Sunday, August 30, 2015

Sunday Morning coffee

Last week is just a blur, it went by so fast.

Baseball practices and baseball games.
One win and one loss this weekend.
Caden bunted for the first time.
He got out, but it allowed one runner in.
Baseball involves a lot more strategy than you would ever think. 



Caden running back to the dugout.


A boy on his team was up to bat and got hit in the elbow by the ball.
His folks took him right to the ER.
Haven't heard what the damage was officially, but at the time they thought he had a broken elbow.
Dang right?



I've been going to take pictures of these apple trees, that are only a few miles from our house, for the last month and finally did it yesterday.

I don't remember any storm that we've had this summer with the power to lay these two trees over like that.
Pretty incredible.


They are both still alive and have some delicious apple on them.


We got Colton all moved back to college as well.
I was picturing his apartment to be something out of Animal House, but it wasn't at all - thankfully. His two roommates seem quite nice too.

That's all I've got for the day.
Have a good one!




Sunday, August 23, 2015

Sunday morning coffee

As warm as it was yesterday - 80*,  it's feeling down right chilly this morning at only 55* and windy.
Definitely a hint of things to come. 

We never discovered the source of our skunk stench, but I tell you the smell has lingered all weekend long. 

Baseball updates. 

The boys' first game on Friday evening started out with my heart in my throat as Caden was the first one up to bat. I was down at the other end of the field taking pictures and the Hubby was right behind home plate. He said you could see Caden's foot shaking from nerves. Unfortunately he struck out, but really came back and hit well his other five times up to bat with multiple runners batted in. 


His team ended up winning 13 to 2!
A good start to this fall league.
Sliding into home!


Video of him batting.


Next day was a whole different ball game tho.
The boys were in the outfield first and the pitcher they had up walked six boys before the coach called a team timeout on the mound. Where he told Caden he was going to pitch. 
AGAIN my heart went to my throat. 
Caden pitched once this last season for the school team and did well, but that was only 45 feet and in this league it is a whopping 70 feet. Huge difference right? Plus pitching downhill from the mound and there is actually a referee standing behind by the mound to make sure you are pitching correctly. 
So...
Caden finished pitching that first inning. 
He allowed two more runs, but managed to hold the other team with no more runs allowed in the second and third innings that he pitched. 
The kid did excellent!
I was super proud of him!
I didn't get many pictures because I figured seeing your mom up against the fence when you were pitching for the first time would be way too distracting. 
You can see him up on the mound here though and the ref off to the left of him.


It was incredibly windy too.
The boys would hit the ball and I swear the wind held it aloft forever!
Which of course allowed for any pop up balls to be easily caught. 

The team rallied and managed to come back within striking distance of winning in the last inning.
Picture it:
The score is 8 to 6 with two outs. Two runners on base and Caden comes up to bat.
.....
.....
.....
This story could only end one of two ways:
Caden gets a monster home run and they win 9 to 8 OR Caden gets a solid base hit which is easily tossed to second base getting that runner out. 

Unfortunately it was the second option. 
So they lost 8 to 6.
But damn it was a good game!


In other news Colton got a job in River Falls and we'll be moving him there to his apartment towards the end of this week. 


I am still working on getting my tomatoes done. 
Last batch of salsa this morning.

later :)



Friday, August 21, 2015

Smells like......

 SKUNK!
YUCK!

Laying in bed this morning I was awakened by that unmistakable stench of skunk.
The house seems to be permeated with the smell.
It was quite cool yesterday and those cool temps made for good sleeping weather so I left a few windows open. Big mistake apparently.
All the windows are open now and fans are running to assist in blowing this fowl air out. Either this method is not working to remove the smell or my sinus/nasal passages are imprinted with the stench as I can still smell it quite strongly. A walk around the place revealed no carcass which would explain the continued poisoning of my air.
Man it's just freaking awful!
ish! gag! shudder! repeat!!

We've had a busy week filled with all kinds of fun:

Caden in the batting cage during practice.
First game for his team is tonight.
I'm excited!


Colton and his buddies hung out and did some shooting.
It's always fun to have the big boys over and hear how their lives are taking shape since they got out of high school. 


Chyann did some horse riding. 
Jennifer was a complete ass so Chyann didn't have much fun.
I think Jennifer is one of those horses that has to be worked more frequently to maintain her brains.
Whereas Gypsy and Scotch are the kind of horses that you could ride once every six months and still have a decent ride. 


Senior meetings, schedule planning and school shopping is done. Now the count down is on for the first day. 

We had several inches of chilly cool rain earlier in the week which split a good majority of my tomatoes. I've been canning them up all week and hopefully will get the last of it done today before the game, so I'd better get busy.

Have a good weekend :)

Friday, August 14, 2015

TGIF



YAY for Friday!

I got 10 pints of salsa done yesterday - five Chyna sweet and five medium. For the medium I added cumin and boy did that make the flavor pop! Even my eager salsa tasters liked the new taste so I'll be trying that again.

In addition to the salsa I did three quarts of baby kosher dills. This is the first year that I've tried this recipe for canning whole pickles. I hope they are good.
Pretty tough getting the cukes when they are small 2-3 inches. They grow so fast that if you don't check the plants everyday all you'll find when you look are monster cukes three inches around and seven inches long. Not at all what you are looking for in a good pickle so I turn those babies into pickle relish.

Today is Colton's last day of work. He'll have a week or so of cleaning packing up his room to move back to college. He is planning on living in an apartment instead of the dorms this year and THAT my friends includes signing an actual lease for twelve months. You realize that means this is probably the last time he'll "live at home". I suppose it had to happen sometime. sigh...

We never made it to 90* yesterday - too much cloud cover, but we might do it today. It's already mid 70's with beautiful blue skies and not even 9a yet. I foresee lots of time in the pool this weekend.

Have a good one :)

 








Thursday, August 13, 2015

This and That...

The day I have been waiting for all gardening season has finally arrived: I have enough tomatoes for a batch of salsa!
WHOOOWee!
Those beauties will make some awesome deliciousness! 


Caden started practices with the fall baseball league on Sunday.
There ended up being enough kids for 9 different teams.
The kids are in grades 7 and 8 so aged between 12 and 14. The size difference between 12 and 14 years old is astonishing in some cases. A few giants and a few small fry on each team with the bulk of the kids somewhere in the middle of those extremes.

Two of the boys on his team he played against while on the Wheeler team (the Wheeler team won).

This league plays on a HUGE field. The distance from home plate to first base is a pronominal 90 freaking feet! Last season the biggest distance from home to first was 75 feet. Those extra 15 feet make for a LONG sprint. The coach timed the boys and Caden hit first base in a super fast 4.6 seconds!
Now that is some serious boogieing!   

Caden is going to learn a lot on this fall team. 

The other night we were driving to practice, it was a nice afternoon and we had the windows down.
I'm sitting there gawking around at the beautiful trees and flowers when a bee flew in the window and stings me on the top of my thigh!
OUCHY!
Damn that hurt!
After the first few minutes it didn't bother me much,but now days later it's crazy itchy.

Well I'm off to start the salsa before it gets too hot out.
Might get up to 90* for the first time today and course it's humid has hell.

Dodger says to be like him and stay cool!


Later :)

Sunday, August 9, 2015

Sunday Morning reminicing


Did you know we haven't hit 90* at all this summer?
We've had a few days that were forecast to be that hot, but never quite made it.
There have been several days of seriously nasty humidity that made it feel a whole lot hotter than 90* though.
We've had enough consistent rain that I haven't had to water my garden once, which has been really nice.
All the trees we planted at the end of April are doing pretty well too.
At last count we'll have to replant about 11. Which considering we planted 70 trees that were barely bigger than a pencil is not bad.


A few pictures from this week.
The patch of tiger lily's are blooming and look gorgeous.  


Dodger wants to play ball with Caden and his friends.
He will pick an apple from one of the trees, bring it to the side of the pool and drop it in. Then he will wait and wait for the boys to throw it out. Silly dog.



I read today that my old school in Cold Bay has closed.
Hard to believe that there are really so few people with children living in that town.
In my minds eye it was always a bustling little metropolis, but I guess in reality it never was. Just my kid perception on the place where I grew up and couldn't wait to see the last of.
Like most kids I was in a hurry to grow up and get gone.
Of course looking back I kick myself in the ass for not slowing down and enjoying childhood/life in the unique place that it was.
Check out the below article about the school closing and the town. Very good article that illustrates what life is like on the Alaskan Aleutian chain. 


The boy featured in the article is actually the son of a boy I went to school with. His family has been there the longest of any I think.

Did you see those orange lockers? 
I member thinking they were so cool. I scratched my name in mine on the inside. I wonder if it's still there? I bet it is as most of the chairs, tables and other furniture I recognize from back in the day.

When we first moved there the school didn't have a gym so for PE we'd push all the desks to one side of the room to do our activity in the center. 
On my very first day Mr Scheidler had us all do sit ups and other exercises. For some reason I remember doing 110! I could hardly walk for days afterwards my gut was so sore! But hey being the new kid I had to do the most. I think there was 10 of us kids from sixth through 12th grade at that time. Which was considered a lot. In fact my graduating class was one of the biggest in school history - there were 5 of us who graduated in 1989.
The teachers we had during my time there were amazing. They made learning fun and we all had individual attention to ensure we learned what was expected. 
Where else could you ride your three wheeler to and from school?

Anyhow.
Have a good week :)





Wednesday, August 5, 2015

Monday, August 3, 2015

First batches

A few of my sunflowers are open and looking gorgeous!


Yesterday afternoon and today after work I got my first batches of sweet and spicy pickles, spicy dilly beans and brussel sprouts canned up.
It was about the last thing I felt like doing, but damned if I was going to let them go to waste so I got it done.



Cooler than average temps this week feel like September instead of the dog days of summer.
I'd rather be sweating than cool this time of year; winter will be here soon enough.

Speaking of winter, have you noticed the shorter days yet?
ish right.

Tonight the Hubby decided to do Scotch's hooves while we had a few free minutes. So I'm holding him leaning up against the hitching post gawking around when I see the funniest sight ever. 
Picture it (cuz I didn't have any cameras handy): Dozer who had went to bed with Colton totally tangled up in Colton's bedroom blinds! He had all his paws in different slats and his head through another slat! Barking and whining to come outside with us.
Colton had left his room for a moment and had no idea the surprise he'd come back to lol
I figured our luck he'd fall through the screen which he was straining against, but nope it held. 
Only good screen in the house apparently.
How do those damn things get holes in them?
I don't have little kids poking fingers through to explore anymore so it is definitely a mystery.
Every summer I end up replacing about half the screens in the house. 
I'm practically an expert now.

later alligator

Sunday, August 2, 2015

Lake fun

We spent yesterday with friends at a lake North of here.
It was great change of pace for a Saturday.
The weather was perfect and the water was warm.

Our friends graciously accepted the challenge of teaching Caden to water ski.
We got in the water to help him get the skis on and assist him getting up.


A few key things to know when learning how to water ski:
1 - knees together
2 - let the boat pull you up
3 - let go of the rope if you fall
4 - let go of the rope if you get scared
5 - repeat the above steps until you figure it out

and he did repeat the steps for almost an hour.


He was up for about 10 seconds on this third attempt!


However most of his attempts looked like a big splash lol


BUT my boy did get it figured out!
Look at him go!


Afterwards he was completely worn out, but totally hooked on water skiing and already asking when are we going again.


I almost tried it too, but decided it would be a bad move with my sore shoulder. 
Next time.


I've got tomato's, green beans and cucumbers ready from the garden.
They are amazing!
I am going to do up some pickles and green beans today.
YUM!

later :)








Saturday, August 1, 2015

Saturday AM coffee

 Did you get out last night and see the Blue Moon?
It was incredibly bright.


Then this morning a gorgeous sunrise. 
The light pole in the yard looks quite odd all covered in grape vines.
Almost like a character from a Dr Seuss book.

No idea what I was doing up so early this morning since it felt like I hardly slept last night.
There was no sweet spot to be found for rest as the long forgotten injury of bursitis in my left shoulder has flared up for no damn good reason and talked to me allll night long.


Can you believe it is August already?
The school sent out a newsletter yesterday filled with important events for this coming school year - which starts on September 1st. 
It's official GRADUATION DAY is Friday May 20th at 715pm sharp!

We are already talking grad party plans.
Chyann is thinking walking tacos for the main food and then your usual sweets like cake and cookies.
Sounds pretty easy, but we'll see if it changes between now and then.

My to do list of shit to get done before her graduation has grown instead of getting smaller.
How does that work?
I can picture it now: we do everything in the two weeks before May 20th.
Cuz that's about how we roll.


Happy Saturday to you!
 It's going to be gorgeous here today and we've got to savor these days while they last.
later