A big Achievement

These are my achievement day girls, minus one who couldn't be there. They are charming girls, and very active and talented. Two of them take piano lessons from me. We made chocolate waffle cookies this day, and had cocoa powder all over Colleen's kitchen. But they were GOOD cookies!





After this last week, I am looking forward to a Thankful Holiday. It was a busy week with a funeral, community choir practice, achievement day activity, helping Adrienne after her surgery, quilt guild, doctor appts for grandma and me, piano recital for my students, and helping Jamie with her booth at the Unique Boutique. (I thought I had a picture of that, but I guess not). And then the best part was when Barb and Curt Pollard came with son Curt, to spend the night. We certainly enjoyed having them, visiting, and eating cookies and ice cream. They went to church with us, and I think the ward wanted to keep them. But now, on to the happy holidays............

Trip to Provo

I have been really busy in Provo the last three days. Avery and I decorated cookies, baked little cakes and bread, wore our aprons, sang songs to Max, played games, practiced trick-or-treating, read books, laughed at Max, went for walks and collected leaves, and ate good food. Oh, yes, Kallie was there, too, and sometimes Ryan. It was a good vacation, and you might even notice that I got my hair cut.

Story about Avery: She babbled some nonsense syllables, and then clearly pronounced, "That is a different language", and resumed her babbling.............

I Love Harvest

Yesterday was my second applesauce day, and I did 42 1/2 more qts. I am closing the home canning shop for the year! (I think). So here are most of my home canned products. Aren't they pretty? Some of my kids still hate to go into the food storage room to get something, but I love it. What is their problem?

Beautiful Bottles

Today was applesauce day. It only took 12 hours to make these 42 quarts of applesauce. A long hard day, but I did have a little help for some of the time. Caleb and Braden are "experts" (Caleb says) because they helped their mom with the same thing. And then Greg did all the dishes, or I would still be in the kitchen!
The thing is, I only used about half of my apples. Do this another day again? Oh, dear.

Greg wanted a picture of his pumpkin patch. This one weighs in at 60 pounds. He had fun watching these grow, and now giving them to his grandchildren. We worked hard at getting everything in before the early winter weather comes this weekend. We only kept 7 boxes of apples from our trees, and Dawn took about 8, but there are more if anyone needs them!

I keep forgetting to take pictures of all the canning I have been doing. Not just peaches and pears galore, but tomato everything: salsa, chili sauce, spaghetti sauce, and plain tomatoes. But I did take a picture of going out to lunch for Adrienne's birthday. Jamie and boys met us, so that made 3 adults and 6 children. What a great idea! And a good break from canning.......

Spud Day Fun

Yesterday was Spud Day in Shelley, an annual gathering for the public to celebrate the famous Idaho Spuds. So..........the community orchestra was invited to perform, and since I have been playing percussion lately (they begged) here we are. After we played about half the program, the rain started, and we had to run under the cover. We regrouped and finished our numbers. Funny, but it worked! I like playing the cymbals and xylophone, but mostly I play the big bass drum. Great fun.