Summer Fun Part 1

Where has the summer gone?!? It's actually only the middle of August here, but I've noticed some of the trees are already starting to put on their autumn attire. Sigh. I love fall, but I'm just not quite ready for it yet. Especially since my tomatoes have JUST begun to ripen. I hope to enjoy a few more summer time bar-b-q's and yummy summer salads.

We've done some fun stuff this summer. Michelle and I met up with some friends several times for various "field trips" to the museum, swimming pool, or just to get some ice cream. One of the favorites was the museum.

 Why, yes, my daughter is wearing sweat pants. It was a bit rainy and chilly that day, and she has grown almost 2 inches since spring and out grown most of her pants. Definitely going to have to do some shopping before the really cool weather hits.

Does anyone else feel really old when they go into a museum? You know, when you see one of your child hood toys behind a glass display? Sigh again. Life really is moving too fast for me.

We also had several friends over for a 4th of July bar-b-q and fireworks. 

Michelle and I went to our first Summer Camp this year. 

Our silly dog tried to tag along with us. Sorry, Layla, no dogs allowed at this camp. 

Yeah, I think she had a good time. ;o) 

Mike got to go with us to the zoo, and we're planning a trip to the aquarium with him tomorrow. It is his last day off before officially starting as a teacher this year. I'm so proud of him and all the hard work he's done. I know he's going to be an awesome teacher. 

Well, I think I'll wait and post photos of those trips a bit later. Right now I've got to go make some salsa and freeze some beans from the garden. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Garden love

Sigh, I love this time of year. Actually, I love all the different seasons here, but right now, I love this one. It always amazes me how quickly things green up here. One week we have a foot of snow on the ground and a couple weeks later, everything is green and blooming. Here's a shot from my hammock at the beginning of May:

And here it is today. Simply amazing how all those leaves just pop out of those branches so quickly.

We've had an amazing amount of rain this year. Our creek hasn't quit flowing yet. Every time it gets down to a trickle we get a couple more inches of rain and it starts flowing strong again. Pretty cool to listen to at night.

This is the dock at our little lake here in town. Yep, that's a bit higher than usual.

All this rain has made my garden really fill out nicely. My dad gave me the cute little boy and girl figures in this photo for Christmas. We set these up just before everyone arrived for our son's wedding at the end of May. Mike cut the stumps for me based on my measurements.

Apparently, I didn't measure very well. I moved the flower pot from the middle stump and stacked the short one on top so the girl wasn't completely hidden in the peonies. Good thing we've got plenty of downed trees on the property so he can cut me some new, taller ones later.

Aren't they cute though?

Here's my bed from the deck 2 weeks ago:

And here it is now.

I love how the flowers are filling in. Most of these are perennials we found around the property and transplanted here or were given to us from friends. The columbines I found in the woods as tiny little things got huge this year! The peonies have lots of flower buds that are just beginning to bloom. My lilies should be blooming sometime next week, I think, and they also have a lot of buds on them. And, my favorite, the daisies are beginning to bloom. :o) It's a hodge-podge of flowers, but I love it.

I thought I'd share these cool tulips I planted last fall. Love the coloring on them.

What about you? Do you have any garden projects in the works? I'll have to get out and get some photos of the veggie patch to share. We tried a few new things up there and they seem to be working well. Hoping we didn't get things planted too late in the year to be able to harvest before the first frosts come, though.

I actually have a rather free afternoon so I think I will get some of the crafting done I've been wanting to do, but haven't had time for.

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

Another Bird Has Flown the Nest

Hello there! How are you this fine spring day? Yes, it's me, the long lost blogger from the upside down house. I have a good excuse this time, I really do. :o)

See, I told you. Actually, this was the calmest part of the last month or two for me. My cake hobby went a little crazy there for a couple of weekends and I barely made it out of the kitchen to eat meals and take showers. There was a couple of late nights and nerve-wracking travels. I will be sure and blog about those episodes over on the cake blog a little later. For now, I thought I'd share some of the photos from my son's wedding. What a beautiful, and even relaxing, day.

Warning: lots of family photos to follow. :o)

Michelle was super excited to be one of the two flower girls. The bride and her family made all the dresses, including the bride's. They were beautiful!

This is my niece. I kind of think she's crazy. She just got home from college and thought it would be a good idea to go on a road trip with my mom in her camper. So grateful that she did, 'cause we were so excited to get to spend more time with her and felt a bit safer having someone else with Mom driving all over the country. Still thinks she's crazy though. :o)

Speaking of my mom, here she is with the bride. This was her second grandson's wedding in two weeks. (That will be one of those posts over on the cake blog later. ;o)

This is my gorgeous sis. She was such a help to me last  week. She is the reason I still have my sanity and can say that it was a rather relaxing week. I really need her to move to WI and help me in my kitchen. What a blast that would be.

Oops, had to sneak a kiss in there.

Mike's sister came up from Texas. I'm glad his mom was able to spend some time with her as they don't get to see each other very often.

We had some more nieces and nephews (and their significant others) come for a visit. So blessed to see what great young men and women they've grown into. I am looking forward to seeing them again in a couple of months for another wedding.

And here's another one of my nephew's who came out to visit. If he keeps growing we're going to be hugging his legs pretty soon.

 

My dad and his wife drove over from CO to spend a couple of days with us. It was fun to get to see them more than once a year. 

Guess who caught the bouquet? If the tradition is true, I pity the other single ladies as it looks like they have a long time to wait till they get to marry.

This was the wedding cake, designed by the bride. I loved the simplicity and elegance of it. The topper was her grandmother's, which we updated to co-ordinate with the rest of the cake.

This is a shot of the back of the cake. What is that blue thing there?

A little surprise for the Dr. Who loving groom. :o) 

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

Honey From the Rock

Well, hello there! It's been quite a while hasn't it? Life has been VERY bumpy around here. Mike lost a very special co-worker and friend a couple of weeks ago. We rejoice because we know that she is at peace and enjoying the rest of eternity with the Lord, and there's no better place to be than that. :o) We do, however, have quite a hole in our hearts right now as we miss her and her sweet, sweet smile oh so terribly. :o(

In His faithful fashion, the Lord continues to encourage and bless during this rough time. The ladies of my church go to a Ladies' Retreat every spring, and what a retreat it was! The fellowship was so sweet, and the messages were amazing! God never ceases to amaze me in how he gives messages to the teachers that seem to be just what I need, when I need it. More on that later.

First of all, I don't have any pictures of me. I was the official photographer for the retreat and I haven't figured out how to get myself in front of the camera when I'm behind it. I had such a fun time running around getting pictures of each of the activities and classes though. I can't post most of the 900+ photos I took on here, but I will share some of them with you.

There was a serious snowstorm forecast to hit us the morning of our departure, so we ended up leaving a day early. It was a good thing we did because the weatherman was right. We got a foot or so that morning at our house. Our trip was a little rough going at first. We had some frozen, rainy, haily (my new word) kind of weather to drive through for the first couple of hours. This was one of our vehicles when we made a bathroom stop.

 I love these little kids. They always look so joyful, even on cold, dreary, rainy mornings.

 This beautiful flower was inside the main office space. It was so nice to see such bright color again.

OK, so this one looks weird, I know, but I had to take it. Lately I've started noticing natural hearts all over the place. I kind of see them as a "love note" from the Lord. I decided that whenever I can, I'm going to get a picture of it. This happened to be a splatter of mud on a step. I love what my friend said about it. "In this drop of yucky mud can be seen a heart (love). Isn't that how it is with us? We are the yucky mud that others can see the love of God through." 

These were outside in the garden. A simple reminder to us that new life will come, spring is almost here. :o)

Because I was the photographer, and wanted to make sure I got all the classes and activities, I didn't get to sit and listen to any of the regular classes. Thankfully, this year they recorded them, so I will get a chance to listen to them later. :o) I did get to go to the special "Chalk Talk" class that was held the first evening. Our guest speaker is a chalk artist and uses her beautiful drawings to share God's Word. Some of you may have seen something like this before. I hadn't.

This part of the drawing was finished when we arrived in class.

Then she gave us a wonderful message of living by faith and not by sight. She encouraged us to remember that God is always there and working in our lives, even if we don't see Him or understand what's going on. She then began to draw the foreground to this picture.

 Here's the finished drawing. Beautiful, isn't it?

But there was a surprise. As she lowered the lights and turned on a black light we could see what we couldn't see before.

Makes me smile whenever I see it. :o)

Back to those messages God had for me. While I didn't get to hear all of the classes,  I did get to sit in on the general sessions. I guess "sit" probably isn't quite the right word here since I walked around snapping shots of the lovely ladies throughout a lot of it, but I did get to hear the messages. :o) So many gold nuggets of treasure. I can't wait to listen to these again when they're up on our website. One little nugget stood out to me and really blessed me. She read from Psalm 81:16. "He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee." Honey out of a rock. I've read this verse many times and I've always looked at it as God reminding us that He can do anything, even get honey from a rock, but our speaker brought up something new to me. She said the rock is those hard times in our lives. You know the ones, I'm sure you've had them too. The times when we're down in the valley and not up on the mountain top. The times when we don't know what to do or where to turn. The times when we don't see anything good happening. That's the rock, and our wonderful, amazing God can bring sweetness from that rock. Sweetness we may never know this side of heaven, but sweetness none the less.

So, while we are still going through a bit of a rock right now, I am looking for and praising Him for the honey. One bit of sweetness has been getting to know our friend's children better and developing a wonderful friendship there.

Well, I better close this here. Got a busy weekend ahead.

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

Tea Party

Hello there! How are you this fine, almost spring day? We are still buried under a couple of feet of snow. This picture was taken on the 5th. It's actually gone down a bit since then. We can see the head of the horse-and-carriage Christmas decoration now, but it's completely hidden in this shot.  

Michelle had a friend over after church last week and the two of them spent quite some time outside as it had warmed up enough to make the snow "sticky" and able to be shaped. They started building a snowgirl, but eventually it ended up becoming a winter fairy house instead.

I hope the fairies can stay warm in there.

This is Michelle on Mt. Driveway. It goes through some serious geological changes throughout the winter. That's the remnant of the fairy house on the right that Layla is checking out. Hope the fairies all got out before the collapse.

Unfortunately, it's a bit too chilly on most days to stay outside very long, so we have to find fun things to do inside. Friday I was in the kitchen working on cakes, as usual, when I received an invitation to a tea party. I couldn't pass that up!

 What a beautiful hostess. She had everything all set up for us. :o)

Yummy! Great food, and great conversation. We did decide that next time, we'll leave the play tea set for the dolls to play with and get out the real stuff for us so we don't have to refill our cup after every swallow.

I will close this for now. Time to go get some laundry going and help a little munchkin with her English work.

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!