Corn Maze 2023

Uncle Joshie and Auntie Lolo arrived to Colville on Thursday evening last and we enjoyed a few days together. On Friday October 27th we arrived at the Pumpkin Patch and Corn Maze when they opened at 4pm.

Addy was keen on reading the map and leading us to find the 9 stations of the maze.

JJ was interested in other discoveries.

We mastered the maze in forty minutes and then it was time to pick a few pumpkins to carve.

Carving happened the following day on Saturday after the pumpkins had time to warm up. We’ve been experiencing lows in the teens and 20’s here in Colville.

Saturday evening we enjoyed dinner at our Country Bungalow with nonstop fun and I even got a back massage by my favorite little boy.

Sunday we were all in church for a wonderful service and afterwards enjoyed lunch together at Rancho Chico before Auntie and Uncle hit the road for home.

A special Fall weekend enjoyed and one that will be remembered. Thank you, Joshie and Lolo for taking the time to drive over the mountains to visit us. Loved our time together.

Happy Reformation Day and Halloween to you all. We are looking forward to our two very special trick or treaters to ring our doorbell tonight!

Marcus Ciderfest 2023

There is no Hodgepodge this week so it’s a good time to go back to our time at the Marcus Cider Fest this past Saturday and get caught up with what’s been happening around here recently.

Every October the little town of Marcus hosts a Cider Fest that is well attended. It starts with a parade on Saturday. This year the weather was so nice it seemed the attendees and cars in the parade doubled!

Granny Great and Jim rode in Jim’s car for the parade.

His car was so shiny that we could see our reflections!

Our kids entered our DIL’s Thunderbird in the car show.

Jamie created all the t-shirts. Dan’s said, It is her car but she lets me drive. Jamie’s shirt said, It is my car but I let him drive and the kids shirts said, What’s the Word? Thunderbird.

We enjoyed the parade with our Grands and then we walked about the craft stalls, bought a caramel apple and headed home for the day.

The last Saturday in September I attended our Women’s Retreat and one of the workshops I attended was on Hospitality and Flower Arranging.

This was my arrangement. Those flowers were spent after a week and I replaced them with these Dahlias I purchased at Trader Joe’s keeping the same filler greens.

Last in this catching up post are photos from our back acres showing some Fall color.

Speaking of Fall, we finally had conditions that allowed us to take care of our burn piles. Branches that fell throughout the year were gathered up and burned. We worked as a team and accomplished a lot on Tuesday.

It’s been good to catch up with many of your blogs.

We are praying for Israel and the conflict on that side of the world. So distressed at how prisoners of war have been treated in such a barbaric and inhumane way. I can’t even imagine the sadness, terror and grief of losing loved ones in this way and the feelings of despair while huddled in a bomb shelter.

Borrowing the verses that Joyce shared on her blog.

“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells. God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day” Psalm 46:1-5

Dublin Day Two ~ Tour Part One

Up while it was still dark to get ready for our all day Paddywagon Tour to Dark Hedges, Dunluce Castle, Giant’s Causeway and Belfast. We were the second pick up spot at 7:20 am, Saturday the 16th of September. That meant we ended up in the back of the bus with 50 of our one day ‘friends’ in front of us. Looking a little blurry in that selfie I took.

This day will have to be split up according to our stops or else I’d have way too many photos. I’m sorry to have to mention that we were not enamored by our bus driver and the information he chose to dwell on and drone on during our trip. We did choose joy at each of our stops! We were last off at each stop which meant we had a few less minutes at each of our stops. We were last back to the bus on most of our stops because of that…

There was a stop about an hour into our trip at a motorway stop with many choices for food, drinks and other conveniences.

A while after our convenience stop, we pulled into a parking lot for cars and buses and were directed to the path to Dark Hedges. There were minimal services here. We were beginning to see the chance for some blue skies ahead.

Stop #1 ~ The Dark Hedges

None of the four of us are fans of Game of Thrones but we were happy to see this row of beech trees.

The Dark Hedges is an avenue of beech trees along Bregagh Road between Armoy and Stranocum in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.

Our daughter-in-love has an eye for photography and putting it all together in a collage. I’ll be sharing many of her photos and collages, too.

We were only at this stop for 20 minutes. We beelined it to the restrooms first and onward to the Hedges. The lines for the conveniences could take a while so we tried to be quick on the draw when we could.

Our next stop would be Dunluce Castle and it was my favorite of the stops on this day.

Thank you for following along.

Back to the present…

We are already enjoying Fall colors out our windows here at our country bungalow. How about you?

Postcards Day 1

We arrived in Dublin and were welcomed with some typical rainy weather. We are hoping to have some sunbreaks here and there during our time in Ireland and England.

I don’t have much time on the computer so any posts before I return home will be postcards with few words. I’ll create my travel diary here on my blog when I return home. Slainte.

Favorite Photos Over the Years

Another post in celebration of Greg’s 70th birthday!

The celebrations are continuing in Ireland and the United Kingdom.

Today in Ireland we are on a full day tour to the Giant’s Causeway and Belfast. Slainte!

Common Book of Prayer

“God,

you see your children growing up

in an unsteady and confusing world;

Show them that your ways

give more life than the ways of the world,

and that following you is better

than chasing after selfish goals.

Help them to take failure,

not as a measure of their worth,

but as a chance for a new start.

Give them strength to hold their faith in you,

and to keep alive their joy in your creation;

through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.”

(from the Common Book of Prayer)

Father and Children

This is another tribute to Dear/Greg upon his 70th birthday. Some photos with our children in their growing up years. Some are out of order and I haven’t transferred all the photos from when our kids were young onto the computer so these are limited but more than you might be interested in. 🙂

Joshua’s baby dedication at Huntington Beach E.V. Free church with pastor Bob Thune.

Daniel’s baby dedication at Huntington Beach E.V. Free church with Pastor Bob Thune.

For those who don’t miss a trick there isn’t a photo from Katie’s dedication but it did happen.

Our kids appreciate their dad and his wisdom, integrity and faithfulness.

Celebration #1

We gathered in Colville with our local family and friends to celebrate Greg on his actual birthday.

Our kids made fish tacos and delicious salsas and guacamole to enjoy. We had bread pudding for dessert.

The ‘Grands’ enjoyed watching Gramps open his gifts.

Requests were sent out to friends and family to send a greeting to Greg and to send those greetings to our kids’ home so they could surprise him with a stack on his birthday. It worked and what a great stack of cards he received from siblings, nieces, nephews, friends and his own kids and grands.

A very special surprise gift from Canada arrived, too.

So thoughtful and generous. Thank you Terry and Lovella!

After we got home and were able to read each card I decided to display them so we could enjoy them all.

We loved the special artwork created by Addy and JJ.

Our sister-in-law, Kelly, is becoming quite the artist, too.

Several verses from the Bible were shared in the cards that Greg received from friends and family near and far.

Romans 15:13

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Isaiah 41:10

fear not, for I am with you;
be not dismayed, for I am your God;
I will strengthen you, I will help you,
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Funny cards and serious cards were all appreciated!

Isaiah 40:31

but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
they shall walk and not faint.

Jeremiah 17:7-8

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord,
    whose trust is the Lord.
He is like a tree planted by water,
    that sends out its roots by the stream,
and does not fear when heat comes,
    for its leaves remain green,
and is not anxious in the year of drought,
    for it does not cease to bear fruit.”

This next card made both of us laugh out loud!

It was quite a wonderful gift to receive all of these cards and to read the special greetings and memories in each of them. If any of you who sent cards are reading this post, thank you so much for taking time to write and send Greg these encouraging greetings!

We will celebrate with our ‘Coast Kids’ in Ireland!

70 Strong!

A very Happy Birthday to my dear husband. He finally has entered my decade. Since this is his big 7-0, there will be lots of photos and memories of many of the seven decades of his life so far. He started out his life in the fifties. His only brother is four years older than him. He was raised in a Christian home in Southern California. His father was called up to heaven in 1985 and his mother joined his father in 1997.

Early years living on Cattaraugus in Culver City.

The bottom left photo has a description written on the back of the photo by his mom.

His maternal relatives lived in Colorado and came for visits.

Great Aunt Matilda from Kansas. She never forgot the birthdays of her nieces, nephews, grandnieces and grandnephews and sent a card on time. She even sent birthday greetings to the spouses of all. I was the recipient of many birthday greetings from her.