This shows some of the beauty of death valley.
We will be back in a couple of weeks with lots of new photos!
Gratitude #83 - Sweet Biddies!
11 years ago
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
away -- yet again!
This shows some of the beauty of death valley.
We will be back in a couple of weeks with lots of new photos!
another trip!
We actually begin thinking of this months ago.
Several years ago David and I drove to Death Valley for a few days. It is too long a drive to do in one day, and we did not have too much time. David had one of those real steady job things in those days (we are both retired now).
Still it was good to be warm and to soak up some sun. But we only could stay two or three days then we had to scurry back home.
So this year we started talking about doing it again. The big difference is that we would make it close to a two week trip. Details rolled and boiled. Then it came together.
David would take his Jeep, and we would hook our teardrop. It would just be the three of us. David, Dave and Miriam (I am the Dave of the group)
Last night David arrived, driving from near the Oregon coast over a very lonely, very boring road. How soon could I be ready?
We will leave today. So yesterday I went shopping and MIriam made a few dozen more of her chocolate chip cookies. Those cookies will be the only “desert” for a while.
Juan will keep my newly started vegetable plants watered. When we return there will be more work to do.
I look forward to temps in the 90’s, to wearing shorts, to perspiring a bit now and again.
We don’t have Leo for a few weeks, so that makes the trip a lot easier. But being away from phone and internet and stores means we have to take a LOT of stuff.
I bought some food, mostly canned. I filled pint wide mouth jars (the bands rattle against each other and not the glass in the galley) with staples of all kinds and now we are almost ready to go.
Of course today is a messy rainy day. The wind is blowing and I need to get the bed made in the tear. Imagine making a bed while you were kneeling in the middle of it!
We will be back in a couple of weeks.
Several years ago David and I drove to Death Valley for a few days. It is too long a drive to do in one day, and we did not have too much time. David had one of those real steady job things in those days (we are both retired now).
Still it was good to be warm and to soak up some sun. But we only could stay two or three days then we had to scurry back home.
So this year we started talking about doing it again. The big difference is that we would make it close to a two week trip. Details rolled and boiled. Then it came together.
David would take his Jeep, and we would hook our teardrop. It would just be the three of us. David, Dave and Miriam (I am the Dave of the group)
Last night David arrived, driving from near the Oregon coast over a very lonely, very boring road. How soon could I be ready?
We will leave today. So yesterday I went shopping and MIriam made a few dozen more of her chocolate chip cookies. Those cookies will be the only “desert” for a while.
Juan will keep my newly started vegetable plants watered. When we return there will be more work to do.
I look forward to temps in the 90’s, to wearing shorts, to perspiring a bit now and again.
We don’t have Leo for a few weeks, so that makes the trip a lot easier. But being away from phone and internet and stores means we have to take a LOT of stuff.
I bought some food, mostly canned. I filled pint wide mouth jars (the bands rattle against each other and not the glass in the galley) with staples of all kinds and now we are almost ready to go.
Of course today is a messy rainy day. The wind is blowing and I need to get the bed made in the tear. Imagine making a bed while you were kneeling in the middle of it!
We will be back in a couple of weeks.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
bri
Since lora works long night hours half of the week, she has trained her two daughters to be extra ordinary cooks and helpers. The boys do their part too!
Brianna is handy in the kitchen.
Last year she made a birthday cake for her moms birthday. Baking cake is easy to smell, so Bri baked bread at the same time, to camouflage the banking cake! Clever child.
This time she made a really nice scratch carrot cake that was superb.
I am extremely proud of her.
our "notebook"
Remember the Movie “The Notebook?”
In the movie the couple had some how anticipated the trials of Alzheimer's and had prepared a book of stories to be shared later.
My daughters have been thinking and working (and stealing -- more on that one). This weekend Miriam was given an 8 ½ by 11 book with a hundred pages of pictures. Our whole life is in those pictures. My parents and grandparents. Miriam’s parents, her as a child, us together. A whole page devoted to each of our daughters just the little school type pictures (except that I took most of them).
Major events were remembered, and at the end there was a picture of the two of us that I had never seen before.
A year or so ago, Lora and Bri came to visit (daughter 2 and her older daughter). We went for a walk at the Birds of Prey Refuge along the snake river, and as we were walking Lora pointed her camera back and us and snap.
The picture is ok of me, my head is down a bit, but is near perfect of Miriam.
I knew a woman a while ago who after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s started to build her a “memory garden.” I never saw it, but I was very impressed by the thought.
Any way, Thank you Lora and Arline and Deanna and Linda (as well as Andrew who was the scanner in chief.)
(For some time when my daughters came to visit they left with unlabeled boxes they had pilfered from their mom’s collection. The boxes were the family pictures that Miriam has guarded. We took them to Texas, so they would be safe. Now the girls have them, and they are being scanning to be put on a DVD and shared with the whole family. This book is the early print version, just for Miriam.)
In the movie the couple had some how anticipated the trials of Alzheimer's and had prepared a book of stories to be shared later.
My daughters have been thinking and working (and stealing -- more on that one). This weekend Miriam was given an 8 ½ by 11 book with a hundred pages of pictures. Our whole life is in those pictures. My parents and grandparents. Miriam’s parents, her as a child, us together. A whole page devoted to each of our daughters just the little school type pictures (except that I took most of them).
Major events were remembered, and at the end there was a picture of the two of us that I had never seen before.
A year or so ago, Lora and Bri came to visit (daughter 2 and her older daughter). We went for a walk at the Birds of Prey Refuge along the snake river, and as we were walking Lora pointed her camera back and us and snap.
The picture is ok of me, my head is down a bit, but is near perfect of Miriam.
I knew a woman a while ago who after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s started to build her a “memory garden.” I never saw it, but I was very impressed by the thought.
Any way, Thank you Lora and Arline and Deanna and Linda (as well as Andrew who was the scanner in chief.)
(For some time when my daughters came to visit they left with unlabeled boxes they had pilfered from their mom’s collection. The boxes were the family pictures that Miriam has guarded. We took them to Texas, so they would be safe. Now the girls have them, and they are being scanning to be put on a DVD and shared with the whole family. This book is the early print version, just for Miriam.)
Monday, March 30, 2009
sunday morning
This is what we woke to.
Saturday night on the way back over the mountain pass, Sid had to put chains on his mini van. Linda put her Jeep into 4 wheel drive.
Snow this late is not at all unusual in this area, but still it was a surprise.
suprise
Saturday morning I got up about 7, dressed and sat down at the breakfast table to write.
In a while, the two girls got up and began working on breakfast. We ate, I took leo for an extended walk and I laid down to take a nap.
Arline and Deanna were due about 11, they had said (we had motel style phone only, no internet and no cell coverage).\
I heard a knock on my door and I swung my head to see: LINDA. Even with my glasses off, I could see it was her. She was supposed (In my mind at least) to be on the other corner of the state.
So I jumped up and began hugging girls; Linda, Deanna, Jessica, Emily, I hugged Bri and Amy and Miriam again. I hugged the boys: Matt, Ben, Griffy. I hugged my son in law Sid. Then just for good measure I hugged them all again.
Lora had her birthday that week and all of her sisters had descended to wish her a belated happy birthday. We knew 3 would be there, but all 4 was a joy beyond measure.
It was a short, intense time together. They had to get over the pass before too much snow had fallen. So they left before dark. I was there wallowing in the memories of all of these wonderful memories, both present and through the years.
IT has been said that good students make good teachers, and good children make good parents, just as much.
Thank you ladies and gentleman, girls and boys!
In a while, the two girls got up and began working on breakfast. We ate, I took leo for an extended walk and I laid down to take a nap.
Arline and Deanna were due about 11, they had said (we had motel style phone only, no internet and no cell coverage).\
I heard a knock on my door and I swung my head to see: LINDA. Even with my glasses off, I could see it was her. She was supposed (In my mind at least) to be on the other corner of the state.
So I jumped up and began hugging girls; Linda, Deanna, Jessica, Emily, I hugged Bri and Amy and Miriam again. I hugged the boys: Matt, Ben, Griffy. I hugged my son in law Sid. Then just for good measure I hugged them all again.
Lora had her birthday that week and all of her sisters had descended to wish her a belated happy birthday. We knew 3 would be there, but all 4 was a joy beyond measure.
It was a short, intense time together. They had to get over the pass before too much snow had fallen. So they left before dark. I was there wallowing in the memories of all of these wonderful memories, both present and through the years.
IT has been said that good students make good teachers, and good children make good parents, just as much.
Thank you ladies and gentleman, girls and boys!
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