Blue Trip, Two Trip to Harrison, Idaho

This was the first of the sunsets we watched at Lakeview Lodge in Harrison.

To capture the halos around the sun and the reflections I merely stepped out on our balcony while others were down at the dock on a fishing expedition. The 'Rails to Trails' bike paths run for miles and miles.

On Thursday 'the girls' went to Pedal Pushers Bike shop to rent these perfect bikes.

They had a glorious time for two hours!

Steven and Evan COULD NOT stop fishing! These fish are tiny ones,

but the did catch keepers...Bass, Crappie, Catfish and Perch...YUM!

We did very little shopping.

Lovella posed for me because I thought she looked so darling in this hat.

Rachel bought each of the kids a soft, stuffed moose as a souvenier which they named Harry (for Harrison) and Mary (for St. Maries, a town close by).

Rachel is a massage therapists, mostly facials, but she chooses to work on her dad every day when she visits. Not much movement was gained, but he slept well.

We had a full kitchen and made all our meals.

I headed up the Thai Salad Roll expedition the first night,

and Lovella headed up the Sushi one the next.

Do I look like I'm having fun?????

Wildlife such as Herons, Osprey and Moose were everywhere. We didn't site any moose, but were told by other bikers that they had seen them.

Steven brought these lilies back from the 2nd day of biking when all the kids went.

Jay and I drove around the countryside for awhile after napping.

The last stop, on the way home, was Emerald Creek Garnet area.

We parked our cars, walked about a half a mile into the scene below.

This is a picture of the 'sifters'.

You can see in the background just right of the middle a person standing.

That's where we filled 2 buckets with shovels (all provided) with dirt and rocks.

You then take your buckets to the sifting area to sift out all the dirt, saving the rocks for sluicing across the road. My camera ran out of battery life so there are no pictures of that or the garnets we found.

Here is Evan at the digging area. We all had a blast with the mining and finding of treasures. The garnets are rough, round, dark and heavy balls of rock.
They have to be cut to see if there is a star in them, and then polished.
I highly recommend this whole trip. Harrison is a fine little town with wonderful swimming for kids and adults, a dock with diving board in the middle of a protected area, great fishing right off the dock and jetty, biking, THE BEST ice cream (nearly) in the world at a place called The Creamery. They also sell fudge, but didn't have any while we were there.
The week days were thin of tourists, but Fridy night and Saturday morning it was heating up with such. We left just then and went on the mining operation.
Oh, folks, it was so pleasant, relaxing and satisfying, a delightful place with sweet people.
I'm getting ready for school and more company today.

One Trip, Two Trip, Red Trip, Blue Trip

This is my MamaPajama, my Little Mither.

My sister Margy and I took her to Anacortes so she could ride the ferry to Friday Harbor last weekend. It was to celebrate her 87th birthday.

And we had a splendid time with perfect weather, great food, and wonderful companionship. The first leg of the journey for me was to get to Kimber's, breaking up the 14 hour drive.

She and Dante were ready and waiting for me with smiles and exclamations of joy.

Some of the great food began at Kimber's too.
This was a picture-perfect chicken dish she'd watched a TV chef create.
Kimber knew she could improve upon it...and she did!


This picture of my sister's Hydrangea's will be turned into photo cards later in the year.

Mt. Baker is in the background as we boarded the ferry. We walked on, leaving our car in the parking lot because we were only going for a few hours that day and just to walk around some shops in Friday Harbor.

Here we are, the three of us. Accompanying us on the ferry was another set of "Mother and Two Daughters" celebrating a 90th birthday, so we took pictures for each other.

We came upon a Lavender Shop that encouraged samples of all kinds of lavender products.

The sailboats out on the water were ever-present as we returned to Anacortes.

Cloud banks were plentiful on the way home too.

It is almost as if you could stick your finger in and dip out a taste of this fluted meringue!

In La Conner we came upon a Quilt Museum that was in the midst of closing for the day, but they let us look at a couple quilts on the ground floor. This one reminds me of the Crazy Quilt my Grama made for me.

Isabella loves to play with my camera, and she took this shot of me with Dante on the last night of that trip...Sunday. I came home on Monday, recovered Tuesday (yesterday) and will leave today with more family for another trip, this one to Northern Idaho.

The Pause that Refreshes

Yesterday morning (Saturday) Rachel, Suzi, and Gail met at my house at 7:00 a.m. to take off for a trip to Moscow to visit Mary Jane Butters' Retail store, the Farmers' Market, and the Cowgirl Chocolates Store. We went other places and out to lunch at a wonderful Thai place too.

Here are the four of us appropriately dressed for the trip. The first person we met was an aproned salesgirl in MJB's establishement.

She called me The Apron Lady from Grangeville.

The store is tiny and filled with countless treats.

The decor is vividly colorful, and the salesgal was unendingly helpful.

I loved what they did with these spoons to hang aprons and such. I'm now looking for about 8 silver spoons or forks to attach to a long and pretty board to hang my aprons on in the kitchen.

How about this old jello mold turned into a pincushion?

It almost looks good enough to eat!

The outside was as festive as the inside.

Here is Rachel coming out with her purchases.

The guests of the Farmers' Market danced to some music provided by accomplished musians play flutes, panpipes and stringed instruments. The song playing for this lady and child was somewhat Celtic.

Rachel ran into some old friends of hers and we stopped at a booth in which a young friend was selling sweet baby things she'd sewed.

The Cowgirl Chocolates store was killer too!

This delightful salesgirl let us sample from the little tins in front of her. We especially enjoyed the 'hot' truffles. I say they were hot because they had an aftertaste of chili.

Here you see some of the displays.

We shopped at the Goodwill-like store, dropped off a meal at the hospital where our dear friend is clinging to life, visited an antique mall and a home decor store. We were filled to the brim with satisfaction upon arriving home.

The exhaustion left quickly because the day was so full of blessings.

I wish you'd been with us!

Finally, a Garden...of sorts

The garden this year is really challenged. We've had temperatures in the upper 40's at night so the tomatoes and squashes are just surviving. My ankle is sprained, so I've not even finished spreading the mulch of straw...as you can see. The sunflowers in the background are volunteers, and I've maintained recently that if I knew how to freeze and eat flowers for the winter we'd be set. But we love tomatoes and winter squash. You see the northeast beds here.

And, below, are the south east beds.

I do love the eclectic approach of inter planting flowers, herbs, greens and squashes in a bed like the one below. That is rhubarb chard, my favorite in the middle.

It has been a great year for cool-weather crops like this cabbage. The maroon flower on the right is part of the perennial called Nautica Macedonica.

The size of the squash below indicates there isn't enough time for it to mature. My sadness over this year's garden can overtake me sometimes because I LOVE gardening. I've been off on trips to visit family, sprained my ankle badly, and accepted the cool wet weather. Fortunately, I've given seeds for my favorite winter squash to about 6 other gardeners who live in warmer areas nearby. I've asked for just one squash from them. We'll see what happens.

The tomatoes are finally appearing, not many, and not ripening.

I love Green Tomato Pie, so perhaps it is a year for that instead of Salsa.

Twins Visit

Jackie and Stacie are twins, and they are my firends.

Jackie is a Homestead Wannabee, and Stacie is a Firefighter's Wife.

That's who they are on their blogs, and in real life. It is so obvious they love and care about each other, and I couldn't resist taking this picture of the genuine care they have for each other.
Jackie makes EVERYTHING from scratch including her own graham crackers and cheese,
and Stacie is busy raising 6 kids.

We made Thai Salad Rolls the first night they came.



Don't these look delicious...and beautiful? We put tofu in some and chicken others for our protien. The other ingredients are shredded cucumber, carrot, chopped cilantro, and rice noodles.

We talked non-stop from Friday afternoon until Sunday afternoon about gardening, children, homeschoooling, scheduling our lives for fitting more in with ease, husbands, God, Bible studies, friends, food and blogging. It was a divine weekend to make new memories because the last time they came (4 years ago) Jackie fell down our stairs in the dark thinking she'd stepped into the bathroom. She broke a piece of bone off her collarbone, and it took a very long time to heal. I love these two girls!