Cascadel Woods with the Family

Our Family all managed to get together at the Ballanti Cabin. What a great experience. Here are an abundance of pictures from our trip.


We had this family picture taken. Maryn doesn't really like to pose, so you just have to imagine her behine the tree. The good news is that we were all together.

Jess's brother Tom and her good friend Stephanie came up to the cabin too, so here is a photo of them with Chris.

Young Adults Visit Yosemite and Old folks hang with the kids

Here is a picture of Chris & Laurel in smoke filled (controlled burning) Yosemite. They went to Glacier Point and didn't really get to see very much because of smoke. But, they had a good hike. Oh, the mosquitos seemed to love Jess and her brother.

Chris & Jess at smoke filled vista.

Grandpa teaches the Lucy and Maryn how to throw rocks in the pond.

Lucy tries to perfect her toss.

Maryn gets into the throw.

Maryn is a very good artist. She is busy with a water color session.

The girls play with noodles on Grandpa's boat.

OK, this is just a really cute picture of Grandpa with the girls.

Lucy liked playing with the windsock.

Laurel relaxes on the back porch.

Hanging out at Bass Lake

It was unusually hot at Bass Lake, so we spent quite a bit of time in water. We brought our very old kayak. Don and I made the kayak the first year we were married. I guess that makes it 37 years old. We all took turns cruising. Lucy preferred playing in the sand. Maryn wanted to kayak with Aunt Laurel. It was so much fun to have the family vacationing together.

Maryn paddles grandma around.

Laurel and Lucy explore.

Chris Jess and Lucy prepared to swim. Lucy thought the water was too cold.

Laurel & Maryn kayaking.

Lucy contemplates getting wet

Dinner at Manzanita

We went to Manzanita Lake for a pizza dinner. The girls loved the lake, the sand and they really loved the ducks. Did you know that ducks love pizza?

Feeding the ducks was a favorite activity.

Lots of Barbie Play And Water Too

We had 12 Barbie dolls (from Laurel's old stash) and 1 Ken and 1 Donnie (as in Donnie Osmond). Maryn loved the barbies. We even had a Barbie pool.

Butfest 2009

What is a Halibut? Here is Mr. Ugly. This is the big bruiser that DB caught at the start of Butfest. It weighed 35 lbs. Now that is a nice big halibut.Here we have Mr. Slim. Bob caught this guy on the last day of fishing. He is young and much more handsome than Mr. Ugly. He weight about 6 lbs. and he probably tastes better. My new favorite way to prepare halibut is Halibut Piccata. Yum!

Halibut are very slimy. You probably can't tell, but that is slim dripping from Ron's halibut. I don't participate in this part of the fish.

Here are all of the guys. Some with fish and some with a good imagination.

FOOD SECTION: When all of the guys come for Butfest, we eat really well. But, this year we really had one of our best dinners. Filet Mignon, Lobster, Ahi Tuna, Cesar Salad and Fresh Corn. Ron was in charge of the Lobster, Bob grilled the filet and ahi, Laurel worked on the salad and corn and the whole thing came together perfectly.

This was outstanding!

OK. We are back to fish. This is Don with Mr. Ugly.

Here is Bob with Mr. Slim and Mr. Slim's friend. They both went back to Boise with Bob. I can see Halibut Piccata in his future

Another Great Butfest Gathering

CBS Leader Summer Gathering

Did someone say they loved June Gloom? Well, today was perfect. My kind of weather. I had a few of the Community Bible Study Leaders over for a tour of the fishing boat (aka “the other woman”) and Rosie the Riveter Park. We had our coffee/tea, scones, muffins and fruit and then went for a short walk to enjoy the bay and look at a few of the WWII mementos at Rosie the Riveter Park. Mostly we just enjoyed each others company. What a great day!

This is one of the monuments at Rosie the Riveter Park.

The Cabin May 2009

Don and I went up to our cabin on Thursday morning. It was beautiful. We played and we worked. On Thursday we drove around the lake and did a couple of short walks. Friday morning was lots of yard works. Then, in the afternoon we took our small boat to the lake. The weather was so perfect, I just wanted to enjoy the Great Outdoors. With a bottle of wine (soda for DB) and a few snacks, my camera and a fishing rod, we set out to enjoy the lake before volumes of people came up for the weekend. The lake a glassy and the temperature was perfect. While Don fished I kicked back and enjoyed myself.

Check out the photo of the local Eagle. I was so excited to find it flying into the tree. I managed to take pictures of other birds (ducks, geese and heron), but none as exciting as the eagle.

While I sipped wine and took pictures, Don managed to catch a trout, a bass and a crappie. When he caught the trout, he seemed a bit irritated because he said that he was fishing for crappie. I guess the fish is supposed to know what he wants to catch. We actually had the crappie for breakfast on Saturday. It was delicious.

On Saturday, Don worked in the yard in the morning. I resisted doing too much because I become driven when I go outside with a chain saw. We did lots of trimming and the outdoors is really coming together. After lunch we headed off to hike to Fresno Dome. It is a long drive on some pretty bad roads. We had never gone there before, so it was our adventure. When we got there, we started hiking, but we actually started hiking the wrong way. So, the first 45 minutes go us no where. Once we figured out what we had done wrong, the hike was fairly easy. The end of it was steep, but old slow and steady did just fine. The altitude at Fresno Dome is 8000 feet, so we did have snow and slush deal with, but it was dry at the top of the Dome.

Rachel and Andy came up on Saturday. They plan to marry at Yosemite in May 2010. I'm looking forward to that event. It was nice to visit with them.

Here are some of the pictures from our weekend. I'm sorry I didn't take any of us grooming the forest. We did a really good job of that too. Enjoy!

Birds on the Lake

The Eagle

Trout

Crappie

Bass

A Day on the Bay

Another beautiful day on the bay today. It was 80 degrees by 10 AM. So, Debbie and Rachel came into town for a visit and Captain DB said he would take us on a tour of the bay. The pictures speak for themselves. The water was glassy.

Don't the girls look great!

Here is a picture of DB. I had to show that he did take a fishing rod out for a quick try durning our lunch break. Speaking of our lunch break, we had wonderful cheese that cousin Krystin gave us last weekend and we had fruit left over from the shower. Yum. I do love food and it was a perfect combo. Oh, we had a few cookies left from the shower too.

Bridal Shower for Laurel's Roommate - Erica

Laurel and Katie gave Erica a bridal shower. Here are the three of them looking great together. The shower was at my house and we had a lot of fun. It was good to see all of their friends. The big day is July 11th.
Here is the yummy tea that Laurel and Katie put together. It was wonderful.

Here is Erica with her mother who came out from Minnesota for the shower.

The Book of John

Today was the last day of bible study. We studied the book of John this year. John's objective was to share information about the ministry of Jesus in order that we may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing this we may have eternal life. I like this study because it focuses on the bottom line that Jesus is our Savior and he loves us.

I took two pictures at CBS today. The first one is of my dear friend Matilda who at 97 comes to bible study every week and inspires so many of us. What a great attitude she has. I hope I can be as inspirational as she is when I'm 97.

This is a picture of our teaching director Chris, a volunteer with a heart for Jesus. Every week she puts in many hours of time researching information for a lecture based on the scripture that we studied that day. She has endless energy and I appreciate all that she gives to the 120+ women that do bible study.

We are now on break for the summer. We will return in September and dig into the book of Genesis. Let me know if you want to join us.