Apricot Jam

 

Here is a collage of the kids making Apricot Jam today. We picked the apricots yesterday, but of course I forgot to get pictures then:( Hunter successfully used the knife without wounding anyone! We're hoping to can some apricots tomorrow.

My Bargains!

As some of you know, Mike and I are now HUGE Dave Ramsey fans (thanks, Jodi:) So, in order to save money to help pay off our "debt snowball", I've become an enthusiastic coupon-er! (With lots of help from the Couponmom and Money Saving Mom's blog!) Here are today's deals - of which I am very excited and proud, especially with the limited number of stores around here!

Here are 4 boxes of cereal and 4 1/2 lbs. of strawberries - my price $10.74 - a 53% savings! Katie and I are making jam tomorrow:)

For all of these items I spent $10.67! 10 spiral notebooks, 2 pair of scissors, 1 bottle of glue, 2 boxes of crayons, 1 pack of mechanical pencils, 1 package of Cheerios Snack Mix, 2 lbs. of Planters dry-roasted peanuts, 6 packets of Kool-Aid, 1 bottle of Pert Plus Shampoo, 1 can of organic diced tomatoes, 1 box popsicles, 1 box Kashi cereal, and 2 trial size Gold Bond Healing Lotion! Mike was very impressed, and I was very blessed!
***Not pictured (because it's still in the trunk) is a 34 lb. bag of Purina Dog Chow that I got for $8.99 - normally $21.49! Gooooooooooooo, team!

Happy Independence Day!

 

We've had a fun day! Paonia always has Cherry Days July 3-5th. The 4th of course is the BIG day. We didn't get in all the activities (there are tooooooo many!), but we did go to the parade - which lasted about 45 minutes! The kids raked in about 5 lbs. of candy between them. Of course, I forgot my camera, but it was a great parade with clowns, bands, old tractors and cars, lots of horses, ponies, miniature donkeys, etc. And best of all - lots of candy:) Then, we went to a U-Pick orchard and picked 7 lbs. of Rainier cherries (Mike's personal favorite)! I think we have about 5 lbs. left. This afternoon, the kids and I went to an Ice Cream Social at the old Bowie Schoolhouse Museum. We also got to tour the museum for free, which the kids loved! I don't think we'll catch the fireworks tonight because, although Hunter is basically back to normal and doing wonderfully, he still is requiring some extra sleep. Here's wishing all of you a stupendous 4th of July. We praise the Lord for all of the freedoms that we enjoy!

Hunter and His Surgery Experience

We are home - thank the Lord! Hunter came through his surgery wonderfully, and is already wanting to play football and chase his sister! (And I'm supposed to keep him quiet for 2 weeks! - YIKES!!) Here are a few pictures of Hunter in Pre-op and in his hospital room after the surgery.
Hunter in Pre-Op - He never fussed one time!

Hunter right after he was transferred from recovery to his room in Pediatrics.

Katie and Hunter playing with a Color Magic game that Cheryl and Sister Gerri brought when they visited Hunter. Vicki and Sis. Bee, and Sandi January also came to visit and bring Hunter some presents to cheer him up! We have a wonderful church family!

Hunter and his Daddy

Riding in Style - Getting ready to leave the hospital. Hunter was very anxious to get home. He is doing great. Thank you so much for your prayers!

Beaver Reservoir - ATTENTION WAYNE!

Hey Wayne, this is what your campsite looks like when the lake is full!

Camping Once Again!

 

Sorry that it's been so long in between blog entries. Anyway, we went camping again last night at Beaver Reservoir. We won't be able to camp 4th of July weekend because Hunter is scheduled to have another surgery next Friday - he has to have his palate lengthened, tubes put in his ears, and some minor scar revision. We are NOT looking forward to it. So, we decided to have fun while we could. Here is where we set up camp; the view from camp; the bear scat 10 feet from camp! (Don't look, Mom;); and the pile of "dinosaur" (AKA cow) bones that the kids found near camp. We weren't able to camp by the lake because the road was flooded out.

Campout

 

We went camping Monday and Tuesday at Soap Creek near Blue Mesa. Mike's parents went with us and our buddy, Lance, came up after work for supper and fishing. The fishing was pitiful, but we still had a great time!

Our Trip to the Muddy

Today was a great day! Grandma and Papa Sayler arrived from Missouri this morning, and then this afternoon we took a trip up to the Muddy to hunt for Morell mushrooms and cook hotdogs & marshmallows. We found some new wildflowers for Katie's wildflower book.
Here are some miscellaneous pictures of the kids on our outing. They had so much fun!

We found 105 mushrooms this afternoon. Can't wait to fry some up! YUM!

After being away from "facilities" for several hours, the girls needed to take a potty break. We were rather surprised to go behind a tree and find 3 potties all ready for use! Not exactly modern day, but rather upscale for the woods:)

There were several flocks of sheep along the way. It was very picturesque.

First Wildflowers of Spring

 

Katie and I went for a walk behind the house yesterday and picked the first wildflowers of the season. We're planning on collecting, pressing, and identifying wildflowers for a summer project now that Katie is officially done with the 1st grade.

Kittens - 5 weeks

 

At the Falls

 

This is one of the waterfalls we stopped at on the way home. Don't worry - Mike never let go of Hunter's hand:)

At Bass Pro Shop

We ate deep fried alligator for an appetizer - YUM! The kids and I had shrimp, and Mike had the fried walleye. And of course the kids enjoyed the shooting gallery and the gigantic aquarium!

Springtime in the Rockies!

 

Ya gotta love it!

On the road again...

 

Today, we had to go to Denver so that I could meet with the ear specialist - AGAIN! To make a long, rather boring story short - at this point I do not have to have another surgery (YEAH!). I have to puff a very expensive dry powder into my ear twice a week, and we're hoping to control my chronic middle ear disorder this way. I have to go back in about 6 weeks for a follow-up - so, we'll hope and pray! The kids did great on the trip. We left around 6:30AM and returned at 7:30PM. We were able to take them to the Bass Pro Shop for a little break and a belated Mother's Day lunch before the return trip. We also stopped at a couple of waterfalls on the way home to stretch our legs. Above are some pictures of our day. Of course, I missed the really exciting things - like the buffalo herd, the elk herd, the mule deer herd, the Big horn sheep - SIGH! We drove through snow, rain, sun, and baby hail - but the roads were fine, and we made good time. Thank the Lord for a good day and a good report!

Mama, I'm in loooove!

 

That was Hunter's very adorable comment when I brought all the kittens down from the roof to play with him. As you can see, the feeling is mutual!

Happy Belated Mother's Day!

To my wonderful Mother and Mother-in-law! I was sick this weekend and didn't even think about posting this until today - sorry Moms! Thank you Mom Sayler for helping to raise Michael to be godly man he is today. Thank you for all your time, effort, love, and prayers. I am so blessed - as my friends often remind me - to have such a man as this. And to my own Mommy - there is no one else who knows me as well as you do. You can tell just by hearing my voice if I'm happy, sad, stressed, or even not drinking enough water:) I had to put this picture on of you exploring with some of your grandkids - you are the best! I love you and hope that when my own children are grown, they will love and respect me as much as I do you, Mom. Thanks for your great example, and for passing on your zany sense of humor. It sure comes in handy!

If It Had Not Been For the Lord on Our Side...

I can tell you exactly where we'd be. My wonderful husband would have been a widower and fatherless when he got home from work this morning. God is good all the time! It was only about 20 minutes after Mike had gone to work last night. Katie and Hunter were in the den reading books. I have a miserable cold and was getting ready to go lay down on the couch in the living room. For "some" reason (the merciful guidance of the Lord:) I sat down at the piano and decided to go through the piano books that Mike's mom had brought to Katie last November. As I reached down between the piano and the wall, where the books were stacked, I burned my hand! The wall was literally so hot that I could not touch it! Mike had built a fire first thing yesterday morning, but that had been 13 hours ago, and the wood stove was stone cold. To make a long, adrenalin-pumping story short, I called our neighbor, Chris. He came over immediately, knocked a hole in the wall at the hottest point, and after tearing off blackened sheet rock, he discovered a thin metal door. When we moved into this house 5 1/2 years ago, the previous owners had built a wall around where the chimney was. Mike had accessed the front of the chimney where the stovepipe went in, but we were completely unaware that on the backside of the chimney was a metal door used to clean out built up creosote and ashes. It has been building up over the last 6 winters, and was now at least 18 inches of glowing red coals. Chris dumped almost 2 gallons of water down the stove pipe in an attempt to cool the coals down. Then he shoveled the still red-hot coals into a metal 5 gallon bucket . He shovelled out between 7-8 gallons of burning coals. After he had worked over an hour, and I was thanking him profusely, he said that he was glad I had called. Otherwise, he would have woken up to the sound of fire engines in the middle of the night. The chimney goes directly up between Katie and Hunter's bedrooms. All I could picture was Mike driving down our lane and coming upon a burning heap that used to be his home and family. I cannot tell you how thankful we are for God's goodness and protection. As Katie said when I tucked her into bed rather late last night, "Mama, this will be a story that I can tell my children someday." Amen, and thank the Lord!

Another job well done!

 

Today the project of the day was putting a tongue and groove pine ceiling on our porch. Mike did a great job (with a little help from me:). It really looks nice. Hopefully we'll have the railing on the porch soon!

A Wonderful Spring Day!

 

Yesterday was a sunny Spring day with temperatures in the 60's. Katie played in her final soccer game of the season. Her team won their 6th and last game, with Katie making 5 of the 12 goals She played a great season and loved every minute of it! Her team was undefeated, which was especially meaningful as she was playing in memory of her Uncle Mike. My wonderful husband finished putting this grill together for us this morning - and in about the same amount of time as it took him to assemble the grill in the A.M., he built a much longed-for picnic table in the afternoon. Just in time to have a cook-out with some special friends - the Weavers, Lance, and our neighbor, Chris. Lance brought 3 of his cousin's horses over, and the kids had a really fun time riding them around the yard and down the lane! Hunter wanted to wear his armor and pretend he was a knight on horseback, but I was busy with supper preparations and completely missed the moment:( Ah well, maybe next time. We had a yummy supper of grilled burgers and chicken, cheesy potatoes, baked beans, veggies, iced tea, and homemade strawberry cheesecake ice cream. Great food and even better fellowship - what a marvelous combination!

Happy May 1st!

 

This morning we woke up to snow! Crazy weather - yesterday it was in the 70's. Must be all that "global warming";)