Blackberry Jelly

This is my Blackberry Jelly that I made after dinner this evening. I made the jelly out of juice I had frozen last year. After picking the berries last year I ran them thru my juicer and froze the juice in pint containers. I'm running out of room in the freezer so I think I'll can my juice in quart jars this year.

Oh............did I say the blackberries are starting to ripen!!!!!!! I'm sure Dad and Mae will be calling me about picking berries as soon as they get back from fishing. They went to Groober Resevoir in Eastern Oregon last Friday. They had heard that there was 1 - 1 1/2 pound crappies in the resevoir..........so they loaded up the motorhome and boat and took off. I asked Dad when they'd be home............he told me Sunday, Monday or sometime this week.

The Cherrio Kids

Yes, that is a tattoo of "Garfield, the Cat" that Rich has on his upper arm.
On the weekends Rich lets me sleep in because I don't sleep well at night. Rich and Misty have Cherrio's for breakfast most of the time. Rich said he got tired of feeding Misty Cherrio's one at a time and so he started giving her a small bowl of her own. I got up in time last Sunday to take these photos of them having breakfast together.

Of course, our little Misty isn't spoilt!!!!!!! LOL

Strawberry Jam

I just finished making 4 and 1/2 pints of Strawberry Jam this afternoon. The four pints will go in the pantry and the 1/2 pint will be put in the refrigerator for using right away.

Later this evening I will be making Blackberry Jelly from juice that I froze last year. I just noticed today that the blackberries are starting to ripen. Dad and Mae will be calling soon wanting me to come over and pick berries in the back yard. Dad makes an awesome Blackberry Barbeque Sauce for chicken. I'm going to have to pin him down on the recipe so I can add it to my family recipe book.

Great Cats Show at Wildlife Safari

Bengal Tiger - Samson
Caracal - Kawaii
Caracal - Kawaii

Ocelot - Pepe
Ocelot - Pepe

Amur Leopard - Meiki This cat is on the cover of 25 national magazines this year alone. He is one of the most photographed cats in the world. Craig Wagner is the owner of Great Cats World Park in Cave Junction, OR.

Amur Leopard - Meiki

Rich holding our tickets for the show.

As most of you know Wildlife Safari in Winston, OR is in our backdoor. Wildlife Safari is a drive-thru animal park. Rich and I have a membership which lets us drive thru the park unlimited times. At times they have special shows in the Discovery Theater. Today they had Great Cats of the World.

We arrived early so we could get our tickets........that you see Rich holding in the above photo. Even though we have a membership.........for the special shows you still need to buy a ticket for that event. We walked around Safari Village visiting with all the animals........owls, monkeys, snakes, cheetah, ducks, porcupines and my favorite the flamingos. They are doing a lot of remodeling to provide better viewing of the animals. In fact.............they will have a new exhibit of WOLVES soon. I can't wait!!!!!!!!!!!! They have a new exibit for the cheetahs.

Finally it was time to get in line for the show. We asked but was told that we couldn't keep our punched tickets for the show. Disappointment for me as I wanted them to scrapbook. Something about they had to have the tickets so they could see how many people attended the show. I don't know why they couldn't just keep count of the number of tickets they sold!!!!!! Of course, that's the scrapbooker in me!!!!!

We took our seats in the very front row...........about 20 feet from the cats. They don't allow children in the front row because they look too much like a food source for the big cats!!!!!! During the show you are allowed to take all the photos that you would like from your seat.

There was 5 different cats from all over the world. I don't remember all the different types. They were all so beautiful. You could hear them making chuffing noises from where we were sitting. Of course Rich wanted to be up on the stage with the cats. He's the Cat person in our family and I'm the Canine person.

The cats are from Great Cats World Park in Cave Junction, OR. Cave Junction is approximately 70-75 miles south and west of where we live. We went through this park several years ago when it had different owners. We are looking forward to visiting the park later this summer as one of our day trips. If you would like more information on the park visit http://www.greatcatsworldpark.com/

Freezing Broccoli and Cauliflower

Top Row: Cauliflower
Bottom Row: Broccoli

The other day when I was shopping I found broccoli crowns and cauliflower heads on sale for 69 cents per pound.

I bought 7.78 pounds of cauliflower for a total of $5.37. I was able to put 6 quart bags in the freezer and had a huge serving for dinner. I will get two servings out of each quart bag for a total of 13 servings. Each serving cost aproximately 41 cents.

I bought 5.06 pounds of broccoli crowns for a total of $3.49. I was able to put 7 quart bags in the freezer. I will get two servings out of each quart bag for a total of 14 servings. Each serving cost aproximately 25 cents.

It's so nice to be able to reach in the freezer and pull out veggies to have for dinner. It seems like they taste so much better than what you buy in those little expensive cardboard boxes at the grocer. The only thing better would be if I grew the veggies myself. Maybe next year!

Thunderstorms and Lightening Caused Fires

Pilchner Creek fire is located about middle of photo and close to the top of the ridge on mountain.
Rich watching fire.

Last night we had a huge thunderstorm move through Douglas county. Tonight on the local news they said there was over 3500 lightening strikes in just our county. There are 18 lightening caused fires that have been reported so far. The fire in the above photo is about 10-12 miles northwest of our home. They are calling it the Pilchner Creek fire. We was listening to the fire crew on Rich's scanner after he got home. After they were finally able to get close to the fire they said it was about 1 acre in size. They had a ground crew, helicopter with water bucket and plane dropping fire retardant working on it. Hopefully they will be able to get it contained before it burns too much timber.

It's very warm today here in Southern Oregon. When I took Rich to work this morning at 5am it was already 60 degrees. It is supposed to be 101 degrees this afternoon. I don't like anything over 80 degrees.

I went and did my grocery shopping this morning while it was cool. One of our major grocery stores is open 24 hours a day (Bobbie's husband, Mike, works for this store and 3 others in Southern Oregon). It's nice and quiet in the early morning. The only bad thing is the stockers are busy stocking the shelves and you have to watch out for them and their forklifts. They had a great buy on fresh broccoli and cauliflower today......69 cents per pound. I bought 10 pounds of each to put up in the freezer. They also had a good buy on Santiam French Cut Green Beans today. Rich will only eat the French Cut Style. They were 3 cans for 99 cents. They had a limit of 12 cans. When I go back to town this afternoon to pick up Rich from work I'm going to stop and get another 12 cans.

After shopping this morning I had to finish hemming up 5 pairs of work shorts for Rich. I did one pair last night so he could wear them to work this morning. I'm sorry but I would rather make clothes from scratch than remodel ready-made clothes. I can't believe the poor quality of these shorts.............they are issued from Rich's work at the VA Hospital. His supervisor ordered the 10-inch length........which would have been perfect. The head of shipping decided he had made a mistake and so they changed it to the 13-inch length without asking him about the length. Most everyone has to hem them up because they hang way down below the knee. His supervisor was not happy!!!!!

I think I will tease Rich by handing him a invoice for $30 for hemming his shorts. It should be worth $5 a pair. Knowing him he'll want to take it out in trade!!!!!!!!!!

I've been scrapbooking a little. I joined the Scrap From You Stash contest on Scrap 101. The object is to not buy any new scrapbook supplies for 2 weeks and use what you have stashed in your ORGANIZED scrap area!!!!!!! Believe me...........I've got plenty stashed. Will update later and post some of my layouts.

Happy Fourth of July

Beginning of the 4th of July Parade in Riddle, OR
Miss Little Bitty Bikini and Mr Muscle Man and their court.
F-16 Flyover
1930's John Deer Tractor (Poppin' Johnny)
1956 Ford

Rich.........aka The Old Hippie
Us!!!!!!!!!!!!
Misty sitting on my scrapping desk and watching me on the computer.

Happy 4th of July. It's a warm day here in Southern Oregone..........close to 90 degrees and it's early afternoon.

Today is Misty's birthday...........she is 1 year old. We got her the play gym for her birthday and she just loves it. She now runs and jumps from top to bottom in a flash. She loves to sit up on the top and nap. I think the gym was a perfect choice for her birthday.

Rich and I went to the Riddle, OR 4th of July parade and festivities today. Riddle is a small community about 3 miles south of where we live. They always have a Sawdust Jubilee as part of the festivities. They have the parade, lumberjack contests, BBQ's, quilt show, music and dances and of course fireworks.

We went to the quilt show at the one of the churches. They had some beautiful quilts.........some were made in the 1860's. There was a Log Cabin quilt that was made in 1868. It was done in solid colors..........browns, dark blue, dark greens, burgundy, dark gold, and black. The blocks were only about 6-inch squares. I just love quilts. I have 4 or 5 quilts in the makings myself.............they are at various stages. I also have several quilts at various stages that I inherited from my paternal Grandmother. I know I need to get busy and get some of them finished. I just brought home my Grandmother's quilting frames. I've had them stored at Bobbie's for a while.

Even more Rogue River Rooster Crow

Rogue River Rooster Crow Parade

The last Saturday in June is the Rogue River Rooster Crow. There is a parade, car show, quilt show and book sale. There are all kinds of food and novelty booths. Yes, there is even a rooster crowing contest.............both poultry and people.

Misty's Birthday Gift

Misty is having a birthday on July 4th. Rich and I decided to get her a play gym for her birthday. We couldn't find one locally for her so we had to go to Pet Smart in Medford. It has a little house at the bottom, a scratching post, a flat shelf and a box at the very top.

At first she wasn't sure what we was dragging into the house. She slowly investigated it to find out what it was all about. We just let her investigate on her own.........we didn't want her to get scared.

She started off by checking out the house. Then she checked out the flat shelf and found the dangling feathers ( we later removed them as we didn't want her to eat them.......I will crochet a toy to attach to the chain for her.). It took her a while to decide to jump up into the top box.

After about an hour she was going from bottom to top. The next thing you know she was sound asleep in the box on top.

It seems that we found the perfect gift for her birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!

Friday Night Challenge at Scrap101

The Friday Night Challenge for June 29 was to do a layout using brown and green. I had this paper in my stash and it was perfect. It felt so good to be able to finally get a layout done. I've had scrapper's block for almost 7 months. I have a page goal of 365 layouts for 2007. It's the end of June and I have 5 layouts done. I better get scrapping!!!!!!!!!

Our 34th Anniversary

Pacific Ocean just south of Bandon, Oregon
Self portrait of the two of us!!!!!!

Rich and I are celebrating our 34th Anniversary this week. Rich is on vacation this week. We have been having so much fun. We decided to do day trips instead of taking off somewhere for the whole week.

We went to the coast Tuesday morning and decided to stay overnight. Misty was not happy that we didn't come home Tuesday night. We stopped at Walk-thru Safari that is located south of Bandon, Oregon. We spent 4 hours roaming thru the safari and looking at all the different animals. We got to hold a 7 week old Red Fox and a 12 week old Desert Lynx. They were so cute.

After leaving the safari we traveled south to Gold Beach. We started going to Gold Beach right after we were married. We loved going there as it was a sleepy little fishing village. We love to stay at the Oregon Trail Lodge. It was built in 1921. The rates are terrific and the rooms are beautiful. For a room with 2 queen size beds for the night with taxes was $44.

We checked in to the motel and rested for a while. We decided to go down to our favorite beach. It seems that since last year Mother Nature decided to change the course of the small creek near the beach. Instead of flowing out to the ocean.............it flows thru the whole beach area. Impossible to cross as it is about 30 feet across and fairly deep. So we decided to go to our next favorite beach and do some beachcombing. Yeah right!!!!!!!!!! They built a new information center and parking lot. We were able to walk down to the beach. To our horror...........they built condos on part of the beach. To say the least..........we were thoroughly disappointed. Our sleepy little village is fast becoming a thing of the past. What next a Wal-Mart?

We had dinner at Dairy Queen and then spent the rest of the evening trying to hear news about the Angora Fire in South Lake Tahoe. We have several friends who live in that area. We were finally able to get a hold of Ted and see if he was okay and how close the fire was to him. He said it was at the west side of SLT. He stepped out his front door and said that he could see the flames about 30 feet above the treeline. The fire was about 3 miles from where he lived. We told him to let us know if he had to evacuate. His parents and sister lives in Carson City, NV so he would go there if he had to evacuate.

Rich and I had already decided that our sleepy little fishing village was being to modernized for us. Rich returned the key to our room to the office. He told the owners that we had enjoyed our stay and would see them again the next time we came to Gold Beach. Rich was informed that the motel was being torn down by November and CONDOs were going to replace it. We were heartbroken.

After leaving the motel we headed down to the Jetty at the mouth of the Rogue River. We love to visit the Jetty Cats. The Jetty Cats are a small community of little houses for the stray cats of the area. Volunteers take care of the cats.........they take them to the vet and have them spayed or neutered. They feed and water them daily. If possible they find adoptive parents for the cats. Whew!!!!!!!!!!! Our Jetty Cats were still there!

The cats love to play and hide in the rocks of the jetty. We could only see 4 cats. Only one would come close to us. She was so sweet. She reminded us a lot of our kitten, Misty. We wanted to bring her home..........but we didn't think Misty would like that very much. We played with the kitten and feed her. They have a donation box for the cats expenses. We always try to leave a little something to help out.

We started getting hungry to we took off north toward Bandon. We had breakfast at the Minute Cafe in Old Town Bandon. It was really good food at a reasonable price. After breakfast we walked thru the tourist traps. Rich bought a tie-dyed T-shirt and incense at one of the small shops. We stopped at CranberrySweets.........a yummy candy shop with lots of samples.

We enjoyed our trip! We were disappointed in the developments in Gold Beach. Other than visiting with the Jetty Cats we have no desires to go back.

Cherries, Cherries and Cherries

!0 pounds of cherries (we had 3 of these boxes full of cherries.)
This is 21 pints of the 42 pints we canned of cherries.
7 pints of Cherry Jam.........Yum Yum!!!!!!!!!!!!

Canning Season

It's canning time again at our home. We went Saturday morning to a friend's house and picked 30 pounds of sweet cherries. As you can see Misty decided that the little red balls were playtoys. The top box I had already emptied........so she reached into the bottom box and pulled out a couple of cherries. She had fun rolling them on top of the freezer . Then she decided to get a cherry out of a bucket that Rich had set on the floor. She rolled it all over the kitchen and hall floors. Rich and I laughed and laughed at her antics with the cherries.

I canned 42 pints of cherries in a light syrup on Saturday and Sunday. This morning I made 7 pints of cherry jam. Will upload photos of finished products later.

Rich and I bought 23 pounds of apricots to can this afternoon. We are planning on canning them Wednesday. Since Misty gets us up at 4am even if it's vacation time we should have time to get them canned before I go to Ladie's Bible Study at 1pm. We will finish them up when I get back and make at least 1 batch of jam.

Pita Bread

I love pita bread so I decided to try and make it. They turned out really good for my first attempt. They are just a little thicker than ones I have bought. I made tuna salad sandwiches out of them. I loved them...........but Rich wasn't too impressed. He thought they were too chewy.

It's Been Some Time

Misty............10 months old. Isn't her color beautiful?

It's been some time since I've posted to my blog. I haven't had internet services at home for some time. I had to go to the library for the internet. Since I could only use the computer for 1 hour each day...........I didn't have time to post to my blog.

I am able to post today because we are trying out ClearWire for a couple of days to see if we like it or not.

There's been a lot happening in my life since I last posted.

Misty is very content now that she has been spayed. She went into heat before we were able to have her spayed. We have never had a cat go into heat before. I honestly don't know who was the most miserable............Misty, Rich or I!!!!!!! Misty would get on my shoulder and put her little head next to my face and cry. I cried with her.

Rich was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes earlier this spring. He is doing good with his eating and keeping it under control. The one food that he has trouble with is ICE CREAM! He loves his ice cream and not just a measley little 1/2 cup. He finally compromised.............he would have a nice salad for dinner on the nights he wants a bowl of ice cream and chocolate syrup. Now we have to work on getting him to eat more veggies!!!

Me, I still have my good and bad days with my fibromyalgia. My osteoartritis seems to be stable at this point. My knees still swell a lot if I'm on my feet for a long period of time. Still struggling with weight. I think I'm the only person that has gone on South Beach Diet for 2 weeks and gained 7 pounds. I thought I was doing everything right!

Rich and I started attending Hillside Christian Church recently. We really love the sermon that the pastor gives. The sermon last week was about giving up the past and the if only's in your life. I felt he was talking directly to me. I struggle with my past and the if only's daily.

Our garden is really starting to take off. We have radishes, turnips, carrots,beets, lettuce, green beans, onions, cucumbers, potatoes, zucchini and garlic so far. I need to pick up some tomatoe plants, pepper plants, cantaloupe seed and Kentucky wonder pole bean seeds this weekend.

Dad and Mae brought over Egyptian multipling onion sets la couple of weeks ago and I planted them. They are starting to come up. Not only did they bring the sets.............they brought a gallon bag of cleaned onions. We have been having them on everything. I think I'm going to chop the rest of them and dry them.

Dad and Mae have been out camping and fishing for the last week. They went to Prineville, OR and spent the week with some of my uncles. They brought back lots and lots of catfish. Dad said they were going to get a smoker and preserve some of them that way. My uncle Junior does this and Dad said they were awesome.

It's almost time to start preserving fruits and veggies for next winter. We sure have enjoyed all the fruits and veggies that we preserved last winter.

That's all for today. I hope to continue posting more often.