Dear Blog Readers

(I guess I'm in a journaling mood. =P) We are back in Lynden for ten days to clean, paint, and basically fix up the house and yard. I'm sorry I haven't really been updating the blog often - I've been doing all my updates on Buzz.

Our trip up here was pretty uneventful - lots of driving, reading, talking, and playing the "yes and no" game. We stopped at Grandma and Grandpa's for a couple hours, then arrived here late last night. Jon and Kelsie were so sweet to set up a king size bed in the living room with lots of pillows and blankets, which Laura, Hannah, and I claimed. =) We slept in late, then swept and mopped the floors, unpacked out bags, then Momma, Laura, Bekah, and Lydia left for Bellingham to pick up paint and other basic supplies.

As Emily said, when the cat goes away, the mice all play.=P I suppose that will explain our chocolate cake for dinner. =P (We were told we could make chocolate dreams, but we had no milk, so we googled recipes without milk, eggs, or butter. It actually tasted good. =)

Since then, we've been watching Andy Griffith episodes as Momma and the girls are still away.

Tomorrow, I believe is the first of many painting days. I'll try to take pictures to post! =)

Lovingly,
Susi

Leaving for Lynden in a few minutes!!

The Golden Ring at the Wasco Train Depot

Homemade Powdered Sugar

For every one cup of white sugar, add 1 tbs. of arrow root powder or corn starch and blend in the Vita Mix.

Looks just like the powdered sugar from the store!

The Blessings of Working for Azure

Daddy got a whole case (I think about eight of these boxes) of outdated Almond Breeze chocolate milk from Azure. We froze it and today, made chocolate shakes with them! So good! =)

Colorful Flip Flops! =)

Washing Windows

Only Six Posts this June?

Here it is the twenty-third of this month and I've only posted six times, two of which were today? That's bad, bad, bad! =P

I missed June sixth, so I have to post of a picture of that.

The invasion of Normandy, June 6th, 1944.

I also missed the first day of summer. And so, here's a picture! =)

And, I guess I owe all you faithful blog readers a little something of what we've been doing here!

A couple days ago, we organized the basement. Now is spanking clean and shining. (not really.=) The next day, we cleaned the first floor. Boxes were unpacked, the few still-packed decorations hung or set out, junk piles dispersed, all flours swept and mopped, or vacuumed. Then, today, we were supposed to finish the upstairs, but I don't think that's going to happen. =)

The weather here has been great! Lots of sun and tons of wind! It's only rained twice here, and that was just in the morning or just for a few minutes. Lydia has been spending a lot of time outside and now has a nice tan. (she doesn't burn, no fair! =)

It's cute - Lydia and Joe have two restaurants outside. Joe has "McDonald's" and Lydia, "Burger King". They also have a gas station for the bikes and I think a fire department, and bank.

In my spare time and in the early morning, I've been doing a lot of reading. Since moving here, I've finished "Stories from English History", an old book, printed in 1901; "Laura", a book about Laura Ingalls Wilder; "What Would Jesus Do?"; "Marshal", about General George Marshal - WWI and WWII veteran, secretary of state and a lot more =); and now I'm reading "Home Comforts" (thank you so much Weese family! I'm really enjoying it!) and "Bulletproof".

I need to go help Hannah wash windows. I'd love to hear what you all are up to up there in Lynden!

Gracie

This is at our Lynden house. =)

Trying to get the tired little Gracie to fall asleep.

And listening to little girl lullabies.

Pictures of our First Day Here

I think this was Thursday morning. French toast for breakfast!

When we first got here, Wednesday night, these boxes were all in a nice pile in the middle of the floor. This is after we'd been rummaging through them looking for clothes, food, dishes, etc.

More boxes!

Machoo. =)

Wee Wee

Yodel

Hensie =)

Washing dishes (wait, I think this picture was taken a couple days ago. =)

Later on Thursday, the Hainline ladies came to help us clean. Here, Faithie is trying to pry open one of the windows painted shut in the dining room.

Having too much fun. =)