Blackberry Season

We are excited that our blackberries are now becoming ripe.  I picked our first bowl last night and they are sweet and yummy!  They have come just in time as the raspberries recently finished for the summer.

We are looking forward to blackberry jam, blackberry syrup, blackberry milkshakes and smoothies, etc.  Yumm-O!

My New Piano!

In all my years of being a piano player, I have actually never owned a piano.  I have a nice keyboard that has served me well for the past several years but it isn't full sized.  My friend was married last weekend and moved to California.  She didn't want to take her piano with her so she asked us if we wanted it.  You betcha!

Knowing how difficult it is to move a piano - especially an old upright piano - we opted to hire professional movers to do the hard work for us.  All I had to do was let them in the house.

The girls have just loved it - even Miss Clara.  It's so cute to watch her try to play.  I love that my girls are musical.

I just couldn't help including this picture of her - look at that smile!

My piano is old, in need of a good tuning, and there are a couple of sticky keys.  But I'm very grateful to have it.

Clara's THREE!

THIS little girl turned 3 years old last week!  It's not possible that it has been three years since she joined our family!

Since her birthday was on a Sunday, we had a low key family party after church and her afternoon nap.  We started out with a fun game of Twister!

It wasn't a very organized game but it was hilarious to watch her try her best to participate!

Her big sisters were really good sports.

After a yummy pizza dinner, we got out her cake.  Clara requested a chocolate cake with ice cream so I made a very chocolately cake.

Here she is being sung to..... Happy Birthday to YOU!

Getting ready to blow her candles out!

She did it!!!!

I think she enjoyed all of the chocolate!

Her grandparents and aunts and uncles spoiled her with fun toys and clothes.  She loves her Minnie Mouse sunglasses.

 And her new Ballet Barbie.....she absolutely loves Barbie!

She received some very fun dress up clothes - including some pink heeled shoes.  It was so cute to watch her walk in them!

We absolutely adore this sweet little girl!  She brings us so much joy and she makes us laugh constantly!  We love you Clara!

Host Family

This past weekend was the Tri-Stake Youth Conference.  The La Grande Stake hosted two other stakes from Hermiston and Walla Walla.  We signed up to host three girls and we picked them up on Friday night - Abby, Siobhan, and Michelle.

They were all from the Pilot Rock ward and they were the funnest girls!  We had a devotional with them and then they bunked in our living room.  We had a nice breakfast with them on Saturday morning and then we had to say goodbye to them so they could enjoy the rest of their conference.  It was a wonderful experience, even though it was short, and I will have a special place in my heart for these three ladies!

Pickle Making!

Our garden has given us a nice harvest this year.  A couple of weeks ago, Mark picked 18 cucumbers one morning and was excited to make his mom's Refrigerator Dill Pickle recipe.  They were very easy and best of all - all the ingredients were grown in our garden.

The cucumbers, the dill, the garlic -

....and the onions.

They turned out beautifully.....not to mention how fun it is to see my husband in the kitchen!

Fair Judging

The fair officially started last Wednesday.  Mark and I had to take a shift manning the 4-H building so we brought the kids along to see what the judges thought of their exhibits.  Samantha is part of 4-H but since she is not yet in 4th grade, she can show her exhibits but they are not judged.  She made a skirt, a pair of pajama pants, and two pillows.  Pretty impressive!

There was a cute farm display by the 4-H building, so I snapped this picture of my cutie pies....

Emma did excellent with all of her exhibits!  This is a blue ribbon she received for her pillowcases.

She received a red ribbon for some bean bags that she made.  We found a pattern for them online and they turned out very cute.  She is even going to make some for her younger cousins.

I think this blue ribbon is for her cookie baking contest.

And this red ribbon is for her Nutricious Breakfast contest!

She also was given a red ribbon for her sewing skills contest.

She earned a blue ribbon for keeping up her 4-H record book....100 out of 100 points possible!

Plus her cookies received a blue ribbon - they were great!  Overall, Emma earned five blue ribbons and four red ribbons.  We'll see what next year brings for her!

I am proud to say that even yours truly received a couple of blue ribbons.  I entered some homemade triple berry jam and some blueberry banana bread.  And since I entered them in the "Open Class" category, I made $2 per blue ribbon.  I'm rich!

Another aspect of the fair were our little Zumba dancers.  Clara and Samantha both danced with their Zumba classes and they were adorable.  Clara's class danced to "I'm a Little Teapot" and "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes."  Mostly she just got up there and jumped around.  But she wasn't at all shy about it!

Emma is also part of Samantha's Zumba class but she had other commitments that night.  Sam did great, and even had a solo that involved a cart wheel.  She has a natural rhythm that makes her a wonderful dancer!

Fair is now over and we can take a deep breath to recover from it.  It was a good experience for all of us and we will look forward to next year!

Fair Prep

The week before our County Fair is when officials hold the 4-H contests.  The kids participate in cooking, sewing, research, speaking, and judging contests to see what skills they have developed over the past year.  Emma signed up to do several contests.  Her first one was a Junior Cookie Baking contest.  This is her, working hard in the kitchen.

The baking guidelines are very strict - from the correct way to crack an egg to how often the work space needs to be cleaned.  It can be very stressful.

 We practiced for a few days beforehand to make sure that she had her skills and recipe just right.

And this was her finished product - Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies!

The next day was her sewing skills contest.  She had to sew an elastic casing on her own.  This was not an easy task but she got it done!  She was given the instructions and a time limit of one hour to complete it.

Afterwards she had to test her knowledge on cooking and sewing.  She was given several questions to look over and think about and then hopefully put down the right answer.

On Friday Emma participated in the Junior Nutricious Breakfast contest.  Unfortunately, her mother neglected to bring the camera so there are no pictures to show her finished product of a strawberry, pineapple, and banana smoothie.  It was delicious!  This contest week is jam packed and was a bit of a stressful for me - just wanting to make sure the my kids are successful and happy and doing things correctly.  A couple of days later she and Sam submitted all of their projects to be judged on and those had to be done just right as well.  4-H is a great program and I am seriously proud of the skills that Emma and Samantha are learning!!

Cousin Time!

We had a wonderful visit with the Perez Family from Texas recently.  I haven't seen my sister and her kiddos in two years so we were ecstatic to spend some time with them.  We weren't going to have that much time so we had to jam pack a lot of activities into their visit.  After lots of big hugs we spent sime time just visiting and laughing together.  Then we headed outside to pick raspberries.  Look at those cute faces!!!!  I sure love them!

The kids got down to business and picked until the branches were almost empty....

It was pretty hot outside but they were serious about their berry picking!

And they also enjoyed some time playing together in the yard - Emma is as tall as her two older cousins!  She loved it!

Then we came inside and had some homemade raspberry milkshakes to cool off......YUMMY!

After staying up late laughing and giggling, we had a good rest and watched as they packed their stuff up head to their next destination.  But before they left, we went to Dairy Queen for some lunch and some fry sauce......apparently you can't get fry sauce in Texas.  Shameful!

We had the BEST time together and it was so hard to say goodbye to them.  Being away from family is so hard - we are all spread out between Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Utah, Texas, Minnesota, and California.  We love our family and wish we could be together more!

Best Summer Gift!

The event we were looking to the most this summer came to use a few weeks ago.  My parents returned home from their two year mission to Mississippi.  Most of my family had been able to see them while they were gone but we had gone two whole years without seeing them!  When they left, Emma was nine, Sam was seven, and Clara wasn't even one.  This picture was taken before they left.

This is Mom and Dad at the end of their mission - at their last transfers.  They worked very hard while they were gone.  Dad was in charge of the fleet of cars and Mom was in charge of Media and Referrals.  It kept them soooo busy!

They had a nice couple that they served with - the Deans.

We are so proud of them and the example they set for our family of missionary service and we are even happier that they are back home with us!

Goodbye Mississippi - Hello Oregon!!!!