A quick riddle for you.

What do you get when you mix 1 four year old, 1 six year old, a box of costume makeup, and a closed door in the bathroom, with permission from mom to play?

I don't think I need to say anymore. Just look at the pictures if you cannot figure out the answer.

Only 7 months to go!

We found out the due date for our new baby today. He/she will be coming into this world on or around July 19, 2009! Brooke is 9 weeks along, a little farther than she thought she was.

So this ultrasound picture is still not our baby, and is actually a little smaller than our baby actually is right now.

This ultrasound is what our baby would look like at this stage(9 weeks).
If it were twins!

But it is not twins, there was only one in there. This ultrasound picture is actually very close to what our baby looked like today at our ultrasound. It is not a picture from our ultrasound but this is about what it looked like. We did get to see the heartbeat too! I do not understand how anyone can look at this and come to the conclusion that this is not a life yet! Nor can I fathom how anyone can see the miracle of conception and development of a child and think that it is all just random chance and it all developed by accident the first time. I thank God once again for the evidence that God has put in our lives and our world that confirm intelligent design and contradict the theory of evolution.
Stay tuned for updates on the new baby.

If God is for us, who......

I just finished my morning devotions. A couple days ago I finished reading through the Bible after starting last January. This time I started in Romans. Today was convicting and encouraging. I sometimes feel like I let life and things get in the way of my walk with God, it becomes stagnant and I am not growing closer to Him. I know the things I should be doing or should not be doing, but through laziness or business I either do not do what I should do, or I do what I know I should not do. This is just like what Paul wrote about in Romans 7:15-25. So it is encouraging to me that even someone like Paul had the same type of struggles and then he explains how to get through them with the strength of the Holy Spirit that resides in us. I really like what he says in 8:31, "If God is for us, who can be against us?" All we have to do in times of trouble and temptation, is to call out to God, because He is always there and is always for us. The last two verses of chapter 8 shows what can separate you from God:

"For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

What can separate us from God? Nothing! This is very encouraging in times when you feel like you are falling away. Just trust in Him and He is there for you.

At last, I got one!

And I thought hunting season was over. A couple nights ago, I was able to get a deer during a special hunt! This hunting season is usually from the week after Thanksgiving until the week after Christmas. The hunting area is inside the city limits but once in a while you will find one outside the city. There is no bag limit, so you can go all season. The best time to find these special deer for this special hunt is at night, or at least in the dark. They are not as easy to spot in the daylight. You cannot use a rifle or a pistol for this hunt. It is knife or arrows only. And the ability to unplug an extension cord! I was able to get mine across the street in my neighbors yard! Here is a picture.

The most exciting part of this hunt, is the enjoyment you get while watching the person that lives near the deer discover that his/her deer has been hunted! This part of my hunt was somewhat disappointing as this person walked past the deer 4 or 5 times the night of the hunt and did not notice that its lights were out. But I got the satisfaction of a successful hunt the next morning when I got a text message stating, "All right, who killed my deer?" This is probably the most inexpensive successful hunt I have ever had. The arrow cost $2.50. And I did not need to buy a hunting license or a tag. So it was nice to end the 2008 hunting seasons with a successful hunt and I am looking forward to next year.

Accidental Discovery!

I was playing around with our 1 year old daughter Sarah the other day and found her 7 year old sisters sweater nearby. I thought lets see what she does with this. So, I put it on her and turned her loose. Little did I know that I was about to discover a wonderful new tool for house work and childcare!

Not only did she think it was great fun and took off through the house playing. There was several side benefits that I had not considered before putting it on her. It was great for keeping her out of stuff she was not supposed to be into. She could not grab anything through the sweater. Secondly, now Emmas sweater was no longer laying out on the floor where it did not belong. It was not put away, but it was not laying in a pile on the floor!

The next benefit was that she has enough energy and explores every nook and cranny in the house that she made a great broom. She swept everything up nicely! If you wanted to take it further, you could have a squirt bottle and just squirt a little water on the floor in front of her and she would make a great mop as well! Who knew a child could be so productive at cleaning the house? We also let her crawl around on the carpet and she was able to collect lots of lint. Then, when she would walk along the furniture, like the coffee table, it was great for dusting and as she walked down the hall rubbing her hands along the wall, she was keeping the lower part of the walls clean.

So lets recap all the benefits:
1. She is entertained
2. She cannot get into things
3. The sweater is not in a pile on the floor
4. Broom
5. Mop
6. Vacuum
7. Dusting low furniture
8. Scrubbing walls
9. Makes for great pictures and blog topics.

Sounds like a win win situation. Now I just need to find a sweater for the older sister that is made out of a good material for cleaning! Any recommendations?

Good news!

No, this blog has nothing to do with the Beavers, or even college football. Although if you want to buy us tickets to a bowl game in El Paso, TX that will be played on Dec 31, 2008, feel free. It has nothing to do with my hunting success or even any Gawkers! All the hunting seasons for 2008 for me are over. It also has nothing to do with the Harley that we have been waiting for donations so we can buy. No, Emmas two front teeth have not come in yet, and she is not old enough to start working to support us, yet! Although we are waiting for that NASCAR contract to come through! Don't worry, Riah is still as funny as ever and still keeps us entertained. Sarah has not started talking in full sentances yet.(at least in our language.) And even though the best good news of all is that Jesus died on the cross for our sins, giving us a way to eternal life with God, I am not talking about that either. I have not become rich by finding a million dollars hidden in a geocache out in the woods, but I am still looking. I have checked 358 so far but have not found anything close to a million dollars in one yet. I have also not found a way to reverse the aging process, or even slow it down. My birthday came again this year, about 365 day after the last one. I have not been able to retire and have them still send me a paycheck.(I will be going to work tomorrow.) And as much as I hope everyday, I come home and no one has shown up to completly finish the landscaping and remodel the house.

But, todays good news, is that my wonderful wife is pregnant with our 4th child. Due sometime between the early part of the middle of next year and the middle part of the middle of next year.(We are not yet sure of when the baby will be due.)

This is not our baby, but this is what he/she may or may not look like at this time, depending on how far along he/she is. (we are hoping for a boy.)
Stay tuned for further updates.

Our Tree

It must be the Christmas season. All the stores have Christmas stuff out, my wife got up at a rediculous hour the day after Thanksgiving to go shopping with 3 million other crazy sleep deprived people fighting over the door buster sales, some of my lights are up on the house, and we now have our tree. Here is a picture of it after I packed it to the truck. I know it is not like those fancy expensive full trees that you buy in the stores or tree lots, but this is the kind of tree we like. (at least me anyway!) I like being able to hang things on it and the branches hold up. It is a Noble fir grown out in the forest instead of in a big field crammed full of trees that are shaped and manicured for 5-10 years and then sold at a rediculous price. But to each his own. Yes, it is a little tall, but thats what all those saws in the shop are for. We will be putting it up and decorating it tomorrow.

Cool Cache Container

Today we went out to find a Christmas tree. On the way we stopped to find a couple of brand new geocaches that had just been hidden this morning. We were the first to find on both of them! The girls were really excited about that and then they really liked this container. This is a little "micro" cache container. People get pretty creative sometimes with these. The cache is named "Spit it Out" and the log sheet is located in the sharks mouth. It has a magnet on it to hold it in its hiding place. The girls thought it was really cool.

Sarahs Prison

I put Sarah down for her morning nap the other day and she went to sleep and all was well. I waited to hear her when she woke up so I could get her up. After she had been in there for about 2 1/2 hours and I had not heard anything, I decided to check on her because I thought that she would have woke up sooner than this. Here is what I found. I do not know how long she had been awake, but she was wide awake and as happy as could be. She was just sitting there with her legs sticking out of the crib, playing with her blanket and stuffed animals. She was perfectly happy just sitting there kicking her legs. So I had to snap a couple pics to remember it. A couple nights later she did it again, only this time it was before going to sleep and she did it on the end of the crib that had a bench next to it. She discovered that if she pushed the bench with her feet and then let go, the bench made a nice big bang against the crib. She thought this was great and was able to do it several times before we figured out what that noise was and moved the bench. Kids are so much fun!

No Rose Bowl This year.

The civil war is over and the Beavers lost. Our defense could not stop the Oregon running game. As usual the Pac-10 officials were horrible, but you cannot blame them for the game. We just could not stop the run and lost the game. Our offense looked ok even without Quizz. We still gained over 400 yards of offense. So there is very little chance for a Rose Bowl this year. Unless UCLA somehow beats USC next weekend. We still get to go bowling so there is still one more game.
GO BEAVERS!!

Civil War

The Beavers and the ducks will be playing the Civil War at Reeser Stadium in Corvallis on Saturday, November 29th, 2008. Thats TOMORROW! It starts at 4 pm and is being shown on Versus. Don't forget to watch and cheer on the Beavers.

GO BEAVERS!!!

Who needs TV when you have kids for entertainment!

Our kids are always doing something for entertainment. At least for our entertainment. It was Sarahs turn today. Here is some pictures of her morning explorations.
She dropped her milk today, and it rolled under the bar stools.

She decided she needed to crawl under one to get it back. Here she is after she retrieved it. She is just realizing that she may be stuck.

"Oh well, I got my milk" she says.

Whoops, there it goes again!

Now what? Daddy, don't just take pictures. Get me out.

(For the record, I did release her from her little self-imposed prison shortly after taking these pictures. No children were harmed in the composition of this blog.)

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving day is coming to a close. I have a cold and do not feel that well right now, but as I think about the last year, I remember that I have a lot to be thankful for. The first thing that comes to mind, even though its been 3 years, is the fact that I did not have to work today as I did at my previous job for 12 year. In fact, I have taken the entire week off and a couple days next week, just because I can.
Every morning I try to start my day by reading God's word. I have read through the entire bible once over this last year. The reading, church messages and bible studies have helped me grow closer to God and helped my faith and understanding grow greatly. This just continues to increase my thankfulness for my God and Savior, Jesus Christ. On this same note, I am thankful for the church that we are a part of. Through the teachings and fellowship there, I am greatly blessed.

As always I am thankful for the wonderful wife that God has blessed me with. She is a great blessing to me and I thank God that he gave her to me, even when I was not following Him.

I am also very thankful for the 3 beautiful daughters that God has entrusted me to raise. I sometimes wonder if I am doing it right, but I know that if I follow God's plan and bring them up in Gods way, then God will take care of the rest. Its hard to believe he would entrust these 3 precious lives to someone like me, but I know that He knows best. So if He thinks I am capable of training them, I will have to trust in Him to guide me.

The other things I can think of, are just things. Like our home, my job, and our car. These are all just material things that God has blessed us with. Things that other people may not have. So I know we must not take these things for granted as they are just things and can be taken away. But God has blessed us even beyond that. He has given us things that are not even needed. Things like my woodworking tools. Just stuff that I enjoy using in my free time. There are lots of other things as well.

The important thing to remember is that God is in control and loves us greatly and has made a way for us to be with Him eternally, once all these things are gone. So even if you don't feel well or have a lot of stuff, you have plenty to be thankful for.

13 years and counting!

Today is our 13th wedding anniversary. It does not seem like it is possible for it to be that long, but it has been. Yes, our anniversary is the day after my birthday. You may think that we did this so that I would not forget it. However that is not the case. We got married in November because it was not fire season and we thought that I would always be home this time of year. Little did we know that the next year, I was put in charge of managing the Christmas tree shipping yard that Miller Timber harvested for Holiday tree farms. That meant that for the next 10 years I worked 7 days a week, dark to dark, in November and December. So until I got this new job in 2006, I was never home on my anniversary and we could never go do anything on it. That has all changed now. This year I am even taking the week off. That covers my birthday, our anniversary and thanksgiving.
I thank God daily for giving me a wonderful godly woman as a wife. Even though it did not start out that way, God had a plan and it all came together. She is always concerned with doing life the way God intended and in every way strives to be a godly wife. It always encourages me to try to be a better, more godly husband and father. She has blessed me with 3 beautiful daughters and is training them to be godly women. I love her very much and am looking forward to what God has for us for the next 50+ years of our marriage. I just pray that we can continue to grow closer to one another and to God together.

My Birthday Present

I am 39 years old today. Sometimes it seems like that is not possible because it was not that long ago I was in high school and college. Yet at the same time, when I think about all the things that I've done and has happened since then, high school and college seem like they happened so long ago. I have now lived on the west side of the cascades longer than I lived on the east side. I always think of myself as someone from the east side of the mountains, but I have been on the wet side longer. For my birthday this year, my wonderful wife decided to get me a present that would remind me I am still a kid. She got me a great gift! I now have my very own Vertol helicopter!!!!
For those of you that do not know what this is, here are a couple of pictures.A vertol is a Boeing made, heavy lift helicopter. I have worked with these a lot on wildfires, but have never been able to fly on one. I have always really liked this kind of helicopter a lot!

Okay, I'm sure your wondering where Brooke got the several million dollars to buy me one of these and how I am going to fly it since I do not have a pilots license or have ever even flown an airplane let alone a helicopter. Here is the vertol that Brooke actually got me.Here I am just taking off (above) and then hovering about 3 ft off the ground.(below)

It is a really cool remote control helicopter. It took a few minutes of practice, but I can fly it almost as long as the rechargable batteries will last. It is a lot of fun. It was a little less expensive than the real thing.Here I am on an early flight about to crash into the ceiling.

To me the real Vertol helicopter is an amazing feat of engineering and design. They made a dual rotored helicopter fly with the rotors turning in opposite directions and during flight they twist and turn at unbelievable rates and never hit each other. This little remote control helicopter is also quite an amazing piece of technology and engineering. They got enough electronics and power into this tiny piece of styrofoam that it will fly and you can control it. It is a lot of fun. Thanks to my family for such a great present.

Blogging, Facebook,! Whats next?

I finally gave in and started a facebook page. There is a link to it on the right side of my blog. If things like this keep up, I will be spending all my free time doing things on the computer just to keep it all updated. That won't leave much time for other things that do not involve going blind from staring at a bright screen and getting carpel tunnel from typing all the time. Oh well, thats the price we have to pay to keep in touch and keep everyone up on whats going on in out lives. I can only imagine how people kept informed and in touch back before all this technology. We are all pretty spoiled being able to talk to someone around the world instantly with just the push of a button.

Emma, The next Nascar Champ!

The Awana grand prix was today. Last night, and this morning, Emma and I put the finishing touches on her car. The last time she entered this event, she got a second place for the design of her car but did not win too many of her races.

This is Emma with her car just after checking it in. We had to add a little weight to it to get it up to the required 5 oz.

This is the lineup of cars. Emmas is the 5th one up from the bottom on the right. The red and white number 7.

This was what the Emmas first 4 races looked like. There was actually 4 cars on the track for every race! She dominated all 4 of her heats in the first round. There was no other cars even close to hers. After round 1, they took the top 8 cars and each one raced 4 more times to determine the winner.

These were a little closer. She obviously won this one.

This one was a little closer, but a win none the less!

She won this one too!

Yet another win!

Yep, she won all 8 races she was in and took 1st place! She was so excited.

Here are the top 4 racers. Yep, girls won the top 4 spots!
Emma told us this morning before we left for the races that she thought she was going to win. We being the loving parents that we are and not wanting her to be disappointed and sad if she did not win, told here that she should not go into it thinking that she was going to win, but she should just go to have fun and enjoy herself no matter how she did. Maybe she knew what she was talking about! Is she ready for Nascar now?

Discouraged but thankful

The hunting season is over. The Gawkers won! Not only did I not get to shoot a deer or an elk, I did even see a live elk or deer during the season. I did see a dead doe that someone had shot and killed and then just left it there. That kinda makes me mad, but nothing I can do about it. It probably ran off the road after they shot it and they thought they missed, then it died about 200 feet off the road on a nice trail. This was probably my most discouraging hunting season ever. Not because I did not get anything, that has happened a lot. But because I put in a lot of effort this year and did not even see anything. In past years that I did not fill my tag, I did not put much effort into finding a deer, so it did not bother me that my tag was unused. This year, I hunted a lot. Not just road hunting either. I was out in the timber and brush, hunting. I found lots of sign where the animals had been. But never got to even see them. The last day of the season did get my hopes up one time. I was hiking back to the truck after a couple of hours of hiking and looking in some plantations and timber, and I heard something creeping in the brush about 100 feet away. So I very slowly and quietly started stalking it through the woods. It was moving away from me. It would got a little ways and then stop for a minute and then move again. I followed it for about 20 minutes, getting ever closer to the unidentified creeper. Then I finally got sight of it about 50 yards away. It was a guy out in the woods picking mushrooms! He had parked beside my pickup, and then went crawling through the woods picking mushrooms! Why you would do this when there are people with guns all over the area I do not know. But thats what he was doing. So much for hunting there. I moved on. Then darkness soon came, signaling the end of deer season for 2008, and I still have 2 unused tags in my pocket. This is the type of year that makes me wonder why I bother to hunt. I wonder if it is worth the time and money. But I am sure by the next hunting season, I will have forgotten this year and have a new batch of unfounded optimism that will drive me out looking for those Gawkers again.

Now if you read my first blog about Gawkers way back before hunting season, you may remember that I said in that blog that God would provide for our family one way or another. He does not fail! As the season came to an end, and I was feeling sorry for myself, my brother in law called and said he got a deer and needed someplace to store it because his freezer was not big enough. We said that we could store it, since I did not get anything there is plenty of room in our freezer. Then, today, when he called to let us know when he would be bringing it up to put it in the freezer, he said that he did not want it all and we could have what was left if we wanted it. Of course we said yes and he delivered the front half of his deer to me at I-5 and I spent the evening after the girls went to bed, cutting it up.

So God did provide some meat for our family just like I said he would. Just not the way I thought he would.

If you ask Brooke what animal this was, she will probably tell you it was "one of those 4 legged doedeerbullcowbuckelk things!" She just doesn't understand the difference! This was a buck deer for those interested. It was not a big one, but it is meat in the freezer.

Baby got book

A friend showed me this really funny video and I had to share it. Its even more funny if you know the words to to original song. Enjoy.

Where oh where have all the Gawkers gone?

Here is a picture of all the Gawkers that I saw during Elk season this year. Well, actually it is a picture from Johnny lake the other day. But it still has all the elk that I saw this year in it. Thats right, none. I was skunked. Not only did I not get to shoot an elk, I did not even see and elk. Actually, I did not see any animals other than squirrels and birds. Which brings me to the next part of my Gawkers and Runners theory.(see previous posts if you have not heard of this theory yet) I think the Runner variety of elk has intermingled with its close cousin, the Gawker, enough that they feel a need to protect them from the strange 2 legged creatures with the big sticks that go boom. They could not risk not running to save their dopey Gawking cousins, so they had to find an alternative means to warn the Gawkers and get them to go into hiding. I think I have discovered what they have done. They are paying off squirrels and birds to warn them! Every time I sneak up to some prime Gawker habitat, the birds and the squirrels start squeaking and squawking like someone just tried to eat their food, steal their firstborn and burn down their house. I don't see any other reason for this odd behavior other than to warn the nearby Gawkers that they need to get into hiding. After all this racket, you can walk into this prime habitat and find so many elk tracks you would think there was and elk superbowl going on. (I think they are getting ready to play the Clydesdales during the superbowl this year.) If you think about it, the squirrels and birds are perfect for this lookout job. They work for very little, (usually nuts & seeds) and they don't have anything else to do all day anyway. So the squirrels and the birds are diligently watching for the two legged beasts to come into the area. When they spot them the start yellin at the Gawkers telling them where to run and hide how fast to do it. Then the squirrels drag some branches around trying to hide the tracks. That usually works because the tracks always mysteriously disappear after a short distance. So now hunting is even more of a challenge. Not only do you have to sneak up on the animal you are hunting, you also need to watch out for those pesky squirrels and birds that are gonna rat you out. This is the best explination that I can come up with for why I did not see any elk at all this hunting season. I saw lots of tracks, but no elk. Those tracks don't taste any better than those big antlers! At least I got some exercise and took some cool pics. Now I just have to hope that the Deer Gawkers have not figured out how to get the squirrels and birds on thier payroll. Stay tuned.

Which way is up?

Which way is up? Fall colors are out in full right now. I was working out in the cascades a couple days ago and had time to stop and enjoy Gods creation while waiting for a truck. This picture is at Johnny Lake, about 1 mile off Hwy 20 up Sheep Creek. It was perfectly calm and the water was as smooth as glass. You could flip this pic upside down and almost not tell that it is not right side up. I was looking at this reflecting on the beauty of Gods creation and thought that this is very beautiful, but pales in comparison to what heaven will be like. Another thing came to mind also. This earth is the ruins of what God made originally. Remember that there was a flood that covered the earth and destroyed everything on it. What we see now, that is so beautiful, is the remains of what God originally made. I am once again reminded of how blessed I am to have the job that I have and can be out enjoying things like this on a daily basis.

Happy Birthday Sarah!

Its hard to believe that Sarah is 1 year old today. It seems like just yesterday that she was born here in our home. She is a great blessing to our family and a true gift from God. She brings joy to us every day. She is in some ways like her sisters but is also very much different and is uniquely Sarah. I thank God for the blessings of all my daughters as we celebrate #3's 1st birthday.

Daddy, how many days old are you?

One day a few months ago, Emma came up to me and asked, "Daddy, how many days old are you?" At first I just tried to estimate, but then thought I could probably make a spreadsheet in excel that would calculate it exactly. It was pretty easy and soon we had a table with the ages of all our family on it, in days and years. Now every time that Emma wants to know how many days old someone in the family is, she can look at this spreadsheet and it is current up to the day that she opens the file. It can make you feel old though, (I am over 14 thousand days old) so don't think about it this way if you do not want to feel old. Here is a sample from the table in the excel file that I made for Emma.

	Birthday	Today	Days Old	Years Old
Sarah	10/29/2007	10/28/2008	365	1.000000
Riah	2/20/2004	10/28/2008	1712	4.690411
Evan	12/9/2003	10/28/2008	1785	4.890411
Emma	6/19/2001	10/28/2008	2688	7.364384
Aleesha	2/17/1997	10/28/2008	4271	11.701370
Daddy	11/24/1969	10/28/2008	14218	38.953425
Papa	2/20/1935	10/28/2008	26914	73.736986

The Pen

Something happened today that I knew was coming, but was beginning to wonder if it would ever happen. My pen ran out of ink! I know this happens all the time, but this pen was different. It has performed valiantly for the last 2 months without even appearing to be tired, when it looked as if it had no ink to write with. It was a great pen. For 2 months, with no visible ink inside, it wrote on, not even fading a little. For 2 months this pen has fought to stay alive and out of the garbage can. Then suddenly today, with little warning, it could go on writing no longer. It struggled to finish a small word. With the last letter, it showed its lack of ink with a faded color. It tried to continue and started the next word. But with each stroke it was lighter and lighter, and before I could finish the word, it was over. The pen was dry. I had no time to mourn for the pen as I needed to continue to take notes. So I put the faithful pen away, grabbed the spare, and continued on writing. It was just not the same. It was a little different color and not as smooth, but somehow I made it through. So now I write this to remember that faithful writing instrument that would not die, and share this last picture of that faithful pen with its replacement. Hopefully I can get used to this new pen and it will last half as long as the old one.
Okay, that's enough of the sappy stuff, time to put The Pen in the can. I need to go hunting.

Gawkers beware

Well, tomorrow is the first day of Elk season in the Cascades. I have 1 week to find one of those Gawkers I have been blogging about the last few months and put him in my freezer. I have done a little scouting to try to find where the Elk, Gawkers or Runners, have been hanging out. That way I would know a good place to start looking. All I have seen are other hunters doing the same thing. So after a week of looking, I still have no idea where the elk are or where to hunt for them. I know where some were about 2 months ago, but even a Gawker won't stand still in one place for that long! They tend to move around a lot.
Since the first weekend of October, it has been deer season. I have, to this point, failed to see a deer to shoot at. Today I was within about 20 feet or less of 2 deer, but the brush was so thick I could not see them even that close! They were apparently runners, because they took off like a flash and I heard them bouncing away for a while and never could get a peek at them. It did not matter anyway, because I did not have the rifle with me. I thought I might actually see a live animal if I left my gun in the truck. It almost worked!
Enough about deer. That season is over now, until after elk season, so lets talk about the bigger variety of Gawkers. I do have to shoot a bull this year, as I did not draw a cow tag. The last 2 years I have drawn cow tags and was successful both times. Bulls are a little harder to find.

I am not going to be greedy and wait for one with the big trophy size antlers, like the guy in this picture. Can you see him? I would be over joyed to find this during hunting season.

This would be the ultimate dream in a hunters life. Those are all bulls. The only problem is this pic was taken in April and hunting season is in October. Why can't they do this for me when its hunting season? So barring a scene like this, the first legal Gawker that steps in front of my sights is the one I am going to try to get. Remember, those horns don't taste very good. I just want to get more meat in the freezer. I have been praying that God would provide for us by helping me have a successful hunt and I would get an elk to fill the freezer for another year. But I know that even if I do not bag an elk, God will provide for us in some other way. He always does. (It should be obvious to anyone that has seen me that I don't miss too many meals or go hungry very often.) I will just enjoy the time I have hunting and if I am successful, Praise God. I just have to remember not to get frustrated when all I see are the hind ends of runners disappearing into a nasty brush hole. If you do not read anymore blogs about Gawkers in the next week, I did not get one. Otherwise, stayed tuned for a Gawker report. If you venture out into the woods in the next week or so, make sure to wear lots of orange and try not to look like an elk or deer! Theres a lot of crazies out there, and they all have big guns.

Finally, the earth moving is done!!

The earth moving is done at the Jayne house. (at least in the front yard) I got all the extra dirt moved out and smoothed out the rest. We had to haul off about 10 wheelbarrow loads to the neighbors back yard and I took about 5 loads to our back yard. (great more work!) It is not totally flat, but it is a vast improvement from what we had before. The best part is that all the grass coming up in the picture is coming up on its own. I have not put out any seed yet. I guess thats what happens when you get the dirt from a grass seed field. Now I just hope that the Oak trees and Oak leaves do not kill the grass. It was a fun project and a lot of work. The girls liked to try to help as much as they could and Brooke was able to come out a couple times and push the wheelbarrow around. This was a true family built project.

The other project I did this last summer was the railing on the front porch. I wanted to do something a little different than the normal everyday railing. So I borrowed an idea from a friend and modified it a little and this is what it became. I think it turned out good. What do you think?
Now I have to fix up the back yard. That will have to wait until next summer. I think I'll come up with some woodshop projects for the winter so I can stay dry and not muddy. That happens to me enough at work.