My husband and I got the idea that tonight would be a good one to see if the thimble berries were ripe at the shooting range. This is where we go every year. Now normally we take a gun with us when we go out to pick berries. Note, we have never seen any bears while picking berries. Unfortunatly tonight, we forgot the gun. So, here we are picking berries,walking along, deciding that the berries are not that ripe and we need to wait another week. The older kids saw some berries, so we stopped. I heard some twigs and stuff getting broke to the side of me, thinking that the 14 yr old was doing it, I did not look. Then we heard the growl. This was not a "checking you out, and these are my berries" kind of growl, oh no, it was " you people need to leave now" growl. Turning to my husband, I was like "what was that??" As I am saying that the second growl came with a little more force. It was then, that we all started to run to the van. Of course, the van was up a hill and around a corner. The 14 yr old took the lead, and I told him to get to the van and open the doors. Our youngest girl -12-was right on his heels, then came my husband, 5 yr old, and myself. The 10 yr old is running but not very fast-- asking " why are we running??" At that point I am grabbing him. We made it to the van, the bear did not follow, figure that he was in the bushes having a fit of laughter watching the dumb humans run. Remember the commercial with the squirrels getting the car to wreck and then laughing??? After we catch our breath, we then drove out of the shooting range. We did not stop to see if we could see the bear on the side of the road. Bears are not noted for having a sense of humor, and can take out a car. Not an experiance we wanted. Ok now I have a confession--all the time I have been here, my husband has told me over and over to wear tennis shoes when we go out in the wilds. I like my flip flops and have ignored him. Not 5 minutes before the whole bear thing, he gives me the "shoe" talk again. While I am running, I am thinking--if I get eaten by a bear because I was running to slow in the flip flops, I am really going to be mad!! Of course, when we got to the van and drove off guess what my husband said??? Oh yeah you got it, the "shoe" talk again. Now I will wear my tennis shoes when we go out no matter how hot it is. Lesson learned.

Only 5 more days

Only 5 more days and my sale is over....If any one sees something that they are interested in, please convo me and let me know. I will adjust the price accordingly--www.thegoldenthimble713.etsy.com
I really wanted to sell some stuff as I have new things to put on there.

I am excited. My oldest son is in town. Not sure how long he will be here. But as long as I get to see him, I am fine.

Getting past the heat is something. Although it is going to help my tomatoes. As soon as they get a few more set on I will take some pictures and put them on here.

The last week in review

Wow, this has been a busy week. I retook most of my pictures for my etsy. My youngest daughter and oldest granddaughter were my models when needed. They did such a good job, both are very pretty and enjoyed the picture taking. That took an entire day. Then the 2 days, I put them on the website. All in all I think that the light was better this time. The pictures were taken in a different room with lots of windows. If it had been sunny, that would have been better too, but then living in Southeast Alaska sunny days are not always when you want them. Let me know what you think of them--www.thegoldenthimble713.etsy.com--

Right now I am in the middle of some new projects for my store. I will let everyone know when I put them on. I was going to open up another store for just my baby things, but decided not to. Geez, it is hard enough keeping up with one, and all the marketing for it, so scrapped that idea.

My family and I drove out to the south end of the island last Saturday morning. It was so pretty out there. That is when I took the waterfall picture. We saw two black bears. The first one was a baby. Just kept on going, as we did not want his mama to have a fit. The second one was a 2 year old. He was on his own. Unfortunatly, both were to fast to take pictures of. It was still cool to see.

Yesterday morning we had a unusual thing happen. The neighbors friend landed a helicopter behind our houses. That was alot of excitement. The first thing I thought of was --alrighty who is going to get arrested, then of course, I thought--maybe I won the publishers clearing house--naw- knew that one would be to good to be true, but was very happy the first thought was not there.

For this week and next-- the younger 2 kids have swimming lessons. There are 6 levels here to pass. It is great for the kids, with all the water around here. There are two sessions in the summer and then during the winter, there is a program in the school.

Speaking of school, trying to get ready for that now. The new thing is for the first time in our schools history, we are going to have hot lunches available in all 3 schools. Now, I know that for all the people down south, that may sound very wierd, as you guys have had school lunch programs forever. The island is small, and the problem as always been how to provide the food. This year the funding came through-money is always an issue--so one of the local diners is going to do the cooking and delivering. Not sure how much this is going to cost us. Funny that part was not in the local paper when the article came out...makes me wonder how expensive this will be.

I did figure out how to fix the whole--2 blog thing--when I write, I will paste and copy so both blogs have the same thing on them. That way not one gets left out. Another exciting thing is that I was able to put Sarah Palin on my blog and my twitter yesterday. For some that might not be a big deal, but for most Alaskans, it is. And we are very big Palin supporters.

Well on my way out the door for swimming lessons.

Upset with the blogging issue...

Ok--I am having a horrible time with this blogging thing. Upset does not even begin to define this. When I was making the blog, I ended up with 2 of them. Well the one that is for my business has my personal name on it, the one that is personal has my business name on it. All I wanted was one blog not 2. And certainly not the names the way that they are. UGH!!!!! So I copied the award info and put it on my other blog. I could not understand why people were telling me that they were not seeing the info on my page... Now I know!!Then I will contact them when Etsy is back up, as it in in maintance mode...go figure...If anyone knows how to fix this mess please let me know. Thanks....

The Premio Meme Award

Since I am new at this, I will try and follow suit with my award--Thanks to Cutie PatootieBeads and Stitchnmomma, I have been awarded "The Premio Meme Award".. I am very honored to recieve this and will continue to try and stay one of their favorites. Both of these ladies have wonderful stores that should be hearted by all. Please check out their blogs and stores on etsy.

According to tradition I must share 7 things about myself in order to accept this award... so here goes...this is not in any order..

1. I love to do geneology.
2. My favorite season is spring.
3. I hate to cook. I am good at cooking, but it is just not my thing.
4. Love to travel and see new things.
5. I want to restore another old car.
6. My goal is to grow my hair down to my knees, it is almost where I can sit on it. Why??because I can..
7. I have a smart answer for everything and am extremely funny. No matter what my kids think..

Ok-- now for the rest of the requirements, I am bestowing this wonderful award to 7 other bloggers--

http://ajscountycottage.blogspot.com
http://eiriel'seclectics.blogspot.com
http://yystudio'sdesignerhandmadecustomwomenclothes.blogspot.com
http://mechelledesigns.blogspot.com
http://craftythisandthat.blogspot.com
http://alygatrseverywhere.blogspot.com
http://countrywindows.blogspot.com

Again, thank you for this honor.

This is for all the "multi-tasking" people. Please bear in mind to get to the best part of the story--you have to have the lead in......Today was busy (like every other day). Took the 2 younger kids on a bike ride this morning, came home, got ready to go to town. The 20 year old was coming home on a charter plane. He has been gone for a month working in the Juneau area. Lucas is a telephone lineman, for about a year now, and loves it. Anyway, he got to come home for a week. So we went and picked him up.

Had lunch with my husband, got groceries, went to the library. Now in the summer the library hand in hand with the school district provides a summer reading program. 10 points in accelerated reader and you get to go to a pool party. The 12 year old girl and the 5 year old have just over the 10 points. Then I have my over achiever who goes to the limit 100 points. That one is 10 years old. After that we came home.

At home, I put away the groceries. Keep in mind that the phone is ringing none stop all morning and all afternoon. Now, I am going to go to work--but wait, I need to boil the eggs for the pork noodle soup for dinner. Here comes the glitch to multi tasking--The eggs are boiling, I am returning phone calls, and trying to do book work for the construction business that my husband and his father own. Chasing kids. Working along,, and all of a sudden----I hear 3 large booms from the kitchen (my office is next to the kitchen) well scared me, and I am thinking what on earth could have made that noise???? The glitch to multi-tasking--I FORGOT THE EGGS WERE COOKING!!!! Have you ever heard eggs explode from the heat??? And the ones that did not explode were burnt on the bottom. Luckily the pan did survive, mess was minimal. Thought about not having eggs with the noodles, but being either very brave, or very brain dead, put more eggs on to boil.. It worked this time. I was searching for a "moral" to the story, but figured that every woman in the world has had a similar thing happen since we are always multi-tasking.

The rest of this day has went fairly good. We went to pick salmon and thimble berries in our favorite spot, but they are not quite ripe. The younger 2 are in bed, and this is finished so I am going to go and check on my raspberries and hill up my potatoes.

making the blog look good????

Ok, now I have spent quite a bit of time getting my blog to look decent. I am hoping that it is pleasant on the eyes. The generic one was not a good thing. My biggest problem was that I could not figure out how to put my "mini" etsy pictures on. That was one of my goal. If anyone knows how to do this, would you please tell me???

I got started on this looking at the forum on Etsy this morning. Lots of people talking about what to put on your blog. Inspired me to get this going. Please let me know what you think about my page.

Since I am at a stand still for this, I guess I need to move on. Finishing up my daughters quilt is on my list for today. Should have had it done yesterday, but grandkids and my younger kids were taking my time. I will be putting my pics of it on the webshots page--webshots/thegoldenthimble.com----

Everyone is home and it is dinner time, so I am finished for the night.