Stephanie and Nate's Wedding in Illinois

Hi everyone,

Wanted to share a picture of Stephanies wedding; was never sure how to do this before Melanie's great email... thanks, melanie. Most of the pictures with Mom/ Grandma Ruby are in the Kodak website our family uses, and I can't make them work.
I had a heck of a time getting Grandma to go to Chicago;she is not comfortable flying alone. She misses all your families, but is so nervous about going places without someone else. So she flew out with me and Phil drove to Chicago with his car full of many of Stephanie's shower gifts that we had for her in Simi Valley.

The wedding was wonderful but would have been even better if more of the family could have come. But we understand Illinois was not very close. After the wedding, Grandma flew back with Michelle and Christopher and Phil and I went on a driving vacation. We had lunch with a couple from Oregon; I went to nursing school in Portland with the wife who now live in Louisville, Kentucky. Then on to Nashville for a couple days which was a great town to visit and to Memphis. Of course went to see Elvis Presley's Graceland and had a great time. Then we drove to New Orleans with lots of heat and humidity. Hard to describe that town; some beauty and some tragedy. We stayed in the French Quarter that did not have much destruction, but still was a sad place visit. Hardly anyone was visiting, the famous bars/ discos open for business, but almost completely empty. Comedians and singing were singing to maybe one or two people. The hotel wasn't anywhere close to being full. Very sad in so many ways. But the spirit of the people was everywhere, they want things back the way it was before.

All was going well, we were having a great dinner in New Orleans until we got a phone call from home. Our 13 yr old golden retriever had gotten very sick and got heat stroke. We had a girl at the house with the pets, but due to the weather and his age, he got overheated and had to go to animal ICU. So.............I flew out the next morning and Phil drove home from Louisiana to California. Raleigh did recover, but is definitely a very fragile elderly dog.

I'll get some pictures of the new rental complex where Grandma is going to live in October. She will be on the third story in a building with an elevator and should have a great view of Simi Valley. Hope this is her final move, our town doesn't have as many choices as other states have, as California has too few choices for the amount of people who live here.

Anyway, I wanted to share a little of what's going on and will be better at publishing.

Love to all,
Aunt Chris/ Sister

Beach Trip (from Mom)

Hope to be seeing all of you at Seaquest for the family reunion on August 13th if not before.

Regarding food for the beach trip, I know you girls are in charge, but . . .

I have promised Traci I would bring potato salad. Also, we have several pounds of bacon in the freezer Dad couldn't pass up because of some sale. I'd like to get some of that out of there, so if bacon is on anyone's menu, I'll bring that. Also, I have some home grown raspberries in the freezer. I'll make a big cobbler if I have time.

For those of you who may not know, we are potentially up to 21 people now. Still one free bed. Melanie and I did the room/bed assignments this past weekend. We have: Grandma Jan, Grandma Ruby, Grandma Faraway, Grandpa Larry, Great Auntie Joanne, Great Auntie Nancy, Auntie Melanie and Uncle Greyson, Auntie Jennifer and Uncle Brian plus Kalena, Emma, Gabe & Nicholas, Auntie Traci and Uncle Tim plus Tucker, India and Christian,Anita and JC. Auntie Nancy is not 100% confirmed yet.

Remember, you need to bring sleeping bags and sheets/blankets.

I'm easing back into work. Went to ODE Monday and Tuesday to earn money for Larry to visit the casino. Worked at the District Office today for about 5 hours. Will work again Friday for 1/2 day or so. Starts in earnest next Wednesday.

Missing

Wow, this is very unusual for me to get on the Blogger and not see any updates for several days. What is going on with everyone? The Porter's are all doing fine. We are going camping tomorrow with the Dean's and look forward to some campfires and smores. Traci and I played in a golf tournament over the weekend for couples and did okay. Traci has really improved and has a very natural swing. The kids are just enjoying their vacation time and spend most of their days playing with friends. Well, that's it for now.

Tim

bla bla blog

First off, a huge congrats to Traci. Regardless of what becomes of the exclusive, that is a big accomplishment to get recognition like that from professionals in the field. I wish her the best. BTW, it was a blast to see the Porters up here for the 4th.

Happy Birthday to Brian. I'll let him disclose his age. Time has been flying. I didn't realize it was already the 8th. The 4th seemed like yesterday. He and I are hanging out tonight to watch a little UFC.

I've been chugging away on my website. I put in a couple of 10+ hour days writing and troubleshooting (ok mostly that) actionscript, which is a programming language built for flash. My head feels as though it's going to fall off of my neck which has been craned for hours on end. If you don't know, flash is software that is generally used for interactivity and 2d animation on the web. It is ideal because it creates a small file size for slower internet connections (dial-up, satellite etc.).

The sun is back out these days after a short hiatus...hooray.

I guess I'll get back to it.

Where's the AC?

Was it hot at your house?

Well the one nice thing about going to work is they have AC there. Our house does not get too hot until about 4pm. Then after about 7pm it starts to cool off again outside. So during that 3 hour window you can get a little sticky. Yesterday we went to the Washougal River for a swim. I was amazed at how warm the water was. I guess the 100 degree day warmed it up a bit. I tried to call the Deans to go with us but I think they are out camping at the coast. I bet it was beautiful there.

So what is going on in everyone's summer days? Camps, kids, BBQs? We had friends over on Sat. for an early B-Day party for Greyson. My summer calendar is filling up fast, are there any dates I need to save besides the labor day weekend? When is the family reunion? Third Sunday in a month, right???

Gotta run to work. The boss has flown over from back east to meet with us so I better not be late.
-Mel

Con"grad"ulations

He graduated with honors: Mr. Magna Cum Laude

One Hail of a storm

So, we had a severe thunderstorm roll through the other day and this is one of the hailstones that fell from the sky. It was a truly amazing sight to see these things falling and hitting everything. Both of our cars now have hundreds of little dings all over them. It was actually kind of scary and India and Tucker were really scared. It actually broke the back window out of a teacher's car at school. There was also a funnel cloud reported in the Prineville area but it never touched down. It lasted all of about 5 minutes and was one of the most intense storms I have ever seen.

Mosquitoes

Today the mosquitoes came out!!!
It all started at about 3pm. I was pulling dandilions out of the lawn and Ada was assisting. At 3pm precisly the mosquitoes started to swarm. I had 4 bites in a matter of minutes. I looked over at Ada and she was snapping on both sides of her body. Being the smart oposing thumb creature I am I quickly ran for the camping supplies where I dug out the 50% deet solution. After a light layering I put 2 extra sprays on both arms that I smeared on Ada's back. I didn't want to see my dog suffer. A couple hours later Ada and I went for a 2hr hike down to SR14. When we stared Ada had 3 bites on her. When we returned I only had the 4 bites I started with however Ada had 30-40 new bites. Anyhow, we are home and Ada is itchy. I guess the temperature was just right for mosquitoe hatching today. Hopefully the bats living in my chimeny will be out taking care of the problem soon. I did yard work and car washing all day and Greyson did some sort of seal replacements on his car. I tried to get Greyson to play tennis but I think he is tired of getting beat, so I went for a jog down by the river instead.

-Mel