Day 192 ~ Sunday, July 12

The rain last week made my veggies grow ALOT.

I try to remember to take a photo every Sunday afternoon of the views west and south of my yard - just to watch how they change from week to week.

These are this week's photos....

Day 191 ~ Saturday, July 11

Today's photos are of the countryside near my house.

Wild Roses and Canola....what says summer more than these?

DAy 190 ~ Friday, July 10

Vinjelu arranged with me to pick Kath up in the morning, take her for a pedicure and then keep her away from the house all day so he could clean. (What a guy!)

So, I got to spend a day with my daughter - she got to have a pedicure and do some shopping (which she loves).

AND we had lunch at the Vietnamese Noodle House in Camrose......Kath's favorite kind of food.

When I arrived home, my day of luxury was OVER.

Jim and I hilled potatoes for the rest of the afternoon.

HARD WORK, I'll tell you!

After the second row, I laid down on the grass to give my screaming muscles a rest..... couldn't resist a few photos from the perspective of laying on my back....here's one.....

Day 189 - Thursday, July 9

Because Robert and Lana will be in Saskatchewan for Lana's cousin's wedding, we celebrated Lana's birthday today at their house.

After the party, we went to watch Vinj play soccer.

Seth was busy with his own soccer game.

When he tired of soccer, he decided to go for a drive.

Day 188 - Wednesday, July 8

I met the Ritchies in town this morning.....

Later, Jim and I went to Edmonton to pick up some soil sample kits for Jim's next job. We also took his personal laptop back for warranty work (again). We left under some pretty ugly skies and a tornado watch.

Andrew was not working so he tagged along with us......

I think he stayed up too late the night before!

Day 187 - Tuesday, July 7

The little girls have begun a Summer Reading Program at the library. They each go one day a week for one hour. That means 3 days a week for Lana. Today it was Sophia's day. Lana had planned to walk to the library and then wait for Sophia since it is only an hour long but it was raining or threatening to rain so.....Mom and Dad to the rescue!

I dropped Lana, Titus, and Sophia at the library while Jim stayed back with Emma - Jim was working (he had just recieved a call for a job as soon as it quits raining in the Whitecourt area) and Emma had school work to do. When I got back to the house, Emma found that Gramma MARKS her school work and then expects her to make corrections! THEN I got her to read a chapter in her 'Bible' (graphic Bible....or, in other words - comic strip format). Finally, we let her play the Wii....as long as she left it on mute since Grandpa was making phone calls for work.

The Goose Family is growing very quickly. The 'babies' already look like small adults:

Day 186....Monday, July 6

I thought I'd share some photos of a few of the plants on my deck.....

My pepper plants have some impressive looking fruit:

I love these African Daisies.....they close up at night and if the weather is cold.

Andrew came over to get the push mower - it hasn't been used for at least 5 years so he had/has a challenge in front of him......I haven't heard if putting new fuel into it did the trick or not.....

Later, we went to town and met Vinjelu and Kathryn and Andrew at the church where they were practicing for worship on Saturday night. Seth had been feeling rotten due to the fact that he is teething so I went along to look after Seth for them. Jim ended up setting up the sound system and 'tweaking' it so it sounded great. He always enjoys 'running sound'

Seth likes to sing into the mike and play the bongo drums.

Andrew was 'taking it easy' for some of the practice.

Day 185 - Sunday, July 5

A family day at the farm.

Lots of fun.....one of the highlights was watching the little boys eat ice cream cones.

This was BEFORE they got real dirty!

Day 184 - Saturday, July 4

Potluck supper at church tonight.

Since sitting in a hard chair is VERY uncomfortable for Kath, Rob brought his big lawn chair for Kathryn to use during the service.

Titus sat with Papa while the ladies were setting out all the food.

Day 183 - Friday, July 3

Jim came home last night......the job is done. Now we wait for another job to come up.

In the meantime, we enjoy being together.

We invited ourselves for supper at Mike and Tor's trailer at the lake tonight. Coincidentally, Vinjelu and Kathryn were also heading out there.

The little boys had great fun - playing with Kaden's uncles' truck and sandbox.

A nice visit - albeit a bit on the cool side once the sun started to go down.

Day 182 - Thursday, July 2

I went to town today to drive Kathryn around on errands.

While we were waiting at the Drug Store for her perscription, Seth refreshed himself with a can of juice - which he kept trying to set down on the bottom of the cart where it would tip and splash juice all over the floor (and my feet)

Day 181, Wednesday, July 1

Jim came home late last night for one day at home - the powers that be wanted to avoid to paying services double time for working on Canada Day.

We started the day by inviting anyone who could to join us at Smitty's for brunch.

Rob and Lana, Vinj and Kath were the only ones free....

While we were eating, Andrew put out a call for help - his water pump had broken and he needed a ride to Camrose to get a new one then back to work to fix his truck. Jim and I answered the call, after we ate. We needed to go to Camrose as well, to get an oil filter for Jim's truck since CT at Wetaskiwin did not have one in stock.

Later in the day, as we were pondering Jim's 'office in a truck' problems, we wondered if Mike and Tor's old trailer would work for Jim as a 'pull behind' office so we drove out to Coal Lake to take a look - and to have a quick visit with Mike, Tor, and Kaden.

Kaden was really too busy walking around to visit much, but we enjoyed watching him explore his little world.

I forgot to pull out my camera until we were driving away so the only photo I have is of the lake.

As we were driving home, Jim suddenly skidded to a stop, gravel flying everywhere. He pointed out a large Grey Heron in the pond on the left. The bird stood silently while the truck sped by, sprayed gravel all over, sat idling while I got my camera and climbed out. Then, as I carefully walked as silently as possible over to the other side of the truck, he flew off.....

If you click on the photo to enlarge it, you can just see the bird toward the right side of the photo, in front of the trees. He was beautiful.

Day 180 Tuesday, June 30

Remember this Goose family? This photo was taken May 28.

Here is the same family, one month later (photo was taken June 28, coincidentally)

That's right, I'm cheating.....I did not take a photo today so I'm using one from 2 days ago.

Day 179 - Monday, June 29

Bible Study today.

Various other commitments kept our numbers down today - just Lana, Victoria, me.......

......and Robert?

Since Rob is on holidays this week, we invited him to join us (as long as Ty or Kaden didn't need him)



here, he's using his new iPod Touch to read the Bible......and looking after Ty, who is wearing a lovely crown made by his Dad.

A more 'traditional' Bible....but is he really with us? He looks like he's thinking about something else. Maybe this is where we were talking about the 'S' word.....(see the end of 1 Cor 6)....he kind of zoned out then. LOL

Day 178 - Sunday, June 28

I had supper tonight at Rob and Lana's.......since it is Sunday, it is 'family day' but Vinj and Kath were at Veteran Family Camp and Mike and Tor were unavailable so Andrew and I (Jim's at work) met at Rob and Lana's for our family day supper......chicken tacos. Mmmmmm.

Rob was entertaining the girls and Ty with silly noises.....I caught him!