Hello December! Before we go full speed ahead we’ll catch up with our long Thanksgiving weekend festivities!
Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, we had a quiet start to the day as we waited for Andrew and Katie to arrive. Our Thanksgiving meal was slated for 5pm at our Colville kids’ home. Our only responsibility was making sweet potatoes with marshmallows toasted on top. Katie and Andrew arrived safely mid afternoon. We drove together to Bayles Mountain for our Thanksgiving meal.
What fun to get photos from both sides of the mountain and see that both of our sons decided to try to spatchcock a turkey this year. On this side of the mountains besides the spatchcock, Dan and Jamie cooked a traditional turkey with stuffing. Spatchcock was a huge success. Another favorite this year was Jamie’s homemade cranberry sauce with added raspberry, so delicious!
Addy and JJ both enjoyed having Andrew and Katie to help them with some projects while we waited for our meal.
Friday morning dawned beautifully as we waited to hear that Josh and Laura were on the road to our home.
We got the ‘on the road selfie’ and we counted down the hours for their arrival.
JJ was pleased to see they brought the vintage G.I. Joe sleeping bag from the 80’s!
Very few photos were taken on Friday. Gramps made his tomato rice soup for us to enjoy and we added BLT’s to the menu.
After dinner we enjoyed some rounds of Skyjo.
Saturday morning found us eating together again!
Greg was on cooking duty again for his Swedish Pancakes and we all love to gather to eat them!
The agenda for Saturday included shopping ‘small business’ for the girls and for the guys chopping wood and preparing for Saturday meals including a birthday celebration for Auntie Lolo!
More about Saturday will come in a separate post.
Our Westside kids made it home safely on Sunday and we are thankful always for traveling mercies!
December is coming in hot with something on the calendar for each day this week! Whew! I’m going to have to be intentional about pausing in the midst of this busy schedule to enjoy this Advent season.
We are in the midst of our Thanksgiving family time here in Colville. This post was prepared ahead of time to publish until I gather the current family photos from activities we are enjoying in real time.
A ‘before’ photo of the queen size bed and accessories in the ‘Blue Room’. We sold this bed complete to my cousin who lives here in Colville.
We have two guest bedrooms in our Country Bungalow. We call this room the ‘Blue Room’. The other guest room we call the ‘Play Room’ because that is where any toys and books are stored for our Grands.
The Blue room was ready for an upgrade with a new king bed set-up. It was fun to pick wall art and linens for a new look. Most of the wall art came from Hobby Lobby on a week when they were all 50% off. It wasn’t as much fun for Greg to assemble the platform for the mattress. It also was a complete clown-show for Greg and me when we took off the wrapping on the mattress that came in a box, rolled up tight. It pretty much explodes into it’s flat king size shape. We were tossed about until we gained control of it and slid it on to it’s platform! Whew!
Andrew and Katie arrived here on Thanksgiving and got to enjoy the ‘new look’.
Here’s a recent photo of Katie with her latest hair coloring. By now we have taken many family photos while celebrating the Thanksgiving extended weekend together. I’ll be sharing those soon.
And in other news we had our first wee snowfall of the season.
We hired a couple of young men from our church to come and clear our planters for winter. Little did we know when we scheduled that we’d have snow to deal with. Thankfully it was just an inch of snow that melted quickly. The guys persevered with freezing fingers and did a great job for us. I’m so thankful to have this task behind us in time for Winter.
1. Do you feel like you have a ‘full plate’ at the moment? In what way?
Yes, yes I do have a full plate at the moment. The calendar is as full as can be with Thanksgiving festivities, both spare bedrooms full for a few days. Monday after Thanksgiving ladies ministry meeting plus decorating our church for Christmas. Tuesday escape to Idaho for an overnight to celebrate our 51st wedding anniversary (December 6th is the actual day). Ladies Christmas party on Friday the 5th. I’ll fit in some Christmas decorating, too.
2. How did you learn to cook? If you have children did you teach or encourage them to cook? Do you like to follow a recipe or is your cooking style more ‘let’s wing it’.
Mostly I learned the basics in my Home Economics classes. I didn’t cook with my mother growing up. My learning was hands on after I got married and it became my responsibility. My kids have the skills on their own initiative. Our sons are both good cooks. Our daughter can tackle any recipe. We modeled openness to invite people over to share a meal and our kids picked up on that. I follow recipes for baking but wing it a lot for spur of the moment meals.
3. Last time you bit off more than you could chew? Elaborate.
Winterizing our property, namely the planters, this is more than I can chew. I’m hoping to bring in some help to complete this task. It’s more than my back can handle.
4. When did you last say ‘the more the merrier’ and mean it?
Anytime my kids or family or friends want to travel to spend time with us I feel like the more the merrier.
5. Write an acrostic using the word T-H-A-N-K-S.
Thank you, LORD God
Hope of Heaven
Acceptance you give me in Jesus
Nothing to doubt
King Jesus my Savior
Salvation assured
6. Insert your own random thought here.
Last Saturday we attended JJ’s promotion at Taekwondo. He did very well and received his Tiger Badge.
He answered all the questions the Grand Master asked of him. One of the Tiny Tiger Creeds is “Tiny Tigers will obey their parents”. The Grand Master asked JJ why he should obey his parents and JJ answered, “because it is written in the Bible, Sir!” Well said, JJ!
Later on this day our Colville kids enjoyed their yearly tradition of a Christmas lights boat cruise on Lake Coeur d’Alene.
Thank you to all who stop by here. I’m thankful for visitors to my blog and fellow bloggers!
It’s time to link up again with Kym at A Fresh Cup of Coffee for some photo prompts.
November Prompts – Everyday Images #75
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layers
We enjoy the layers of mountains here in Colville and beyond.
remember
This is a fun time to remember when all three of these guys laughed till they cried.
texture
Lots of textures in this photo op at our Mother’s Day event at church.
at home (monthly)
At home in November with our Thanksgiving and Fall decor.
prepare
Preparing to toast slices of baguette to go with a salad.
Time to start thinking of all the traditional dishes we are going to prepare for our Thanksgiving meal.
cozy
A flashback to our daughter Katie sitting cozy with her Dzeda (Grandfather) many years ago.
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We were in Spokane yesterday for most of the day so I’m a little behind in visiting. We made 8 stops and managed to find everything on our lists! Woohoo.
Here is my first Fall puzzle and it was a doozey! I bought it at Union Gospel Mission Thrift store in Spokane for $5.
I’ve been working on it for a couple weeks.
Hooray! No missing pieces. I finished this up on Monday before JJ arrived for his afternoon at Baba and Gramps.
JJ lost his first tooth on Monday morning so we had to document that! It’s a little harder to bite into his snacks. This boy loves snacks.
Out for a trek to the mailbox with Gramps.
G.I. Joe with Gramps. The same G.I. Joe show his dad and uncle watched when they were boys. I remembered and mentioned to JJ that I thought his dad or uncle had their old G.I. Joe sleeping bag. JJ wanted me to call Uncle Joshie to see if he still had it. I said I would text instead. Then JJ added that if he still had it he could maybe bring it at Thanksgiving. Later that evening we got this photo with Uncle Joshie’s answer.
Yes! He will bring it at Thanksgiving!
Before we knew it, Jamie and Addy got back from Irish Dance to collect JJ. Addy always wants a rundown of all the snacks JJ had while she was at Dance.
Thankful in this season of thankfulness for the opportunity to spend time with our grandchildren and that we live in the same town.
On Tuesday November 11th I was able to capture some of the colorful night sky with my phone camera.
“The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” Psalm 19:1-2
During this past week we got some photos of our loved ones via text. I am so grateful this kind of communication is available at our fingertips.
Addy getting a kick out of herself and her Skyjo skills! She was “getting ready for her victory dance”.
Katie and Laura on the other side of the mountains at ‘nail time’ that they enjoy together. Our westside beauties!
Woohoo! Look at who is Clubber of the month. Great job, Addy, memorizing all your verses! Baba and Gramps are thankful you enjoy learning about our God and Savior and storing up Scripture for your heart and mind.
Leaving off with a beautiful sunset viewed through the window at Addy’s Irish Dance studio on Thursday the 13th.
What are some of your ‘thankfuls’ this time of year?
Joyce From This Side of the Pond made this announcement; “ I’m hosting a link up here for anyone interested in sharing a Day In The Life post. These are always fun to read and help us remember all the ways we’re connected as we go about the everyday ordinary business of living. Hope you’ll join us!
Joyce’s plan going forward is to do these seasonally, so maybe four a year. Watch for the next date sometime in the early part of 2026.
This is the first she’s hosting and my first endeavor. I chose to share the events of my day on Veterans Day, November 11, 2025 which was Tuesday. I took a couple of the morning photos on Wednesday which show accurately what happened on Tuesday, too.
Up at 5am and my dear hubby makes my coffee when he sees my groggy face walk in.
Our Bunn coffee maker excels at a fast brew time.
Coffee in hand this is my morning first stop. Yep it’s still o’dark’thirty outside.
The rest of these photos were taken on Tuesday, A Day in the Life. 🙂
I had an early eye appointment in Spokane and we set out from our home at 7am. It was a foggy drive. It takes roughly 1-1/2 hours for us to get to Spokane. We arrived a little early for my appointment and since Trader Joe’s is across the street from the office we did a little shopping.
Check in and wait times were over the top on this day because the offices are introducing a new computer system, ugh. We did have a nice chat with a man who was waiting with us. Come to find out he had a connection to a couple who are part of our church.
With eyes dilated we stopped at Hobby Lobby (no purchase), Home Goods (2 small items purchased), and Costco for gas and to order new glasses (big purchase$$). We also bought a King comforter and some real maple syrup that were both on sale.
This is Master’s Brewery in Deer Park. We usually stop here on our way home from Spokane for a meal. Deer Park is about 20 miles north of Spokane and on our route home.
Stroganoff Soup was the soup of the day and we enjoyed it with a salad and bread stick. The daily soups at this spot are always excellent!
I’m adding many views from the road home from our lunch stop. We had about 55 miles more to go to get home.
These shots are from us coming down into Chewelah.
Chewelah is about 20 miles from Colville and it has the only stoplight we encounter once we are on Highway 395 from Spokane and before we reach Colville.
Coming into Colville. We love seeing the big C on the mountain along with the Cross.
Stopping to pick up mail even though it is Veterans Day and there is no mail delivery. LOL! That’s our home in the distance. We made it home at about 3pm.
We had a delivery to our front door while we were gone. It was a very heavy box. We drug it in and then emptied the contents in our entry and brought all the parts into one of our spare rooms. Assemblie will commence on Wednesday. Mystery will be revealed soon.
Greg had a meeting at church that started at 4:30. While he was gone, I worked on this tough puzzle. I’m a glutton for punishment.
Time to put my feet up and enjoy a little ‘Escape to the Country’ until Greg came home. I noticed that people all across the states were posting photos of an ‘Aurora’ event in the night sky. When Greg got home at 8ish, we went on the deck to try to capture some of the images.
This is one of my favorites. What an end to the day!
“The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” Psalm 19:1-2
Thank you for coming along for this day in my life.
It means honoring and obeying the laws of my country and doing whatever is in my power to insure the freedoms our founding fathers established. I love singing the National Anthem at sporting events. A little flag waving is good, too. Displaying the flag on holidays and other key times during the year.
2. September-October-November…your favorite fall month? Tell us why. If you live in the southern hemisphere use these months but sub spring for the word fall.
I’m cheating and naming something that is special to me for each of these months.
September ~ it always seems like the fresh start back to routine activities that make me feel grounded and we get to celebrate Greg’s birthday in this month.
October ~ where Fall colors shine the best and we enjoy the annual corn maze.
November ~ the Thankful month. gathering with family on Thanksgiving.
3. A song you love with the word thanks (or some form of that word) in the title or lyrics?
I’m sharing one of many songs that make me say thank you, Jesus!
My hymn of Praise shall always be forever Jesus! In Jesus I have sooo many reasons to say Thank You!
4. November is National Peanut Butter Month. Are you a fan? What’s the last peanut butter bite you had? Fill in the blank: peanut butter and _____________________ .
Oh, and you can’t say jelly.
It is peanut butter and honey for me. I had a piece of toast with peanut butter and honey for breakfast on Monday.
5. This week’s gratitude question-What event from this past year are you most grateful for?
The year started out with an epic surprise visit from Josh and Laura. We were having our local kids over for a birthday dinner on a Saturday. Dan and Jamie have birthdays 1 day apart and Josh has a birthday 3 days after Dan. Dan and Jamie arrived and 5 minutes later Josh and Laura came in the house with shouts of surprise!! It was such an epic surprise and so much fun to be able to celebrate all our January family birthdays together! I’m so grateful to God for the love he extends through our family.
6. Insert your own random thought here.
Speaking of patriotism I’m copying a post here from 2011. This is from the Orange Circle Flag Ceremony, a weekly event, in Orange, California.
Before they lowered the flag and folded it properly Mark Wayland acknowledged 5 veterans in the audience that had served in World War II. One of the veterans was celebrating his 90th birthday and his family brought cupcakes for everyone at the ceremony. We got to sing Happy Birthday to him. This vet with Mark in the photo above, served in WWII, Korea, and the Vietnam War. He comes to the ceremony every week. It was great to meet him.
Mark also acknowledged a young bride in the audience who’s Marine husband was serving in Afghanistan right then…our Katie. He made her cry but the tears were good tears and then when the big burly Vietnam Vets came over to give her a hug with tears in their eyes we knew they understood and we cried some more. It was great to hear these Harley riders tell her they would be praying for her and Andrew.
Dear’s brother Terry and wife Christina with one of their 3 daughters with Katie and me. Christina got to know Mark while working with the Orange County School Board. She invited Katie and me to attend this ceremony.
I got the following information from an Orange County Register article written by David Whiting although my sister-in-law who knows Mark from working with him at the Orange County School board also filled me in about Mark and his giving heart, a Purple Heart retired Marine.
“Mark Wayland, Marine Vietnam vet, retired firefighter and Orange school board member, looks like a biker with his denim vest and bushy mustache. And he is. So are many of the men in the Circle.
Most are members of the Patriot Guard Riders. In particular, they ride to remember fallen military brothers and sisters and to ensure things go smoothly at military funerals.
With his black Harley Electra Glide decorated with Marine logos parked just 50 yards away, Wayland explains tonight’s mission.
Every Wednesday night, Wayland, his buddies, their wives, friends and supporters gather in the Orange Circle. They come to lower the flag at 6 p.m. and honor, as Wayland puts it, “those who are in harm’s way.”
What an honor to be able to meet these folks and to honor them and others who have sacrificed so much for all of us. Thank you Mark for all you do and may your sacrifices return to you tenfold.
ht: Orange County Register, David Whiting.
The Patriot Guard Riders honored our brother-in-law at his burial on Veterans Day in 2015.
Thanks for the time you took to visit this very long and wordy Hodgepodge. I’m grateful for all who stop by here.
Our friend’s flights from Southern California came through without a hitch and we enjoyed a few days together. They arrived on Saturday afternoon and we were treated to dinner at our Colville kids’ home. It was a delicious gyro meal (all homemade) and homemade ice cream and huckleberry topping for dessert. Our kids grew up with Ken and Heidi’s kids in Southern California until we moved to Washington State in 1988.
On Sunday we all attended church together and split off after church for varied destinations. We spent a quiet evening at home on Sunday. I’ll share our full day of adventures on Monday in a separate posts. We drove around Colville and then up into Canada for lunch.
Heidi and I had many adventures together before we met our husbands and we’ve had some fun adventures since married, too. We can now add a Colville and Canadian adventure to our memories.
We’ve had a few days of showing our friends from Southern California around our parts and even took a little trip into Canada with them. I’ll share all the fun in a future post.
1. Besides Thanksgiving, something on your November calendar you’re looking forward to?
We have been gifted tickets to the Nutcracker and we are also going to enjoy a performance of the Messiah in Spokane.
2. Dictionary.com’s word of the year is ‘6-7’. Huh?
Is it even a word??? I had to consult the internet to find out it’s meaning because apparently I’m old and this particular slang is not part of my vocabulary. Is it part of yours? According to the article I read, it’s a viral term, more of an inside joke with an unclear meaning driven by social media.
What do you think? Oye is what I think.
Dictionary. com says it’s selection each year is a ‘linguistic time capsule reflecting social trends and events, but they also admitted to being confused by ‘6-7’. Some say it means so-so and is sometimes accompanied by the up and down hand motion we associate with the phrase so-so.
What word do you think would have made a better choice?
3. What’s a food, trend, activity, or thing people love but you think is just so-so?
Cruising on the high seas in a little city called a cruise ship! Specialty coffee drinks. Sushi.
4. Are you a tea drinker? Hot or cold? How do you like yours and at what time of day? Do you like flavored teas or teas billed as calming, energizing, healing, etc?
These days I’m a morning coffee drinker. I’ll enjoy teas if I go to high tea or other tea experiences but tea is not an everyday thing for me.
5. The November Hodgepodge has always included a weekly gratitude question. Here’s the question for today-what are three things that make your heart sing?
Being with family, part or whole.
2. Listening to a sermon from the Word of God. Here’s a quote I saw on Sunday at Tim Challies Blog;
“Preaching is the miracle of God communicating himself to a fallen world through the words of a fallen man.” Brian Edwards
“Each Sunday, he (God) communicates to fallen men through fallen men to save his people and to sanctify them. What a miracle!” Tim Challies
If you are interested in reading the whole article, click on Tim Challies Blog, above.
3. Trips to the United Kingdom.
6. Insert your own random thought here.
We have adopted the first line of the Guy Fawkes Rhyme and repeat it on November 5th because it was on November 5th of 2022 that Greg had his stroke. By God’s providence. Greg survived and he survived well. There are lingering difficulties as we continue to live with the ‘thorn in the flesh’, but we thank God that Greg’s life was spared and trust God with our future.
Remember, remember, the 5th of November, Gunpowder, treason and plot. I see no reason Why gunpowder treason Should ever be forgot. Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, ’twas his intent To blow up the King and the Parliament Three score barrels of powder below Poor old England to overthrow By God’s providence he was catch’d With a dark lantern and burning match Holler boys, holler boys, let the bells ring Holler boys, holler boys God save the King!
The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b. 