Home Again

Well, we arrived home from Washington late Sunday night. Everything went well with the funeral and Andy's grandma seems to be doing OK. It was so good to get to see family and friends. We were able to celebrate Andy's Dad's birthday with him, spend plenty of time with Andy's Grandma, and experience a rainy Oyster Fest where I found the first wine that I like. I do not drink, I can hardly stand the smell of alcohol, but this wine is lovely. It's not your normal wine...it's an apple wine. It comes from Hoodsport Winery, located where Andy grew up. Andy's parents are sending us two beautiful bottles of Apple Wine...I can't wait. We were also able to see our friend on the other side of the lake and spend time with Daniel and Cindy in the beautiful and warm house...I wish we lived closer guys...we would have oh so much fun. On Sunday we spent a good part of the day in Seattle going to the market and the original Starbucks (AKA The Mother Ship). I love Seattle and wish I could spend some more time there exploring the shops and history of the city.

Busy week, good friends, and we're off...

I know it is only Tuesday, but this has been an incredibly busy week. The weekend was nuts...I photographed a wedding on Saturday, spent Sunday trying to get the house ready for our Home Study. Our good friends the Moxley's came out from California for a funeral...it is very sad circumstances, but so good to be able to spend some time with them. Their son, Jack is just a month younger than Blake...I have loved watching them play together...oh the difference between boys and girls!

We also found out that Andy's step-grandfather passed away on Sunday night, so we are off to the Northwest to go to the funeral and spend time with family. His grandfather had been sick with Asbestosis. Please be praying for his Andy's Grandmother.

I will be back to blogging next week with pictures from Washington...all you Sheltonites, we hope to see you!

You know you live with a two year old when...

You find one of your favorite shoes filled with Cheerios. Oh the places we find Cheerios.
On another note, while we were outside today, I spotted these little toadstools in our yard...I swear these pop up over night. I love these...they help me imagine a world where elves and fairies live.

Where did all those apples go???

Why in a caramel apple pie, of course. My mom made a wonderfully rustic apple pie yesterday. It was just beautiful and tasted oh so good. What a wonderful way to celebrate the first day of Autumn.

"Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns." ~George Eliot

Even though the weather is still a bit warm and the days are still long, I can feel autumn in my bones. It's coming. Oh, how I love autumn days.

On another note, here are some pictures of our newly painted dinning room (dark celery) and living room (orange blossom). Didn't Andy do a beautiful job?!

Autumn Apples

One thing I love about where we live is that there are community apple trees in our town. There is a tree right behind my parent's house that we have been wanting to pick all year long and yesterday, we were finally able to. My parents' neighbor came up with a apple picking tool so we could reach the apples that were high up. He took a long pole and added a coffee can with a sharp lid. You reach the pole up to where the high apples are and get it in the can then you pull the pole so the apple stem will be cut by the sharp side of the can. It was so hard to do at first, but by the end of the day I was able to get 11 apples in the can at once...yeah! We have big plans for our apples...apple pie (my friend Becky has an amazing apple pie recipe) and mini caramel apples with homemade caramel sauce. Picking apples means that Autumn is here. I can tell by the crispy cool mornings now and the leaves that are slowly starting to change.

Blake loved picking apples...she would help hold the big ol' bucked we were using to collect the apples. When I started washing the apples, I found a few apples with bite marks in them...hmmm, I wonder how those got there, Blake.




Here is beautiful web I found at a neighbor's house while we were collecting apples. Now, I am not a fan of spiders. They are creepy and crawly and where we live, they are huge! Last night, when I was painting, I saw something moving on the floor out of the corner of my eye...yep, a humongous spider. I had to call Andy to come take care of it...of course it took off before we could do anything...yuck. But this web was so beautiful in the sunlight that I had to take a picture of it.