Southern CA grandchildren enjoy winter in OR

Sarah looks the hill over, then starts down the hill followed by a crash.

Noah looks the hill over...

goes over the jump he and his dad constructed...then reaches the bottom safely.

Noah makes an ice fort.

Ice tastes so good, at least Sarah thinks so.

Winter continues

We are now experiencing the third snowiest winter in the recorded history of the state of Oregon. Eric gets involved in shoveling the sidewalk.

In order to get out, we need to have chains on our tires. Salem only has 30 trucks with snowplows and sand/gravel spreaders. Our road has not seen one of them for days. But our road leads to one that has been taken care of, so off we went to do some shopping.

Besides all the extra work snow brings, the beauty of the fresh snow is wonderful to observe.

And while ice is pretty treacherous, it coats the trees and allows them to glisten.

Winter comes to Salem

Snow is a rare thing here in Salem, so when it comes, there are a variety of responses. When we arrived at church yesterday, there was a group making a snowman that turned out to be at least 5 feet tall. The children in my preschool class at church kept bringing up the subject of going outside to play in it. Many stayed home from church because there are a lot of fears related to driving in the stuff. By evening, it was snowing at a good clip with the wind blowing, too. I went online to see if the schools had posted whether or not they would be closed on Monday and was pleased to see that there would be no school. But this morning I had to venture out to get the following photos to document what's happening here at our house.

This is what Molly does on a cold, winter day (or any other day for that matter).

Although it was cold (21 degrees), taking these pics, this shot makes it worth it.

It appears from the amount of snow on our deck railings that we got 2 inches.

Our neighbors are having fun on our hill (watch out for the shed at the bottom!).

The plow made it halfway up the hill but then turned around.

This is what happened when I took a photo with flash last night.

Mighty Mountain Maples

Today my husband and I drove up to the North Fork of the Santiam River to take a hike back to see a waterfall. The day was cool (about 60 degrees), but it was sunny which is a rare commodity around here this late in October. I'm including the following photos so you can appreciate what the northwest looks like in the fall. Hope you can come and enjoy it with us some day. When I saw the size of these maple leaves, I could hardly believe my eyes. Rather than trying to describe how big they were, I put my hand on it to make it more believable.

The moss on this branch created a perfect photo with Halloween next week.

The name of this waterfall is Little Falls.

This view made the hike all worth it. I took it at the same place the previous picture was taken. All I did was look downriver.

Even 3-year-olds can be a blessing

One of the things I wanted to do this school year was to have my 3-year-old preschoolers be involved in some sort of an outreach into the community. Our school is located across the street from an assisted living facility. I am quite familiar with it, because our neighbor spent the last few months of his life there, so I visited this place on a regular basis. So I contacted the office there and asked if my class could bring birthday cards at the beginning of each month that could be distributed to the residents on the appropriate dates. She told me how many to make, and at the end of September I delivered them.

Today, I got the following thank you:

"3-year-old class: thank you for the birthday card. That is so very thoughtful! I liked the decorations you added to the card. Have a wonderful life. Thank you again - you really brightened my day."

We bless many people every day and don't even know it. But today, God allowed this teacher and 16 boys and girls to find out that a simple act of kindness makes a difference. That's why I'm passing it along to you. And during this week and the next, we have 5 more cards to make so that the blessings will continue.

Yummy applesauce is a family affair

On Saturday morning, we headed out to Herb Doering's farm to purchase apples. He has been the source of all the apples we have used to make applesauce in the 16 years we have lived here. We chose a 20# box of golden delicious and a 20# box of Jonathans. Each box was $6 which is a great price seeing as how apples in the store run between $.89 and $1.50 this year. So armed with my applesauce maker, heavy duty aluminum dutch ovens and lots of plastic freezer boxes, we headed over to Andrew & Megan's to start the process of some of the best applesauce in the world (yes, that's right - in the world).

Andrew rotates the apples so they cook evenly.

Megan gets the first sample. With cinnamon and a scant amount of
sugar, the warm sauce was very tasty.

My applesauce maker attaches to the side of the table. Once the apples are quartered and cooked they are poured into the white hopper at the top. Using a wooden tool and cranking the handle, the apple skins/seeds/stems go straight and the sauce comes down to the left. Looks like Andrew is trying to get his first sample. Note Molly laying down by the front door. With all her fur, I think she was too warm laying on the carpet. Later in the day, I found her all by herself in a cool, back bedroom.

Lowest gas prices are here!

That's right, Costco started offering regular unleaded gas at $2.89 a gallon. We had bought it the day before at $3.03 and thought we were doing well. So hopefully the price will stay low so that I can make use of that good price. From the other side, who would have thought that we would be so happy to have gas at this price?