Hike – Silver Falls – 5 miles

On Saturday Kangaroo texted in the morning and invited me to go on a last-minute hike, and I accepted. Kangaroo’s baby granddaughter, Daisy, had to be born prematurely a week ago and passed away. Kangaroo wanted to hike with Daisy’s ashes.

We headed to Silver Falls State Park and parked in the South Falls parking lot. Since it was the weekend and we had gotten a bit of a later start than usual, the parking lot was quite full already, and there were people on all the trails. Many of the people were practicing for various trail run events that are happening in the park the first part of November. Kangaroo plans to participate in the 7-mile run event then.

We headed down toward South Falls, but instead of going behind the falls we took a side trail to the bridge over the creek at the base of the falls. Here Kangaroo took a photo of her dad’s ashes and Daisy’s ashes in front of the falls.

We followed the trail and stairs down to Lower South Falls.

Lower South Falls

Behind Lower South Falls

We saw some nice fall color on the trail.

Instead of going our usual way down the Trail of Ten Falls, we decided to go on the Maple Ridge Trail, which leads back to the South Falls Lodge.

Maple Ridge Trail

We made a pit stop at the lodge and then walked through the field to get to the “Nutcracker Hill” trail. There was a wedding happening at the pavilion there and some people were having their photos taken on the bridge.

Nutcracker Hill

Nutcracker Hill is a hill that is a usual part of the 7-mile trail run at Silver Falls, and so Kangaroo wanted to get some training in. It actually doesn’t have as much elevation as the Maple Ridge Trail. We were wondering whom we should write to get more benches placed on the Maple Ridge Trail! On a side trail off Nutcracker Hill, we found these large concrete structures. I think they are cisterns of some sort. We could hear water running in the area.

On the way up the trail Kangaroo urged me to walk ahead and keep walking. She always kindly does this when there is something I don’t want to see, namely, one of these guys here. (Wait…shouldn’t he be hibernating by now?)

We went up and then down Nutcracker Hill and returned to the car. We could have chosen to eat at the lodge, but we decided to do our usual Dairy Queen run for lunch. It is less expensive and you get ice cream.

For the rest of this post, please enjoy Kangaroo’s photos of various flora and fungi.

Some sort of fungi, we had never seen a blue one before.

Just keep walking!

~Ninja

Happy Birthday, Sis

Yesterday we had a little belated party for The Sis for her birthday, which was awhile back. She had requested guacamole and cupcakes for food, and I bought some King’s Hawaiian rolls and a meat and cheese tray and veggie tray to round out the meal. I also brought fruit salad, but there were so many grapes on the meat and cheese tray (?) that we didn’t need the fruit salad after all! Here is The Sis blowing out her candle. Happy Birthday, Sis!

Wordless Wednesday

30

The Boy turned 30 this week. 3-0. Thirty. It’s hard to believe it’s been so long since he was just a tiny baby! We are very proud of him. (If you know of a nice Christian girl who is around his age and is looking for a handsome, smart, talented husband, please comment below!) 😁

The Baby

Here is a photo of our grandbaby, Lucas. What a fun little guy he is! I love to just hold him and watch his little facial expressions while he sleeps. Can you tell I am smitten? 🥰

BABY!!!

We have a baby!!! The Girl and The Son-in-Law had their little one last night. He is healthy and perfect and was so sweet being content to just snuggle with Mama while he was waiting to be weighed and measured. These days they give Baby and Mama a whole hour to snuggle before taking Baby over to do the weighing and measuring, and giving him a little shot. He was so brave he didn’t even cry when the nurse gave him the shot! The nurses and doctors were wonderful and The Girl felt well taken care of the whole time. He was 9 lbs 1 oz, and 21″ long. A big boy! The little family will be in the hospital for the next day and night, receiving instruction and visitors. Nana and Grandpa are so excited!!

Baby and Daddy

Catnap

My Son

Thought I’d share this nice photo of The Boy. What beautiful kiddos we have! 💗

A Wedding!

We had a wedding! The Girl and her Fiancé were married on January 14th. We had the wedding at a house here in town that is set up and decorated to hold weddings, and had a bilingual ceremony in English and Spanish, since The Son-in-Law’s family speaks Spanish. It was a lovely ceremony and I would like to get a transcript of it, the minister did a great job. The bride and groom declared that they had a fun day. After the wedding everyone came to our house for cake and coffee and we had a nice visit. The lady who runs the wedding house took photos too so we had some family photos done for the first time in forever, and a photo of all three of our kids together for the first time in years. In fact, it was the first time they had all three BEEN together in years and years! We enjoyed meeting the Son-in-Law’s family, with the rather whirlwind courtship and wedding we hadn’t had the chance to meet them before. Here are some photos for you to enjoy!

The Girl and The Son-in-Law

The Hubs and The Girl

The Boy, The Girl, and The Youngest Girl

Some smooching! 💕

Cutting the cake. The groom chose German chocolate for the cake flavor, even though he had never eaten German chocolate cake before! I was very glad he liked it!

The cake.

It was a lovely wedding and the The Girl and The Son-in-Law enjoyed themselves, which was the most important thing. They now live in wedded bliss upstairs in what used to be just the The Girl’s space, so they can save up for a place of their own. The Son-in-Law fits in well at our house and we are happy to have him here.

Hooray, wedding!! 🥰

Christmas, Part 2

As I mentioned in a previous post, we had our Christmas celebration at Mom and Dad’s on New Year’s Day instead of Christmas Day because an ice storm we had messed up schedules. I went over to their house on New Year’s Eve to make the dressing and do a couple of other things for meal prep. To make the dressing you first make the cornbread, then eat a bit of cornbread when it’s done with lots of butter. When the cornbread is cool you break it up into pieces, add white bread (in this case, hot dog buns) and add the chicken broth, onion, salt and pepper, and sage to taste. I mixed it all up and didn’t even really have to add anything except a little bit of pepper after I tasted it. Mom declared it a triumph, so we put in in the fridge to cook the next day.

Mom has the timing down exactly right for all the holiday foods, so I kept going to her to figure out what to put in the oven next. We had rolls (they go in the oven last); mashed potatoes with sour cream, butter, cheddar cheese, chives, and bacon (The Hubs made that); turkey breast (that goes in first since it isn’t cooked), ham (made the glaze the morning of, didn’t have any cornstarch to put in it the day before); a veggie dish with broccoli, cauliflower, pepper jack cheese, sour cream, and other yums; chips and guacamole (always made first for an appetizer); and sweet potatoes with orange juice and marshmallows (put the sweet potatoes in under the broiler to brown the marshmallows — I didn’t do it quite right and the marshmallows melted into the sweet potatoes but they were still delicious). The we had chocolate pie and pumpkin pie for dessert, but everyone wanted chocolate pie so we left the pumpkin for Mom and Dad to eat later. It wasn’t the same as when Mom makes the dinner, but it tasted good and everyone enjoyed it as far as I know. The Girl and Her Fiancé weren’t able to join us because she wasn’t feeling well and he was scheduled to work.

The soft trivets were made by my Great Aunt Clara.

We had gift-opening time before we ate and that was fun as usual, I got some very nice gifts and I think everyone appreciated their goodies. I received this Garmin Venu smartwatch and I then modified it with a screen protector with a pink frame and a new black band with a lace design, because I enjoy making things my own, ha. It started out like this:

Original Venu Sq watch.

And now it looks like this:

Modified watch.

The screen protector just snaps over the whole front of the watch, and came in a set with many other colors. The band came in a set with many colors to choose from as well. I found both sets on Amazon. I also ordered a new RoadID with my pertinent information on it in case of emergency, it fits over the watchband. The one for my old Garmin watch was too large for this band.

Some other photos from our Christmas celebration:

Having dinner.

Another angle of the dinner eating.

Some of our goodies.

A nifty lantern snow globe Mom received from a friend.

I wish I had gotten more photos, but I was busy concentrating on the food.

We all had a great time visiting and I was sorry when we all had to go home. I went to Mom and Dad’s again this last Sunday and helped put away the Christmas decorations. They have been using a potted pine as a Christmas tree for the last three or so years and it is oddly doing well in its pot outdoors during the year. Dad says it is almost a bonsai tree at this point. Here he is taking it back outside to its place on the deck.

We had a great time together celebrating what God has done for us through His Son, Jesus. Amazing Grace, indeed!!