First Float of the Summer

The weather has been so wonderful out here, we just had to take a shot at the river. We drove up the road about six miles and planned on drifting back to our house.

It looked so green and lush throughout the whole trip.

Tons of inlets and little waterfalls.

We also saw a bald eagle, but of course, didn't have the camera out.

After four plus hours, and a few semi intimidating rapids we made it home. After this maple tree it is just a corner away from our house.

We pulled up to our sand bank beach and decided that we had gotten so hot from the whole rafting trip that we hopped in the river. It was chilly, but a nice cool off, which is crazy since it wasn't even June yet. I have great excitement for this upcoming summer, full of great weather and lots of water activities.

Food = Friendship

We are continuously progressing on our friendship with our neighbors. Here Jered feeds them some tall grass from around our fence line. Daisy acts as if there is no one there.

Our Closest Neighbors

Our closest neighbors have become much more friendly over the last few weeks. Even after the little "incident" where Daisy felt totally cornered and intimidated by their large stature (notice how I automatically take her side :) and "lunged" so you say at one of their faces.

So, the name Scarface it is.
It isn't that bad, just that little black line in between her nostrils. She is fine, and yet still totally fascinated by Daisy. Daisy wants absolutely nothing to do with them, and may attempt to bite her face off again.

This little lady is also just as fascinated by Daisy. Her name is Shaggy, just because she is more shaggy than Scarface. This one has not encountered the wrath of killer Daisy....yet

Memorial Weekend Barbecue

We had a very exciting Sunday with my grandma, sister, mom, and Steven. I made sure to pick up all the dog poop before we invaded Daisy's property. She didn't seem to mind one bit, as long as she got to be the center of attention.
We (and by we I mean Jered) cooked up elk steaks, halibut, chicken and vegetable skewers. What a grand way to kick off the barbecue season!

Daisy got to be the center of attention most of the time. Ashley took it a few times :).

Gardening Again

We started working on a garden (again!). Jered worked with the rototiller for hours to ensure perfect ground consistency for our new plants. We still had a few green and walla walla onions that we brought from the old house, but we are mostly planning on starting from scratch. I think the warmer climate out here will make up for our late start.
That is the view walking from our back yard down toward the garden. The in-between land is pasture. There are two cows that graze on it, and they are just the cutest. I can get them to let me pet them now, but they are still very jumpy. They sure aren't scared of Daisy, and she is still working on her fear of them.

She wandered around the pasture for most of the day today, but made sure she stayed close to us at all times.

We planted green onions, broccoli, carrots (lots of carrots), pumpkin, watermelon, pickling cucumbers, and garlic. Hope to have more to come, there is plenty of room left.

No Dogs Allowed!!

Daisy and I got to be the biggest rebels ever the other week. We hung out in a YURT! A YURT is a strange looking cabin that sporadic state parks have as an accommodation. There are three main rules to stay in a YURT: No cooking, no smoking, and no pets! We were an exception to the rule on this particular day, oh, and a grand day it was.

My managers put on a "officer refreshment" training to help refresh the park rangers that have the authority to write citations. After the hours of bookwork and video watching, the officers get to go out on a practicum and work with actors in different scenarios. That is where Daisy and I came in; we were actors in one of the scenarios.

The act consisted of a few different plots:
Girl camping with her dog. Girl thought that dog was too old to sleep outside, so she rented a YURT, well aware that dogs were not allowed, but very willing to pay an extra fee, or try to manipulate rangers to change the rules. Rangers attempted to get her to bring the dog out of the YURT, but girl is very reluctant.
Another was:
Lady was grumpy about her stay so far at the park. There was no toilet paper in the restroom at one time, her daughter got pulled over earlier for not wearing a helmet (many other complaints follow). Lady is approach by a ranger for having her dog in the YURT. Lady totally denies that she has a dog in the YURT.

That is just naming a few, I got to use my imagination to free style and such. It was great fun! Daisy was a good actor too. She was a little bad at barking on queue, but she was friendly and excited to help the rangers practice their enforcement skills. She seemed a little disappointed that so many of the rangers refused to pet her, but that is part of the training. None of the employees are supposed to pet any animal at work, which can be very difficult at times, I speak from experience!
This was Daisy's station for most of the activities. This is probably her first, and last time in a YURT.

Please, don't feed the animals!

This is what happens if people leave dog food outside at my work.

This is very bad to feed the wild animals, but it was so cute, I had to snap some pics.

And he has a friend too!

Goodbye Coastal Commute

Today we made our second to last run to our storage unit. It will be a relief when the moving is over. Stopped on the way back home at a new lot of state park land up in "Beaver Creek". How could I ever complain about such a beautiful commute. Oh wait, I wouldn't. I will miss this coastal commute, but am looking forward beautiful summer days ahead!
I am so happy to have the Internet turned back on at home!!! I can get wireless at work right now, but it blogging isn't the same if you aren't in the comfort of your own home.

Are New House!!!!

It is still too overwhelming to call it "our" new house, so that is the best that I can do. We looked and looked and finally found a little (yet way bigger than my old house!) farm house we could both call home (and Daisy too!). Jered was so excited, he started making lists! I am still working on my list making skills, so it was wonderful of him to do it for me! We spent the weekend moving out of my old house.......

After a very long weekend of packing and unpacking, we started spending the night at are (still can't do it:) house. This is a view of the HUGE garden that the landlords have, but we are welcome to use. We planted some walla walla onions Saturday evening. There are blueberries, peaches, apples, pears, plums, and I am sure I am forgetting some other stuff. We took the more mature looking lettuce heads with us when we moved, but I ended up planting them in planters and lining the walkway with them. So if you are ever coming over, you are more than welcome to stop on the way up to our (oh I did it YAY) front door and have a salad. It is very nutritional, but you would have to come inside for the ranch dressing......

This is a picture of our (oh now it is easy) kitchen, VERY huge compared to the last one! Shot was taken while unpacking, so in theory it would be clean the rest of the time, but we will see.

This is the view out the kitchen window. The landlord has two drift boats, and they happily invited Jered's boat to hang out with them. The closest building is our storage shed, and Jered set up the boat right next to it. I felt it was appropriate since the river is only 500 feet away! The little fence is part of Daisy's actual fenced yard area. She has never had a fenced yard before, and it is obvious to watch her. We have been putting her out there for an hour or so at a time, but all she does is lay by the gate (I can watch her out the kitchen window) and wait for us to come and get her. It has also come out that she is terrified of cows. There are two that can come right up to the fence, and she barks like a crazy dog every time they come around. She will have to get used to that. I want to be able to leave her outside during the day in the summer, so she can roll around in the grass all day long. We will have to see how that works out.

View of the living room, right off the kitchen. Jered is going to have to build some more furniture or something to fill up the huge room!

The hallway down to the bathrooms (there are two full bathrooms!!!!!) and bedrooms. The house also came with a skinny mirror! That was very exciting for me, and a complete learning experience for Jered.

This pic I am standing in the main bedroom, looking into the bathroom. I am so excited to have such a big closet! There is one on each side just before you walk into the bathroom.

This is one of a million places Daisy has to lay! She can't decide if she likes that or not!

Jered started mowing one of our two lawns yesterday. It was super cute! I think Daisy is going to love it!! I already know that we do!!

Parade Update

We won the "Queen's Trophy" at the parade!! So, not only was it super fun, we will supposedly be getting a trophy to remember the wonderful day.

Our district manager snapped this picture, it was pouring down rain, but it sure was fun!
We had ran out of candy, so Kate and I jumped on the back of the float and became "state park princesses".

Parade Day!!

Today was the loyalty days parade! Kate, Brian and I were lucky enough to get to show off our "State Park Spirit".
Kate designed a "replica" of the Spencer Creek Bridge. We have been dealing with bridge construction at work for so many years, in a way this was our celebration of the whole project, and its completion. Although I was stuck in construction traffic for about 5 minutes on Friday, the project is nearly complete, and the bridge that they have built is absolutely beautiful.

Kate, standing under the bridge, in the "creek" acting as a fake troll. She even made a beaver dam!

We had coloring books and little stuffed beavers to give out. Judy, one of the hosts from the park, and Brian were in the truck. JR Beaver, Oregon State Park mascot (Judy's husband), rode in the back of the truck. Kate and I got to hand out the stuffed beavers and coloring books. We ran out a little more than half way through the parade. We hopped on the float and rode the rest of the way, waving to the parade watchers as if we were princesses of OSP. It was super fun!

It started pouring down rain sometime toward the end of the parade (it rained lightly throughout) and by the time we were driving back to our starting point, the wind picked up to 40+ hour gusts! We were very lucky to have missed that, our signs would have never survived, let alone the semi and tonka truck atop the bridge.