{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

This Summer we Enjoyed...

As the temperature is changing and our rhythm too it is clear that summer is leaving us! I always enjoy looking back on our summer to see the natural rhythms that fall into place, themes or anthems of our summer if you will! Foods we eat over and over, places we visit as many times as we can, and just regular things that turned into cherished things!

:: watermelon

::picnics in the backyard

:: swimming in mountain lakes

:: strawberries

:: goodwill finds

:: road trips across the desert

:: the Truckee river

:: Debbie's rice salad

Debbie's Rice Salad

2 C. cooked brown rice

1 1/2 C. black beans

1 lg. tomato, chopped

2 stalks celery, chopped

2 scallions, chopped

1/4 C. cilantro, chopped

1 pkg. Good Seasonings Italian, prepared

Feta cheese, crumbled

Mix all together and serve with feta on the side.

We have been busy this end of summer/ nearing fall with putting away all of the beautiful colors of summer for a colder, whiter day!

We love fermented dill pickles so I tried my hand at making some on my own by loosely following THESE directions. I think I may jar up another couple jars too!
And I got some strawberries jammed before they were all eaten last week! ;) I use Pomona's for our pectin so I was able to use honey as the sweetener in this.
We have also frozen strawberries, blueberries, and corn. And we are looking forward to apples of course, and anything else we can get our hands on! Pears are tomorrow!
One of my favorite canning books is Putting Food By, and I covet The Natural Canning Resource Guide and Root Cellaring!
What is your favorite summer goody put away for the winter months?

{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Using Up Summer!!

School may have started but we are not wasting this last precious bit of LOVELY weather and LOVELY friends!

So this week we took advantage by meeting friends up at Lake Tahoe after school and staying as late as we could! It was a wonderful beautiful day and we are starting to get use to the "bear-proof" trash cans here! Mountain lake swimming is quickly becoming a favorite activity for me (as yesterday's picture proves)!

Then Friday morning we got up before the sun and met friends for the Great Reno Balloon Race! What a beautiful sight, but I have to tell you the sight on the ground was most beautiful! I loved the rainbow balloons and Smokey the Bear, and on our walk back we got to see a balloon land on the road to refuel!

Enjoy!

~

{this moment}

First Day of School Photos!

Well we succesfuly had our first day of school today! And along with the first day of school I always take pictures of the kids, there are more on our schooling blog.

Riley 10
Jake 7

Fern 5

And sweet Leili 2!

XO

Schools Starting Adventure!

We always start school after the local schools start and some time during the week or so in between we squeeze in a great family adventure!
We thought it would be fun to have a fun hike with a great goal at the end, so we drove up to Lake Tahoe and hiked down to Skunk Harbor. Leili was a super hiker!


It was a nice broad dirt path but went strait down 600 ft. in just a couple miles, down hill was not so bad...

We saw circling vultures! They were waiting for us not to make it back up! :)

Getting closer!

Then we made it to this beautiful harbor!

We set up on the sandy beach, had a nice picnic lunch and then...

We hoped into our swim suits and jumped it!

Riley edged around for a while.

Dad caught me in the water even! ;)

Jake was happy to find some large logs to float around with, he named this one "fatty". This kid cracks me up!

Leili and I enjoyed nursing in the lake.

What a beautiful view (times 2, my babes are so pretty)!!!

These mountain lakes are chilly! But the sun was warm and the rocks warmed us up!

The girls enjoyed playing in the sand with Dad.

Fern was quite the builder! We stayed and enjoyed the non-activity around us having nothing to do before all the renewed rhythm and activity of the new school year. We stayed until the mosquitoes came out!

In this Harbor is an old stone house called the Newhall house... just address my letters there I'm moving in! ;)

Here we are still smiling before we started up... it was a little grueling with little legs who were SOOO tired and a baby on my back!

This is when we were almost back to the top, do you see the circle? That is the van...

lets just say we were tired and sweaty when we got to the top.

It was a beautiful day and one we will enjoy in our thoughts for a long time!