Zoo visit!! Smoke, smoke and more smoke

Luckily yesterday was absolutely perfect for a visit to the zoo. It was cool- in the 60's- and cloudy most the time we were there. The sun broke out later. One of my dad's goals was to get to the zoo. So we went with Erika and the girls. All enjoyed it! Although Scarlet is a bit young yet to really appreciate it much! All the lions were out, even the younger ones. One was chewing on mom. :) Quite cute! The girls lasted about 2 hours although we were needing to persuade Teagan to smile for the picture at the end!

Today the smoke from all the fires moved in. We've actually been quite lucky so far. This is the first day it's been super bad while a lot of other area's in the state have been dealing with this smoke for a couple of weeks. The air quality was HORRIBLE!! It was at 229 and when it reaches 100 it's considered bad! We went out to the convention grounds today for the last day of preps. My job was to spiff up the well house and clean the drinking faucet area's. Then conventions start next week! YEA!!! :)

Work is going quite well right now. Although I did lose a client today. :(  Really, I'm better off without him and it all happens for a reason! At least some taxes should get paid next month.

The lions were out!

There's something interesting in there! Great grandpa and Teagan.

Snack time!

I really like this profile picture of my dad!

Erika and Teagan

Picture before we left.

Teagan had quite the attitude at the end!

Erika tickling the mood out of Teagan. :)

The Well house is clean!

Spiffed up!

So smokey!!

My dad is going to mow the dandelions! He was one happy camper!! :)

Smokey- Orange sun. This school may be where Christina's second job may be.

These months really like the mint!

And so do the bees!

Raspberries are already ripening! A month ahead of time!

Caffeine and Diabetes? & updated grandchildren pictures!

It's been a bit of a roller coaster with my dad's diabetes. I found out he didn't have his Metformin and hasn't taken it for quite a while! I'm thinking that is part of the issue. However we've managed to make progress regardless! Today it got down to 109 and he has been in a wonderful mood!! A couple of days ago it really spiked though and he really hadn't had anything that was 'bad'. So I started wondering about caffeine, as he had had quite a bit of it. I looked it up and they are finding that too much caffeine will actually cause the insulin to not be near as effective as it should be. So the last couple of days he's had no caffeine and as I said his mood is much better. Once we get the Metformin, hopefully tomorrow, we can start having a bit more meal wise. I've been fixing very low carb meals and it's been a struggle to keep it below 150, but again how much of that was because of the caffeine? So those wondering why insulin isn't working very well, how much caffeine is being consumed? That was certainly an interesting find!

In other news, I had the girls Monday and Wednesday this week. Yea!! :) They're growing up so fast! Scarlet is starting to talk quite a bit, however it takes some doing to really understand her sometimes! :) She'll be 2 the end of next month and Teagan will be 3 1/2! We went to the park Wednesday morning. Those pictures are below. Great-Grandpa helped push!

The garden is doing pretty good. It's been a tough go for the cucumbers but the crooked neck squash are doing quite well!! As are the tomatoes. Hopefully lots of those can be frozen, as I'm 1 shy of being completely out of them! One of my favorite dishes that I make using the tomatoes and squash is frying the sausage (Hillshire horseshoe shaped) in some olive oil and browning it and then add onions and bell peppers and saute those and then add summer squash saute some more and then tomatoes right at the end. No seasoning is necessary since the sausage takes care of that! My dad LOVES that dish and it is extremely low carb. At this point the peppers, tomatoes and squash are from the garden! Garden pictures below. I need to take some more. There's not many new ones right now! :)

Diabetes

My dad  is visiting for 6 weeks. And an interesting 6 weeks it'll be! We're going to try and figure out why his sugars are so high in the morning and as a result just over all.(170-180) I have my suspicions but only time will tell. I do know part of it is those snacks that have 30 carbs in just 6 pieces! (Yikes!!!)   Those goldfishes are nasty things for diabetics! Needless to say a handful really plays with sugars!! It is tricky because fruits need to be eaten in small portions. Since he's running so high probably just a 1/4 of an apple with carrots for a snack, with maybe peanut butter? It's tricky when there's a love for food! ;)  Scarlet has neonatal treated as type 1 diabetes. My dad has type 2 diabetes. They're treated somewhat differently. I have found out they avoid using short lasting insulin with type 2, although I need to research the exact reason. I do know that technically speaking type 2 diabetics do produce some insulin.  For Scarlet's both long lasting and short lasting are used. There is very little or no insulin at all produced by the body.  Long lasting insulin and metfromin is what is being used for my dad. It's going to be a journey. I hope that we are able to make progress!! Carb counting here we come!

Hiking... sort of :)

Christina has really started getting out and hiking. I've just sort of started this weekend. She had a bowenworks treatment Friday and was told to not do much the next day. :(  So we went to Oxbow Park and walked down to the Sandy River and enjoyed some peace and quiet. It was cloudy and cool so there weren't very many people there. There was no one where we were so it was very nice!! And we got rain this weekend! Yea!! :)  It's the first substantial rain since the first part of May I believe. And then the heat is back this week.  Oh and apparently an interest in the weather runs in the gene's according to another one of my cousins. So I came by it quite naturally. :)

Lots and lots of moss. :)

Visitors, Gorge pictures

My aunt and cousin visited Thursday and we had an awesome time going up to the Vista House and then continued down the road to Multnomah Falls. While we were visiting Friday evening I realized that a laugh is genetic, at least mine is! My cousin and I have amazingly similar laughs! And I have been told quite a few times that I have a unique laugh. Even more interesting is there were several times we said things at the same time. And this is a cousin I have been around very little. Our family's visited when she was quite young but not since then. It's amazing how strong genetics can be! If only she didn't live so far away!! It's was wonderful to get to know her a little bit and to see my aunt face to face again!

A panorama from the Vista House. The left side is towards Portland.

The Vista House in the Columbia Gorge. The front steps of this place will get hurricane force winds in the winter time due to east winds coming through the Gorge. It's gotten to 120 mph I believe.

One of the falls along the Old Columbia Highway

Multnomah Falls- It's been a very, very dry year and there's not much water.

The bottom part of the falls taken from the bridge that's in the picture above.

The top of the falls

Christina, Auntie and our cousin

Apology

I have no way of knowing if Dave reads this but just in case I'm going to post this as I have no other way of communicating this!

This morning I've really felt a need to apologize for all that you had to put up with. We heard about justifying yesterday and how easy it is to do, I now find myself trying to do exactly that as I type! There's no justification for what I've done, for my attitudes. In K-Falls, in Portland. As a wife I needed to be putting your needs first and I know that that didn't happen. The last couple of years I worked on it but it was much too late then! I do appreciate the insight these last several years have given me into myself. I don't know when I'll be able to apologize face to face. But I do hope that day will come eventually. Meanwhile please know that I'm truly sorry for all that you had to put up with! Your in my thoughts and prayers each day.

Thankfulness

I'm so thankful for all that we have naturally and spiritually. It's been made real to me that there are those that are in a lot worse shape then me!! I have a Father that has provided for us. I've been very lucky to have wonderful support of some very awesome friends and of family. I'm thankful that it has given me an appreciation for what others go through. An appreciation for the rough patches of life. It helps me to have compassion where I may not have had compassion before, simply because there wasn't a true understanding. The greatest understanding comes with experience and that experience sure can be tough!! Then there's the wonderful experiences! Grandkids! I love it when I visit them or they come to my place and you get greeted with a big hug! It's so awesome!! And my kitties. They're getting elderly but you'd never know it! They're 11 and 12 now. Pippy desperately wanted me to take him out today so I did. He was such a happy guy! He doesn't stay out for long, he does such a wonderful job of just staying in the backyard. It was pretty funny watching him try and catch a big as it was flying!

Mia can be quite the love!