SUMMER VISITORS

This has been such a beautiful summer!

OUTSIDE

we have pretty flowers to look at

INSIDE

we have pretty "girls" to look at!

We loved having Sarah and Julie and their families come

for the 4th of July.

Again, sweet faces INSIDE

and OUTSIDE!

We took some day trips to the beach (did not get those pictures)

and to Flores Lake to watch the para-sailers.

THEN HERE COME THE BAKERS!

When did Ryan get so tall?

When did Bryce get so cute? (at birth!)

Little Baker boys love Little Bear!

And someone loves picking flowers.

Cape Blanco Lighthouse was a highlight of the trip.

The BEACH was the biggest highlight, but once again I did not get

any pictures while we were buliding sand castles!!!

After all the company was gone I was forced to take

pictures of some of the "characters" in Port Orford.

It seems everyone here loves summer!

For the EXCITING CONVERTIBLE picture

see Laurel's blog!!!

LIFE'S LITTLE SURPRISES!

When we came home from our trip we had a few surprises!

Our Little Bear . . .

 (who is supposed to have two standing up ears as he grows up)

has matured into one ear up and one ear down.

This is a big moment for a Schipperkee,  kind of like a new tooth for a baby. 

Then another surprise when we arrived home was a phone message

telling me that we had won a raffle that Dad had bought tickets for.

Does someone really win those things?

There were so many items from different merchants in Langlois

and gift certificates too!

There was a gift certificate for $100.00 to the nicest restaurant in Port Orford.

 (Which is about as nice as a regular restaurant anywhere else!)

The best gift was a chair!  It is actually called a

"DREAM CRADLE"

and has a fable which says that anyone who sits in the chair

is carried away to a beautiful magical tree where their dreams come true.

My favorite of all the "treasures" is a yellow afghan.

It is much prettier than this picture.

It is soft and warm and yellow! (My favorite color.)

Speaking of yellow, another surprise we discovered after our trip

was how much our grass had grown.  I don't want Dad to cut it

because it is full of little yellow flowers.

While planning this post I noticed that our little bear was awfully quiet.

WHERE COULD HE BE?

Fast asleep on the stairs.
Life is full of surprises!

OUR SWEETEST GIFTS!

On the road again  . . .

We "hit the road" in May to visit our kids in Arizona.  We traveled through

Nevada and California (Mount Shasta above) and finally reached the beautiful desert.

The first sweet face we saw was little Cardon.

Seeing our Julie again was wonderful! (Rusty too!)

We loved getting to know "Cardy" and holding him.

I loved taking him for morning walks.

(WE ARE BONDED FOR LIFE!)

Then we were blessed to be in Arizona when John and Tiffany's

new baby Jace was born.

Kaylee loved her little brother right away.

JACE ...a sweet gift to Grandma and Grandpa!

Here is another sweet gift...ALICE!

What could be more beautiful?

Does she look like her Dad? Does she look like her Mom?

YEP!

We had to pull ourselves away from these cute babies

to visit Val and her family in Delta Colorado.

It is so very beautiful there!  They live on a "mesa" with

a beautiful view of the mountains.

Eva lives right next door to Val and Dan. 

This is her cute little house.

This is her cute man...and this is her cute little Ella.

Ella loves garage sales and stuffed animals and her

great uncle Jeff and "Auntie Nancy".

We had such a wonderful time in Colorado.

We hated to leave such a beautiful place.

Even the cemetery was beautiful.  Dad found his favorite

flowers growing...LILACS.

Don't tell anyone...we stole some from the cemetery.

After a few wonderful days with Val we headed back to Arizona

to see some more beautiful faces.

After we said "goodbye" to Julie and Rusty and

Tim and Katy and John and Tiffany (and their very cute babies)

we headed to Flagstaff to visit with Amy and Wade and their kids.

What could be cuter than twins who love to be busy

INDOORS AND OUT?

I think Matthew would have picked flowers all day.

Liam and Abby have grown so much.

They were so much fun to spend those few hours with.

VERY FUN INDEED!

After a visit with Wade and Amy (which was much too short)

we headed "home".  All of the heart wrenching "Goodbyes" were almost

too much for this Grandma and Grandpa.

Only one thing kept a smile on our faces and helped our aching hearts...
knowing who was waiting for our return!

DOGS, KIDS, AND MOVING TRUCKS !

Well, actually I did not get a picture of the moving truck!

Wendy and Jose are moving back to Texas.

(I think Jose is a Texan at heart!)

So, Sarah and David came down for the weekend to say their goodbyes.The kids had so much fun with "LITTLE BEAR!

R. J. and Joan brought their Sckipperkee puppies over too!
This one is R. J's puppy called "DIETERS".

Yep, he looks just like Little Bear and so does Joan's puppy "URSA".

On Wednesday we went to help with the loading of the U-Haul.

My job seemed to be taking pictures and spending time with

Jazi while she "took care of" Little Bear.

Wendy had a little break from her work to "bond" with R.J. and Deiters.

R.J. brought his two dogs, Sarah had left Lucky for Wendy to take to Josie,

Wendy had her two dogs and we brought Little Bear.

Then some of the people from the Bandon Branch

came to help and brought their dogs! At one point there were

N-I-N-E D-O-G-S

at Wendy and Jose's house. You can imagine how much work it was

to keep track of children and dogs. What fun!!!!!!

Grandpa did find a quiet moment to have a chat with Sam.

We will miss these grandchildren so much! Josh gave us a sketch (he made with chalk) of a beautiful hay field on a sunny day.

What a treasure! It is now in our guest room waiting for company to come and admire it. After a long and heart-wrenching day we headed home and "crashed".

(Physically and emotionally.) This little guy had seen enough of dogs, kids and moving trucks!

INTRODUCING . . .

LITTLE BEAR !Yep, our family grew a little bit today.

This is our new little Skipperkee puppy.

He doesn't yet love riding in the car

but he loves being outside in the grass.

His mother was not very pleased to see him
being held. She certainly did not like
seeing him go out the gate.
Little Bear likes Dad already. When we went to pick
out a puppy, Little Bear went right up to Dad
and just sat there by his feet.
(Dad was smitten in one minute!)

He wants to play outside all day.



Come on little grandkids . .

. . . Little Bear needs someone to play with!

What a sweet little addition to our home!

We had to change his name from Chewey to Little Bear.

(He just looks so much like a little black bear!)

JUST ONE PICTURE . . .

I have not been blogging lately because I have not remembered to

take pictures much recently. This morning I was looking

at some blogs and I realized that it doesn't take

too many pictures to express one's feelings!Perhaps just one picture of beautiful flowers

given to me by a friend can show my joy in flowers.

(...and my love for everything yellow!)

Certainly one picture of the smile of one granddaughter can reflect the love I have for that sweet little girl and for all of her siblings and cousins too.

(We ran into Wendy on a trip to Walmart with R.J. ... it is such a small world here

on the Oregon Coast.)

Just a few pictures can bring back fond memories of a trip to see Sarah and her family in Portland. The trees were just starting to show spring buds and Portland was covered with white and pink blossoms everywhere. The trouble was that as soon as I took the picture of our Subway cups, my camera battery died. (Of course, the charger was at home.) Just one picture can remind me of how cold and windy this spring has been. However, the ocean looks beautiful in every season, especially at sunset.

H-E-L-P! I have tried to single space this blog page three times

and it always moves itself to double or triple spacing.

Any one know how to fix this?