Wild Daisy’s???

Today I went out to lunch with a friend and then had a meeting in town.  After the meeting, I decided to ride to one of my favorite spots on the bridge.  Even though everything is dead, dry and brittle, and the river is low, it still has its own kind of beautiful.



But this is what surprised me the most.  Even though we’ve had some pretty hard freezes the past two weeks, these little wild daisy’s were all along the side of the road leading to the bridge. 



After looking on the net, I’ve found these little flowers to be quite interesting.  They are actually called Chamomile (I have heard of the name before).  Anyway they look just like the flowers I was looking at.  According to this site, it states that Chamomile is definitely one of the most popular wild medicinal plants that can be eaten. The two main types of chamomile are the more popular German chamomile and Roman chamomile (Chamaemelum nobile). Although they belong to different species, they are used to treat the same health ailments in herbal pharmacy. Both are used to calm frayed nerves, help in soothing various stomach problems, reduce muscle spasms, and to treat several skin conditions.  Hmmm, I never knew any of this.  And all along I thought I was just looking at a pretty, little, wild daisy.  I do know after today, they are obviously a very hearty, little plant.

Stroller/Walker Jean Bags

OK, remember This Post, where I briefly talked about a stroller bag that I made for my daughter so we would have something to place our items in for the town BBQ.  Well, from there, a different bag was in the makings.  A cousin visited our home a few weeks ago and I showed her one of the stroller bags and she commented that it would be nice to make them to hang on walkers, too.  What a genius idea!  As it so happened, I have a walker in my home that I purchased to give to my sister.  The bags are very simple to make using an old pair of jeans.  As a Relief Society project, we are planning on making these to give to the elderly in our area.  Fun!

 

For our Relief Society Super Saturday last weekend, I made some bags for display and I also made an instruction handout for anyone wanting to make these bags.  Super easy to make and very useful. 

A Good Year For Bottled Beets….Or Was It?

Ah yes, another year of canning done.  Yesterday, I finished canning the last of our beets.  I think beets has to be one of the prettiest things I bottle.  I just love the deep, dark, reddish purple color of each bottle.

It wasn’t until I was down to marking my last six bottles, that I noticed something………………………….. Oh my, are we really in the year 2012?  What was I thinking?  It was late so I decided I would get up in the morning and change the dates.

Can you believe it?  Look what I found this morning………….One of the bottles even had the year 2010!  Hello…..knock, knock, knock, anybody home?!

Oh well, nothing a drop or two of lemon essential oil on a paper towel and a little rubbing couldn’t fix.  All better (Ha…I even typed beeter and had to go back and change it).  I THINK I’m in the right year now……………..?  Yes, red roots (hair color) grow deep and I really do think it affects my brain, sometimes!

Thanksgiving Place Cards

As I was browsing blogs this morning, I came across some cute Thanksgiving Place Cards.  The place cards posted on this blog are freebies for you to download and use.  I liked the idea and was going to print hers off to use this Thanksgiving but then I thought it would take up too much ink where they were all different colors.  I decided to use her idea and made some for our use that wouldn’t use up so much ink.  I also cut my card down the middle instead of along the side and then split it from side to side instead of having one long stand in the back.  You can go to the other blog to see what I mean when I mention making my cut down the middle instead of the side.  I found a free turkey graphic but couldn’t find any acorns and leaves that I wanted so I purchased that graphic from “Can Stock Photo”.  Sometimes, you come across a graphic you just have to have.  The acorn/leaves graphic was $3 but hey, it’s worth the price if you get the look you want.  Well, there goes the money I would have saved by not printing off her colored place cards. 

Come Back Fall

FALL – Ah, Fall!  My most favorite time of the year.  My only regret about Fall is that is doesn’t last long enough.  Once the leaves start turning, shortly after, they’re gone.  Wouldn’t it be nice if the trees would turn their beautiful colors and then stay on the trees for at least September, October, and November……then, the winter months wouldn’t seem so long and drawn out and that would make me happy.   The two photos below were taken 6 days apart from each other.  The top one was taken on October 13th at 2:30pm while the bottom one was taken this morning at 9:30am.  Besides the big tree, look at the trees/leaves in the front and background of each picture.  What a big difference those few, short days made.  Come back Fall!  Just as an after thought, wouldn't it be wonderful if a big wind came up and blew all the leaves off the lawn, saving me a lot of raking time.  We have a large lot surrounding our home with lots of trees and with lots of trees comes lots and lots of leaves to rake and bag.  See what I’m talking about, if the leaves stayed on the trees for a longer period of time, maybe, just maybe I might enjoy raking a bit more if I had the time to enjoy the pretty leaves before having to rake them.  I know, I’m rambling, so with that…………………………..  Oops, sorry, another after thought.  I guess I don’t want a big wind to come up because we use all those leaves to till into our garden plot which produces us a wonderful garden each year.  Done!

Short Vibrant Rainbow

My husband and I were standing in the living room talking when my husband looked out the window and said, “look at the rainbow”.  I wondered why there was a rainbow when it hadn’t been raining.  I got my camera and stepped outside to get a photo when I was hit with a slush like rain/snow mixture.  Not anything worth mentioning, but enough to give us this pretty rainbow.  The rainbow  was only in this one spot and didn’t even arch across the sky.  It was short, but vibrant in color.

Salmon, Idaho Road Trip

My husband asked me if I wanted to go for a ride last Saturday and head to Salmon, Idaho.  We thought the leaves would be turning and hoped for a scenic drive along the Salmon River.  Although the leaves around our home were pretty in all their brilliance of yellow, orange and a touch of red, our expected drive of colors was a bit disappointing.  It was a nice drive but we were a little early for the change of colors.  However, there were a few pretty spots here and there.  On the way up, I didn’t take too many pictures because it was still a little early and the sun was hidden behind mountains, rocks, and hills.  Some of the rock formations and colors were pretty awesome and since I was doing the driving, I stopped right in the middle of the road to get a picture or two.

One of the first places we stopped at as we were entering the town of Salmon was Ack’s Auction & Second Hand Trading Post.  We stopped at this place another time a few years back and found some pretty fun deals but on Saturday, nada, nada.

As we were walking along the back of a row of stores, I spotted an old building with the window broken out.  I thought it was pretty cool but my husband, not so much.  He just looked at it as an old building with a broken window but I look at things a lot different while camera is in tote.  He did however stand and wait patiently while I took my picture. 

After going to a few more stores and out to lunch, we decided it was time to head home.  On the way home, I spotted on the top of a mountain, a flag waving in the distance.  As we got closer, I noticed it was an American Flag and I thought how cool it was that someone would climb that mountain and rock formation to raise the Flag. 

Another point of interest was this little, blue building.  Out in the middle of nowhere, stands this building, which happens to be a Post Office.  My husband, many years ago, used to be a substitute driver for a mail route and this was one of his stops.  He stated that it really wasn’t a town so-to-speak but there were a few homes scattered about.  Wikipedia writes it as this:  Ellis is an unincorporated community in Custer County, Idaho, United States. Ellis is located on U.S. Route 93 15.5 miles (24.9 km) northeast of Challis. Ellis has a post office with ZIP code 83235.

As we got closer to Challis, I did take a few pictures but by that time, the clouds had rolled in and the sun wasn’t too bright so I didn’t get the pictures I was hoping for but…………………….

It was a fun drive and it was nice getting away for a bit but what it all came back to, was that the most beautiful part of our drive was arriving back in our own stomping grounds and being welcomed home by our little pets.

Bottled Peaches

Another year of peaches out of the way.  If it’s one thing my husband and I like, it’s bottled peaches.  I almost lost out on the opportunity to bottle peaches because I forgot to put my order in.  The lady I order peaches from only purchased enough to fill the orders she had and said there would not be any more available.  I felt pretty bad about not getting my order in until I received a phone call from a friend stating that more peaches were going to come in and asked if I wanted any.  Did I want any?………..Silly question……Yes, I WANT PEACHES!  The only draw back was that it took me two days to do 34 quarts because I had vertigo.  So, between the dizzies, I bottled peaches.  So worth it……………..mmmmmm…..PeAcHeS!  Peaches for “Peach Cobbler”…peaches for “Peaches and Toast”…peaches for “Eating Right Out of the Jar”…Peaches For……………………..

Halloween Baggie Topper – Twix or Treat

I posted a blog earlier about “Twix or Treat” tags that could be attached to candy bars or a bag of candy and then the thought occurred to me…..why not just make a snack bag topper to go on a bag of candy.  Ever since posting the other blog for the tags, I’ve been working off and on for days creating this baggie topper.  It take a lot of time just trying to find the right pictures that I want.  And just when I finally do find the perfect picture I want – AGH – it has a copyright on it. It takes a lot of research to find clipart that does not have a copyright on it.  I have over 40 pictures and different layers on this bag topper.  Sometimes I get something layered, look it over again, think of something that would work better, undo a few layers, fix what I would like better, then redo the layers.  Since doing all my creations using Microsoft Office Word 2007, the arrow keys and the un-do, re-do shortcut icons are my best buds.  It’s a long process but when it’s finally tweaked and tweaked again, I’m satisfied enough to print.  Or, maybe not……I’m always tweaking! 
  

Here are things mixed up a bit so you can see what I mean when I say I use different pictures and layer everything.

I love creating things on the computer.  It would be heaven to be able to have the opportunity to have different graphic programs and the technology needed to design my own graphics and create anything I wanted.  But, for now, I am happy creating, using my own computer in my little corner of the world.

Content Deer

I think the deer are becoming more than pets.  Do they look a little content to you as they graze and lounge around our yard.  I’m thinking they know a good thing when they have it. 

Deer hunting season opens soon, and would you look at that…..I think this deer is sticking his tongue out at a potential deer hunter.  I can picture it now…….tongue out, eyes closed, and hearing nanner, nanner, nanner!