Sunrise in Oregon

Princess

While the younger girls were getting "sparkly" my oldest was adding a few sparkles of her own, in the form of dress-up clothes.  Yes, my girls are girly-girls.  Hey, I've got four of them; we may as well have fun with it!

Spider

With plenty of trees to spread webs from, it's no wonder the spiders love my parents' yard.  I thought this was a particularly handsome spider myself.

Fish pond

My dad lived in Japan for two years, and he's always had a fondness for Japanese gardens.  When they built their house several years ago, most of their time and money went into creating a backyard pond.  When we visit, our kids love to feed the fish in Grandma and Grandpa's pond; I like to photograph the fish.

My folks don't keep pets, but they do like their fish!

These are the fish's swimming patterns.  They're a cozy little bunch.

Sparkly Kids

"What has my sister done to me?!"

Grandma has the coolest "beauty kit" for kids, full of bright, colorful goodies (or goop) that can be spread all over kids' faces.  My second oldest daughter took the role of makeup artist for her younger sisters; these photos show her "masterpieces."

And here's the artist herself:

Romantic getaway

We've been visiting my folks in Oregon.  My husband and I don't get to leave the home for a date very often, so my parents encouraged us to take a bike ride through the forest.  My folks are fortunate enough to live near a paved nature trail that lies within walking or biking distance.  So we borrowed their bikes, grabbed my old Canon Powershot 6 MP camera (the dSLR was too bulky for a bicycle ride), and disappeared for a couple of hours.  Can you tell that we had fun?

It's a forest--of sorts.

I grew up in western Oregon, with a forest in my back yard.  Now I live in eastern Utah, in the middle of the desert.  As you can imagine, it's been a bit of an adjustment.  Several years ago, we built a house.  The next summer, I started planting.  But the plants that you can grown in western Oregon are very different than the ones you'd choose for Utah.  I added a new word to my vocabulary--Xeriscaping--and took on the challenge.

One of the first plants I added to our home was a hollyhock.  It was available in the early spring, when I was desperately searching the nursery for anything green, and my gardening books assured me it was "drought tolerant when established."  It survived.  So the next spring, I sowed some hollyhock seeds next to it.  Next year--wow!  I swear those little plants must be related to the beans in Jack and the Beanstalk because they grew like crazy. . .and multiplied.

I love waiting for them to pop out each summer.  In the spring, the kids and I chop down the last year's stalks (and I do mean chop--I have to use my large pruners).  Then we wait for the magic.  One day we can see a carpet of green spread along the west side of our home.  A week later, it seems, little stalks have shot upward.  Then the heat of summer arrives and suddenly the entire side of our home is covered by these lofty, friendly flowers.

Our trees may be small, but we have a forest--an entire grove of hollyhocks.