Fast Trip to Portland

This weekend we made a trip to Portland, Oregon with Jeanette's mother and her brother, Alan, for a wedding of one of her cousins. We stayed with them a couple years ago after the infamous Ride to Remember bike ride from Boise to Portland. Anyhow, the wedding was at an old poor farm that has been transformed into a huge lodge-restaurants-pubs. It is called McMennamin's Edgefield and was just crawling with people. It was built in 1911 and provided room and board for about 600 indigent people while they worked the farm. This was what they did before welfare.



While we were there we were facinated by some hummingbirds. They must have made their home in a thicket next to one of the buildings. We stood transfixed watching them. They flew right next to us and I was able take a picture of one as it hovered right in front of my face. Okay, who can tell what type of hummingbird this is?

Tomato Harvest

Our little backyard garden only consists of a few varities of vegetables - tomatoes, peppers, rhubarb and a couple lonely eggplants - and the tomatoes take up most of the space. This year the tomatoes did pretty well. This last week a bunch of them ripened. When that happens, it's time to make Spaghetti Sauce!

First we picked the tomatoes.



Then we set up a kitchen out on our patio. It was 100 degrees outside, so we wanted the inside of the house to stay nice and cool. We figured we couldn't make it any hotter outside. After cooking up all the ingredients in a huge pot, we started canning.



And the result was 23 pints of great tasting Spaghetti Sauce.



And we'll probably have to do it again in a couple weeks.

Hot times in August

Erin, Lance, Jacob and Allison rolling into Boise on the 1st of August for a week visit. Keep watching this site for new and exciting photos of their stay with us.

It's hot too. This is the temperature in the shade!

But we didn't let that stop us from eating our weekly dinner with family and friends outside on our patio under the misters. The Duekers actually look pretty good for driving 13 hours from Fresno across the desert of Nevada in the heat of the day with two little kids. Yum - corn on the cob, potato salad and grilled tri-tip. Oh yes, rootbeer floats for dessert.



Time for Allison's bath in a duck. It sure beats bending over the bathtub!



This is the first time that Melinda has seen Allison. And vice versa, I guess.



It has been busy - Jacob helped me clean up all the apricots that fell on the ground,



then we went and picked some blackberries,



we played on Erin's old balance beam,



and then we relaxed.



And we woke up ready to go again!



Then we took some family portraits - nice looking family, eh?



We went down to the local swimming pool on a hot evening and cooled off.







The next day we decided to make some playdough and create some Christmas ornaments. You don't want to leave Christmas projects until the last minute! Maybe tomorrow we will paint them.