Wednesday, July 22, 2009

10 lbs of cucumbers

Christina and I just harvested 10 lbs of cucumbers from the garden, with many more on their way. I'm looking forward to some pickles!

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Garden Update

The heat is here and the garden is beginning to put out the next round of crops in plentiful numbers! Everything is huge - the tomato bushes, cucumber plants, corn, and pumpkins are taking over.



That is the cucumber patch behind the girls (lot's of pickles coming soon!), a pumpkin plant in front left of the frame, and some cantaloupe directly in front of the girls.


Compare that to just six weeks ago:



The pumpkin leaves are magically large when viewed from Miriam's height. (Those are the out-of-control cucumbers in the foreground.)






Abbie stands near the sunflowers, beans and some more pumpkin plants.




The first round of corn is almost ready to be picked and the second round of corn is taller than Miriam already.





Abbie at the end of the tomato row, with the raspberry bush behind her showing shoots over 8 feet tall.

Abbie and Daddy Camping

I took Abigail camping this weekend. Indian Henry was our destination, but since it was full we continued on deep into the Mt. Hood National Forest, to a tiny campground at the end of 6 miles of gravel road. Even that deep into the national park we took the last available spot at Hideaway Lake Campground. The lake itself is maybe 10 acres, sits at 4000 feet, and with only 14 campsites it was a quiet and isolated place to camp, even better since our site was right on the lake shore. The time together was great - we chatted, cooked, fished, swam, hiked, and roasted "smarshmellows."

Here's Abigail's video tour of the camp site and some pictures: 








Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Catching Up...

It's been a busy few months and I've been all but ignoring the blog, so it's time for some quick catching up....

Dad's been in and out of surgery and seems to be doing well, back to walking and eating well each day. The pathology reports look good so far. Praise God! 

The kids have been taking swimming lessons and they all seem to love it. I'm a little jealous of the swim instructor that Miriam is absolutely in love with, but she still seems to have plenty of love to give me when I get home. 






The cat and dog have still been annoying each other. Here Kodak demonstrates his dominance by eating from the Morpheus' dishes and then taking a nap in Morpheus' bed.


Christina's been canning, starting with a year's supply of strawberry jelly. Mmmmm.


We celebrated David's 12th birthday. (With a fancy cake by Christina!)




We went on our second annual 4th of July camping trip to Lake Merwin with our home schooling group. We couldn't have asked for better weather, the water was perfect for swimming, the nights warm, and a bit of wind here and there for sailing. Here are some shots from the bike parade.






Last weekend David went to the Youth Shotgun Clinic, I think we found a sport that he really enjoys! There were about 75 kids at the event, and David was put on a team with just two other boys, so he got some great hands on training. Here are some shots and a video of him being coached by Tom Jones, the club president and Skeet state champ, who we were lucky enough to be paired with the for the day.








One morning a balloon flew right over our house, that was fun.



The garden is growing like crazy, I'll try to get some shots of that in later. For now that about catches us up so I can get this blog guilt off my back. :)

- Adriel