A Relaxing Day

Since we don't have quite enough farm animals yet, we got 5 baby turkeys Wednesday night. They are really cute now--hard to believe they will be big ugly birds in a few months! ~~Tasty though!~~ Currently they are living in the baby chick box with a heat light on my dining room table for awhile until they are a little bigger and can handle being in the pen outside. Ill work on getting some pictures of them and post them next time.
Goats are all good. We are in the process of weaning Lucy and Edmund from Dora, so we separate them at night. Everyone is reunited in the morning after we milk Dora. We have a friend and our neighbor are both interested in Edmund to use for breeding. So he'll go to one of them hopefully by next week. If our neighbor takes him, we are going to trade for one of her female goats. I still want to get 2 sheep to add to the mix. I want to learn how to spin wool, so one of my next things is to find a good spinning wheel. Too bad my mother in law doesn't live closer--I might have to steal hers! LOL
The garden is coming along. The strawberries; raspberries and onions are doing awesome!! There are also signs of the watermelon; crenshaw melons and squash. Tomatoes and peppers look horrible. I may just have to go to Home Depot and pick up several of their beautiful plants and then pop those babies in the ground. With all the rain and balmy warm weather we are having, the weeds we seriously beginning to encroach upon my plants. I spent about an hour out there this morning. I forgot what good exercise that is when you are picking up the big stuff and using a shovel! Who knows, I might get in shape yet!
Jeremy has been gone since yesterday to the other side of the mountains to finish up a bathroom he was doing now that their new cabinets are in. Looks like he will finish ahead of schedule and be able to come home late tonight! Then he will be working here in Okanogan/Omak for the next month, then back to Bellevue to work.
Jack is all signed up for swim lessons and starts on Monday! We are so excited for him. 5 is a big age around here: swim lessons; Awana; kindergarten; soccer----It will be so much fun to watch him develop this year!
We did our first orientation class to become foster parents last week. Now the mound of paper work begins.........by the time all is said and done, it should take 90-120 days to get licensed--sometimes sooner. We are really excited to see who God is going to put in our care!!
Well, it's snack time--we are going to have chocolate chip muffins and apple slices......YUM!!!

Party Week

Well, our "little" one is now 5!!!!

This was his 'magic' age--so he is feeling pretty good about himself currently. Of course this morning as I was brushing his teeth he told me that he is looking forward to being 6--

Last week, the Caldeira family came to visit for the week. The guys worked during the day, so the game plan was for Melissa and I to take them to the lake each day to wear them out--can you believe that we had terrible weather the whole time????? We did finally get sun on Saturday though-the day of the party. The kids seemed to have a good time playing and eating popsicles (though Jack ate enough popsicles for about 8 kids!). Clay and Veronica picked up Trevor on Friday and got here on Friday night.

We had a great party. We invited 2 other families, which made for LOTS of kids since we all have bigger families! We did a Transformer party and had a pinata. After the party, we all had a snack and headed to the lake. The Caldeira's left for home from the lake and after awhile, the rest of us headed home. We BBQ'd burgers and had another "friendly" game of Phase 10 with Clay and Veronica--I think I won this time! (sorry Clay!)

Also last week, my friend Martha had baby #4!!!!!!!!!! Kally Brooke got here on June 8! She is such a cutie and I can't wait to meet her!! Other big news--my newphew Chris turned 11; nephew Orion turned 6; my cousin, Roxanne's oldest, Cameron AND my bestest friend, Marnie's oldest, Kyle AND Trevor all graduated from high school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So many awesome and blessed stages of life!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Memorial Day Weekend

Memorial Day weekend was wonderful for the main fact that my husband was home!!! It was so wonderful to have him here and have another adult to talk to! :) Talked to Veronica yesterday and she had a wonderful birthday!! Next is Jack's birthday!!

Those of us following the 'camping' experience, I told Jeremy of the idea and vision for our retreat, and he LOVED the idea!! He is even willing to sleep in a tent outside and be our personal chef if we want! I told him that would be awesome, but he is not invited to hang out with us---he was totally ok with that!

On Saturday and Sunday we ended up planting what veggies we do have starts for in the garden: onions; tomatoes; lettuce; peppers. Then we went to Home Depot and I got 2 lavender plants and several varieties of pretty flowers. Don't ask me what kind they are, but they are orange, yellow, purple and a fun looking red one. While Jeremy was digging making new garden rows, I decided to go outside the front door and work on reclaiming the front dirt area from weeds. Normally I HATE pulling weeds--I mean you pull and pull and pull, turn around and you didn't even TOUCH the area you are working on! I decided to take my litttle shovel and draw a square in the dirt and only work on that section before moving onto the next. Then I realized why gardening is used as an analogy with the ways of God. Pulling weeds is hard and there is so many of them. But, like sin and the quest of making us more God-like, Jesus works on a small section of our life and pulls until it is clean. As weeds grow back in our life, He is patient to go back and pull again. Painful, stressful, annoying (there are a lot of little bugs in the air to discourage us from the task at hand)--yet in the end satisfying and beautiful! Lord, please give me peace and pleasure as I'm working in my garden; knowing that you are working on Yours............

Rain......

Rain, rain, rain, rain........Holy cow, I'm beginnig to think that I'm back in Seattle! It has not stopped raining for the last couple of days and it is still raining. We have received almost 2" of rain! Which is good for fire control over the summer and green fields and all.........I think I would of rather been snowed in during the winter so that I can be sitting at the lake right now!
Oh, well.
After my last post, I'm excited about everyone's responses to 'Camp Omak' @ Simkins Farm!
Everyone please keep this idea in prayer and also for everyone's personal situations to be able to come!!
Jeremy should be coming home late tonight!!! Except for a couple of days here and there he has been gone for 3 weeks and I'm so ready for him to be home!! Pray for his safety while driving back-like I said there has been a lot of rain and it is holiday weekend.
Veronica will be 22 on Monday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Isn't that crazy?????? She is loving married life! Jeremy took her present to her last night. There were 2 crock pot cookbooks she wanted, so he bought those for her. The gift bag was a cute reusable bag he found at Michaels for her. ----birthday season has officially started in our family!!!!!!

Camp Omak

Well, technically we should call it Camp Okanogan, since we don't technically live in Omak.......
Yes, a girl weekend. Only adults (and little babies, like Peaches). A weekend sometime in late spring/early summer of 2011. Those that are interested, please pray about this! I'm seeing eating yummy food; fellowship; a devotion each day; walks/hikes; maybe going to farmers market; eating.........

Today, Jack and I were going to head out to town for awhile, but a big wind and rain storm is currently going on, so I think we will put a fire in the wood stove and just be at home again today. We will try again tomorrow.
I've been working on putting things in the car that we simply do not need or use so that it can be donated. It's very exciting --my closet is getting bigger and bigger! :) Now I just need to go through the large pile of papers!

Have a blessed day!
2 Samuel 22:31
As for God, His way is perfect; The word of the Lord is proven; He is a shield to all who trust in Him.

Morning Exercise

Ok, those of you city girls will find my little adventure this morning pretty funny. So, I go out and give the goat their morning hay and grain. They are happy to see me (well, happy to see food!). I talk to them for a couple of minutes and move on. Then I let the big chickens out for their daily trek around the farm. Then, I look over at the pre-teen chicks and notice that their food is low, so I decide to be nice and feed them now instead of later this afternoon. As I walked into their pen, I notice that they are on the far end and I think, "how cute--they are exploring the area! i'll just get some hay for them to scratch in." I go get a bit of hay and as I toss the hay out to them, they all totally freak out---all kinds of noise and several of them climbing the fence wall! As I'm trying to comprehend all that is going on, I quickly discover that there is a small hole in the chicken wire at the back of the pen. Of course I notice this as one chicken got through the hole and is now looking at me quite confused on the OUTSIDE of the pen! Lovely......So out I go trying to catch this little girl, but to no avail. So as I'm giving up on her (because it is pretty much impossible to catch a chicken in the open by yourself) I notice that she ran towards some fencing by the garden and was sitting inside the rolled up fencing. So I did what any smart woman would do, I picked up the roll of fencing with the chicken trying to hide inside. Then I took one end of the roll and shoved it in the pen doorway and shook the roll of wire fencing until the chicken came out in the pen. The girls all huddled together with much stressful clucking over the matter. A total of 25 minutes later, I head back inside and promptly make a large cup of chai tea and sat on the couch!
Ah the glamorous farm life! As for my "Camp Omak" girls, maybe we can plan a little women's retreat up here Spring 2011????????????

"Man" Weekend

This was a big weekend. Our friends, Chris and Martha allowed their son, Eric to come and get out of the city and stay the weekend with us! It has been fun and exhausting for all!! Actually, I'm not really sure why I'm tired: the boys have been TOTALLY occupied with each other--I just throw them food! Since Jack is so busy with Eric, I've been trying to get as much misc. housework done. Jack and Eric have been running EVERYWHERE! They were 'hunting' the other morning for wild animals and bad guys; jumping on the trampoline; eating popsicles; playing with all the indoor toys! Eric has to leave early tomorrow morning to head home though........we will miss him!!!!!!!