another harvest

These August days are long and busy with the boiling canning pot going every day and my outdoor canning kitchen working overtime. The Lord has blessed us with abundance in our own garden and lots of local produce this season. In addition to canning our own garden surplus we've been busy picking from local farms and also lots of wild berries. Our food budget is way down this month as so much of what we're eating we've grown or raised ourselves. Just yesterday I embarrassed myself (and my kids!) by gleaning apples from a tree on public common ground in my friend's posh Portland neighborhood. Many apples were already rotting on the ground and apparently no one in that neighborhood cared much about picking or canning the tart apples. This morning while light rain fell outside the girls and I cooked those apples slowly over the stove top until they melted into a thick, delicious apple butter. Lunch was hot apple butter spread thick on homemade cinnamon raisin bread with scrambled eggs fresh from the coop out back. A few yellow pear tomatoes picked by West rounded out the meal. For me days spent like this and meals built from what we've grown or made ourselves is what makes life fulfilling, blissful and sweet.

A few weeks ago we signed up with Salem Harvest a great local organization that organizes harvests or "gleanings" of local farms that have a surplus of crops once the farmers are through harvesting. Volunteers from the organization like us come in a pick the leftover crops and get to keep half (for free!) and donate the other half to the local food share. It's a win-win and because we are in the valley where farms are everywhere there are harvest going almost everyday this month. Blueberries, plums, apples, cherries, and on it goes. Tonight we joined an apple harvest on a beautiful piece of land outside West Salem. While the sun set over the hills we laughed with fellow harvesters, the kids ran through the corn fields and Shane and I picked buckets and buckets of apples, about 200 pounds worth. Tomorrow I'll begin the process of making applesauce, apple pie filling, dried apples and more apple butter. I can hardly wait!

family vacation: camping in Manzanita (our favorite beach town)

summer in the valley

Our little town of Silverton is surrounded by miles of farmland on all sides. Whenever you leave town, no matter which way you go, you'll be driving past farm fields. Many of these fields are right now blooming with cover crops in bright colors like this purple field of Cosmos.

summer dresses for the girls

I had planned to make these dresses for Easter but just got around to finishing them. Mira actually made hers herself with some help from me and she entered it in the county fair where she won a blue ribbon. The fabric is a super lightweight voile from my favorite designer, Anna Maria Horner.

balloons over bend

A couple weeks ago we headed over the mountains for the annual Balloons Over Bend, a hot air balloon festival in our beloved Central Oregon. First we spent a wonderful day and night with Shane's mom and Darell and had fun swimming in their neighborhood pool, riding the four wheeler and hanging out together.

 After a night in Crooked River Ranch, we drove into Bend and hiked around Lava Lands and drove up to the top butte where we hiked around the perimeter of the lava butte. I'll admit I was a little nervous taking 5 little ones up there but they loved it and the view was spectacular. It was also very educational as we learned about volcanoes and various kinds of rock in the museum/information building.

 After leaving Lava Lands we were super hot and needed a treat so we drove to nearby Sunriver to get some ice cream and wander the shops. Here is West sharing his ice cream with Silas.

We next headed to a house we rented in Bend with our friends the Mulkey's for the weekend. Shane's parents met us for pizza dinner there and then the girls and I headed out to the night glow for the Balloons Over Bend festival.

 The next morning we got up at 5:30 am in order to go watch the hot air balloons get ready and although it was painful waking up five peacefully sleeping children we did and it was a lot of fun once we were up and there. Unfortunatly all the balloons were gone by 6:30 am and we were left with nothing to do at that hour except find the nearest bakery and get donuts!

Would you believe that the following morning we did the same thing and went to watch the balloons take off at 5 am?! We did! During our weekend in Bend we also had lots of fun walking around Drake Park, downtown, visiting the old fashioned candy shop and preparing big meals together at the rental house. Our friends that we went with also have two girls (one of their girls is named Tirzah!) and two boys just our boys ages.

The baby boys in their strollers in front of the candy shop; not old enough to know what they are missing.