The Great Pumpkin

Well-l-l-l-l-l-l-l, maybe it's not the great pumpkin as in the Charlie Brown story, but it's a fun pumpkin for me.  For the past few years, I've bought a pumpkin around September or October and keep it as an autograph pumpkin.  It started out as a joke to my visiting teacher and every month when she came to visit, I had her sign my pumpkin.  Last year, this went on until May when the pumpkin finally rotted and I threw it out.  This year, not only did I have my visiting teacher sign the pumpkin, but I've had everyone that comes to our home sign it.  It's been a fun and unusual thing to do and with this year, having everyone sign it, it was even more fun.  Where I've been doing this for the past two years, would it be safe to say it is my "NEW TRADITION"?  Tradition or not, I think it is one I will keep doing for years to come.  It's fun to see the look on people's faces when I ask them to sign my pumpkin, especially after the fall season.  As of tomorrow, I think my autographed pumpkin will have to say good-bye because as you will notice in my pictures, he's kind of looking a little puny.......and, if anyone asks, I can honestly say I know the life expectancy of a pumpkin.

Baby Animals & Ice Cream Sandwich Cameras

This post is going to start and finish with baby animals.  I needed to go to town this morning so on my way I stopped off at the neighbors to take her some egg cartons.  While there, she told me about their new baby lambs.  They were so cute so I had to take their picture.

From the neighbors, I went to town and on the way home I decided to stop off at the local green house to see what hanging plants they had.  When I pulled in, cedar wax wings flew off the ground in masses.  I thought if I just sat in the car long enough they would come back so I could get some pictures.  A few of them came back and were picking these little white balls off the ground.  I have no idea what they were eating or attempting to eat.  I say attempting because for every two they put in their beaks, every other one was pa-too-eed out.  Funny watching them.

Tonight for Young Women's, we had someone come and share their photography pictures and discuss with the girls how to use their cameras and the different features that were on their cameras.  It was a fun and informative evening.  For refreshments, we decided to make each girl a camera out of ice cream sandwiches.  We used Oreos for the lens and a little red licorice nib for the picture taking button.  They turned out really cute.  The only problem was that some of the ice cream sandwiches looked like they had been melted and re-frozen somewhere along the line but they still tasted great.

On my home from Young Women's, I noticed some colts and their momma's on the side of the road.  The momma horses were not as enthused as I was about taking their pictures and immediately led them away.  

 

Deer Antlers

I just looked out my dining room window and noticed that we have approximately 20 deer in the field next to our home.  Evan noticed that some of the bucks were starting to get their antlers so I zoomed in on one of them and got a few pictures.  Once their antlers start coming in, it doesn't take them long to get their full rack.  I don't think I could ever move back to a populated area where I couldn't just look out my windows and enjoy the wildlife. 

Does This Look Like Spring To You?

Does this look like Spring to you?  It's surely not the Spring I'm looking for.  No matter which direction I look from my home, I see snowy mountains and gloomy skies.  Although, in the first picture I do see a hint of sun over the mountains.  There's still hope - Wahoo!

May Hail

I can't believe the weather we are getting, lately. With the exception of a few days, it has been nothing but cold since Spring arrived. My daughter, her husband, Corey, and his family are supposed to come to Mackay on Monday so Corey's parents can see where Amber spent her growing years. I told them they should have come this winter when it was warm. - Ha! It has been cold and windy here all day and yesterday, well, take a look. I was in the house when I heard pounding on our metal roof and loud bouts of thunder so I went out to see what was happening. What I saw was hail, coming down pretty fast so I grabbed my camera so I could share it with you. Agh-h-h-h, come on summer, it's time you come for a long visit. It looks like the video that I downloaded from my YouTube page went kind of fuzzy and it's actually hard to see but there is getting to be quite a bit of hail on the ground.  I'm having a bad day with the blurries and fuzzies. Also while my YouTube page was loading, we just had a snow storm pass through. Yippeekiah, huh!

Temple Marriage Handout

The first week in June, I am giving a lesson on "Temple Marriage", to the Young Women in our ward.  I decided to make a handout for the girls from a quote I found on the Internet.  I wanted to share this handout with others that read my blog but I couldn't figure out how to load the instructions to my blog.  Hopefully someday I will be able to figure out how to accomplish this process.  To give you an idea of what it looks like, I used my snipping tool, snipped the picture and posted it.  The wording/writing came out a bit blurry, sorry.  I got the temple picture from an LDS blog that allows you to use their photos.  Once again, and to the generosity of others, I can make something that works for me, and that I can share with others.

 

Lavender Calla Lily

Flowers. Mmmmm, I love flowers and plants.  Actually, my home is full of plants.  I have two large windows in my dining room that is the perfect spot for plants.  Like, wall to wall plants...literally.  And besides those plants in the dining area, I have plants throughout our home.  Plants make me happy.  Last weekend, I traveled to Idaho Falls with my husband and while there, I did, I bought another plant.  This one is a "Lavender Gem Improved Calla Lily".  I thought it was so pretty and to top it off, one of the leaves actually took on the color of the lily. Interesting. 

Kindergarten Graduation 2012

Another year, gone.....can you believe it.  Wow, I'm getting OLD ----ER!  But, if I must get older, I'm glad I do it along with the Kinders.  What a joy it is to see them the first day they walk into the classroom and then again at the end of the year..........my, how much they grow in such a short time.  Here are a few pictures of this years graduation.  There are a few parents who prefer not to have their children on the internet and for that purpose, I have blocked out their little faces.  Just below the children, hanging on the front of the stage, are pictures that the children colored of "what they want to be when they grow up".  We had everything from teachers, doctors, firemen, etc.  But, my most favorite one being.................A Dog Walker.  Don't ya love it.

I've used the same programs and diplomas for the past few years so this year I revamped them and made them look totally different.  I used free graphics from the internet to help in making the diplomas, programs, poems, and candy bar wrappers.  Love the Internet and people who make their stuff accessable for others to use.

 

DIPLOMA

PROGRAM...Outside Cover - Inside

GREAT EXPECTATIONS - POEM

GRADUATION CAPS 

I make the graduation caps from poster board.  They are easy to make and they looked so cute on the little Kinders.  Although, as you can see, our graduation caps do not have tassels on them.  We've learned from early on, that tassels, little Kinders, and graduation, are not a good combination.

CANDY BAR WRAPPERS

I got the candy bar wrapper idea a year or so ago from the internet. It is fun to gather ideas from others and then make it into something that works for you.

These are the invitations I made that were given to each family.  To tie everything together, I used the same graduating children on the programs, candy bar wrappers and invitations.  I thought they were the cutest graphics! 

Bar J. Wranglers

This past weekend, my daughter, my husband, and I went to see the Bar J. Wranglers in Arco.  I also attended their concert last year and it was equally as fantastic this year.  If you want to spend an evening of laughter, music, and comedy, this group is a must see.  They were on stage a full 1-hour and 45 minutes....now, that's entertainment.  I took some pictures and video but the way the lighting was, my pictures are poor quality but this will give you the jist of what I had the opportunity to see.  I'm telling you, they are a must see group if they ever come to your area. 

The site highlighted in red is a much better video of the Bar J. Wranglers, singing "They Call the Wind Mariah".  I really like this song.  They actually sang Mariah the other night too, but I was out of disk space.

This picture shows you that the lighting was not good for taking pictures or videos but while watching them on the stage, you could see everything just fine.

I borrowed the next two pictures off of the internet so you could see the group.  I'm just saying.......go see this group if you ever get the chance.  You won't be disappointed.

Mine Hill Wild Flowers

Yesterday afternoon, I took a drive up the first part of the mine hill.  On the way down, I noticed all the pretty wild flowers in bloom.  I've never noticed how many different varieties of flowers there are along the mine hill road.  It's amazing how when you grow flowers in your garden you can't stand to have weeds but out in nature, the weeds mixed in with the flowers are totally beautiful.  I took pictures of flowers that were close to the edge of the road but because of a spring with many wood ticks, I didn't venture out of the car to get photos of those flowers to far away to get a nice picture.  I didn't think a picture was worth getting one of those little creatures on me.  Ooohhhh, just thinking of them gives me the chills.  

Mother's Day Surprise

To my surprise, as I sat in my home Friday morning working on the computer, the doorbell rang.  When I opened the door, my beautiful daughter, Brittney, was standing there wishing me a Happy Mother's Day.  What a gift, for sure.  She now resides in Utah and decided to surprise me, and a surprise it was.  Around 11:30am, we decided to go for a ride, hit a garage sale, then go out taking pictures.  We headed towards the Mackay reservoir where there were oodles of pretty, purple wild flowers, everywhere.

We rode along the top of the reservoir dam where I was able to capture this picture of the water with the mountains in the background.  So many awe moments in photography!

On the side of the dam is a hill/mountain that had a cave on one part of it.  There were many birds flying in and around the cave.  This photo doesn't show any of the birds, but they were all over the area.

This is just a random shot that I thought would be pretty, and it was.

From the reservoir, we headed up to the other end of the valley where I was able to get a picture of the Three Sisters.  The Three Sisters is the mountain range, with the three peaks, on the right-hand side of the photo.

Driving a little further, I captured another photo of the Three Sisters with their reflection in some water.  Pretty, and the sky was awesome, too.

Here is another photo of some mountains being reflected in water.  I don't know what this mountian range is, but it was pretty in a different way.

When it was time to head back to town, we decided to stop at the local hamburger drive-in and get a bite to eat.  There were some other ladies there that we knew so we sat at an outside table near theirs and enjoyed a good chat.  I totally enjoyed my day!  Oh, just thought I'd add............it was on Mother's Day, last year, from my oldest daughters persistance that I started blogging, and I've enjoyed every minute of it.      

The Rain In Spain

Bur-r-r-r-r, for now.  My husband set the sprinklers on our lawn last evening and as you can tell, we had a cold night.  When I got up this morning and looked out our windows, I noticed we have ice circles all around the house with iced fences and pine trees.  The ice, with the sun shining on it sure looks pretty but also reminds me how cold it is.  But, according to the wheather broadcast, it is supposed to start getting warmer, warmer, and warmer with each new day!  The prettiness of the ice is nice (ha, kind of reminds me of...The Rain in Spain) but it sure gives me something to look forward to with the warm weather coming.

Extra, Extra, Read All About It

A few months ago, a friend of mine approached me and stated that I should e-mail my turkey picture to the Post Register, an Idaho Falls based newspaper.  She gave me the address (part of her newspaper), I brought it home, and let it sit for quite awhile.  A year-or-so ago, my same friend told me about sending pictures to the newspaper.  I entered a sunset picture and they posted it.....a 2"x3" picture, if that.  Well, I kept coming across this page of the newspaper she gave me containing the e-mail address and thought, OK, I'll send in my turkey picture so I can throw this piece of newspaper away and get it off my cupboard, table, couch, or where ever it was laying at the time.  I sent it in a little over a week ago and had totally forgotten about it when at work today, a co-work came down the hall, approached me and asked if I had seen the newspaper and that it had my turkey picture in it.  When I looked at the picture, I was totally shocked......this picture was huge.  It measures to be a 7 " x 4-3/4" picture.  I'm sure lots of pictures make the paper but this one made me happy.  Yippiekiyah!..........That's happy turkey talk.

Salmon Patties

My sister e-mailed me tonight and said she was making salmon patties for supper.  I thought it sure sounded good so I decided to make some, too.  I remember making them once before but couldn't remember what I put in them besides crackers and eggs so I called my sister and asked her what else she put in hers besides crackers and eggs and she said she uses dill, onions, lemon, or lemon pepper.  She didn't give me any amounts but I went to work on my version, writing down amounts as I went along.  They were very simple and turned out pretty good.  Here is my salmon patty recipe:

Salmon Patties
2 - 7oz. cans salmon
2 - eggs
2 tsp. dried minced onions
1/4 cup Quick Oatmeal (1-minute)...didn't have any crackers so I substitued the oatmeal.
1 tsp. lemon pepper

Mix all ingredients together.  Use 1/4 cup mixture per patty.  Grill on a griddle, turning once, till cooked through.  This recipe made 6 1/2 patties. 

We served ours with Ranch Dressing.  Doesn't Ranch make everything taste great.  So maybe, just maybe it wasn't that the salmon patties were really good and it was just the dressing.  Ya think?  I think not, these were actually good.

The "BIG MOON"

The News kept broadcasting, for two day, about the "BIG MOON".  Last night was supposed to be the night to look toward the sky to see the "BIG MOON".  I kept waiting for it to appear but could not see it.  I e-mail my sisters in Utah and they said it was out, shining brightly.  It was quite cold here so I put on my coat and gloves and went outside to check things out.  This is what I saw..............................  I thought to myself, this is just great, I want to get a picture of the "BIG MOON" and it is hidden behind the clouds.  I couldn't see from the house if it was out or not because the pine trees were blocking the view so I kept going in and out of the house checking to see if it would make its way out of the clouds.

Sure enough, after about a half hour of waiting, it showed.  It was indeed a pretty, bright moon.  It was not, however, the "BIG MOON" I was expecting.  To me, it looked no larger than any other moon I'd seen.  After taking a few pictures, I went in and talked with my sister and she confirmed my observations.................pretty, but not the "BIG MOON" we were expecting.