Happy 21st Birthday Christopher!!!

I cannot believe that 21 years have passed by already. It hardly seems possible. Christopher James was born at 2 pm on October 15, 1987 in Salt Lake City, Utah after 52 hours (that is NOT a typo) of labor. I really had a hard time with his delivery. He was three weeks overdue and I was more than ready to finally meet this little guy. He weighed 8 lbs 15 oz and was 21 inches long and had a head full of dark brown hair. He had his first haircut when he was 2 months old and I can remember Aunt June chasing him around our apartment during his toddler years trying to cut his hair. He just never wanted to be still. There were far too many things in this life to take in, and he did not have time to sit and not move. Actually, I think he continues to be that way.

Christopher has always been an avid sports fan and was very good at football and basketball. Anything he tries, he seems to excel at. He has been blessed with a treasure of talents. He came home from high school one day and showed me some drawings that he had done in a beginning Art class. I was amazed. They were completely effortless for him and they were all incredibly good.

Christopher became Elder Williamson 20 months ago yesterday and continues to make us proud. I remember the day he left. It was so hard to say goodbye to him for two years, but it has been so worth it. He has come to love the people of San Bernardino, California and wants his mission to slow down. He keeps telling me he has far too much to do before he returns in just a few short months. He comes home on February 17, 2009 and we are all excited to see him again. We miss you, Christopher and love you very much. Happy Birthday Son! Love, Dad, Mom, Jenni, Tara, Josh and Emma :)

Making Grape Juice

This past weekend our family made grape juice with our very bountiful crop of concord grapes. I have always been working and never had the time to even attempt this in the past. However, this year I am home and I was determined to use make juice out of each and every grape! The first step was to actually pick them. I was amazed at how many we had in our small "vineyard". We really do not have that large of space for them, but we were able to pick four bucketfuls.
Next you have to wash them and take them all off of the vines. Tara was a big help with that. I told her that if she wanted to go on her date later in the evening, that she needed to get all the grapes off the vines before she left-Ha! She did an awesome job ( I think she must have really wanted to go on that date). Note the facial mask she has on in prep for the evening :)
Next you place them in a steam juicer. Then you simply place the lid on and let the steamer do the work. It is amazing how the grapes just shrivel up and release all of their juices.
Soon you start to see the juice appear in the surgical tubing. This is where the juice is collected before being bottled. Emma loved watching the juice come into the tube. It was difficult at times to keep her from filling up the bottles a drop at a time. I had to keep telling her to be patient and let the juice gather.
This is a picture of the grapes shriveling as they are steamed.
You then release the clamp on the surgical tubing and fill the bottles. Emma especially liked this part. Her job was to release the clamp and I held onto the bottles. I wanted to make sure that my floor did not end up purple!

We ended up with 13 quarts of juice. Not too bad for an evening of work. It is very concentrated, so when we go to drink it we will have to dilute it. I am planning to save some for Christmas and Christopher's Homecoming in February. Emma was drinking it as I was filling the jars, so we actually had more than 13 quarts. She loved it! I had to tell her to slow down before she got a tummy ache! If you have never tried this before, I recommend that you give it a whirl. It was a great family activity.

GOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!

We just returned from Emma's last soccer game of the season. It was snowing...can you believe that it was snowing on the 11th of October? Crazy. Emma is all business when she steps onto the soccer field. She really has a talent. I am a little biased, but she is a very good player. I cannot believe how good her footwork is. She has made at least one goal each game and her team won every game with the exception of today, which ended in a tie. Her goal today was incredible. She was sliding on the ground going one direction and kicked the ball about 25' in the other direction for a goal! For a nine year old girl that was pretty awesome to see!
These photos were taken a couple of weeks ago while the weather was still warm. In the picture above she is waiting on the sidelines to return to the game.
This is her team at half time getting a pep talk from her coach...Aryl. He is a very patient man. He was great with all ten of the nine year old girls. They really liked him.

These are just more pictures of the same game. I can't wait to see how much she improves over the winter. Her next season is in the spring with the same team. Go Emma and continue to be an animal on the field!

This Is A Slug

This is a slug...isn't it gross??? While making the apple cider I noticed this little dude slithering around. I had forgotten about these little critters. You can find them everywhere in the northwest and this one is actually quite small. Some you can find about the size of a large pickle and they are kind of a mustard colored. Those are the truly disgusting ones. When Dayna and I were little we used to take salt shakers around the yard and sprinkle these tiny monsters. When you put salt on them they shrivel up. I can't believe we used to do that!

While in Seaside last month, Dayna and I were on a mission to find me a "Slug Magnet" for my fridge. No luck. If anyone knows where I can find one, please let me know!

Making Apple Cider

While in Oregon a few weeks ago, all of my family met at Kirk and Gina's home to make apple cider. When we were growing up we would do this each fall to sell the cider. The proceeds our family received from the sell of the cider was used to pay our ward budget each year. I recall many afternoons coming home from school and heading outside to pick up apples and make cider. Most of those days it was freezing cold and I can still remember the pain in my hands from having them in cold water cleaning off the apples. BRRRR!

When Mark and Kirk announced to Dayna and I that we were going to go down memory lane and relive this childhood memory, Dayna's comment just about summed it up for me. She had told them "You must have different memories than I do." However, I have to admit, I have yet to taste any cider that comes close to the flavor of juice fresh from an apple press. Here is how we did it...First you gather the apples. We had everything in the picture above plus some in Kirk's pickup truck. It ended up making around 20 gallons.
Next you wash off the apples. Kirk and Gina wash theirs in a kiddie pool...pretty smart.
This is another picture of washing apples. In the background you can see the press. The two wooden bins are were the apples will end up after going through the hopper.
Then you start dropping the apples into the top of the press through the hopper. This chops up the apples into about 1" pieces. They then drop below into the wooden bin.
When the bin is full, you scoot it forward and then use the crank press to start squeezing the apples. This makes the juice come out very fast.
We then let the juice drain into a bucket. (Note: You need a couple of buckets on hand because they fill up so fast). I forgot to take a picture of pouring the buckets of cider over cheese clothe to get out any unwanted pulp.

Then you pour the cider into gallon jars or milk jugs. YUMMMM! This is my niece, Lauren, sampling the cider. I have to say it is pretty darn good stuff.

How YOUUUUU Doing???

Christopher recently sent my home a CD full of pictures from his mission. This was one of them and it made me laugh! You can tell that girls are not completely out of his mind. At least this was a P-Day and he was not dressed in a shirt and tie. Christopher! Stay focused! :)

My Hometown

While in the northwest at my Grandmother's funeral, we were able to return to my hometown, Astoria, Oregon for a couple of days. I definitely feel a "pull" to this area. I have a lot of ancestors that lived by the Columbia River and I feel a connection to them. I always feel like I am "home" while in this great historical city. In the picture above, Dayna and I are on top of the famous Elliot Hotel. It has been renovated and we were able to take the elevator to the top. From this view, you can see almost all of Astoria. If you look really close, you can see the Astor Column behind us on the very top of the hill. My kids love to climb the column whenever we come here.
This is a view from the other side of the roof on top of the Elliot Hotel. Seated with me is our life long friend, Cathy Oja. We met when we were three years old and have stayed in touch ever since.
We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express while in Astoria. This is a view from our hotel window on the first afternoon that we were in town. It was very grey and overcast. However, I loved it! I know a lot of people can't stand the dreary northwest days, but I really like them. They just seem so soothing to me.
This is also a view in the other direction from our hotel window. If you look really close, you can see the mouth of the Columbia River. Throughout the day many ships would come in from sea and travel right past our window on their way to Portland. It was great to see those massive ships and hear the fog horns in the early morning.
Our last morning in Astoria, we woke up to this beautiful day! The air in the northwest is so clear and crisp. I told my Mom that I wanted to bottle it up and take it home. It seemed especially clean and crisp that morning.
Another view on the same morning. This was just below our window and we called it our "mini beach"-Ha! At night we left the windows open so that we could hear the water coming in on the shore. I slept so good those two nights!
This is the Liberty Theater in downtown Astoria. This is where I saw my very first movie, "Cinderella".
When we went to Seaside later in the day, Pete shocked us all by actually pulling out his own money and buying some candy. I was so dumbfounded that I quickly got my camera and snapped a picture to freeze this moment in time!
The day we visited the beach in Seaside, it is incredibly beautiful. As you can see, hardly a cloud in the sky.
Another picture at the beach. I have not been to the beach in Seaside recently when it has been such a perfect day. There was hardly even a breeze.

I really love my hometown and look forward to returning as many times as possible.