Considering it was such a cool, wet May it's been pretty hot and dry the last couple of weeks and the ground is dry and cracked.  The garden is fairly neglected at this point.  I've just been so busy.  I finally pulled the arugula and radishes since they had gone to seed.  We ate as many radishes as we could.  I'll plant more again around the end of August in hopes of a September harvest before is frosts (or snows).  The eggplant is slow and I thought I lost it in June due to drowning, but it fought back.  The head lettuce is look beautiful and we'll eat some this week for salads.

There are small cucumbers and green peppers.  I'm itching to make gazpacho but we don't have any ripe tomatoes yet.  The tomatoes are looking a little junglish right now.  After last year when the tomatoes got so heavy they toppled the tomato towers I came up with a plan to trellis them.  In my head it worked way better than it is currently working.  If you have any suggestion for tomato towers for next summer, I'm all ears!

We haven't gotten any strawberries.  Between a 4YO and Henley they've eaten all of the ripe ones.  And some that weren't so ripe.  There are perhaps five plums on our tree and no cherries.  But the rhubarb is going gangbusters!

I know that's how it goes in gardening.  Always a product of mother nature, but with a little TLC we'll have some goodies.  Because there is nothing like walking out the back door to gather homegrown goodness for dinner!

The meadow behind the hut

catching bugs

catching bugs with her good friend

to roast marshmallows of course

The water was freezing!

Moose!

On Friday we hiked (Bryan biked) in to a hut where we camped for the weekend.  There is a hut system all over Colorado.  This one, however, is privately owned.  The hike in was about 2.5 miles.  I've not been to any others huts (we had planned a hut trip as a group, but two of us had newborns so we cancelled it) so I don't have anything to compare it to.  While the hut was rudimentary at best, it had running water!  Not many of them do.  And it had solar panels so we had electricity.  The wood stove in the basement provided enough heat that we were hot!  Which was good because it was in the 40's in the mornings.

The kiddos ran and ran and ran.  They climbed rocks and hikes and waded in the (freezing) creek.  Needless to say they were exhausted!  They roasted hot dogs on sticks and we all roasted marshmallows and made s'mores.  This mama also got in some good knitting time while sitting outside soaking up the wonderful weather.

Cell service was definitely spotty, but texts were able to get through in an emergency- luckily we didn't have any of those.  It was nice to unplug for the weekend.

*  Tuesday night we went to a Colorado Rockies game.  It was C's first baseball game.  There was a huge group of us there to celebrate the 70th birthday of a dear friend.  It was a surprise party and the guest of honor was in complete shock.  It was bittersweet for a few of us because my sweet friend Bob (who I met at a baseball game) is no longer with us.  He would have been the first to sign up for this shindig and he would have been on the early flight to Denver.
Happy Thursday my friends!

It's Wednesday again and that means it is time for the weekly Yarn Along.  I am joining with Ginny and everyone to share yarn and books.  I have been working on the "Woobie" for a baby gift.  It's coming along quite nicely.  I got to the part where I "criss cross" the stitches to close the hole and somehow dropped eight stitches.  Ugh.  I was able to pick them up again, but that row is not pretty.  Luckily it will be under the puppy's head.
I just finished reading Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger.  He is the author of the Cork O'Connor series that I read a couple of months ago.  This book was a stand-alone book, not apart of that series.  The story is told from the perspective a 13 year old boy but told 40 years later.  For young Frank it is the summer of death with the hardest one was the murder of his older sister.  I really enjoyed reading this book and while it wasn't quite as suspenseful as some of the mystery books I like to read, the story was fabulous.

Happy Yarn Along Wednesday!

It's Wednesday and that means it is time for the weekly Yarn Along.  I'm joining with Ginny and everyone to share books and yarn!  I actually worked on some knitting this week but reading was non existent.  Thank you to everyone who made suggestions last week on baby knits.  I am making a woobie for one gift and decided on a bath set for another.  I will make some wash clothes and then bundle it with some other of our favorite bath products.

So.  The Woobie.  What's a woobie?  I didn't even know it was a name of a thing.  It is a small blanket with an animal head for cuddling.  This is a woobie!  I am making a pink and grey woobie which is actually coming together quite easily minus the few mistakes I made with counting stitches.
 It starts with a provisional cast on and the grey section is actually much wider, but it is doubled over on the yarn over section to make the pretty edge.  I made undoing the provisional cast on much harder than it needed to be only because I was traveling and didn't have the foresight to bring an extra set of needles to unravel the crochet edge.  So I had to do it one stitch at a time. Took quite some time.

I am reading book number three of the Ruth Galloway series, The House at Sea's End by Elly Griffiths.  Ruth Galloway is an archeologist specializing in bones who helps solve murders!  I think the books get better...book one I thought was just ok, but I'm really enjoying the series now.   The last week was spent with family, so while we are a family of readers, we spent more time talking and catching up than reading!

Happy Yarn Along Wednesday!

My cousin and her family rented a house on San Juan Island and invited us to stay with them on their vacation.  Who were we to say no?  Last Sunday we flew to Seattle and drove to Anacortes to catch the ferry to Friday Harbor.   The house was in Roche Harbor on the channel where the Anacortes-Sydney BC ferry passed by.

Mt. Baker

View from the deck

knitting on the deck

BC Ferry from the kitchen window

Fireworks are legal in Nebraska.  So much so that people pay hundreds of dollars to have their own fireworks display.  Fireworks are not legal in Colorado and one must attend a stadium or city sponsored fireworks display in order to see the shows that we watched in Nebraska from the porch.  It was all very much a shock to my system to witness the amounts of fireworks being blown up across the street.  Don't get me wrong, it was a spectacular display, just not something I'm used to watching from my front porch!  And fireworks were being blown up at all times of the day!
 We also went to the Omaha Zoo.  They had two new sea lion pups that were not even a month old yet!

It was a fast and fun filled weekend.  We ate a lot of great food.  We laughed.  We cried.  We remembered other reunions and toasted those who are no longer with us.  It's always great to see family since we are all spread out (mostly in the  midwest though) and everyone is so busy with work and family life.