August

Gonna go all out and post twice in one day! Hope you can handle the excitement!

After my lip fiasco, I am very cautious about going into our planter bed...we have TONS of strawberries in there now and they need to be picked every few days or they rot on the vine. I make Kevin do it!

I could just see me tripping again and having to explain a black eye or another cut lip. Besides, the wasps and yellow jackets are gearing up for Fall and they will GET me if I go out there (I even had a dream about these huge wasp/yellow jacket hybrids that had built a nest in our garage!)

I'm all freaked out about the economy. I mean really FREAKED out. I was reading some stuff on the internet and it has me very worried. I hope all of you faithful readers (all three of you) are storing food and getting your bills paid off. I have posted a web site before for anyone who wants to know more about our impending disaster but I'll post it again in case you didn't get a chance to go to it:

http://www.chrismartenson.com/ Start with The Crash Course and then read from there. I don't pay to belong to the higher access stuff that he posts on there. I just look at the Daily Digest.

Kevin and my 30th wedding anniversary is coming up on the 22nd. We are going out of town the weekend before to Bend, Oregon. http://www.oxfordhotelbend.com/ Check it out. Gonna play some golf (I CALL it playing golf but it's somewhat short of that description for me), eat at a nice restaurant and  just relax. I need a break from all the bad news! Kevin says we still have to live life despite all the crap that's happening. I know he's right and really, I do manage to get through every day without falling apart. You wouldn't know it to look at me that I am this ramped up about things.

Polina and Jasper are back from Russia now. Polina is getting ready to start PA school this next week. She is SO EXCITED! And we are thrilled for her. She has wanted this for a long time. She will do great, I know. Jasper is working hard and enjoying his job at Micron in the marketing department. He has travelled a lot for work this year, going to Japan and Taiwan. I think he's content to stay home for a while. His trip to Russia followed on the heels of his Asia trip so he is pretty sick of planes right now.

Chelsie and Michael are awesome too. Michael starts into his final year in school in a few weeks. He's doing really well and we are so proud of him. Chelsie has moved up a level at work and has her eye on some further opportunities within her department. They have attended a few weddings of friends (4) this year and are wedding'd out. I don't think I mentioned it before but Chelsie wrote a novel and it's been published! It's a download only and it's available at Amazon.com. Here's the link to her book:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_31?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=the+pull+by+chelsie+shakespeare&sprefix=the+pull+by+chelsie+shakespeare
She is currently busy writing her second novel!
We watched their dogs over the weekend while they attended a wedding and they were good for us. Their mini-shnauzer (sp) is pretty funny. She likes to stand up on her hind legs and Chelsie has taught her to sit on her haunches with her front paws in the air for a treat. Well one day, Kevin came down the hall and she stood up on her hind legs. Kevin thought she was going to jump up on him so he said "down". She didn't do anything so he said "sit". So she sat on her haunches with her front paws still up in air. He didn't know about the thing Chelsie had taught her so he told her "sit" again. She started kind of waving her paws in the air. He just rolled his eyes and walked away! Awwww...I told her she was a good girl ;)

Well, that's all I can think of for now. Going to go buy some more canned goods! See you later ;)

July post a little late...;)

I'm trying to get under the wire on a post for July...it's technically still July so I'm good right? (not July anymore!)

We started out the month with a trip to the cabin where we did this project...it took a lot of work and some cussing but we finally knocked it out sometime around July 10th (and we left on the 11th!) So I can't say that the trip was "fun" in the classic sense but it was rewarding! The slate turned out great and we have had nothing but rave reviews. If it looks familiar, it's because we copied the design from the tile backsplash we had recently installed in our kitchen at home (not cheating since we picked the design in our house also).

There was some funky weather but that's par for the course up there and we were used to the weather changing every five minutes...makes it interesting and cool because you can get outdoors when it's nice, and snuggle in when it's horrid. It hailed and rained and then it would clear out and be beautiful and warm. This is the view from our front windows during the biggest hail storm we had that week.

Chelsie and Michael came up for a brief weekend but we packed it in with some fishing for Michael with Kevin and some hanging out time with Mom. We also cooked our dinner of fresh bull trout with potatoes and berry cobbler over a fire out by "the bend" which is a large curve in the creek that runs through the family property up there. It makes for great memories to share that with your kids! Love having the kids up there because they are so enthusiastic about everything there and make it all fun for us...gets us away from the working aspect a little bit more.

Meanwhile, back at home, we have gone golfing a few times. Polina and Jasper even went with us a couple of times and it's been really fun to see Polina take to golf like a fish to water. Jasper is doing great too and they both seem to enjoy it a lot.

Later on in the month, I had a mishap. I was out trimming a shrub and I thought I saw some wasps or something flying out of it...needless to say, I panicked big time and ended up tripping over a tree stake line and running lip-first into a rock we had put in our planter bed earlier (remember the photos of a while back?   yeah, those rocks!) Ended up infected...triggered a cold sore in the same spot...got on antibiotics and antivirals, fielded jokes and inquiries from co-workers...lots of fun was had by all I can tell you! (sorry no photos!) What a lousy way to wrap up July!

Hopefully, August ends better since Kevin and my 30th wedding anniversary happens on the 22nd of August! We are planning something special but I don't know what exactly just yet...better get it arranged though since it's less than a month away!