Our first day of school

Tuesday was our first day of school and we spent three hours at our friend Sarah's house. We had a day of canning and Donna and her daughter Maia joined us too. I brought fresh grapes that I had picked the day before at a friends house and we made homemade grape jelly! Yum! We also made plum jelly with wild plums from Sarah's tree and also applesauce. In the last picture you can see our share of what we got. I know we will enjoy the fruits of our labor when we open these jars and add them to our meals!

A day of canning

Sarah stirring plums or apples

Donna cutting apples

Maia and Janessa making applesauce




Maia getting the applesauce ready for the jars

This is our share of the end product!

Cool fall days to work outside

Yesterday I spent lots of time outside weeding in the garden, mowing and trimming near our front door and picking the wild plums in our yard. Ken also helped me to prune some branches off the bushes under the plum tree so we could get some ladders under it so we could pick the plums. This is the first year that we have picked them and I'm hoping that we will enjoy the jelly we make from them.

Wild plums

These are wild plums that I picked yesterday from one of the trees in our yard. The first tree that was beginning to ripen this year were already all on the ground. I'll have to catch that one when it ripens earlier next year! We will hopefully get these plums turned into wild plum jelly soon!

Flowers in our front yard

Weaning kids

Here are the three kids that are being weaned from their mommas this year.
Heidi and Hannah are in the back and Milly in the front. They are all growing and healthy!
Jaron and a couple friends put up this kid yard so they couldn't escape and find their mommas. We still have more fencing to work on sometime, but it is nice to have this yard for them.

Summer excursions in July

The last week that my Dad spent with us this summer we decided to make a couple close road trips. We visited Brainerd and Duluth and made a few memories! Michael and Janessa were good sports when we visited Paul Bunyan Land (it was a "kiddy" land!)
I hope you enjoy the pictures!

A visit to Paul Bunyan Land in Brainerd, MN

Here is my Dad and Janessa and our nephew Michael visiting with Paul Bunyan!

A swim at Park Point in Duluth

This is our nephew, Michael and Janessa and her friend Alysa cooling off when we visited Duluth in July.

Duluth - A city on a hill

We visited Duluth on a hot summer day in July. You can see how it is built on a hill. This is my Dad.