictures we took on our way here. We decided to go through Montana, my favorite place in the whole world, instead of going the same way we always go to get anywhere. We have had a lot of fun camping and seeing old places I have lived as well as new places we definitely want to go back to. Just to let you know, the pictures really don't do it justice. We have been traveling through some amazingly beautiful country! I thought I would post some anyway. I hope you can see the beauty in spite of our lack of camera's ability to take awesome pictures.

Couldn't get the pictures to download for some reason, so will try again later.

It's now 9/15 and I'm just getting back to posting. Here are pictures of our trip. We both really want to get back. We loved it up there. Especially around Drummond, where we attended church.

This is in Drummond, MT. We thought it was a funny sign, but a beautiful little town. We continued to drive up the road, forget what it is, admiring the quiet beauty all around. We headed west off the freeway to find a campground for the night and just relax. Bill got excited when we saw this ski resort off in the distance.

Eventually (the next day) we started to go to check out the ski resort but the road was in horrible condition, it was pouring rain and lots of mud, so he decided not to do it, since we had the camper. Below are a couple of different pictures of the campground we stayed at. It was so beautiful, in spite of the hail that we had. That's Montana for you. August and hailing. Gotta love it!

We found out the next day that the lake was huge and very pretty all around.

Here is the view from the church. It was so serene I just wanted to sit for awhile. I guess it was still green because it has rained every day this summer, very unusual, but makes for beautiful green fields.

Then off we went towards Bozeman and the Gallatin Canyon, one of my favorite places. It is so beautiful. Here we are heading from 4-corners, which I have to say is barely recognizable it is so built up. It was kind of sad to see how much it has been developed, though the pictures probably don't show that, at least not here at the mouth of the canyon, but there were houses all over in the canyon that weren't there before. I know, it was bound to happen, but still sad.

Isn't it beautiful, even with those huge storm clouds!!! Those mountains. What a beautiful earth we have been given.

When we finally get to the Big Sky turnout, my mouth dropped open, I couldn't believe what I saw... A LIGHT!
I couldn't believe it. I hope it is temporary since there was road construction going on, but as we camped on the Gallatin River that night the traffic was crazy busy, so maybe not. Now for the really sad pictures of Big Sky. It reminded me of Aspen. It is so sad. I guess there is a place up there called the Yellowstone Club or something like that. It is a Billionaire's club. Heard about it talking to someone that works there. I guess it's horrible, though I'm sure beautiful. It's on some falls that we used to cross country ski to, it was a wonderful place.

Can you see all the condos and houses? There aren't even a fourth of what is now in Meadow Village and on the way to the Mountain Village. When I was there, there weren't any houses between the two.

At least this place is still there.

You know, sometimes it's best not to go back, keep it the way it was. I still love the Gallatin Canyon and I had a great time talking to my old boss, Mike Schultz, at Bucks T-4, but the changes were so drastic and very sad.


I'm going to start a new post with the rest of our Montana pictures. I'm tired of having to scroll down forever for every picture. Does anyone know how to make your pictures just pop right where the cursor is instead of all the way at the top and then adding tones of space between paragraphs? Would love to know if you don't mind sharing! Besides, forgot to add some of the Gallatin River, so will do that too.