Oregon Living 2026 – Blog #35 – A Great End to Labor Day, Mowing, a Birthday, and Dancing Again!

 

  

Sunday, September 6^th., 2026…… Today we headed over to Frank and Maryanne’s early. We didn’t take the dogs today because we would be busy cooking pizzas and such. Plus, there would be too many people today and there are a few who do not like dogs and let us know that they don’t! So, we left them home. We plan to come back to feed them and also pick up the pineapples and other toppings we have to tonight’s pizza cook. The day was really fun. Shaun got out his Ninja Slushie machine and made us apple slushies (with Fireball if you chose that!). It was really good (I took a pic)

and now I am looking into getting us one for our parties and evenings out on the deck!  Maybe after Cathye wins big at Vegas next weekend!  We hung around the tents because it would be raining off and on. It was supposed to quit later in the evening. Later in the afternoon, Frank got the tractor out and gave folks rides again. No rain until the very end! We spent the afternoon having our regular Club meeting. This year we all crowded in the larger of the tents because it was raining off and on all day.  After that, Cat and I headed back home and fed the girls and grabbed our items for dinner and headed back. After that, the four of us who had pizza ovens got them out and ready to cook dinner. Each of us have a different style oven. And we learned later that each one cooked differently. I think I must have cooked at least 10-12 in my oven. I must say I got a lot of positive feedback! The others did ok but some had temperature problems either too low or too high. 

After the meal, we all cleaned up and let our ovens cool down for the night. We will put them away tomorrow morning. We hung around for a bit, playing cards and visiting, then headed back home for the evening.

Monday, September 7^th., 2026……  HAPPY LABOR DAY!  The plan for today was for us to head back over and visit for a while, then help take down tents and get our popup and tables and the pizza oven loaded back up to take home. The folks in their rvs made breakfast each morning and were late today so all of the tables and such were being used. No worries, we weren’t in any hurry. We have a picnic to go to later in the afternoon but we hung around for a while and helped for the most part in breaking things down. I managed to get our tables and the popup loaded along with the pizza oven and all we needed to put away was our chairs. We stayed until we had to leave. When we got back home, we unloaded everything except the chairs and then rested a bit before going down to Cat’s party at the park in Brownsville. We took the dogs with us for this one. The girls always bring some good food for everyone. Cat baked a cake yesterday while we were home and we took that. It was a nice day and the dogs enjoyed running around in the park. We didn’t have towels for Rylee so we avoided the river area. But she knew it was there and wanted to go down her familiar path to jump in! After a bit, we loaded up and came back home and we were done with the parties! We relaxed and watched tv until hitting the spa before calling it a night.  

Tuesday, September 8^th., 2026…… Today we have Zephry and Thomas coming to work in the yard. We left them around 11:00am to go to town to meet Omalea and David for lunch at Robin’s Grill. We haven’t seen them in a while and we had a nice meal and got caught up. They came back to the house and we sat out on the deck and visited some more. We saw the kids had loaded up the mule with clippings and brush so David went with me to take it out to dump on the burnpile. When they left, I had a few other things to clean up from the weekend and then we were done!

Wednesday, September 9^th., 2026…… We had nothing on the calendar today!  Yaay! We spent the day being lazy and hanging around the house. We want to meet up with Mike and Cheryl to plan logistics for the Vegas trip but that probably won’t be until next week. They did talk to us about going to Cirque du Soleil while we’re there and we said that we be great. Just get us tickets and we will settle up later. Cat told me later that Cheryl got us good seats for Friday night. It’s at the Bellagio so we can walk there. I think it’s O, which is the water show. That sounds like fun!

Thursday, September 10^th., 2026…… Today we take the dogs to the groomers. But first up, we walked and fed them and then headed off to the gym and then to Kristi’s for breakfast. Later, we took the girls in. When we got back, I got out the mowers and gassed them up. I found a YouTube video showing how to bypass the shutoff on the seat of Cat’s tractor. Up to now, it shuts off when pressure on the seat. That means she had to shut it off each and every time she gets off of it to dump the grass (or any other reason). I used the trick they showed me and got it set up. Now she just has to make sure to disengage the blades before she gets off for any reason. We waited until they called about the dogs and then we went to pick them up. Now we wouldn’t miss their call while on the tractors. We got the lawn mowed in about 45 minutes (no field mowing this time) and the machines put away. We rested for a while. Penny came by and visited. Later, we had dinner and we were done for the day. Tv until bedtime.   

Friday, September 11^th., 2026…… HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!  Please also never forget those lost on 9/11!  It would turn out to an interesting day!  Penny came by and gave both of us our birthday cards and gifts. Thanks, Sis!  We were asked to go today to the Burgerville in Albany and help out a promotion for our Club! One of our members, Lisa, is assistant manager and set it up for us. We would get a bunch of dancers and help with bussing tables and delivering orders to customers as well as doing a promo dance exhibition in the parking lot. Shaun and Lila got set up and Shaun called pretty much for 3-4 hours out there, with our members hopping in and out of the squares. I think the count was around 31 of us. Not too bad!  We also got 20% of the revenue for those 4 hours. We expected about $400.00 so it was worth the effort, plus we may spark some interest in joining our beginner’s class staring Sunday. Turns out Sept. 11^th is also Frank and Maryanne’s anniversary so we all got a kick out of that - spending birthdays and anniversaries at Burgerville!   But it was a lot of fun!     

Saturday, September 12^th., 2026…… The only thing we have today is a visitation to a dance in Sweet Home later tonight. We have both been watching all of the 9/11 shows and we have a lot of them taped. So, we watched a little bit of them today. Some we’ve never seen before. So sad to watch but also interesting to know more about how things evolved. Later, we dressed and headed over to visit the Squarenaders first dance of the season.  Shaun was calling and Lila called a tip too! She is getting a little more experience and we think wants to continue.  We did leave a bit early and came home to relax with the dogs and watch more taped shows.   

Oregon Living 2026 – Blog #34 – A Little Lawn Work & Heading off to our Weekend Outing!

 

 

Sunday, August 30^th., 2026…… Last day of little league baseball for me!  I didn’t necessarily want to see the two teams - Nevada and Curacao - play in the final game, but it wanted to see it through. It’s still awesome to see those little guys playing a game they love and that they’re very good at!  Lot of memories for me! That was pretty much all we did today was watch tv. Cat had a stomach ache and so we both just lazed around the house all day.

I did work on Penny’s old laptop. She wanted to take it apart for disposal and brought it to me to finish the job….

Monday, August 31^st., 2026……  This morning after we walked and fed the dogs, we left for the gym. We have decided to only go to breakfast every other week or maybe one place each week. So today, we skipped Kevin’s and got a couple of breakfast burritos from McDonald’s and came back home.  We waited until later in the day but managed to get the lawn mowed. Cat’s lawn tractor has a weak battery so we ended up parking that one on the charger and I mowed and Cat dumped. But – we still got it all done. Zephry and Thomas come tomorrow so we had a chance today to get the mowing done. I also called a guy about having this

removed! It’s a wasp’s nest that the guys found last week. It’s active, but when I called the guy and texted him that pic, he responded that it didn’t look active and he wasn’t interested. So, we will have to take it on ourselves. It will be at night when they are all in there and quiet. We have spray that we can shoot in the entrance and then we can cut it down. More on that as it progresses. Tv and spa and then bed.       

Tuesday, September 1^st., 2026…… Zephry and Thomas got here right at 9:00am to start their day. I took the mule out and staged it so they could load it up. Either Cat of I would take it out whenever it was full. I told Zephry about the wasp guy said and they said they would take care of it for us. Turns out when they sprayed it down really good, there weren’t any wasps coming out. So, they made quick work of it. I poured a little gas in a 5-gal. bucket and they put it in there to soak. Later, after the gas evaporates, we will throw it in the trash. The guys did everything on the east side of the driveway. Next time they will go around the house. We have a few trees that will need to be trimmed back off the house and we have a pole saw they can use for that. Another couple of weeks for sure but it’s sure coming along!  Later, I replaced the pizza stone in the Blackstone oven and we tried it out for dinner with the pizza dough that Frank gave us last week. Not a fan of pre-made dough but the oven works well now!  I think I have the timing figured out. We will load everything up to take to Frank and Maryanne’s for this weekend’s campout. We have decided to just drive there each of the three days, starting Friday for the potluck. We can take the dogs so we can stay for the day/evening if we want.  

Wednesday, September 2^nd., 2026…… I was a little busy with my cardiologist this morning. They texted to see how I was doing on the Atenolol, that they have me trying on a test basis. They want to see if my energy/fatigue levels change any. I asked them to call me back so I could share more than a message in MyChart. I also added the log that wanted me to keep track of my blood pressure, but I waited until they called back. Meanwhile, we are planning on going to the Club’s campout this weekend, so we wanted to go to Costco to pick up a few things. Frank called Cat and asked her to order a sheet cake for the summer birthdays. When we got there, we did that plus got what we needed – plus a lot more! Also, we picked up a few things for Penny that she will come get later. When we got back and unloaded, I received my callback from Fatima from Cardiology. I need to send her the log that I have made and she will be getting that to the Doctors there for evaluation and further action. The rest of the day we hung around the house. It started raining around 9:00am which is good for us since it’s been so dry here and fire watch is in effect. So far, it’s still going this afternoon. The forecast is for more rain this weekend. The guys at Frank’s have already put up a couple of awnings and we will bring one on Friday as well.  

Thursday, September 3^rd., 2026…… Not much on the list today. We needed to go get some items for the campout and we took care of that with no problems. We decided to go out to breakfast and went to Kevin’s today since Kristi’s was closed for the next few weeks. I spent some time gathering everything we would be needing to take to Frank’s tomorrow. I think we’re good to go. Later, we had dinner and settled in to watch tv until bedtime.

Friday, September 4^th., 2026…… After walking and feeding the girls, we loaded up everything we needed to take to Frank and Maryanne’s. We needed to pack carefully because we needed room for Butthead to ride in the back as well! We got there and spent some time unloading and getting things set up. The guys already had the large tents up and they also took the time to add additional tarps on them because we WERE going to get rain! We stayed until close to 4:00pm, then came home with the dogs to feed them and then head back (without the pups) for the potluck and for the rest of the evening. We had the potluck and after that visited and played Swish for several hours then decided to come back home. With all of the tarps in place, we all managed to stay dry for the night! We left around 8:00pm to come back and relax and be with the dogs for the night.  

Saturday, September 5^th., 2026……  This morning, we walked and fed the girls, then ate breakfast, before loading everyone in the car for day 2 at the Silo party. Most of the day was rainy, so we ended up finding cover under the canopies or else in Maryanne’s house, playing cards. The dogs love to be outside and when we could walk them, we did. Cat took them out to the pond and of course, Rylee had to lay down at the water’s edge.

No worries, she texted me and Frank had an old towel we used to dry her off!  Later, we were told that Shaun was making apple slushies, with or without Fireball!  Of course, we had to go try them!  We were the first there so I guess we were his test dummies!  They were great!  I had to take a picture or two and especially one of the Ninja machine he had. Hmmm, may need one of these soon!  But we were careful because we would still be driving back home to drop off the dogs before coming back again. Later, when we got back, Frank got out the hay trailer. Note: this is the same trailer we always use for our float in the Strawberry parade in June. But it does double duty, hooked up to his big tractor. We loaded up a handful of folks and Frank took off across the field. He has 200 acres so we had plenty of room to ride! We were out for a bit and it was nice. Then it wasn’t!  We all got wet on the ride back but it was still fun and we got some good pics…..

That was the end of the rain and the weather was excellent for the rest of the day and evening. Later, we played cards and talked and then it was time for the second potluck. This one was spaghetti and all the fixin’s. We have some great cooks in this Club and they showed it tonight!  Everything was plentiful and tasty. One of my favorites was the frog eye salad. It has acini de pepe pasta and canned fruits and whipped topping and a silly name!  But it’s delicious!  The different spaghettis and garlic breads were good too, as were the veggie snacks and desserts.  More visiting and cards and it was time to head home again.  Last day tomorrow....