Our Garden Rocks.

I have not had much time to blog lately because we have been so busy trying to keep up on the garden. This first picture is of our cucumbers. That would should be ready to pick today.






This picture is of our lettuce. It is growing faster than we can eat it. So occasionally we cut a bunch off and go help the lady across the street feed her bunnies. She has a couple dozen at least.







Our corn is doing really well. We will have quit a bit of it. Some are almost ready to eat. The kids have had a lot of fun watching the corn. Maybe now I will be able to get them to eat it. Tay is about the only one who loves corn. But she eats just about everything.






We have been able to harvest quit a lot of peas. Mostly we have Daisy go out and pick them. Then she will come in and the kids all shell them. The peas are pretty much done for now... in the fall when it starts cooling down again we will hopefully get some more.








So we way over planted on potatoes. But we did not think that they would all come up because there has not been anything planted for so long. Much to our surprise they all came up. so we are going to have lots of potatoes to share with our friends and family.




This picture is of our 2 rows of green beans. They are starting to get flowers on so it should not be to much longer before we have some to eat and can. Which is exciting, I love fresh green beans.









We didn't plant many onions. We mostly wanted them for seasoning. Willie and I are not big onion people.










This picture is of our beats. We have not eaten many beat greens this year ourselves but the bunnies across the street love them. The beats seem to be doing well and are getting pretty big. Marybeth and of course Taylor are our beat girls.








We have 3 squash plants. One crook neck, a zucchini and a yellow squash plant. The crook and zucchini are doing really good. They yellow squash not so good. We have been enjoying fried squash a lot and this past weekend Willie made some zucchini bread. Which was very yummy.




So even with the never ending story of weeding, we have been having a lot of fun with the garden. We are very proud of it as well. When we started this adventure we didn't know a whole lot. This is our first garden on our own. The kids really seem to enjoy helping us pick the veggies. Thought I would share our successful garden.
Oh yea, we got our grass planted and it is coming in great. It has a lot of weeds right now but we will get rid of those slowly. When I took this picture I thought of a story I used to read as a kid about the little house on a hill and how the city was built around it and it got ran down then some one moved it back to the country. The little house in that book looked just this one.

More Highlights of this years reunion.

We had a lot of fun at the reunion this past weekend. Saturday morning Willie and his Dad made breakfast for everyone that wanted to come up to the park. Then around 2 we had dinner. The first picture is the coolers that Leo helped us make, home made Root beer. It was great to see what happened after the dry ice got put it.

This is a picture of Daisy and a cousin playing in the grass waiting for dinner to start. They where inseparable the entire day. It was fun to watch all my kids and how they entertained themselves at the park. This year Daisy spent a lot of time just sitting in the shade talking about things with this cousin. Where the other 3 hardly sat still again. Also family gatherings are getting a lot funner for me because I don't have to constantly take care of a small child. The kids are to the point of being able to go play and just needing Willie and I every once in a while. So I actually get to have adult conversations. It is weird. :o)
This picture is of Uncle Ron cutting up one of the roasts that was cooked for the dinner. We had 51 pounds of roast and 50 pounds of chicken. Most of it got ate. There was a turn out of around 125 people. This years reunion was relaxing and fun.


This is a picture of Willie conducting some family business. Giving updates on some family members who where unable to attend. Asking for any suggestions for next years reunion. That sort of thing. Willie did a great job.

I can't remember this family members name but she gave a short history on Willie's Great Grandpa. It was very interesting to hear. She even has some clothing worn by early family members. I love hearing about the history of the family.
Every year we have a raffle, of things that are donated. Uncle Ron had the kids help pick the tickets out of the lunch bags for the winner of each thing. The kids really liked doing that. Each one of my kids got lucky this year and won a little something and I also got lucky and got a copy of a drawling done of Willie's Grandma Snow. She was a very sweet lady who was always very welcoming. I loved her the minute I meet her and miss her greatly.

This is a picture of the siblings that where able to make it this year. In the back is Willie's Dad, then Uncle Ron, Aunt Mira, Aunt Ester, and Aunt Carol. There was 2 more living siblings missing. But it was really fun being with these 5.

It was a fun but tiring weekend. Sunday after we said good bye to those who live else where Willie and I got a few things done around the house but we basically crashed.

The start of reunion.

Last night we kicked off the Snow Family Reunion. Willie is the president this year. So we where the first to arrive and the last to go home. Before people started to arrive at the park we decided to play with our camera. We set the timer and we got a family picture. I think it came out really cute. We had perfect timing too because just after we where done people started to arrive.
There is a really nice play ground at the park. The kids had a blast playing on it. They all made friends fast with different cousins.



We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Which was kind of hot but it was fun. The kids got their first roasted hot dogs.
There was lots of pictures taken. This is our Aunt Carol waiting for someone to let their guard down. Little did she know I was taking her picture. I love the 18x zoom on my camera. I like to be sneaky about taking pictures because I really like shots that are not posed on events like this. Also with the new camera the flash is not always on so it is another way that I can take pictures with out people knowing that I am. While we where up camping on the 4th of July weekend I was able to set the camera on my lap like it was just sitting there and take about 6 pictures of the people around me without being caught. I tell Willie almost everyday how much I love our new camera... who we kidding it is my new camera that he gets to use every once in awhile. :o)

Old and young seemed to have fun yesterday at the park. The older folks had fun watching the kids play and chatting. Willie's Dad got to come this year and it has been a long time since he has been able to. So that is exciting for us.

All in all it was a fun evening. But I now need to go get the kids up for another day of fun filled activities at the park.

Our latest Veggi from the garden.

This is the last Hook Rug Kit Daisy did. It was her first one so we started with a simple 3 colors. She is doing a puppy one right now that has a few more colors. She is doing well with it so far.



These are our first 2 cucumbers. (Willie thinks I am a geek for taking a picture by the way, but what can I say any chance to use my new camera!) So tonight we had one for dinner. The kids where way excited, because they all like cucumbers. Well John had to be reminded of that but he enjoyed them too. It is so neat that we are able to eat stuff that we grew ourselves. We are really enjoying it.

What is up with us.

The above picture is from my Grandma Erickson's garden. She always has pretty flowers. We just got back from Ogden last night. We drove out there on Friday night so Saturday we could do some shopping at Cosco for the Snow Family Reunion. Cosco is cheaper for things like forks and plates and cups. We had planed to come back on Saturday afternoon but we had so much fun hanging out with Tracy and her family that we decided to leave Sunday afternoon instead. I went to the craft store and got some supplies for cross stitching I have a new book I wanted to do some of the cross stitches out of. Daisy also wanted a new Hook Rug kit. She is working on a dog this time. Need to take a picture of the last one she did. Saturday night we also were able to go out with Tracy and Kirk for a double date. Our niece watched the kids for us. That was a lot of fun.

So this weekend is the family reunion. Then before school starts again we are going to go back to Ogden to get school outfits for the girls. John we will be able to find here because he wants all western wear. But last year we had a heck of a time finding Daisy's size jeans. I think Willie is going to take a long weekend so that he can come with us too. He has a couple days of pay vacation left.

Our garden is doing great. We will probably have cucumbers for part of dinner tonight. We had fried squash last night. Willie was a little bummed because our squash is not ready yet but his Uncle had plenty to share. Our peas are almost ready to pick and the corn is doing great as well. Last night the kitten we kept and the kitten we gave to a man whose back yard touches ours where playing in the garden together. That was cute to watch. Oh and the kitten came right up to Willie and I and gave us some love and played with me too.

Well I best be off. Need to do laundry and other chores. Have a good day!

What up in my world.

On the 4th of July weekend we went camping for a family reunion. The house above is the house that my Mother-in-law grew up in. My Mom always took me as a kid to different historical sights and buildings. I loved seeing how people lived in the early 1900's. Norma's father bought this house and land in 1945. It was so much fun hearing about the history of this place and family. I got quit a few pictures of the different places.
This was a deer that was like a few feet away. We saw lots of critters and they came rather close to us. We saw lots of deer, horses, cows (still a working ranch), chipmunks, wild turkeys, and lots more. The kids loved seeing the wild life so close.
What is a camping trip without roasting some marshmallows? We did some karaoke, and made some Smores. There was about 21 family members there, that includes us. So it was a lot of fun.
We went hiking as well. The kids had a lot of fun. I had a new camera that I got to play with so I took lots of pictures. Got some really neat ones.

I have not blogged for awhile so I figured I would write what else is up. The litter of kittens we have right now is growing fast. They are about 4 weeks old now. I have been trying to play with them enough that they are people kitties but not enough to get attached. The last 2 litters where really hard to give away. But they have all settled in to their new homes well and the owners love them to death. All 8 where really friendly cats and loved to be played with and cuddled. One family took 2 and they said they have to keep getting them back from the people next to them because they keep trying to keep the cats. We actually kept one after all as well.

Our garden has taken off. We are really surprised at how well it is doing because of the soil we had to work with. Willie was standing in the middle of the corn the other day and it went up to his waist. All our potatoes came up and are doing well. The spinach and lettuce is growing fast than we can eat it. We have frozen a lot of the spinach, and have given some to the lady who lives next door. She has a lot of bunnies that love it. Our Strawberries did not produce much this year but they look like they will be doing really good next year. We have some grass in the front now, but we are going to have to seed it again to thicken it up.

Oh the coolest thing happened this week. About a year ago I forgot to grab my purse out of a cart, probably at Walmart. I was so mad at myself because it had a 100 dollars for a bill that was due, credit cards, mine and the kids social security cards, my inhaler, not to mention I loved the purse and wallet that was in it. Well Monday the police department called my mother-in-law and asked if I was there or if she knew how to get a hold of me. She told them that I didn't live there any more and asked what it was about. They told her that they had my purse. Well when she called me I said you are kidding right... it has been a year! Well I went down to the police department and sure enough they had my purse! They said they have had it for a while but didn't know how to get a hold of me. I still had my Arizona drivers licence in there. Any way everything was still in the purse! It has made my week. There are still honest people in this world.

We are also getting ready for the Snow Family Reunion in about a week in a half. Willie is the president of the planning committee. The closer it gets the more stressed he is getting. Willie likes to try and make everyone happy. He does not really know how to let it roll of his back on things like this when their are unhappy people. I told him that not everyone will be happy with how things are done. He will be glade when it is over, we might have to take another mini vacation just to get him relaxed again.

Well I think that is all for now.