More camping trips

We got back from backpacking and visiting people in CA, dove into a kitchen project for a few weeks (more on that later), then went car camping in 2 places. These camping trips were back to back. There was only a 19 hour stop at home between trips. Normally I would not have done that but two big reasons lead to this decision. One-all the camping stuff was already out, I just had to do some wash, restock the ice chest (I planned the same meals for both trips simplifying the shopping, meal prep and packing) and load up the kayaks for the second trip. Two-we wanted to do something with the family before school started up again and this was the time that worked for everyone. So off we went.

The first trip was to Cape Lookout. I booked this trip about 2 months before we went. I was surprised to get a spot under the trees in this campground. We took grandkids, their mom (dad was on a hunting trip), and Jack, their dog. We had rain/drizzle the first night but thereafter was great weather. The kids had fun on the beach, running in the waves, playing in the sand. We explored caves and creatures that lived on the rocks at the southern end of the beach. We followed the park's nature trail, discovering different trees and plants that grow in the area. The kids enjoyed roasting marshmallows. Jack is an older dog and enjoyed laying around. All in all a good trip.

     

      



The second trip was to Trillium Lake in the Mt Hood Wilderness. Just Mr WAU and I went on this trip. The views of Mt Hood were fabulous, the mountain looked different depending on the time of day or the weather. I took way too many pictures of that mountain. They had just restocked the lake before we got there so we took our fishing poles in addition to the kayaks. We forgot our fishing net so we lost some of the fish that we caught. Have to remember that next time. All in all we hooked 11 fish but only came back with 5. So now we have plenty of "the one that got away" stories. There is a nice trail around the lake, it is 2 miles and pretty easy to do. Each morning we could watch an eagle scope out the lake on a tall dead tree next to the shore, take to flight, swoop down to catch a meal and fly off to eat it. It was a relaxing trip. It did drizzle one night but not so bad that things were damp. The next night the wind came up, it was nice to go to sleep with the sound of the wind blowing thru the pine trees. And the stars at night were dazzling. It is a trip that we will do again.

      

   

   

Backpacking

Late July we started on a series of trips-as opposed to vacations, we decided when retired that these excursions are now to be referred to as trips. This backpacking trip was about a year in the planning. I think it was my son-in-law's idea and it was a great one. About 16 years ago Mr WAU and I took the kids from our church's high school group backpacking. We did this 2 years in a row. Each year it was about 15 kids and for many this would be their first backpacking trip. My son-in-law (then not my son-in-law) came on the second trip. It would be one of the events that helped my daughter and him to become a couple and to eventually get married. From this second trip many friendships were forged and we wanted to experience that again with some of the same people-only now they are all grown up and have families of their own. So the idea was to invite some of the same people plus add more family and friends to the mix and go to the same location. My brother and his partner even came-it was special to be able to camp with my brother-we hadn't done that since we were kids. That meant a long road trip for some of us as this place was in California, at Lower Rock Lake in the Grouse Ridge area of the Sierra Nevadas. People came from Oregon, southern California, and the Sacramento area. We ended up with 17 people on this trip. It was nice to go again and not have to be in charge of a bunch of high schoolers. This lake has a large open meadow near the lake that we knew would be good for this trip. Just in case, one of our group went up the weekend before and checked it out to make sure the camping was still good. We had 4 different waves of people come up, each grouping had organized themselves for departure times that worked for them.  Mr WAU and I joined up with 4 others to be the first to get there on Thursday. We wanted to make sure that we would get the same spot we had 16 years ago and it worked. As the day went on others would show up. The trail to get there was not complicated to follow and it was not a technical trail, in fact most of it was a wide road into the wilderness. So it was pretty easy for everyone to find where camp was set up. Even my grandkids made the trek, 7 years old and 3 years old, carrying what they could in their own packs-their daddy taking the rest of their supplies. To encourage the grandkids I set up a "sign" for them on the trail. I took large sticks and made initials of their first names in the path. I did it in about 3 different places. Their parents said it really helped. Some of the group came in the dark and we put lights out on the end of the trail for them. And this time again, it was the first backpacking trip for some of the people. It was a great time. We hiked, swam, ate, fished, and just relaxed in hammocks-we had a lot of hammocks.

Our hike in on Thursday

Me and my brother

    

Grandkids initials                 Grandkids

   
Hammocks                                      City of tents

Refurbishing & Refinishing

We have been moved in for over a year now. Most of the house repairs have been done. We did most of them last year while the weather was good for tackling those repairs. This year, now that the weather is good for the summer, we are back on track for fixing things-things about the house or our own personal things.

Last summer we did not get to the hall bathroom shower. It was leaking under the house. Our solution was to not use it until we could get to it this summer. Mr UAW fixed it! It turned out that a new faucet was needed, a trip to the local home improvement store had what was necessary to fix it. Now we have 2 showers that work.

   

We stopped at a garage sale last month and I found sewing material, fill a bag for $6. How could I turn that down? I found material to use for a shower curtain. A trip to the local superstore and I had grommets to use for the top. I've never put grommets in material before but it worked great and now I had a shower curtain. Since I did the curtain I wanted to paint the cupboards. I made my own chalk paint from leftover paint (Pinterest has lots of recipes for chalk paint) and I had some dark wax left over from my hutch project last summer.  Used together and I have the cupboards redone!

    

Next on my list was a dresser that used to be my grandmother's. While we lived in CA we refinished the small one but for some reason didn't get around to the tall one. I know that if you're looking to sell old pieces you shouldn't refinish them, refinishing them devalues them. But I wanted to keep them and they were so bad that I didn't want to put anything in them. We just took the old finish off of them, left the original stain on them, and oiled them for a finish. Now they look like a nice pair.

Our next project was our kitchen table. It is something that Mr UAW had refinished years before we were married. He used to refinish furniture for a living. This is a oak harvest table from the late 1800's to early 1900's. It was in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and was badly burned. When Mr. UAW first did this piece he had a big job to do. He took it all apart, he had to replace some pieces, there was much sanding to remove burned areas. When he finished it was beautiful. It is very heavy. Fast forward many years and this table has been used as a family table as my girls were growing up. The combination of children, and living in the kitchen to be used as extra counter space, and a family eating off of it, and things being placed on it that probably should not have been placed on it had left it looking very old. It was time to refinish the main part of the table, the extra harvest leaves were still in fine shape but the top needed some help.
Before picture shows the burn mark in the center from something too hot being put on it and there is a moldy spot in the corner-moisture from a planter. There was also many scrapes and dents on it that don't show up in the picture.



The during pictures-here it is all opened up, without the top piece. You can still see the burned areas that Mr. UAW left from the original refurbishing.

Here are some of the refinishing pictures:

Stripper has taken off first layer of lacquer-burn mark gone but mold still there

All lacquer off and mold sanded off

Now stained and drying for 3 days

Now has 3 coats of polyurethane

The hardest part of this whole project is working with the stripper. It is nasty stuff. Adequate ventilation is required-hence we are working outside. Chemical resistant gloves are necessary, you don't want to get this stuff on your skin. 

Then we had to wait a few days for the polyurethane to dry. A final coat of mineral oil rubbed in with #0000 steel wool and we were ready to put it all back together. 

Jack, the grand dog, supervising Mr UAW putting the table back together

Now it's all back together and looks better. We are going to leave it open for a week or so because it will help it all to lay flat.

   

The next project: kitchen counters! It should be interesting because it needs to be done and we have to do it ourselves. It costs too much to hire it out. We've researched what we want to do and feel like we are able to do it. So... to be continued...

Update June/July

Here is a random post, just updating the things that we have been doing.

Of course there are family things.
       


      

Zeke and I had a science day. I checked out a science experiment book for kids from the library and we had fun with the experiments. Zeke got his green belt in Taekwondo and he participated in the Blender Dash where he got to run 2 miles thru paint powder being thrown at him, thru maintains of bubbles, past zombies to get to the finish line.  Micaela danced in her dance recital and did a great job! Most of us ran in the 5K at the balloon festival here in town.  And Jeni and I got to treat ourselves to tea at the Japanese Tea Garden, and we went to the rose garden-so beautiful.

       

      

We have been making things. I put together the succulent turtle, maybe the succulents will spread-we will see. Anyway the kids named it Yurtle the Turtle after a Dr. Seuss story.  We made a fairy village-the kids made most of the houses and ladybugs, with some help, then they set it up. Jim got around to finding a place to hang up his tools that he has been collecting. We got some lights for our deck. And the garden is producing. Here it is July and we are still eating peas, they just keep growing. My broccoli is almost ready to pick. The brussel sprouts are just starting to form on the stalks. The green beans are about an inch long. I have 1 pie pumpkin on the vine so far. I have green tomatoes. We've been picking blueberries and strawberries.

             

We have been going places. We went to Henry Hagg Lake to fish but didn't catch anything. I did see 4 fish jump and I got a nibble! We took the kids to a local water park. The balloon festival and the 5K run were fun. Hiking at Cooper Mountain was fun-it's a local park. The parking lot is at the top of the mountain so anywhere you go is down hill. And we all know that for every down hill there is an uphill-so it's good hill practice for hiking. At this park at this time of the year there are plenty of wildflowers.



One of our sunsets. So far it has been a mild summer. We are still getting used to the cooler summers-it is very nice not to be hot all the time. Hope you are all having a good summer. I'm sure there will be more adventures to post later.