Lavender Farm

I'd read about a lavender farm outside of Walla Walla (about an hour away) and wanted to go to it this year before all the lavender was gone. So we went today since Alan had the day off. It was very nice! It's called Blue Mountain Lavender Farm and they have a ton of lavender that you can pick, plus plants you can buy and sachets and dried lavender, all sorts of wonderful things!


After the lavender farm, we drove to Hat Rock and then to McNary Dam to see the fish running. Not any great pictures of the fish, but here's a couple of Hat Rock and one of the viewing area.

Wordless Wednesday

Spencer's Rash

And in other news, Spencer has a weird rash that broke out yesterday. He was grumpy all day, finally after his shower he came out and said he had a weird bumpy rash. I sent Alan to the store for Benadryl and cortisone cream (yeah, bent the Sabbath a bit there but we had no liquid Benadryl and Spencer can't swallow pills yet). It looks a bit better today, but here are a couple of pics of how it looked last night.

Organized Linen Closet

I love the organized linen closet! Kudos to Sarah and Spencer for doing this on Saturday for me. Kids can be GREAT when they're in a helping mood, LOL! Here's a couple pictures of the nice, organized closet. Still a lot of stuff in there, but the closet is VERY small, so we're stuck.


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Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson died. Wow. I am almost his age (well, give me a couple of years). Alan's older than MJ. Kind of freaky when your generation starts dying off. I have to confess, I didn't love MJ's lifestyle or personality, but his music was terrific. Thriller, Beat It, Billie Jean ... too many more to mention. It's just a sad thing.

Dentist Followup

I went back to the dentist yesterday and they filled the tooth that had the root canal. Apparently the endodontist put in some packing or something, and the dentist took that out and filled it like a regular filling. I will have to get a new crown on that tooth; that crown is 7 years old and with the drilling and such will probably not last too much longer. So I went ahead and scheduled that for September, after the kids are back in school (assuming I'm not working). I really hope that I can stay home and get some home-based earning going on this summer and fall. I so do not want to go back to an office environment, but I think that's where my best money would be if I do have to go back to work. Sigh.

Apollo the patient cat

AAnd just for kicks, here's a picture of Apollo enduring the indignity of having Spencer put string around him. LOL. He's a very long-suffering cat. Ignore the weedy backyard, if you can see it. Well, now you know it's weedy even if you can't see it! Forget I said that!

Spencer left for a two-night scout camp tonight. They're going to Trout Lake, near Mount Adams. *Sniff.* First time he's been gone more than one night, and those have pretty much been to a grandma's or a friend's in town. I'm not sure how many boys are going; there were about 5-6 that I know for sure were going to be othere, including Mark, my niece's son. When we pulled up, Mark said he was claiming Spencer for his tent, because it's a two-person tent and Spencer's skinny. LOL. Here are some pictures from the packing up of the trailer at the Shannon's house. Mark is in the second picture with Spencer. The dog is the Shannon's, named Bogus. Cute, huh?

We had chicken enchiladas tonight for dinner. I found a couple of recipes that looked interesting but I didn't 100% like either of them, so I took what I thought would work from each one. Here's what I came up with, if anybody's interested.

Chicken Enchiladas

2 cups cooked chicken, chopped or shredded finely
1 can refried beans
1 pkg cream cheese
1 cup salsa

Put the above ingredients into a saucepan or frying pan, melting the cream cheese and blending together. When well-blended, put filling mixture into a 9x13 pan that has a layer of flour tortillas on the bottom. Top with more flour tortillas, grated cheese, and bake until cheese is melted, about 15-20 minutes at 350 F.

Pretty easy, huh?

Okay, I have a confession. Well, a couple. I am addicted to Fox News. There, I said it. Sue me. LOL. I love Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly, and Sean Hannity. I referred to them in an email today as my Trinity. In fact, I just bought Glenn Beck's newest book, "Common Sense", that just came out TODAY! I didn't even wait to go to Costco. Bought it at Walmart.

Second confession. I love trashy novels. I said it. My favorites right now are the "In Death" series by J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts). Love 'em! They are a fast read, but interesting, and I decided to start at the beginning to see how the relationship between Eve Dallas and her husband Roarke has progressed over the series, as well as how the other featured characters grow. I just really have liked this series, in spite of some rough language, and I am saying I think it's fine! I look at blogs that list all these esoteric books that the bloggers read, and I think REALLY? What ELSE have you read that you're not putting on the list because you think it's too trashy or political or whatever? There. I said it. It is that kind of day, I guess. Having a root canal will do that to you!

Here are the performances!

The kid had their piano recital today. Shirley does such a great job with her students! Sarah played Fur Elise, and Spencer played the theme from Stargate SG-1. I recorded their songs with the camera, and of course took pictures!

I think I wrote that we went to 3 Margaritas for dinner after Monday's jury duty marathon. We had a good time. Spencer sat by me (sometimes he loves his Mom), and Sarah sat with Alan. The boys are shaggy in this picture, but they did go for haircuts after dinner.

I had to report for jury duty Monday. Ick. I believe in serving and all that, but really. The juror assembly room was at least 80 degrees, and humid, and stuffy, and full of 100 or so hot, cranky people. (Me included.) I woke up with a tired headache (Alan decided to spend half the night rolling around and making the bed move like it was in an earthquake. I love him, but he can be really restless some nights and I wish for another bed for me! Sigh.), and my IBS was beginning to show signs of acting up, so it wasn't an auspicious start to the day. But after 3+ hours, getting the enviable #47 (not my age anymore), and being told to go to lunch and report back at 1 pm, I got to go home to my nice air conditioned house. I was a little bit frantic because I hadn't heard from Alan and didn't know what his work schedule was yet, so I didn't know if I had to rearrange kid pickup or not. Finally talked to him, he had run Sarah's keys up to Kamiakin for her, and Emily (bless her!) had texted her mom and made arrangements for them to give Sarah and Spencer rides home. Bless Susan! Long story short, things worked out fine. No drama after school today so Sarah and Spencer entertained themselves until I got home around 4-4:15 ish. I was hot, tired, cranky, still had a mega headache, and took an hour's nap. Alan got home and then around 6 we went to 3 Margaritas for dinner. I like that place. Family friendly, the meals are reasonably sized and priced, and best of all Spencer ate ALL of his cheese quesadilla! Proof I went to the courthouse follows.

I don't really have anything to post about. Just thought I would post for a change more than once a week/month. LOL. We're watching So You Think You Can Dance and I'm shaking my head at some of the dancing!

I did learn something new this week. I learned to put videos on my iPod Nano. Woo-HOO! Love learning new stuff like this. I refuse to let technology defeat me.

Since I got Easter pictures up, thought I'd better do Mother's Day as well. We went to Gma Noakes's house and Alan fixed lasagna for dinner. Mom went to Diane & Sam's, so after we were done at Gma Noakes's we went over to Mom's and gave her a card and hugs from the grandkids!

I haven't posted Easter pictures yet (sigh), so here they are. First off, DH and I. Aren't we handsome and gorgiferous? (LOL) Then, we have Sarah and Spencer. At least they don't act like they hate each other.

Next is a picture of Sarah and me, and then Spencer and Alan. This was just after Spencer's birthday (he turned 12), so he was ordained to the Aaronic priesthood on this day. *Sniff.* We went to Diane and Sam's for Easter dinner, and got to spend some nice time with them. We didn't do an egg hunt this year, and nobody seemed to miss it. Well, Sarah did mention it, and did a fake pout when I said she was too old for it, but other than that nobody cared much!

(You know, I really hate it when pictures don't go in the order I put them in the silly post! ARGH! The picture of Alan and I should be first, but it decided to go in second. Go figure.)

I have to confess, I didn't see ALL of General Conference. I did see 80+% of it, though, and it was wonderful. I DVR'd all the sessions, so I am going to go back and watch the talks that I missed. I am so glad that we have this opportunity to hear from our prophet and apostles and others in leadership positions in the church. The Gospel is so important, and I take it for granted so often. It's something I'm trying to resolve to be better about!

Xina from HNH Family sent this great website the other day. It lets you make "motivational posters" using your own words and photos. I made a couple for the kidlets. The site is http://www.bighugelabs.com/flickr/motivator.php . It was fun!

I rediscovered a great site today. http://www.ldschurchtemples.com/ This site tracks the construction of LDS temples worldwide. The big news is that the Vancouver British Columbia temple got its Angel Moroni yesterday. Wonderful! I had forgotten there was a temple being built in B.C. Cool.