Our 1 Week Visit

Mamaw holding Peyton..Mamaw holding our daughter.

Bryce climbing the rock.
Mamaw holding the sleeping boys

The "Super Charged" 4 playing in the back yard .

Things grow big in Washington.

Good soil and moisture.

Muscle man Drake showing off his "tattoos"

Pawpaw holding Peyton.

Even Copper has his own bed.

We send a box almost every month

to the kids and they look forward to

opening them. We timed this one to

arrive about a day after we got there.

Even Copper the dog gets into the act

Bryce is ready for some ball playing.

More box opening.

Drake and Peyton are up to something.

Poor little Logan has to go to school

when he would rather stay home

with Mamaw and Pawpaw

Morning time and pacifier time.

Dog gone dog has his own bed

but prefers the couch.

Grandparents Day

Two of our grandchildren, Joseph and Adam, wishing us a happy day with signs they made. Our daughter posted this on her blog and I borrowed it.

Joseph Takes A Dive.

One for the money

Two for the show

Three to get ready

Four to go.

Here is our grandson Joseph showing his Mamaw & Pawpaw how he has learned to dive.

It was the first time we saw it so I guess he has been practicing in private ( With Mommy and brother Adam)

They learn so fast and grow up too fast as the years seem to be flying faster and faster as we age.

Summer is almost over and they are back in school so they can't come over as often now.

Soon it will be pool closing time again and I dread the winter that I hate more and more each year....

My Inside Hobby

When it gets too hot to work in my yard, I sit inside where it's cool and embroidery pillow cases. I give these as wedding gifts mostly, or to close friends.

With the temperature in the 100s lately I have finished these 5 pairs very quickly and as the heat lingers I will probably get more done....Madeline

Bigfoot Brigade

Here I am with my middle daughter and her 2 boys, Adam & Joseph.

We are all wearing a bigfoot "T" shirt designed by our son in law, their Dad.

The design won a contest and we all got freebies.

Click on picture to enlarge. Madeline

Fish Pond is now Rock Garden

After the owls successfully cleaned out our fish pond, we decided to make it into a sunken rock garden. It wasn't as easy as it sounded. First I had to cut a drainage outlet and found several inches of muck in the bottom that had to be manually removed. Large rocks had to be man handled and I'm not the man I once was. After I removed the rubber liner, We had to devise a plan for the garden that would be easy to look at and easy to maintain. The large rocks had to be moved again and again to get the right look or something we could live with. We placed small river rock in the bottom over garden felt to give it a dry river bed look. We planted flowers in pockets between the large rocks on the walls and decorated with our abundant supply of garden ornaments. It will look better next year when we add more flowers. We rebuilt one corner with the liner intact where we have water irises planted. We miss the goldfish but this will be easier to maintain than the pond so maybe it's for the best.

Joseph, A Junior Genuis

Here is a picture of our grandson Joseph 8, with Meterologist David Neal, with Fox 6, at the Jr. Genius Challenge winners' party at the McWane Science Center. It seems Joseph entered the contest and forgot about it untill he was notified he was a winner.

We don't know all the details yet but he sure looks proud and Mamaw and Pawpaw are always proud of him as well as our 10 other grand children and 1 great grandchild. We believe they are all genuises...:-)

Pair of Fish Thieves

I finally got both of the thieves to pose together. Mr. & Mrs Owl. look awful "fishy".

I suppose you have to do what you have to do to raise a family.

The Fish Thief

This is one of the pair of Owls that cleaned out our fish pond. They both allow us to get close and even seem to pose. I always thought owls were nocturnal but these are active all day.

We have a yard full of pesky chipmunks that we would love for them to put on their menu.

Our whole yard, I'm afraid, has been undermined by the cute little vermin and I've trapped many but don't have the heart to kill them. I usually take them to some near by woods so they can start a new colony.

I suppose the owls do catch some but the fish were so much easier to nab.

Goldfish Diner

In this peaceful pond , once lived about 100 goldfish but now there are none.
A big ole hungry owl moved in close by and used our pond as his own fish diner.

They disappeared slowly at first before we knew of the owl's presence and we suspected coons, possums or cats and maybe we were partly right. We only spotted the owl sitting on the bridge railing, with his mouth salivating, about a week ago and in 4 days the last 12 disappeared.

Look close and you can see some of the fish in the top middle of picture which was taken last year.

Moses Takes Flight

Mission accomplished....Here is Moses ready to flee the coop looking so much better than he appeared in the story below. Our daughter and grand kids did a great job of rescuing him from sure death.....Fly, fly away Moses but be careful out there, it's a dangerous world.

Bragging time again

Yep...It's every grandparent's right to brag on their grandkids and we aim to do it every chance we get.(Smile)

These are our middle daughter's boys and they are getting smarter than their Mamaw and Pawpaw.

It was awards day and they continued their sweep of awards again.

Adam, the oldest, completed 5th grade with perfect attendance and was on the "A" honor roll. He won awards in Bible , Spelling, Math, Language, Science, History and Citizenship. CLAP CLAP CLAP.

Joseph did quiet well also. He completed 2nd grade with perfect attendance and also was on the "A" honor roll.

His awards include Bible Memorization, Spelling, Math, Phonics, and best all- around 2nd grade boy. He also won the First Place trophy for the 2nd grade class spelling bee. CLAP CLAP CLAP.

Mamaw and Pawpaw are real proud of our boys.

Our new Grand Bird

I suppose you could say our family has grown again (in a way) This is Moses, our Grandbird : -)

Our middle daughter is so kind hearted that she just couldn't look the other way when she saw this poor bird on the ground, alone and hungry, with no nest in sight. It was just skin and bone until she nursed it back to health. It still has a bare spot but is rapidly going away.

She did research to learn what to feed it and she tenderly acts as its mother feeding it with tweezers. We think this one is a starling but not positive. This isn't the first bird that she raised till grown and able to fly away.

I believe she should have been a veterinarian and I'm sure she would have been a good one.

Washington Angels

These are our Grand Angels stuck way out in Washington State and we know they would be happier here in Alabama closer to their Mamaw and Paw Paw.

Bottom picture left to right, Logan 6 1/2...Bryce 15 months...Peyton 2 1/2...Drake 4 1/2..

Our daughter has her hands full for sure.....

Ethan at 9 Months

Ethan Is 9 months old and visited the Photo studio.

The top picture is our grandson Eric and his wife Summer holding our great grandson Ethan.

Aren't photographers great at getting children to pose so cute?

We can hardly wait untill we get to visit them in Texas.

Our Family is Growing

Our family is growing but not in numbers, just size. They grow so fast and we don't get to see this growth very often of our only great grandchild in Texas (Ethan) and our 4 grandchildren in Washington state.

This is the latest picture of Ethan whom we haven't seen since Thanksgiving.

Our oldest grandchild in Washington lost his first tooth and he called his Ma Maw so proudly exclaiming that the tooth fairy left him $5.00 and mom explained, to us, it was the smallest she had. His next will be substantially less.

Maybe another trip to see them is on the horizon.

The years first Blizzard

The weather man predicted snow flurries and since It's been a while since we had snow ,I had to record this blizzard. As you can see, the slope to our neighbors house is ready for skiing, the back deck is too deep for outdoor cooking, the birds have been snowed out of their birdbath and my car is almost buried....Oh well, I did get a little excited but I still remember the deep snows back home in Northern California. Maybe we will still get some this year but Karl hates it......Madeline...

A Botanist I'm not.

I'm no botanist nor have I ever been accused of having a green thumb. In fact almost everything I try to raise dies a quick death no matter how much loving tender care I give it. If it's a wild plant and I leave it alone it seems to do great which gave me an idea. When my daughter, Deann, gave me this poinsettia last Thanksgiving it was somewhat smaller and I expected it wouldn't last long with my brown thumb nursing it so I let it live a life of it's own and to my amazement it thrived with no care. (Ain't it Purty?) So maybe that's the secret that experts are keeping from people like me, just leave it alone.....Madeline

Adam did good

Here is Adam our grandson with the ribbons he won at theACEA state academic competition: He won 4 first place and 2 second place ribbons in English, Math, Science, History/Geography, Spelling, and Bible drill. Mamaw and Paw-paw are so proud of him.

Adam made the paper

This is a picture in the Birmingham News of our grandson Adam waiting his turn in a district spelling bee where he came in second .An eighth grader outlasted him. Adam is in the fifth. Wait till next year (smile)