10-13 August, 2011 Raspberries, Huckleberries and Paintball

Been keeping busy as usual for the summer.  The phone company was out and installed the phone line to Barbara and Victor's cabin so they now have phone and Internet service of their own.  We've done a little more to the cabin but not as much as I'd like.  We've had too many other projects going this week.

The raspberries are in full production mode now so we've been getting lots of tasty treats.  Susan picks them early in the morning when it's too cold for mosquitoes or yellow Jackets to be active.  Who'd have thought she'd be picking raspberries in mid-August in her winter coat in forty-degree temperatures!

Obviously it's early morning in the cabin while she's shelling peas.  I helped with this batch then a couple of days later all four of us shelled peas.  It goes much faster with more hands doing the work.  Susan has canned peas, oranges, raspberries and huckleberries this week.  Barbara canned her first batch on huckleberries this week also.

Susan making bagels.

Finally ... huckleberry picking time.  We've had a late start this year because of too many other projects going on. We should have been out two weeks ago. 

Time to head up the mountain ...

... or down the mountain!  The stream is a couple hundred yards below where we're parked.  Susan And Victor checked the area for huckleberries.  They found lots of plants but the berries were still green.

The dog went along this time and had free run of the mountain.  This is one of the clearing where the huckleberries are thicker.

Susan peeking through the brush spying on my huckleberry patch!

Others had already hit this section of the mountain but they left small pockets of berries scattered about.  The berries were good this year.  They were thick and large.  To bad we didn't get out earlier.  We still ended up with about a gallon of berries for each family.  I'm the fastest picker when our youngest daughter isn't around.  She's faster than me but more of hers get eaten instead of put in the bucket for consumption later.

The raspberry bushes are loaded this summer. These are in the garden.  The picture is in the wrong place.

Latest progress on the cabin.

Barbara working on the soap she made.

The goat got his horns stuck while butting his house.  He's kind of impatient and if he thinks I'm taking too long to feed him (about thirty seconds after he sees me) he gets mad and butts his house.  In this instance I made him wait while I took his picture before I got him free.

This is the dog's area.  She has places she spends a lot of time and this is one as evidenced by the bones, sticks and toys she's brought over here.

We were in Eureka getting the CO2 tank for recharging cylinders for the paintball games on Sunday when Susan took this picture of a Canadian woman and her dog doing his "chores.".  Notice the sign in both English and pictograph?

Ah ... paintball!  We did this to celebrate my birthday this year.  The best bruise award went to Dennis for this impressive specimen on his leg.  With the little kids we keep some distance when shooting at them but with the adults any shot is fair.  Some were pretty close and left some ugly bruises.

Me filling cylinders at the charging station.  We rent the CO2 in 50 lb. bottles then use the charging station to fill the small cylinders.  It's about the only good way to do it in the field when you're playing all day.  We went through approximately 4,000 paint balls.

We're going out for another round!

Back in from a round of capture the flag.  Most of them in this photo are family members.  We had three who couldn't get off work to come.

The younger boys couldn't keep up with us so we let them do some target shooting in the woods.  Three of us guys were the targets.  We dodged through the trees and let the kids shoot at us.  One of the boys is off to the right and outside of the picture.

Me and our oldest grandson coming in from a game.  Jonathan is nine and took part in several of the games.   He got hit but went back out for more games later.  Sometimes adults quit after the first hit. 

This is David, Jonathan's younger brother.  He played in a couple of games under the watchful eyes of mom, dad or grandpa.  When we got hit he was out too.  He was really happy when he got to shoot at someone.

Hannah and Andrew checking out the portable video game.

Jonathan showing off.

David's turn to show off.

Anna was having great fun pushing down on Dad's head.

Logan, the youngest grandchild, enjoyed all the action going on around him.

Andrew playing in the lake while dad fishes nearby.

It was a good day in the woods.