Archery in 3D

Sheldon wanted to do an Archery competition located at Lake Malony the past weekend.  So we decided to make it a family day minus Tyrell who stayed home to work and take care of kittens, but we had our other son (Will), Sheldon's girl friend and another friend of the kids.

Despite some minor annoying issues with his bow Sheldon had a really good time and was a great learning experience for him.   The 3D part was walked through a course with several different 3D targets and shooting angles.

Following Arrows you find the shooting points have have to touch the "white or yellow" and take your shot.

Some of the targets were unexpected!

From a Blind

Through a Fence

And from up High

Here are some shots from the round target competition.  These were shot as 12 rounds of 5 arrows and 10, 20 and 30 yards.  He had to do a lot of adjusting as his target sights and peep wouldn't cooperate with each other.  Discovered later he had popped off a crucial piece of string that held the peep sight in place.  At the break we were able to scrounge up a small piece of "string" to attempt to hold it in place.  

Parents scored their kids shots so here Chuck and Sheldon are discussing points and which way to do some adjustments

At the end of the day he come home with a Silver in the 3D and a 3rd in the Round Target.  Very respectable placings.  Lots of fun and sun was had by the group and we all learned something.  Pretty sure he will be wanting to go back next year.

Here are some other random shots of the day

Thanksgiving 2012

My sister and I decided that with all of the dietary issues several of the family members have to try and find some new versions of the standard dishes we normally would have for the thanksgiving meal. So we started scouring the web for some ideas and from the comments during the meal we did pretty good. After finding the recipes we were going to try we made our plan of action and decided the cooking order based on temps and times. So here is our meal plan of action and the links embedded in the names for where we found recipes.

We thought it would be smart to make our pies first...Stephanie made the crusts then we started on the fillings. The requested items were family favorites pumpkin and pecan... Stephanie broke out the trusty better homes and garden cook book for these... I took on the pumpkin and she did pecan.. Now our family is kinda leary when we say we are making pecan pie... Seems she and I tried to make a festive one once and well no one appreciated our festive green colored pecan pie...It has become an inside family joke.. well much to the family's relief these were made the normal boring way nothing festive here. (I really wanted to try red or orange this year)

Green bean casserole : this was just awesome and I think will be come the standard from now on. Fresh green beans washed and snapped by my oldest son ( which he did willingly so his aunt would make him some coffee) while I worked on the mushroom sauce...I will definitely be making this sauce more often. It was easy and tasted great.

Mashed Potato cakes : these were interesting to make... By the fifth one think I had it down...definitely a learning curve but they turned out great. After seeing the size they turned out I would add more potatoes and make them bigger.

Maple Sweet potato cups: this recipe had mixed reviews, it totally deviated from the normal yams and marshmallows. Some really enjoyed the meringue topping and others said marshmallows.  We did have another option for the sweet potatoes that I will be trying some time. Maybe for Christmas dinner to go with the requested Mashed potato meatloaf..

Creamed corn with bacon: this was a WOW recipe and no leftovers. Will definitely be making this again for any meal.

Roasted broccoli in a lemon garlic sauce: this was really good and would have been great if we hadn't over roasted.. Since both of us girls had our gall bladders removed some of the raw veggies we loved don't love us back anymore so we had to find some alternate ideas so we could still enjoy them.. We did forgo the pine nuts in the recipe because well at 1 am when we were last minute shopping we just could not find the pine nuts even though we circled the aisles several times. My youngest son cut up the broccoli in exchange for his aunt to make him a coffee.

Cranberry sauce: this one we totally did by the seat of our pants... Frozen cranberries, little bit of sugar ( which wasn't near enough) and some water... Yes we added more sugar later....

Stuffing : we so totally cheat on this but well one can not go wrong with stove top. However there is a funny story involved... While we were on the previously mentioned last minute 1 am shopping trip neither one of us could remember if mom could eat the turkey flavor or cornbread flavor..so we got one of each...of course we had to walk around a bit to find them and we were totally distracted by the directional arrows taped to the floor.. One way aisles in a store? Wow... we were totally giggly by this time and the arrows weren't helping. Kept waiting for one of the many restockers to yell at us for going the wrong way... and now the next funny part...mom arrives mid morning and says "I brought four boxes of stuffing where do you want them?". Stephanie and I look at each other and just start laughing...well neither of us remembered the conversation where she had told us she had the stuffing...

And the turkey... Ultimately it was decided to inject the big bad boy with marinade and deep fat fry it.... Now where was the injector... That's right.. The injector was 3 hours away at my house...so this was the real reason for the 1 am shopping trip...after several walk arounds we finally stumbled upon the marinades... And for the bonus they came with injectors!

Another thing about this last minute shopping trip... We forgot the list... So here we are standing at the front of the store racking our brains as to what we had written down..because that is why you write a list right? We managed to remember most of it and her wonderful husband sent us the list as well...

Everyone enjoyed the food and had a great time...the only one missing was my husband who had to stay behind due to other obligations.. However the boys did a great job keeping us entertained in the father's absence. Stephanie and I are very proud of the fact we only opened one canned item..and that was the pumpkin...everything else was fresh, frozen or made from scratch...and really didn't take us all that long to make.

July 6th

From 2010july6storm

From 2010july6storm

From 2010july6storm

From 2010july6storm

From 2010july6storm

Tank Redo and New Fish

So I was challenged to revive my tank. And now I have some new fish to join the crew.

Going to find some other landscapes that I did on this tank. Seems like I redo every 6 months or so.

June 25th Storm

This one hit fast and hard. Towards the end when it was just the big hail stones falling, one could hear them hitting the metal roofs over at the fairgrounds.

June Storm

Well we finally got hit by hail, and I didn't have a panic attack. Focusing on taking pictures really helped I think. Chuck said I did a lot better with this storm. I had most of the computers unplugged, my weather radio blaring on the table, my phone had the radar going and camera in hand. I stayed on the porch as long as I could, then the hail started bouncing everywhere. The south porch ended up being too wet and had more hail bouncing on to it, so I went to the east porch for a while.

Found some fasinating clouds to start things off. Right before the storm hit, the vultures were out in force riding the currents.

Then the rain column headed towards town.

Yes I know these would be better with out the trees but that would have meant heading out of town to get the "whole" shot. Given the fact we had the garage cleaned out for both vehicles I wasn't about to take one out. It was a rather nice feeling, as those great big rocky chunks hit to know that the vehicles were safely put away. When the hail started you could hear them hit one at a time a smack here then another one, then they all hit at once.

And the rain, it was like someone dumped a large bucket of water and ice.

Naturally I couldn't find a golf ball to compare these too, so just had to make do with the ruler. There were a lot of very jagged pieces. Lots of marble size pieces as well. Sheldon thought I was nuts when I asked him to go out and pick up hail.

Anyway, enjoy.

Birds

We have discovered at least 3 bird families in the ponderosa's, so I enjoyed some time sitting on the porch with my handy dandy camera. Chuck actually found the blue jay nest and I was off on a picture taking rampage. After taking over 300 pictures it is hard to narrow it down to just a few that I think are neat. So here we go, I give you the "Birds"


Blue Jay Family



Robin Family



Starling Family



Mourning Dove



Finches


Not sure what these are yet, when I find the book will figure it out.

I think this is a Western Kingbird but I am not sure.