~ Summer Scrapbook 2 ~

 

Beautiful summer sky. 

I can't remember a year when I've enjoyed summer as much as I am enjoying this summer.

Sitting at the kitchen table, I can hear the pft~pft sound of the pressure canner.

Turkey vegetable soup is being processed. 

My second pressure canning session of this summer. 

I am so rusty where pressure canning is concerned, so I've been doing small batches to remember and tune up my pressure canning skills.

My first batch of pressure canned goods was some boneless country-style spareribs.

They turned out wonderful, although I had a bit more siphoning than I wanted. Too hot of a burner... this time I'm trying to find the sweet spot on the burner setting.

Morning sky view, from my front porch...

Along our walking path, early in the morning. On this morning, we could still see a bit of the smoke from the fire over by Fillmore, on the other side of the west mountains. Quite a long ways from where we live, but the smoke was quite visable in our valley. The fire is completely out now, thankfully.

Our view from the front porch... mountains and more mountains.

Also, our neighbor's pasture for their two mules... that "HEE~HAW" so loudly in the morning, and see their chickens running around.

A good yard~sale find ~another puzzle by Eric Dowdle.

I've been collecting these puzzles whenever I see one for a good price at a yard sale or at a thrift store.

Turns out that our one white rose bush produces long-stemmed roses. What a treat!!

Another morning sky over our subdivision.

Another early morning soak at the natural hot spring . We only soak our feet and legs and watch the sun rise over our valley.

We have enjoyed taking our side by side aka : the scooter, up the canyon for morning rides.

The red barn. This is the red barn at a new RV park in town, where we can go for BYU Creamery ice cream. It's a real treat!

Growing up in Provo, and with my mom working for BYU, I have always been a fan of BYU Creamery ice cream, so all these decades and decades later to have a place for delicious ice cream in our little town is awesome!

We are big fans of popcorn. We recently bought 40 lbs of popcorn, We have Sam's club membership that we can order from and free shipping right to our front door. Sure makes it nice, especially with gas prices being so high and we are at least 2 + hours from the closest Sam's club.

We have a Whirlypop popper, and we love, love popcorn made in that thing! It's wonderful!

Along a 'country road' drive a day or so ago, we saw these hay bales being wrapped with patriotic mesh. How fun!!

Newest members of the family .. two border collies. Brothers.

We are training them and they are so smart!!

They will be outside dogs, but house trained so that when the weather is too hot or cold they can be inside.

Ye olde pressure canner **smile*.

I have a goal of emptying one of our freezers and canning all of the meat in that freezer. 

A few more yard sale finds... this glorious rooster and a wreath as well.

I don't know about where you live, but where we live, the yard sales have been few and far between. Not a ton of great stuff at the thrift stores either. I feel like folks are hanging on to their decor and deciding that they can live with their choices ...for now.

I did give one of our daughters in laws some darling country blue dishes that she has long admired. I found them at a yard sale, new in the box, last summer. 

She was tickled with them and I was happy that she was happy!

This week ~~ more canning. 

                 ~~ more cleaning out borders..trimming and weeding, etc.

                ~~ painting the garage side of the laundry room door. Really needs a re~fresh!

               ~~ beginning the process of switching around the library for my office. 

              ~~ morning walks and country drives, and watching the sunrises and sunsets.

~ Summer Scrapbook ~

 

Summer sunflowers.

Sleepy morning bees...still sleepy from gathering pollen.

Sweet little sheep, grazing in a field. 

On an early morning ride, we saw these sheep in a nearby town. They are very small and quite sweet looking, though I haven't any idea what kind they are.

We drove to Loa to a shop to have new tires put on one of our vehicles. Loa is close to Capitol Reef National park.  This cute old truck was at the gas pumps. 

Love it!

Lots of beautiful skies this summer. 

Most mornings we go for a walk, and what a treat to see such beautiful morning skies. Although, most evening skies are equally beautiful.

Sea Holly. This has been a good year for our flowers, and the sea holly is gorgeous. 

For July, I put out buntings and this sweet Uncle Sam porch sitter that I made years ago. I gave him a refresh this year with a new wooden USA tag. 
July is a big month in Utah... not only do we celebrate Independence Day, but Pioneer Day as well.

Also, both of our sons have birthdays in July, one of our daughter~in~love, and our only Grandson has a birthday in July!!!

There is a great barn door and shutter-making factory in our area, and many times they will have scrap wood that is free for the taking. It is a great benefit for the community to have the free wood, not only for making cute crafts but also there are those that heat with woodburning stoves, and that scrapwood is so nice for that.

We used a bit of the scrapwood to make these sweet little 'lathe' stars. I put one on all the exterior doors of our house for July.

 

Another day, another beautiful sky.

New French-style bistro in our area. 

There is a darling patio attached to the bistro as well, strung with cafe lights and cute French-styled bistro chairs and tables.

July hutch... all the red white and blue. 

Barn on the property just west of us. This barn belongs to the people that sold off 40 acres of their farm and made our subdivision. We are still on 'farm share' water, and we pay just $10.00 a month for pressurized irrigation.

Incidentally, the couple that owns the farm, and barn, and sold the land for our subdivision, lives in our ward. The Mr. told me that this land is fertile and some of the best farmland he had ever had!

We made this sweet 'Garden Angel' with scraps we had. The shutters were given to me by a friend when we lived in Spring City, the head and wings and arms were from the scrap wood pile at the factory that I mentioned previously.

The wheelbarrow was a curbside find and given a bit of a crafty makeover. 

I am enjoying this summer so much. It's been a long time since I remember enjoying summer so much! Usually, I tend to wish summer away a bit. 

Especially as I have gotten older the summer heat just zaps me, but not this year! I am loving all things summer and each and every day has been a blessing and a treat. I am thankful for this summer.

So many good things and blessings plenty this summer. My cup runneth over.

~ Country Roads ~

Another Country Roads drive....

 Vultures sunning themselves in the morning sun.

My favorite country road drives through one of the canyons.

In the same canyon above...a sweet wildflower grows out of a crack in the rock cliff.

Mule deer 

Cottontail

Natural cave

Dozens of pelicans.

Lastly, a morning sky along our country roads walk.