daily yarns 'n more

a walk with the grandkids

Lauren was babysitting for Elaine's kids yesterday and the two oldest were a bit bored so Jim and I took them on a much needed walk with Sadie.

Jim gave Jared his walking stick to walk with. 

We saw some deer trails that lead down to the river.

I stopped to take a picture of a red-winged black bird.  Grandson Jared commented to Jim that he doesn't like these birds.  Jim knew why too....Jared compares the name to the Red Wings hockey team.

That's what you call a die-hard Black Hawks fan.

We brought some pieces of wood to throw into the water for Sadie to fetch.  She loves to swim out and get them.

Jared spied a frog along the edge of the lake.  Jim went to reach for it but came up with only a fist full of weeds.

We found some wild flowers to pick.

Both Kiirsti and Jared enjoyed the walk.  We did spy some interesting things along the way.

To see more photos head here to my photo blog.

another one married

The wedding was beautiful and went without any problems.  Talking to Kelli's mom, she said that planning the wedding went really smooth but she just knew something was bound to go wrong...But, from what I could see nothing did.  Everything was great and the food was wonderful.

Just some candid shots from the rehearsal and wedding.

Two of our granddaughters were the flower girls.

The groomsmen....

The brides attendants.

The wedding...

Meet Mr and Mrs.

These two did an awesome job...and they looked so beautiful in their dresses and their hair all fixed up like big girls.

Dan and the nieces posing for pictures...About 500 5 cameras were snapping away.

Telling secrets.

Time for our family to get their picture taken.  It takes some work to get us all together.  Julie did a great job taking the pictures.  Her photography is out of this world, and after checking out her blog for sometime now I finally got to meet her.

But, here we all are.  This is the first wedding in a very long time that all of us are together.

Now I'm off to get back to life here after a wonderful weekend.

You all have a great day.

eta:  I forgot to post this picture as well.  I thought it was too cute.  After I took this picture I saw Julie taking the exact same picture.

it wasn't easy getting them all to sit still

i thought I was going to be fine

And I was, really I was...That is until I dropped Dan off at the train station and I watched him walk away knowing that the next time he comes back home to our house he'll be a married man.

I remember the first time we brought him home from the hospital.  Everyone wanted to hold him...our 6th boy and 8th child.

Life for Dan was not easy being the tail end of 6 boys.  He took a lot of teasing because he was the youngest of the boys.

These two tho were like shirt and pants growing up.

Even together on his first day of school waiting at the neighbors for the bus to come.

Dan overcame a few obstacles growing up. 

When he was a freshman he made the Varsity High School hockey team with his brothers.  After only playing one game ended up crushing his talus bone in a freak accident that ended the season for him.  Dan lived on crutches for 6 months, not being able to bear any weight on the foot.  He overcame this and when he finally got to play hockey again he ended up being the all time leading scorer in only 3 playing seasons and still holds that record to this day. 

After graduation Dan left to live and work in Minnesota.  Life there brought a lot of changes in Dan.  He found that he was not little Dan anymore he was an independent Dan.  One who didn't have to follow after his older brothers any more.  There he became Dan.

Dan moved back home after being gone over a year.  Life for him started to settle down as he joined his brother and brother-in-law in the garage door business.  Soon we found out that he was "talking" to some girl from Michigan, whose name was Kelli. 

Hmmmm.....what's this?

Well Kelli and Dan became engaged after courting for some time.

I know that these two are going to do just fine in life.  And as long as they love each other and are together nothing could be better. 

I'm getting better, really I am.  I'm letting go, and I'm cutting the apron strings.  Dan went early, that is why I brought him to the train station so they won't have two cars in Michigan and to do what ever last minute wedding plans that needed to get done...But, in the car on the way Dan mentioned that his hair needed trimming up around the ears, that there are a few long pieces.  I said to him "that I could do it at the hotel".  Then I quickly said, "or maybe Kelli can trim it".    I then laughed and said "I guess I have to let go and let Kelli do things for you now".  We both chuckled at that.

I said all I could say here at the last wedding we had.

Life has lots of changes and even tho I might have a hard time with the changes I'm looking at the changes and seeing lots of good in them.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and I'll see you next week with some wedding photos.

i bet you could fry an egg on the sidewalk today

It is hot, hot, hot, outside today and the past few days.  I haven't been wanting to venture outside at all.  I went yesterday to check on the gardens and the sweat perspiration was starting to drip, and today proves to be no better.  At 8:40 a.m. this morning the temp is already 84°.

I have been trying to work on another baby blanket but it has been too hot to even pick it up.  I'm really excited as to how it's going and I can't wait to put it all together.

Talking to the neighbor last night about picking up our mail, he offered to look after Sadie while we are gone for the weekend.  I think instead of putting her in the kennel we are going to have him look after her.  He has 2 dogs already and Sadie just loves them.  He offered so we thought why not take him up on it and it helps to leave her with someone who adores her.  Not that the kennel doesn't do a good job, they do.

I still have a lot to do to get ready.  I hate leaving a messy house so I need to do some cleaning.  I still have to pack, which shouldn't take too long.  The list is long and time is flying by.

You all have a great day and try not to sweat perspire too much. 

i have lots to share today

My blog here is ready for the 4th of July.  I posted here that there might be some changes this year on my blog.  I'm going to every month change my blog look to fit the month, season or holiday...give or take a few days.  I also mentioned that I might do a give away.  Notice I said might?  I'm still working on that.  But, the blog look is in effect starting with the July 4th celebration.

The asparagus that we planted is already starting to really shoot up, even with the drowning it took.  We have counted at least 17 shoots coming out of the ground so far.  If we can get at least half of what we planted to grow we will be very happy.

A few people have wanted Jim's bread recipe.  I don't mind sharing it but it's a bit tricky to make.  You see, we grind our own wheat and roll our own oats to make bread, waffles, pancakes, oatmeal etc.  This is the post that I had done way back in 2007 of Jim's Basic Bread.

JIM'S BASIC BREAD

makes four one pound loaves

10-12 cups hard wheat berries
one cup rolled oats (optional)
one cup flaked wheat (optional)
4 cups very warm water
one-half cup olive oil
one half cup honey
one half cup applesauce
one Tbsp dough enhancer
one Tbsp wheat gluten (no gluten is o.k., but bread is a bit 'heavy')
two Tbsp SAF yeast
two Tbsp coarse salt

Grind wheat berries, roll the oats, flake some wheat.

Combine water, oil, honey, about half the flour, enhancer, gluten, and yeast. mix in Bosch machine on speed one for a minute. Let rise in Bosch machine about 16 minutes.

Add applesauce, a couple cups flour, oatmeal, flaked wheat, and salt. Mix at speed one, add flour
until sides of bowl are completely clean. If using flaked wheat and rolled oats, they will soak up lots of water while kneading, adjust as needed. Knead on speed one for 8 minutes.

Set dough in warm bowl to rise for 16 minutes. Cover with towel. punch down and let rise again for 16 minutes.

Divide into four loaves, put in pans and cover. Rise for 35 minutes.

Bake in top rack @ 350 for 27 minutes.

Remove from pans, set on rack and cover.

I was also asked by Sharyn once how does one find wheat berries and how do you grind them?

My answer is this:

He gets the wheat and oats from either a farmer or a health food store in Minnesota. Then he grinds them with a grinder called a "Whisper Mill". Here is a web site. www.nutritionlifestyles.com.  It's not really easy to find wheat around here. He does use the grinder and roller a lot. He makes oatmeal with oats for breakfast, pancakes and waffles with the wheat flour.

The reason he started to do this was because of health reasons. Eating processed white flour started to react badly for him. Since his dad and a grandfather are and were diabetic he decided to check into wheat and found that fresh ground wheat was far the best for not turning into sugar in your body. Hoping that he will prevent getting diabetes later in life.

I'm sure if you eliminate the dough enhancer and the gluten and use store bought wheat flour it should work just fine.  Let me know if you make it and if it works or not.

This is a crazy busy week.  We are leaving on Friday morning for Dan's wedding in Michigan.  I've been trying to wrap things up for this weekend.  Carri and her family are stopping by Thursday night instead of trying to drive all the way from Minnesota.  The same with Becky and Erin...but they will be riding with us there.  Sadie will be going to the kennel on Thursday afternoon.  I hate doing that, but any one who could watch her will be at the wedding.  So, I saved a nice bone for her and will give it to her when we get her back home.

I better get hopping...I have lots to do today.

The temps are starting to rise, so you all try to stay cool and have a great day.

momma and babies

I'm so glad I took my camera with me when I went running my errands today, otherwise I would have missed all the mommas out with their babies.

As I was taking pictures I spied these two who were keeping to themselves the whole time, were starting to get a bit agitated.

I wasn't sure what was going on quite yet.

Then I realized that one aggressive momma seemed to have it in for this baby and tried to give the baby colt a couple of good kicks.

Then the two mommas squared off with the aggressive mom who is on the right trying to give a few kicks to the baby's momma as well.

The momma had enough and went to go find her baby.

Trying to get herself in between her baby and the aggressive momma.

Off they went to the other side of the pasture keeping their distance from everyone.

Taking a look to see where the aggressive momma was and seeing that she was far away.

They both started to relax and began to graze...

but the baby colt kept close to her momma at all times.

While the aggressive momma looked on.

pretty busy right now

will be back later.

happy father's day

I would like to wish my dear hubby a

Happy Father's Day



I hope your day is relaxing as this is.



and...A Happy Father's day to my father and father in-law and to all the fathers who read my blog.

the storms...they came

Last night was bad...the skies started out like this.

After the rain and wind started I didn't take any more pictures.  I took out the candles and oil lamps on the chance that the power went out.  Jim decided to bake some bread before the weather got ugly.  The power went out during the rising of the dough...But, he's made this bread so often that he could just tell by the look when it had risen enough. 

So in between making the bread...Jim checked the basement for flooding (which BTW did) and trying to save the asparagus plants that were under water.  The river that flows through our yard during hard rains was so big that walking through the middle of it the water was over my boots. 

But through it all the bread turned out great.

Today brings a few things on the to do list...

*Getting the generator fixed for the next time the power goes out (we got lucky this time)
*Do some work on the asparagus patch.
*Call the strawberry farm to see if the fields are okay for picking.
*Make my menu for the week and grocery list.
*Go grocery shopping.

I know there's more on my to do list but right now these are at the top.

While we are trying to dry out over here I hope you all have a great weekend.