Canada Geese

Glenn and I are in a raft floating down Soda Creek that flows into Sparks Lake. Glenn commented to me about the one bird we saw that was alone and away from the rest of the birds when I looked it up I found that answer:

In a gaggle of geese why does there always seem to be one who is the outcast?
In: Wild Animals

he is the looker. He or she is looking for danger to keep the flock safe.

Here we are approaching the gaggle of geese in our raft with our favorite mountain Broken Top in the back ground.

Here is some more on the other side of our raft with the South Sister in the back ground.
The geese are moving away from us, if only I could hold this momment in my thoughts it was amazing to watch. Here we are getting to close for their comfort some walked off and others took off into flieght then circled around and came back. Amazing sight to see. You should get a raft and give it a try you will be please with the outcome. The only problem is the creek will be only a trickle in about 2 weeks, the snow melt will slow and soda creek will not be the raging 6 to 8 foot wide creek that flows quickly and smoothly both at the same time.

Happy Anniversary Glenn!

Happy Anniversary To My Husband Glenn!

May we keep having the time of our lives. May we keep enjoying each others company. May we keep up what ever it is we are doing to keep our marriage alive and well as the day it started in July of 2001.

FEET of Camping Chapter VI

When you are on a camping trip for 5 days there are things that seems so important and you want to make sure and record. The one topic I picked is FEET, there were multiple times I laugh to myself and also out loud when I was looking at one of my fellow campers feet either because what they were wearing or how they were standing, walking or washing their feet was funny to me. It seemed that the later it got into the night the funner FEET got. The photos displayed below are only some of the examples I saw or it was the times I had my camera in hand. So here you go: The FEET of Camping!


As for my feet they seem to get very dirty with the daily life of camping. It did seem that right after you cleaned your feet they were dirty again, but it was so hot I enjoyed the cool water.

Try standing like this, not as easy at it looks, I think you have to be standing in red dirt after a drink, have tennis shoes on with it looks like no socks, what do you think.

It was late at night and these guys were doing the "standing by the fire stance", I guess...

Final Chapter: A Day in a Life of a Camper! Chapter VII

Family Garden

The sunflower patch! These sunflowers are all volunteer from last year so I can't wait to see how they will do, they should get to at least 6-7 ft tall. The zucchini plants! We always have way to much zucchini last year we ended up putting most of them out by the road in a wagon with a free sign. They were gone by the next day. The yellow you see in the zucchini plant is the flower that produces the zucchini some people eat them, the flower can be put in salad or sauteed and served as a vegetable.
Close up of the zucchini flower it lasts about 5 days. pretty isn't it.

The three hop plants Glenn got from Amanda on Fathers Day, and boy have they grown. Glenn moved the hops to our patio and they are growing up to the roof, this is very exciting to watch.
This is the trellis I got for Mothers Day the trellis is the entry into our garden area, it makes a great hanging basket holder also. I like to put baskets together I am not really very good at it but I am getting better. I have to put the baskets up high out of the deer reach.
We have grapes and 2 other vines (I can't remember what they are) growing up the trellis, I really can't wait to see if they make it through the winter.
More wild flowers.

The Family Garden looking from our house, corn, sunflowers, beans, zucchini, tomatoes and peas. Oh yes and wild flowers to enjoy. The corn is coming along and should be ready by early October. I know there is a lot of weeds but it is hard to work full time and keep up with the weeding so I hope the plants will get big enough to hide them shortly. Glenn is real good about running the rototiller on his day off to keep the weeds down next to the plants but they like to come up anywhere they can. I have toyed with putting down the fabric netting you can get that keeps the weeds out but I really haven't heard how well it works, can anybody tell me?
Here is the wild flower patch it is just beautiful.
Glenn is trying something new with the tomatoes since we get a lot of them on the vines but they are still green when the nights grow cold, since they need the sun and warmer nights to turn red, that didn't happen. So this year he used these towers filled with water that is suppose to keep the root system warm so the tomatoes with ripen. We will have to be patent and wait to see what happens. Yeah! maybe we will have our own red ripe tomatoes.

The sun has been good to the garden and this year could be a bountiful year. Gardening in Central Oregon is a challenge and I get frustrated easily with it but I am learning with Glenn's help how to get the best out of each plant we grow.

Next post: The Feet of the campground

Chapter VI

Family Jeeps Chapter V

My Husband and I both have Jeeps, Glenn bought his Jeep in 2005 and approx. 2 months later I got mine. His looked like he was having so much fun I wanted one of my own. We are not "rock hoppers" by any means but we do like to take our Jeeps off road, I know that Glenn tests the capability of his Jeep more then I do mine but I guess that is why they are "trail rated" isn't it.
The 1st sight of sun Glenn has the top off his wrangler and it stays like that until fall. During this trip Glenn took the doors off and put down the windshield we all liked to ride the mountain roads with the wrangler like this.

Lisa and I took some time in the liberty (my jeep), and went through the mountains on a make shift road that lead to no where, it was pretty exciting to be on a trail and not know where you would end up. Honestly I think we were on the back side of our camp but I will never know because we couldn't see through the forest and it was fun anyways. Glenn likes it when people like to ride in his jeep, Lisa and Paul's kids are always the 1st to get in if Glenn is going to ride up the hill side they even have different areas named where they have been. I will not mention the names at this time, but you won't see me going to the "killing fields" any time soon!


See Emily on the right, she is in the back seat holding her cell phone and bullets???

Below is Emily again holding on with her Dad looking to see where the next tree is and what is Glenn doing sleeping I thought he was driving????

I thought they were going to run over our tiki torches but they missed them ...

Off they go until the next time, and I am sure now is not soon enough.

Exploring the mountains in a JEEP!

It doesn't get any better then that!

Happy Birthday!!

Monica Happy 15Th Birthday to you!
Monica's birthday breakfast..

I made the pancakes and cut up the strawberry's, Monica decorated her pancake. I wish you another happy 15 years and more!

Wild Flowers Chapter IV

During our camping trip to the Ochoco Mountains we were able to enjoy the wild flowers. One has to remember with wild flowers their life span could possibly be just one day to maybe even just hours so while I was there I tried to enjoy all I saw. Next time I will be taking a wild flower book so I can identify them. These photos are just a snapshot of what I got to see in real life but the photos are still enjoyable to look at. Wild mountain rose bloomed the day we left, hundreds of buds still waiting to bloom when I took this photo.
Morning Glory likes to be cradled in the rocks, they have a hint of pink on the outer edges of the petals, you can hardly see it in the photo.
This blue flower is small and weed/sagebrush like. As you can see they also like rocks and they were in the gravel all over the mountain roads.

This is a field of pink blossoms, they were everywhere, covering as much dirt as they could. You have to wonder how in the world do they make it without water, I probably asked my camping partner 100 times that same question, she would just shake her head and wonder also. I got her into taking as many photos as I did, I hope she enjoys them as much as I do.
Oh My Gosh! Daisy's and Grass what a great combo. Seeing this sight made you want to run through it just like in the movies. BREATH TAKING!
Yellow Daisy's and red dirt what a great contrast.
*Indian paint brush*

That is all that needs to be said about this flower :)



It is hard to not take the time you spend somewhere for granted. I thought about these flowers alot last night when I got home from work, I then realized I wanted "wild flowers" to be the next chapter of my vacation. Here is why, a Lady I work with says to me "I can't wait for Saturday", I knew she had it off so I asked her what she was doing? She tells me that she is going on a Guided wild flower hike in the Ochoco Mountain Range for 6 hours. I thought to myself I just spent 5 days there and there is someone out there that gives guided trips to talk and look at the wild flowers for a job, WOW, I told her I just spent 5 days up there and she was really excited to talk about it some more but we got busy and that is where the conversation ended. When we left the store I told her to stop by the Ranger Station and get a brochure on the different kinds of wild flowers and by all means don't forget your camera. I guess I can consider myself lucky to have spent the time I did in this most incredible area of the State of Oregon!



next chapter: Our Family JEEPS!

Sparks Lake / Vacation Chapter III

Cold Water + Rafts + bugs singing in the night+ helicopters + fire fighters + Conversations with friends + mountains in the back ground = SPARKS LAKE!

Cold Water!

Smoke Jumpers landing their helicopter at Sparks Lake, while fighting a fire south of Bend. What an amazing task to watch, the helicopter also used their water bucket which we watch them fill out of Sparks Lake. Great entertainment!

Libby enjoying the evening sunset! The Jerkins Family Dog.

Paul making a proud hand jester to one of the Sisters Mountain and the rest of us not really paying any attention to him.




37 miles from home on Century Drive and you can camp at one of the most wonderful places, well that is if you like to raft in the lake, hear nothing at night except for the multiple calls from bugs, frogs, birds and what ever else you can identify. I woke up at about 3am and I wanted to call out for everything around me to be quite then I realized I was in their home land and who was I to ask them to quit singing their night time symphony.







There are no rafting photos because we did not want to get our cameras wet so next time we go I am going to buy a throw away water proof camera to capture the scenes from this adventure. If only I could show you Lisa's head bobbing up and down while she is in her raft paddling down one of the channels that flows into Sparks Lake. She looked like one of those carnival games when you hit the head when it pops up I still am laughing just writing about it. As for me I was in a raft with Glenn and by the end of our trip they were calling me Cleopatra, whats with that???

Monkey Face / Vacation Chapter II

Look close at the rock pillar and you see Monkey Face, at Smith Rocks Park.

Smith Rocks in a great place to hike and watch people rock climb. I spent the afternoon hiking the trails with Glenn, Andrew and Debbie. Our goal was to hike to were we could see "Monkey Face", we completed our goal but not without watching rock climbers scale the mountain, walk by the sound of a rattle snake, become extremely warm, and just enjoy our surroundings.

Warning sign at the beginning of the trail head!

Andrew and Debbie right after hearing a rattle snake..

Glenn and I in a rock cave trying to cool off we are about 1/2 way into our hike.

I was so taken by this sage brush because the color from the green leaves and pink and white flowers made this plant look like wall paper from past. The photo doesn't really show you what I saw but trust me it was beautiful.

On our way home Glenn stopped at the local market at Smith Rocks where they have been serving Huckleberry Ice Cream since I can remember. The ice cream was as great as I recall from so long ago. I think Glenn felt bad because after you hike the trails then you have to hike out of the canyon and it is up hill so I was challenged to say the least, it took me awhile to get out of the canyon but I did it. What you don't know is I came home and sat in my chair with a wet towel over my face trying to cool down. Debbie kept coming over to me asking me if I was going to be OK, of course I said yes but at the time I just wanted to die. Probably won't go back to smith rocks until its Fall time. I will end this chapter of my vacation with; it was nice to see you again Monkey Face and I hope to see you again in the Fall/Winter months.

2008 4th of July / Vacation Chapter I

Our 4Th of July weekend was the beginning of our vacation week. In my previous career I had 5 weeks of vacation and at times it made me stressed because it was so hard to take all 5 weeks and if you did not take them you loose them at the end of the year. I have change directions for the time being and I get 2 weeks and 5 days so my vacations are very special to me. Over the next few days I am going to log my journey of one of the best vacations I have had. The photo above is of Glenn's oldest Daughter's Family, Amanda and her Family walked in the 4Th of July Pet Parade in Bend and they were dressed up so festive. Amanda's Brother Micah joined her in the parade and also Amanda's Mom walked with them which made it a very special time for Lucy (granddaughter) since it was her 1st parade she has been in. I am sure there will be more to come.

After our barbecue we went to our good friends for some Karaoke, Glenn and Micah like to sing together and you know they are pretty good. They both put on a great stage show... Glenn's son Andrew plays one of Michael's guitars while we watch and enjoys his playing.



When not singing there is always a great game of pool going on. Our Family has and will still enjoy our time at Michael and Shelley's home, they are so good to us and really know how to have a good time. Happy 2008 4Th of July