What a week

The trees have started turning color and are just beautiful.   I love this time of year with all the brilliant colors.  It is starting to get cool at night, we actually had to turn on the heat a few nights ago.  The days are not too bad but I have had to resort to long sleaves on my shirts.  It is taking me a little longer in the mornings to be able to shake out the creaks in the old joints.   But I am still able to hold my own at the end of a shovel. :) Over the weekend we had a 3" water main spring a leak. The hardest part was digging the hole to get to the leak. Thank god for Tom, It took Tom and I about an hour and a half to get the hole dug so we could even find the problem.  Everything here is build on decomposing granite.  Mix it with a little mud and you basically have a hard sticky mess to try to dig through.  I almost think it would of been easier digging through concrete.  All in all it took us about 9 hours to get the leak dug out and repaired.  What a mess.  I was sort of surprised the following morning when I could actually move.  I figured the arthritis would be hollering at me but I actually felt pretty good.  Tom was a bit more on the sore side than I was.  Guess I am not as out of shape as I thought I was. :)  Makes me feel pretty good to think I can still keep up with a kid 12 years younger.
  We have a mess on the yard right now.  For some reason the skunk that has been a part of this complex for the last 7 plus years has decided to tear up the lawn for some reason.  This is the first time he has done anything like this.  As far as we can tell he is after worms and grubs.  Sure has made a mess of the lawn though.   We are having more bear sightings down in the valleys.  The game wardens have said that they are coming down to get as much food as they can because they know it is going to be a "cold" winter.  I heard that not to far from here an old man was heading to town and hit a 400 lb bear in the road.   And several of them have been sighted around Ashland. About 45 miles from here.  By all the signs that mother nature is giving it might be an interesting winter here.   Anyone for shoveling snow?

Pictures of Mom and Dad in their early years

This is a old Photo of my Dad.  By looking at it I would guess this to be sometime shortly after my parents were married.  It appears that he was backfilling around a house that they had just built.  But I have no idea where the house is located.

When I went over to look after Mom the other night she had been going through some of her pictures and had this one of her wedding announcement.  I borrowed the newspaper clipping long enough to make a scan of it then gave the original back to her.  This piece of newspaper is over 55 years old.  I think she was surprised to find it.

What a beautiful evening

 Looking West from our Property 

This is looking west from the Fred Meyer parking lot

I took my Mom to the store this evening and when we came out to go home this is the site that greeted us.  I know the pictures are not very good. And they do not show all the brilliant colors in the night sky.
But I took them with my new cell phone.  We are now on the ATT network for our phones.  Grandma got a little green one with the slide out keyboard and touch screen so she is happy.   Hoping that I can get back into keeping this blog updated better.  I know it has been awhile.  And I won't make any excuses for it.