Day 77

1. Feeding ewes and lambs. All the lambs have been born.

2. Daniel's portrait of Wilma enjoying the sunshine

3. It's Dad's birthday! Scott and Juli came over to help celebrate, along with Roger and Bev.

4. S&J also finished opening up their wedding presents.

5. A proper rum cake for his birthday.

Day 352

written 2/12/2013

1. Driving to the Woodburn Auction we passed a store selling what looked like sugar cane... cool.

2. At the Woodburn outlets with Andrew doing some last minute Christmas shopping. 

3. My birthday present! My birthday is in February, but the gift that the boys were going to give me didn't work out.  So yes, it took a while, but I'm very happy with the end result.We also opened up Tyler's (11th) and Mom's birthday presents (21st) as Mom is going in for surgery the next day and we hadn't gotten all of Tyler's presents when it was his birthday. So it was a mini party!

3. Our rather last minute attempt at taking a family photo for Christmas letters. With Mom going into surgery, this was it!

4. The result. I think it turned out pretty well. You can't even tell that Jacob is wearing sweat pants. :) From the left... Sara, Dad (Jeff), Daniel, Mom (Ann), Jacob, Scott, Andrew, Tyler

5. What else? Finally taking the older hens and some extra bantam chickens to the Woodburn Auction. 

Day 346

1. Finally making some progress on re-caning my chair. 

2. It's Tyler's birthday! I came up and "kidnapped" him from work and we went to coffee at Singer Hill.

3. Then it was off to the grocery stores to gather ingredients for Black Forest Cake. Then I rushed home and attempted to make it, bake it and assemble it so we could eat it before midnight.

4. Juli came over for dinner and to help celebrate. And then left her keys in the car (she was rather distracted , see following point) so her parents were forced to drive down and join us for dessert.

5. A sad day after hearing about the shooting at Clackamas mall. Juli almost worked at the mall today, but Scott ended up going to the ER (nothing serious) so she found a sub and spent the day with him. But we had friends from church there, and boy, it sounded scary.

6. An exciting day after finding out that Mom is finally, finally, finally going to have some neck surgery. We've been waiting over 3 years for this news. Praise the LORD.

Day 337

1.-4. Love these boys. 

David is Jacob's best friend and we were at his house this weekend 

to celebrate another brother's birthday (David's eighth of ten children). 

And as I was leaving they asked me to take their picture. This is the result.

Day 334

1. Jacob, Mom and I get to visit Dr Z every two weeks for updates. 

He's a functional neurologist, which is a pretty amazing "new" brand of medicine. 

Also, in the evening we got to have dinner and dessert with the Paynes to celebrate Juli's 20th birthday.

Day 265

Hannah's birthday party. The Lyons helped us celebrate.

And there was much ice cream. 

Also, Jacob and I made these brownies.

And they were very good. Very, very dark.

I think I might still like The Domestic Goddesses Recipe 

for most occasions better.

Day 125

1. Beautiful blossoms. Walking through the apple orchard in the evening smells AMAZING. Nothing like the fresh scent of apple blossoms.
2. We are trying something new this year, and I don't know why it's taken us so long to do it. We're pasturing several of the ewes and their lambs in the orchard. This time of year it always seems like we are doing nothing but mowing, so the sheep are definitely saving us time, plus it's so much fun to see the babies from the back yard!
3. Jacob's birthday... we finally celebrated his birthday (April 25th) over a week late. I was out of town, and then people have been sick or gone in the evening. He has been amazingly patient for an 11 year old. 
4. What else - I didn't blog yesterday, so the sad news first. Our poor sick calf died. Our vet thought it was going to be okay, but I guess not. Sniff. Sadness. Now we just have one poor lone cow. Hopefully we'll find a friend for him! Not much else for today, I've been on antibiotics all week and it's making me more and more tired. And they're making me sleep 10 hours a day, (argh!) so I'm pretty done by 10 o'clock, which is sad because that's my normal blogging time... so posts are kind of sporadic right now. My eyes are trying to close on me, so I better head to bed... g'nite!

Day 104

1. Voodoo donuts! Jacob & I out on a early birthday date. 
2. An amazing looking hoe at The Urban Farm Store
3. Bob's Red Mill
4. Cinnamon Raisin Bread
5. What else? Woodcrafters to pick up a new router base, buying asparagus, serging some farm sweat pants to wear outside (those silly calves like to slobber all over when you feed them!)

Day 46 (Birthday!)

Today is my birthday! I had a lovely evening with three of my favorite ladies with whom I've been doing a Bible Study now for a little over a year. The picture above is from an outing we had in December to celebrate completing a year together. My mother then awesomely got it placed on a mug and gave one to each of us tonight. So fun!


Our outing was right before Christmas, and after taking an historical house tour we ended up at a Konditerei in Salem, where the picture was taken. You can't see it to well in this blurry photo, but the window has a swag with lights on it, which makes the picture so festive! And we all love how it says Desserts in the window... and you can tell we are holding our leftovers. :)


Most of the day I just puttered around leisurely... and cooked. For my birthday dinner, I made ginger pineapple glazed ham, mashed potatoes, and a spinach salad with candied walnuts, mushrooms & avocado. Christine brought the appetizers and Jeanne & Janna both made the amazing flourless Chocolate Cake. Tyler and Daniel (and Anna - my little friend) also lovingly helped with the food and then all the young men lovingly did dishes!

Insta gram

So I'm trying out the internet phenomena of 2011; it's kind of fun and quirky. And it's definitely helpful for hiding the imperfections of my photos. The name always reminds me of porridge though. And my grandmother who we called Gram or Grammy. Thus the name conjures up images of an instant cereal box advertising something along the lines of Malt O Meal, but instead it's InstantGram! .

Proof that our little town has the coolest Hi School Pharmacy.

Took a walk and spied violets.

 

Today is Daniel's birthday. He's fifteen of all things and taller than me now. Sigh.