General Conference thoughts

I just love conference weekends. We are able to literally sit back with our feet up, let life slow down and be spiritually fed. This weekend was not exception to that tradition. I took copious notes (it helps me stay focused) and did the seminary jeopardy game that I've done for years when I taught and still share with teachers around the world. Here are a few impressions that stood out to me:

Pres. Monson: We need many more senior couples to plan to serve and prepare now for that day. As circumstances allow and eligible for retirement, make available to leave home and give full time missionary service. (Michael and I have a goal to serve missions during retirement!)

Elder Holland: The sacred value of each one of you is reason there is a plan of salvation. This is about you. . .

Elder Christofferson: A consecrated life is: Purity, work, respect of one's body, service, integrity.

Pres. Uchtdorf: Work on our relationship with ourselves. It seems odd but we do have one. Some people can't get along with themselves. The criticize and belittle themselves all day long. Get to know yourself better. Enjoy God's creations, ponder truths of gospel and what they mean, learn to see yourself as Heavenly Father sees you, as his precious daughter or son with divine potential.

Elder Andersen: Two words signal danger ahead: offended and ashamed.

Elder Scott: You get what you pay for is true of spiritual matters as well, in obedience in faith and diligent application. What you get is the molding of character and growth and capacity.

Pres. Monson: Gratitude is a divine principle and the parent of all other virtues. To live with gratitude in our hearts is to touch heaven.

Elder Lawrence: Nothing good happens late at night.

Elder Arnold: We are free to choose for ourselves but not the consequences of our actions.

Pres. Monson: Take time to read the conference talks for they are deserving of our careful study. Blessing we are able to meet here in this conference center in peace and comfort.

I'm sure I'll have more impressions as I read and study these talks in the next few months!

Garden Sweet Potatoes

On Thursday Ryan helped me dig up one of our beds of sweet potatoes. We have a half a bed in another part of the garden still to do. The potatoes got huge this year and some were the size of loaves of bread! They taste great. I think I am going to try to can some of them that were cut up when we took them out of the ground.

Michael and I also moved our potted plants down into the greenhouse where we want them and strung them up. We planned to put them in the middle area so when it gets cold we can put up some plastic walls and just heat that area. The lettuce, spinach, broccoli, brussels sprouts and cauliflower will do fine in a colder area as long as it doesn't get too much below freezing.

We have our materials to build the hydroponics so that is our next big project.

From Russia with Love!

Svetlana sent Ryan a package that also included some gifts for us. It's been fun for us to Skype with her a few times and get to know her as well. She speaks pretty good English which is getting better and she has a beautiful laugh. This morning, while we were skyping her, we opened the box with our gifts. She was so sweet to think of us and send things. It took about six weeks to arrive.

She got Ryan and Michael new ties! She's really good a picking them out. They are beautiful ties!

She sent us some coasters with cute pictures on them. Right now I put them on display on our bookcase!


The background for these pictures is a beautiful shawl made from goat hair. It's so soft. I'm amazed at it! She sent me this cute Matroyshka doll. . .

That had ten dolls inside, the littlest the size of a pea.

She lives in Vogagrad and sent some refrigerator magnets with some monuments from her City. These are some huge statues honoring the battles from World War II. One is 170 feet tall called the Motherland Calls. It has 200 steps honoring the 200 days of the Battle of Salingrad (which is what Volvagrad use to be named!

Butterfly Bushes

We have two huge butterfly bushes. I cut them back in the winters but they just keep coming back!

They have been full of beautiful butterflies of various types all summer.

Moving into the Greenhouse

I took a short video of the new tables we built for the greenhouse and our plants all moved in. We have several tomato plants that have some fruit set already. I also have eggplant (more plants than we wanted but they all came up) that have fruit on them). Unfortunately, we only had one pepper plant that survived. The others were eaten by grasshoppers. They were terrible this year! I also have a lot of lettuce, broccoli and cauliflower coming up that we plan to set into a hydroponic system soon!

Ward Tailgate party!

Our stake has a new outdoor pavilion and game field so our ward used it this weekend. Kelly had the great idea of making this a tailgate party and for everyone to decorate their cars and wear their favorite team's clothing! The car decoration wasn't real impressive but the food and visiting and games were great! Here are some pictures.

War with the Beavers!

Our ordeal with the beavers is far from over. We bought some spray that was supposed to be a deterent and it worked for a little while. . . but they are determined.

They have taken all five peach trees, two plum and now our Nectarine.

Here's the nectarine. This is the first time that they actually cut the tree down and left it there. It stayed there for three days but last night they came back and finished taking it to their home.

I have researched what to do. I found some things on line that sounded like a solution only to order it and have it never delivered! Thanks to Paypal we got our money back. I have heard the best thing to do it to make a fence around the trees. Today we finished fencing up what is left. I hope this works. We've ordered some more trees but we have to make sure we can keep the beavers off! Anyone got other ideas except shooting them?

Fall Garden update

The weather has been amazing lately. We've lost the humidity and the days are milder and it's been beautiful (even though a bit dry). I thought I'd take a stroll out in the garden for an update.

Believe it or not, this is our asparagus. Some of it is now two years old so I expect a good cutting in the spring. Once established, Asparagus will live for 25 years or more!

The three beds on the left are broccoli and cauliflower. We also have planted onions, carrots and beets in here as well as a few heads of cabbage. Our okra and peppers are still producing and in fact having a comeback since it's cooled a little.

Here's our green beans that are just blooming. The plants look so green and lucious. Our fall tomatoes are on the right and just starting to produce.

These containers hold about six tomatoes and four eggplant and a pepper plant that will soon go into the greenhouse with drip irrigation.

We put the greenhouse floor in last week and are working this weekend on some tables and plumbing for our hydroponics.

Our three year old princess

Our little Haily turned three yesterday. It's hard to image. Last month some members in the ward were moving and asked me if anyone would like this little bike and I knew just the girl who loves pink and wanted one!

Her Grandma Fuller made her a princess dress and she got matching "glass" slippers! She was in heaven.

Tracy made her a cookie cake!

Sure Water Storage Tank

I've been worried about having adequate water storage that we could easily use in an emergency, even for an extended period of time. We had a 55 gallon drum but it's not easy to empty and refill. We had talked about putting in a well but the expense is out of reach. I think found these sure water tank. It has two spigots that you can use to get water out and a big lid opening in the top for easy fill. This tank holds 525 gallons of water! We decided to order this and used Labor Day to fill it up! It took about 1 1/2 hours but we now have good drinkable water and can use it to water the garden in the summer and refill it yearly.

We are looking into similar tanks to harvest some water off of our roof for water gardening and other water uses in an emergency. Hopefully this plan will work instead of a well for usable water!