Merry Christmas to All

We are enjoying 8 wonderful days in Denver visiting Amy and Tim, Lisa and Betty and of course our sweet grands, Mark and Lilly. It is going to be a white Christmas here. We hope it is a joyous day for everyone....
Here are some pictures....
Lilly is quite expressive and she has mastered rolling over since we arrived- she is so fun to watch....

We now have three food traditions to accomplish during Christmas-First is making Great Grandmother Matter's tie-knot cinnamon rolls. Here is Mark gettng to punch down the dough...

and the assembly line......

and the final product

we also made tamales....

and decorated sugar cookies

here are Mark and Lilly in their matching Christmas morning sleepers...

Lisa's present from Betty was a tool box....

On Christmas afternoon Grandma and Tim took Mark sledding. He loved the ride down the hill...

and - he walked back up the hill on his own two feet while holding grandma's hand....

First snow in Kettle Falls

Longview Visit

We were in Longview in early December to the induction of Kurt's high school football team into the local sports Hall of Fame. Here are some scenes from our visit.

We always try to visit Kurt's Aunt Dolly when we go to Longview- she will be 90 next year and she is doing great....

Then we made a drive-by of Kurt's childhood home...

At the induction ceremony we met Kurt's junior high basketball coach....

We also visited with several dozen of the team mates- but the only picture taken by us was Kurt and Steve Vogel. These two 6'7"er's made up the two ends of their football team that went undefeated for a season and a half.

Thanksgiving weekend

We have had a wonderful, relaxing weekend. Started off by this visit from our local turkey flock. Fortunetly for them, they don't taste very good- so they were in no danger of becoming dinner...

We were 7 for thanksgiving dinner- but no pictures were taken. Here is Mary, one of our dinner guests, and Joanie out by our bonfire prior to dinner.

On Friday we continued throwing anything that would burn onto our bonfire. It was a beautiful day to be working outside

On Saturday we drove up to Sherman Pass- elevation 5575'- where we found a foot of snow to test out our new snow shoes. Here is Kurt

and here is Joanie. We loved snowshoeing- it was easy to do, great exercise and great scenery.

Real light fixtures!

In the entire history of this room- which is 34 years as of this week- the light fixtures have never been more than a porcelan base and a bare light bulb. But now look- Three real light fixtures. Isn't Kurt clever!

And speaking of Kurt, here he is taking a well deserved (and needed) rest infront of the new-for-us satallite tv. Livin' the dream!

Like Mother, Like Daughter

We have been wondering who Lilly looks like. Well, we think she looks like her mom-- look at their sweet cheeks! Here is Lilly

Here are a couple of shots of Amy at 1 week old

And isn't this the cutest thing---Lilly in her cat costume for Halloween

And, here is Amy dressed up as a cat- as a 4 yr old...

Another BIG change!

Kurt had a surprise for me when I arrived home from Denver. He had removed the ceiling above our kitchen. What a change to have a 12 foot high ceiling instead of the barely 6.5 foot ceiling...
Here is the kitchen with the old ceiling still in place and before our remodeling efforts of this spring....

Here is the kitchen before the new floor but with the new window (on the left) in place.....

Here is the kitchen today.... new floor (which Kurt did in May) and the raised ceiling and new beam overhead.

Taking out the lowered ceiling exposed the original ceiling boards-- and some of the old blue wall paper.

I really like the look of the boards in the ceiling- but there is no insulation above them so they will have to be covered when we put up insulation.

OUR TURN to visit the Grandkids

It has always been our plan to wait several weeks after Lilly was born to make our first trip to Denver. Then she was born a week earlier than we thought and waiting those 4 weeks to meet her was so hard. But finally our time came....and of course we are ecstatic!
Here is my first look at Lilly.....

Here is Kurt making a big lap for Lilly and Mark.

Later it was my time to share my lap- what a beautiful handful!

A big part of our onsite job is to keep Mark entertained so mom and dad can spend time with Lilly and/or get some rest. Mark and I spent an hour one sunny afternoon burying him in his sandbox. (It was fun for both of us--and not too messy since I was right there to brush him off. I imagine his folks won't be so happy about this game the next time Mark tries to recreate it himself!)

Kurt went hiking with Mark and Tim and they found some great climbing rocks....(also notice Mark and grandpa in their matching "grandpa shirts")

All too soon it was time for Kurt to say goodbye to Lilly as he went back to KF before Joanie. Here he is giving her his last big cuddle. Lilly LOVED sleeping on Grandpa's chest. They both are missing each other already!

firewood cutting

Today was a first for Joanie- I cut down a tree with a chain saw! Woo-Woo! It was a good day- I only cut what I was supposed to (like wood only- no flesh!) ... and now my wood is in the wood shed-- along side the tree that Kurt cut today.
Here is a picture of our wood shed, my baby chain saw and my little logs......

Garden update

It is SO much fun having a garden again after 10 years! We are amazed everyday at how well and how MUCH everything has grown from those tiny seeds planted in May and June.
LOOK at this sun flower- it is 10 feet tall!

Here is the middle of the gardern- zucchini in the foreground, flowers in the middle and the pumpkin patch off in the back.

Here is what the tomato patch looked like this morning before I hacked back the growing tips and harvested everything that was red..

These are our pole beans. We put strings up to a wire and the plants have grown up and created a wall of green that is 6 feet high. The beans are just coming on...

This is what remains of our corn patch. We have been cutting down the stalks as we harvest a row. Right now we are in the middle of the patch where all the stalks were knocked down a month ago. This looks pretty bad- but we actually managed to salvage most of the crop and have been eating corn on the cob 3 to 4 nights a week for 3 weeks. Tonight we harvested the bulk of the remaining ears and froze the kernals for winter.

And here is why we can't be too unhappy about the corn-- because the rest of the garden is so beautiful. This is our gate- with morning glory in bloom and climbing across the top of the gate. (Did you know that morning glory only opens its blooms in the morning?)

We have another patch of morning glory on the side of the fence facing the house...

And, of course, the harvest of wonderful vegetables and flowers is the other reason we love having a garden. These were all picked this morning- Cucumbers, tomatoes, a watermelon and a cantalope and several bunches of flowers. (Later in the day I picked a bag of zucchini and dozen peppers of 4 different varieties that went right into salsa. )