Marcella - picking cherries and eating them. She really likes them.
Picking peas is one of her favorite things to do too. She has Lilly and Ki hooked on them too. We didn't get a lot of peas but enough for them to enjoy. I didn't get my camera in time to get the picture I wanted. Marcella had the stool she is sitting on over in the garden by the peas and was sitting on it picking the "fat peas" she said. She looked pretty cute hidden by the pea plants eating the peas.

We have had a good crop of strawberries this year - glad I didn't pull them out like I had planned on doing and starting with new ones somewhere else.
The raspberries are really growing this year and filling in the boxes. Dann wanted me to transplant some into the other two boxes that we have for raspberries but I am not touching them. I think if I do it I will kill them. I will leave that for Dann to do. I hope we get enough raspberries to make some jelly this year. We are out and it's our favorite.
Dann was home for a day and did a lot of fixing for me. He fixed the pole green beans so they have something to grow up. They are doing good.
The tomatoes are growing really well. We also have mint growing wild in the tomatoe box. We didn't realize it spreads and it has been taking over the tomato box so we have had to pull some of it out. I transplanted a lot in pot containers. The green, red and yellow peppers don't seem to be growing too well. I pulled some garlic the other day and have it hanging up in the storage shed to dry out. It's suppose to dry out in a dark place from what I read.

A family came over from our ward and picked cherries. They took some home and left me with some. There are still cherries in the tree - they are hard to get to. Cathy, my next door neighbor and I will be making freezer jam and bottled jelly. I think I will freeze some to just eat - I have heard that is good.

I have herbs that I need to cut and dry. Have not ever done it before but thought I would try it and see how it turns out.

Taking care of the yard and the garden is a lot of work for one person. Jason has weeded some and the neighbors have helped some. I miss Dann being here to pick everything - he doesn't seem to mind the picking and I really do not enjoy it. (he is missed for more than that).

The park at Anthem, Arizona -

Our trip to the Phoenix zoo
It's too bad we couldn't ride the camel around the whole zoo! It was extremely hot - weather that we definitely were not accustomed to.
This was a pretty big rhino and stinky too! He is stepping into what we think was his litter box and rubbing his face in it before going potty!
This giraffe was having fun herding the longhorns around.




We were able to walk into the home of the monkeys and watch them.
A place to cool off at the zoo and we needed it.


The bear is in the water.
We thought we were all going to be sunburned. All of our faces looked like Marcella's in the above picture - bright red - but once we got home and cooled off none of us were sunburned.

A big turkey!
Claire loved her water.

It's that time of year again to think of the garden and what to plant and all the yard work. I love spring, the warmer weather but not too hot, the occasional rain showers, the flowers, not having to use the air conditioner nor the heater - therefore saving money. Along with all that I love about springs comes all the yard work - I do enjoy mowing the lawn, having a garden (especially when Dann is here to do most of the work in the garden). I hate pulling weeds but love spraying roundup. Dann thinks I go a little too crazy with it and I think gets frustrated with me for using it. I guess that the strawberries are suppose to be replaced after the 2nd year and this patch of strawberries are going on their 4th year so the plan is to take them up and build a couple more boxes to go in their place. The 2nd year was the best year for these strawberries - they were abundant, big and delicious. The plan is to plant a new crop of strawberries in the sand box.

We get some delicious blackberries off of the blackberry bushes - they are just starting to come out of hibernation.
This is garlic & carrots that we have that Dann planted last year some time and made it through the winter.
This box has some onions from last year and today I planted more onions, green peppers, red peppers, anaheim peppers and chili peppers.

The rest of the boxes will have tomatoes, green beans, peas, lettuce, radishes, cucumbers, zuccini, broccoli, cabbage and banana squash (not in a box). We will have herbs of various kinds in among the vegetables. Certain herbs placed with certain vegetables help keep out the bugs, worms and slugs so I thought I would try it and see if it really works. I asked the neighbor Cathy if she wanted to help me with the garden this year and share the harvest. She agreed to do that so I will have some help getting things planted and pulling weeds and picking (I hate picking) . We bought lots of tomatoes - we both want salsa and bottled tomatoes. Wish us luck on growing a garden this year. Dann did such a good job on it last year and we were blessed with a lot of vegetables and fruit to process.
Here are three boxes that have raspberries in them - they are actually doing quite well (knock on wood)






I put some grass seed down this morning and roped off the area to keep the kids out and the dog so hopefully some grass will grow in the bare spots.
Daffodils and Tulips plus a mixture of other things that are hid in the daffodils and can't be seen (can't remember there name)

David, Rose and William at the Temple

Kanien and I at the reception
Our family at the Temple - Jon was hiding Claire(she was asleep) and William was looking the other way.
Amy and Nathan with Nathan's grandparents.
William, Marcella and Claire - they are so adorable and fun! I Love being a grandmother!

This is what Nikiya and Marcella had fun doing yesterday. They told me to come and see their airplane. I thought they were playing bookstore or library but somehow in their imaginations this was an airplane and the middle of the floor was the inside of the airplane.