Do bears sh-t in the woods?

This morning when Kurt went outside- he noticed that some time during the night or early morning a bear had done his business-- IN OUR FRONT YARD!

Guess I won't be going outside much after dark!!

We have been canning

Not to be outdone by our Denver daughters :) Here is our recent canning output:

6 jars of dill pickles on the top shelf. 3 pints of tomatillo salsa on the bottom left. 7 qts. of peaches, 2 pints of sweet pickle relish and 6 pints of mandarin sweet and sour sauce on the right. So fun!!
Update 9/4/09- We canned 6 more quarts of Peaches on Wednesday night. Then made 13 pints of Peach Chutney with the left over peaches on Thursday night. Then 7 pts of tomato salsa on Friday afternoon! Hope to do a small batch of spicy green beans this weekend (you know- perfect swizzle sticks for Bloody Marys!)

Reunion, birthday, anniversary Celebration

Much of the Matter Nation gathered on Aug first - a combination reunion and celebration of Maureen's 65th birthday as well as Susan's 50th and Jim and Susans 25th wedding anniversary.
Maureen seemed to be having a good time...

The "entertainment" for the day was watching Anthony, Matthew and Evan cavort around the yard. The wading pool was a great hit.....

As for the adults, we sat around and chatted....Jim, Tim and Bob

Jerry and Molly

Aunt Dolly and Margaret..

Kurt...

Susan, Jim and Grady....

Elizabeth and Kateri spent much time getting ready for the party and helping out....

Garden Tragedy!

Our garden has been spectacular this year. Everything has been growing like crazy- here is our corn patch in the middle of July- the corn stalks are half way up the water stand pipe- which you can see to the middle left in this picture.


Fast forward to August- We have been eating peas, beans, kale, salad greens, strawberries, raspberries, herbs and we have zucchini coming out our ears!
Here is our garden gate.....

Here is our over zealous squash and pumpkin area...

and here is just one tomatillo plant- it has hundreds of blossoms and stands about 5 feet tall....

Pole beans, calendula, basil and salad greens in this shot....
and here is the corn patch. The late variety of corn reached over 8 feet tall by this weekend- you can just see our white water stand pipe to the middle left in this picture- it is 6 feet tall and the corn towers over it....

here is another more close up of the corn

But this weekend tragedy struck.....half our corn patch was knocked over......

we think the stalks were actually pushed over by our irrigation spigot.... most of the stalks are broken and likely won't set ears. VERY SAD for us as corn is our favorite fresh-out-of-the-garden treat. :(

Parting shots from Chile

Here are a series of pictures from our travels in Chile.
The Spectacular view from the apartment...

A beautiful tree speciman in a Santiago city park...

A major pedestrian street near the center of Santiago-teeming with humanity it seemed to us...

A quaint side street in an older part of the city

Many buildings have massive wooden doors - this is just one example

We spent a weekend in the Elqui Valley-a prime vegetable and grape growing area about 500 km north of Santiago. We stayed in the town of Pisco Elqui at a hotel on a one lane road. We were amazed to see this truck negotiate the lane outside our hotel....

Leaving the valley we took a 60km dirt road over the Andes-quite a scenic trip...

Some folks live along this desolate road- and use solar energy...

A blooming cactus along the road...

Something you see A LOT of....stray dogs....they are everywhere and will walk along side you for several blocks to see if you have any treats for them....

A shot of the fertile Elqui Valley (it is winter here)

more cactus

A poinsettia tree!!!

The sun setting on the Andes above Elqui Valley

MACHU PICCHU!!!

The pictures tell the story! What an unbelieveable experience!

Here is our first view of the site in the morning

We climbed up Waynapicchu, which is the mountain the the background in the above picture.

From Waynapicche you look back at the whole site....spectacular!

Another city hike

Today we took a bus and the subway to get into the heart of downtown Santiago. We got to see the skyscrapers from the ground-looking up...

Then we went to the top of the Cerro San Cristobal for the view looking down.....

Thankfully there is a funicular to get you to the top. Here we are waiting for the car to get moving

and the view part way up

Here is the statue of the Virgin that can be seen from all over the city

We ended up walking all the way down the mountain following the car road. There were several overlooks to enjoy on hte way down....

Sights around Santiago

The Andes came out on Tuesday. They really seem almost close enough to touch from Santiago.

Some of the local flora..... the lighter pink flowers are a kind of geranium and grow like weeds everywhere. The taller red one is a form of red hot poker plant

Catharine took us to this artisans village, Los Dominicos, for some shopping. Inside the walls are many quaint stalls selling good quality handicrafts.

On Monday we took the bus tour of Santiago.
This is the main river, the Marupucho, that runs through Santiago

We got off the bus in several of the nieghborhoods. This was Bellevista, a prime location for night life and to purchase lapislazuli items (which we did)-

This was one of the stops, Santa Lucia hill in the middle of the city. It is a city park. There is a massive entrance portico, it is all landscaped and has steps leading up to an overlook.