Come On In

Come on in, it's been a awhile.  We'll get all caught up on life at the Stone House.

 Last post I shared my blog book, today I'd like to share my instagram books.  I found out about these little gems on Dear Lizzy.  Sixty instagram photos per book, you may edit, choose your cover, and give books a title.  I used @tamraraery On Instrgram.  Not very creative but that is what it is.  The books are $6 each and I am now set up to automatically receive my next book when I hit 60 more instagrams.  I think I'm at 36+ now so it will be a bit.  But when I do, they will notify me to edit and then book will arrive by mail.  

Who doesn't love some happy mail?

 These little books will be nice for me to take to the old folks home.  A small basket of books by my rocker to flip though and get nostalgic with someday.

 Yes, it adds a date at the top of the page, yes, it prints in chronological order and yes, it prints your caption and hash tags.  The app for your phone is called chatbooks and it is a free app.  Shipping is also free.  That's a lot of free!

 I spent a day cleaning appliances for the '57 Aloha last week.  The bottom heat shield in the oven was written off as garbage but I scrubbed and scrubbed and it is once again shiny and silver.

 Hubby got the trailer base cleaned up, removed the rust and painted it.

 He also worked on the new floor.

At the end of the afternoon we were feeling pretty good about our accomplishments.  I went into the house to get some ice water for us when the phone rang.

We got a call from Max, he had an accident.  A large tire blew as he was adding air.  He was taken to Urgent Care and treated there.  The gashes on his chest were pretty nasty. The air ripped his shirt and skin off.   I'm not including photos cuz it'd give you a sick stomach.  He temporarily lost his hearing and he permanently lost some skin but he's okay.  It shook him up but the guys working with him were even more upset.  They could not find him because of the dust from the explosion.  The disc (I found it spelled disc and disk)  machine was new this year and the tire had less air than the others so they aren't sure why this happened.  We are so thankful Max is healing and is going to be fine, it could have been so much worse.

So, I laid awake Monday night wondering if they'd really checked him for internal bleeding, cuz I'm the Mom, that's why...  But it's all good now.

 We are loving the garden produce that comes with August.  And we had a few cooler days for walking.  I was trying to balance out the fair food last week.

 Hubby and I spend our evenings on the patio soaking up the last of summer nights.

 Karen and I spent a day in Anacortes shopping and lunching.  We had lunch at Girl'd Cheese, which I highly recommend.  Your grilled cheese sandwich comes with homemade tomato basil soup for dipping.  We shopped in the antique stores and at Pearl Buttons.  A fun girl's day out.

 Shelly and I worked at the Tough Enough to Wear Pink booth at the NNW Fair on rodeo night.  Of course, we had more fun than should be allowed.  We pretty much had a class reunion at the Fair, including Audrey Doesburg!

 Saturday evening we went to the fair and saw Collective Soul in concert.  Thanks Dor!  We went with Mark and Karen.  Braden dropped us off and picked us up at the gate so we didn't have to find parking.  All we had to do was bring him home a plate of poffertjes.  It was a fun night and a great show.

 I love a baked potato at the fair. And I got a new potato cookbook form Farm Friends.  That always makes my fair experience complete.

I think we are all caught up.  This week I need to dust, vacuum and start cutting back in the flower beds.   August is dry and dusty and my house looks it.   

The last two weeks of August are the fastest weeks of the year.  Enjoy!  

Volume Four

 While there may be several reasons why I have maintained my blog one of the big ones is Blurb.  Blurb is a company with software that  slurps  the blog, has editing tools, and then prints the blog into a hard cover book.

 Volume IV of  The Lady in the Stone House  arrived this week.  I don't change the writing or content but I do use the editing to arrange and resize the photos with each post.  I keep some photos fairly small to keep the book size reasonable.  I usually slurp about a year and a half per book.  My next slurp will begin April 2013.  I choose my end date based on number of posts and events in my life.

It's rewarding to get the blog in print and for someone that doesn't scrap book it is a nice alternative.

Can anyone buy a copy?  Yes, but my books run between $95 to $125 per copy.  So, you may want to think that through and just read it online.

By the way Blurb doesn't pay me to mention them on my blog.  

No one pays me anything, ever, to write this blog.

A Long and Rambling Post

Last week Hubby went to Eastern Washington and brought home three boxes of peaches.  I've been eating peaches for every meal and freezing tray after tray of peaches for winter.  They are delicious.  And they were ripening fast.  So, though Hubby had just been there and though I really needed to stay home and freeze peaches we took off for Eastern Washington on Thursday evening.  Hubby had found a source for appliances for the '57 Aloha on his last visit and the seller was ready.  We looked at the calendar and decided we should make a quick trip.

 We left after work Thursday evening and once we were on the road we realized that DOT is blasting on top of Snoqualmie Pass, at eight p.m.  We decided to try to beat the clock and get over the pass before eight.  This meant no stop for dinner, pray for no traffic and GO!

Once we were past the blasting area we started to think about dinner.  We drove through Cle Elum and didn't find anything that looked good.  We like to take the back roads to Ellensburg, it's a gorgeous drive.  When we got to the Red Horse Diner we were hungry.  But it was worth the wait.  It's a great little diner filled with memorabilia and it has yummy burgers.

 We tried their local IPA and it was a winner.

 Anytime I can watch beef cattle grazing, I'm pretty happy.  We finally got to George, visited a bit and went to bed.

 Friday morning we had coffee with Hubby's Mom and then went to do some picking and harvesting.  Okay, so the trailer doesn't look like much.  It's going to become a duck blind so that is why the appliances could be sold to us.

I didn't realize that we were getting a sink too.  I did a happy dance.  It's all cleaned up now and the pump works.

 The ice box still had its instruction manual inside.  Squeal!

We got everything in the Element, went back to the farm, showered, took Mom for lunch and then hit the road.  Since we still had a little room in the Element we stopped in Thorp and bought peaches for my folks and one more box for us.

We took I-90 all the way into Seattle, where we met Sam and Angela for dinner.  We went to Vons 1000 Spirits on First Ave.  I took one lousy pic.  It was fun to be downtown on the Friday night of Seafair with all of the Coast Guard and Navy guys walking around in their dress uniforms.  We had a nice visit with Sam and Angela and then drove home.

 The sunset on Friday evening was crazy gorgeous so it was a pretty drive.

 I was looking at Pinterest on the way home too.  Ooh, I can not wait to decorate the '57 Aloha.  Peaches!

 Millions of peaches, peaches for me.  Peel, slice, freeze on a tray, break up and bag them, repeat...

 We had a rustic peach tart on Saturday evening.

 And the figs are ripe so I need to make fig jam.

 If you want some figs, send me a message.  They are particularly nice this year.  It is a u-pick situation.

I'm off to clean my new stove and ice box and yes, freeze more peaches.  It's just peachy here!

Permission to Board Granted

**imagine music

Chris invited her junkin' friends on a final cruise.  The Renewal has been sold but before the new owners cruise off into the sunset, Chris wanted to leave the dock with her friends.  I'm perfectly content to stay secured to the dock but no, not Chris.  She's crazy like that...

I took my motion sickness meds, separated my mind from my body, reread boating etiquette 101, said my prayers, said my good byes, and we lifted anchor. 

After asking permission to board, we were waiting for all passengers to board and I grilled Captain Paul on his education and experiences as a captain.  He told me that he had a copy of  Captaining for Dummies on board.  I asked about his experience as a Coast Guard, he told me he tried that but flunked out.  Excuse me, Captain, that isn't funny!  He's actually a very capable captain, with a good sense of humor.

While I scoped out the emergency life raft and fire extinguishers and questioned our captain, Chris set up a lovely sunset dinner in the galley.

 It was calm, sunny and still for our sunset cruise.  I kept one eye on the horizon and was just fine.  We had dinner on the upper deck after enjoying a drink and appetizers in the main saloon.

 T'was gorgeous scenery and delicious food and drinks with my junkin' friends.

The sunset was beautiful.  It's hard to capture just how beautiful on a phone camera so you'll just have to trust me.

 The captain was called upon for collateral duty as photographer.  Paul was busy with captain duties on the bridge or cockpit up on the helm, and was a good sport on a boat full of crazy.  Crazy, laughing, loud ladies on board!  In between getting the money shot he took the helm and kept the sunset as the photo background.  We went aft to the stern deck for the pics.  Aft? Aft daft!  Possibly an accurate caption for our evening while onboard.

Trisha took the shot of Shelly, Chris and I on the stern.

 Thank you Captain Paul and First Mate Chris for a fun, safe beautiful sunset cruise.

 *All BOLD are yachting terms.  I may have used them incorrectly.  I don't care. 

I made it without falling overboard, getting sick or otherwise embarrassing myself.  And that is all that matters in matters of the SEA.

Ship Ahoy Matey!  

**Sound track includes Gulligans Island theme song, Nearer My God to Thee, Smoke on the Water, Peace Like  River, Will Your Anchor Hold, Wipeout, Bridge over Troubled Water and Looks Like We Made It.

***Edited to add for people that don't know everything about boating...
Hairdressers, beauticians, and couturiers have salons; sailors have a saloon. The Encyclopedia of Nautical Knowledge defines a saloon this way: “In a cargo and smaller passenger vessels, the main cabin, or that serving as a dining-room, assembly room, etc.” The Oxford Concise Dictionary describes a saloon as a “public room for first-class or for all passengers on ship.”The only dissonant note is sounded by Webster’s New World Dictionary, which allows the use of both salon and saloon but then confesses that saloon is “specifically, the main social cabin of a passenger ship.” Nevertheless, whereas most sailors use the word saloon, most powerboaters seem to prefer salon.It’s possible that some boaters use the word salon because they don’t want their boats to be associated with saloons where strong alcoholic drinks are served and rough men indulge in fisticuffs.  - From Yachting Forum

Around Here

My favorite dahlia farm stand opened last week.  I went before it opened and they graciously let me cut my own.  But now it's officially open.  Five blooms for a buck, that's more fun than anyone should have for a dollar.

 Friday evening Chris, Shelly and I went to the Vintage Market pre-show at the Lavender House.  We found some treasures and then toured the vintage trailers.  Chris is a tad tall for some vintage RVs.

 I am looking for ideas while going through the trailers and focusing more on the details than the over all trailer.  I love seeing all of the great ideas the owners have to decorate and to make their trailer more efficient.

 I think I'd like a bigger awning but I did love the polka dots on this awning and the idea of making your awning from a shower curtain.  Hello? Instawaterproof awning material.

 An outdoor kitchen is a great idea if your trailer is small and cooking outside will keep your trailer cooler in the summer.  A skirt and bunting makes a Cabella's kitchen vintage trailer cute.  I've always used picnic baskets as my kitchen cabinets when we tent camped.  It keeps everything clean and organized.  She had a cute stack in her kitchen.  Her oven is from Costco.

 A cozy bed with a pretty quilt makes for a good night's rest while camping.

 While I was out getting ideas and gathering a few treasures Hubby was over on the East side gettin'er done. He went to visit his family and while there he found a vintage ice box, a stove and hood and a light fixture.  Aqua! 

Our lumber package should arrive this week for the '57 Aloha and then it's forward instead of backwards.  That makes me happy!