Dec 7th

We had received about 4 inches by 3am when Jeff went to work. When I went out to feed we had 6 inches and decided to take these shots. It continued to snow all day and into the next, by Tuesday afternoon we had 9 inches.

The horses are having a hard time with it and the chickens don't even want to come out of their house. The ducks thought it was great.

Too much snow for the old tractor to plow so it'll just....

.......rest.

snow, snow and more snow.

OK, Jeff's sick of snow but I love it and it does make for some neat photos.

the new Fernley flag

The Fernley Youth Theater group put on a play called "Rumor has it" about the founding and growing up of the Town of Fernley. At the end of the play the new city flag was presented along with a cake for the cast and crew. Tony is in the middle holding up the flag. His cousin Mathew is at the right side.

Last of the honey for this year.

We gathered another gallon of honey from the girls before putting them to bed for the winter. That makes 4 and 1/8 gallons for this season. Next year we are going to try our hands at splitting a colony and set up a second hive. We should have enough next year to sell. The jar on the left is late season harvest, mostly clover. The jar on the right is from the summer harvest and is mostly an orchard blend.

Tree House of Sorts.

Tony has bugged his dad for several years to have a tree house. Well, Jeff started on it Oct 24th with Tony's help. The floor had been up for several months. By the end of the day they had three walls up.



Over the next two weekends it has been coming together.






Eventually
there will be another roof to the north side (door side) that will cover over the rest of our hay shelter.

Apples, apples, and more apples!!!

This year with the bee's help we were blessed with our largest bounty from the Lord yet. We estimated 600 pounds of apples harvested and probably another 200 pounds that had dropped to the ground before we got to them. (They went to the compost). Our kitchen was filled with apples for several weeks but we finally got caught up.

These are not the same ones in the previous picture. We used Christine's old bedroom as a overflow storage coldroom. Each tub is approximately 75 to 80 pounds.

The press arrived after some delay but we quickly got started on the cider. So far we have made several gallons of cider. Joyce has been putting up cases of apple sauce, apple pie filling, apple butter and sliced apples. Also the pastry shop (Joyce's Kitchen) has made apple pie's, apple cake, and apple donuts.
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Tony was busy after the harvest, painting the trees to get ready for winter.

Weekend to APPLE HILL

Sept 19th we took off early for a day to Apple Hill. My sister and her kids went with us. She was especially thrilled with the drive along mountain cliffs. Her favorite drives are over long high bridges with water below but unfortunately this trip didn't involve any. This first shot is just south of Minden/Gardnerville.

This is "Bills Apples". The best groomed farm in the area. Tony and Mathew are roaming the lawns. The orchards are to the left of the boys and continue up over the hill and down the other side. The other is of the parking lot and gift store and storage barn. His wife Felice use to sell handmade dolls. They are both retired from the physical side of the business and travel the world in the off season. Bill gave Joyce and me a ride in his John Deere Gator and a first class tour of the farm. This place is a must for anyone who visits the area! We're going back!!



This is the orchard for a small farm that specializes in Apple donuts. The donuts were made with apple cider. Sorry but Joyce's Apple donuts made with our Apple sauce is much better.



This is a row of Granny Smith apples from High Hill Ranch. This was the first place we stopped at and is a must for anyone going. We bought a gallon of fresh pressed apple cider and it tasted so good we decided to buy our own press, but that's another blog.




Finally on the way home we stopped on the side of the road to get this shot of Christmas Valley with Lake Tahoe in the background. This was Tonya's favorite spot, she was screaming with joy as I pulled over and had trouble catching her breath as she clutched her chest and closed her eyes as emotions overcame her. The vertical drop was quite exhilarating.
















I must confess my sister is absolutely TERRIFIED of heights.

What are the odds???

This year Tony was number 11 on his soccer team. So was his cousin Mathew and his cousin Jessica.

WE"VE GOT HONEY

The bees have been working hard making Clover Honey. We just pulled two frames today and boy does it taste great.

Newest Priesthood member

Tony turned 12 on the 11th of August and was ordained a Deacon today. He has been looking forward to this for some time and can't wait to pass the sacrament next week.

Yosemite day 2

Our second day we hiked the Maraposa Grove.
It's at the south end of the park. We thought we were taking the 1 hour trail and ended up on a different trail that took us to the top to a log cabin. It was worth it , though it threw the schedule off.

Watched a squirrel eating the seeds of a Sugar Pine cone.



Took one last view of the Valley before heading home.





And saw our first Bristlecone pine near

Tioaga Pass just before leaving thepark.

Family Vacation / Summer Edition /

This summer after talking about it for 10 years we went to Yosemite. First stop was Calaveras State Park.

On the way between the two parks we drove a section of hiway named after Eva Marie Schicke, the first female California firefighter killed fighting a forest fire in 2004.

Yosemite Valley The weather was nice, but most of the water falls had dried up. Have to go back in the spring.

update on the bees!

By the time we got the bee's most of the orchard had already blossomed, only the apple trees were left. Looks like we are going to have a bumper crop of apples this year.

Other member of the family

This is Sam. He adopted us Christmas 2006. His favorite thing to do is sleep. More important, he likes to sleep on or in things. To get an idea how big he is. The wicker basket is 18" by 24". The plastic tote in the bottom photo measures 22" by 16". He weighs 16 lbs.

The newest Member of the family.

This is our newest member of the family, Snowball. His job is to provide fertilizer. He's very good at it.

Our Bee's

We decided to get into the Bee business. We have a modest orchard on our Homestead that wasn't doing too good and decided to help out the trees with a little extra pollination. They sure have been fun to work with so far.

Baseball's here !

The HIT






The RUN







The SCORE



Tony is #7. Plays fielder for the Boston Red Socks.

"The Redwoods" Part of our Spring Vacation

They sure can grow em big 'n California.
Even when the center burns out they keep growing.
Peaceful stroll among the living giants
Time to pose for the camera.