Aaron & Janice

O.K. Tearsa, here is a photo of the brothers you left at home....anyone changed since you last seen them? Probably not, they are still the same old goof cakes you remember.

Anyhow we had a weekend with snow. Not perfect timing since Aaron was trying to get some wheat planted and we still had some hay down....but the boys loved it.

Cold? Not too bad, the top photo was taken before we headed off to church...no one wore a coat. The weather had warmed up since then, so now we are finally having fall weather.
Tilmann in the Saturday snow storm.

Here is Tilmann with our new extra fuzzy pot-belly kitten. I knew one of the wild cats was pregnant, but we don't normally have kittens in the fall. Apparently she only had one big kitten, who is under our porch. He would dash under the porch when anyone came near it....unless there was tame cats around too, then it would stay out like one of the gang. Tilmann was able to catch it and hold it. Fun....but now that momma has taken it some place else, so we haven't seen him in a few days.
We had a weekend of snow on the ground.....and low and behold another cat showed up. It is about the size of our spring kittens, and coloring like a few others around, so I think it is a kitten from another one of our 'wild' cats. Very pretty with long hair. But now that it has warmed up, I haven't seen it again. Makes you wonder how many cats we actually have on the farm!

This is my mother-in-law, Elsie. Last week was her birthday. (I was going to post this earlier) She loves making dolls, and these are her latest. When she asked if I would take a photo (she was hoping she wouldn't be in the picture) of her dolls, since she didn't have a camera....well I borrowed one.

Rug Hooking has been her latest passion for over a year now. She cuts her own wool, often from clothes that she has bought from a thrift store. With these dolls, you can tell the color variety that was used to make up the face. (might need to click on the photo to enlarge) The clothes are also made out of wool, such as the pink dress made from an old Pendleton shirt...notice the collar?

This year I decided to do some concord grape juice like the old timers did- by putting the grapes in the jar. Normally I steam the juice from the grapes in the steam juicer that we have. My mother-in-law has done it this way for years, and honestly, it is more fun! My father-in-law grows plenty of grapes, so I thought we'd try a new method.
Tilmann and I worked on this together. Gathering a cup of grapes for each quart jar. The recipe (in the Ball book) says to add 1/2 -1 cup of sugar to 4 cups of water, boiling it so the sugar is melted, then fill the jars.
Here is the finished product, some grapes floated, some didn't. I think the jars are pretty. To drink the juice, you strain off the grapes. Big change in color from the first photo's grapes.

Last weekend was a longer weekend, school being out on Thursday & Friday. The older 2 boys spent Thursday with their father trying to get the hay done before the rain came.

Aaron had heard that they needed help at Camp Bradley, (a scout camp that is up past Sun Valley area) volunteers to work on a new building, a shower and bathroom. He decided it would be a fun weekend....and when he had called ahead finding out that we could stay in a cabin (they have them for the merit badge leaders) and be fed, well he was all for it! Besides his birthday was on Monday....so it was a good idea to have some fun.This is our cabin #5 which was the largest cabin. I found sleeping together in one room...interesting....the noises, snores & even a sleep-talker. But the hardest thing to get use to was the wood stove! The boys were so sure if they filled it with wood, I mean piled in the wood, that come morning the cabin would still be warm. Problem with that idea is come midnight I'd be awake sweating! (and opening the door) And then the idea that a cabin that has lots of holes and cracks can keep in the heat...nope it didn't work. So come early morning we'd be awaken by the fire builders.
Friday the day was beautiful, warm & sunny. Aaron, Drey & Taft worked on helping put up trusses for the new roof. The younger boys and I went hiking through the woods (actually Taft & Drey were with us some of the time) walking down to the lake and such. The Lodge (above) was where we ate....and ate well! By the way, these aren't photos that I took, I found them on the internet. I am getting so creative without a camera!
Saturday it rained off and on all day. But the pool was freshly cleaned and so very tempting! That is to 3 younger boys. No, we didn't have swimming suits....or even towels! They went swimming in their pants....and shook all the way home to the cabin! The water is warm, some type of hot spring filling it. p.s. the above photo looks like my boys- in action, but it isn't them.
Saturday the group worked long and hard finishing the roof of the shower building.
The mountain tops around us come Saturday morning had snow on them. But the most beautiful part was the fall colors of the trees! Traveling up past Sun Valley to the camp was just perfect timing on our part. We stayed over Saturday night, and had such a great weekend. It was so nice to get away and so some camping!

The acid smell of smoke fills the hazy air of a new morning. The glow on the hillside of late last night, still glows in the dark dusk of the morning......



Monday afternoon Aaron and a couple of the boys head up South, to help with the fire. The fire was in the South Hills, heading up the road a few miles past Nat Soo Pah. There were 6 BLM Fire Trucks there to work, but as usual the one Fire Truck from Hollister did more work than the others...combined. 'Volunteers' vs 'Paid Employees'. Aaron thought they would have the fire under control by that evening, but it wasn't until two days later, burning up "6800 acres in the area 3 miles east of Rogerson". Tuesday morning it didn't matter where you were, there was tons of smoke and the odor of it drifted everywhere. There was quite a haze of it on the horizon that made it hard to figure out where the fire really was at. At school that afternoon (I'm there working in the library) they had a fire drill.....all the kids are lined up outside, and who shows up but a fire truck! It was just a drill, but it sure sparked some intrest!

Now normally fires don't happen this late in the the year, even if everything is real dry. But I thought I would also point out that yesterday was Oct. 1st and it was 91 degrees!

I don't have a working camera, so I thought I could take a photo off of the newspaper....the above photo made the front cover of our daily paper.....somehow I thought it could have been a wee bit better, so I decided to throw in a more dramantic fire shot.