July and the Beauty of our Home Place

Scenes of the yard in early July. Lots of work yet to get it in ship shape for Mallory's wedding in August, but we're getting it done slowly but surely. We're going to put paving stones under the swing. and take out the grass so we don't have to move it every time we mow.

Well, the start of our gazebo. It's been over a month and the package still hasn't arrived, but the base is all ready to go. We're supposed to get the package this coming week, and Mom told Chad she wants it completed by the end of July. Notice that we planted gladiolas for the first time since we stopped growing them commercially. We're also planning to put landscape ties all around the edge of the gardens, (Eventually).

The new soil we put in these beds last year is better than what was there, but after seeing the beautiful black soil Trevor was putting in the beds at the job we visited in Edmonton, we are no longer happy with this stuff. The perrennials seem to do just fine, but the annuals don't seem to like it.
It looks pretty good according to our standards. Maybe not as professional looking as the stuff Trevor does that we saw on Thursday, but it'll do. As you know we had fun getting the washed gravel to our place, although the return trip for the second load was uneventful. We dug all the landscape ties in and leveled them with our small level. Lots more hard work.
The water is finally clear, and unbelievably all eight of our fish are still alive. They've survived cold weather, muddy water, several days with no running water, and just a small gurgling fountain, and a blue heron that seems to slow down every time it flies over.
Mallory re-stained the bridge and it looks much better. It will pass muster now for the wedding. We still need to redo the bridge to the right of this picture with cedar to match everything else.
Note the trees bending in the chinook wind. Not a warm one though. The iris's are all finished flowering and need to be cut back. All the lillies are about to flower probably some time this week. But even after 13 inches of rain, we have had to start sprinkling the flower gardens, and right away we'll have to start on the lawns. Although it does look like rain outside right now, and has even sprinkled a little.

Rain, Rain, Rain!!!

Well, it's been raining all week again and we've had probably over 5 inches again since Monday when it started. This is a view of the canal taken from the road this morning. It's a small river right now from all the run off.

This is the canal taken from our lawn and looking towards the road. Notice the raging stream entering the river at the upper left. It's coming from a huge lake in the field above. All the debris in the centre is the water level almost at the top of the culvert going under the road. There's a huge whirlpool over the culvert where the water is being sucked in.

This video is the whirlpool. That's a telephone pole trapped there so you can see it's a big culvert. If you fell in there you'd be sucked straight through the culvert and probably drown. So if you see something like this kids, stay away from it!!!

Just a few more pictures of the flood. Of course, we got home from the Temple last night,, and the water was starting to come into the basement. So we got up every hour and a half or so and vacuumed with the wet/dry vacuum. No real damage due to our vigilance and hard work. It stopped raining today, and hopefully everything will return to normal in a few days.

Spring has sprung

Well it's time to add another entry on the old blog. Let me start by thanking everyone for the birthday phone calls, it was great to talk to all of you. Thanks for remembering your old dad. I guess I'm probably not the greatest conversationalist on the phone, ( can't ever think of much to say), that has traditionally been Mom's realm of expertise. But feel free to call any time you want to, even if only to shoot the breeze. Also thanks to everyone for remembering to call your Mom on Mothers Day. Mom loves to hear from you all. We think about you all every day. In fact three have moved back home for a while.....

Yes, spring has sprung, and it's time for another season of WORK in the yard. You'll notice in pictures # 10 and 11 that we finally got continuos eaves troughs on both sides of the garage, and did you notice that we got rid of those pesky, always in the way, down spouts. So no more stepping over 4 inch pipes.

The twelfth photo was yesterdays "first big project" that we did yesterday. The back of the house has cleaned up nicely eh! A few more loads of gravel and a little more sweat and effort spreading it and it will look great!!! Mom can already imagine it with the deck over it (someday). There's always next year.....

Just a little word or two about this blogging site. I actually uploaded the pictures in the order I wanted to talk about them, but every time you up load a picture it becomes the first in line, and I couldn't figure out how to get them into the right order. Nuff said!!!

Pictures # 3 through 9 show how the back gardens look right now, and are an indication of the ongoing projects that we have each year. You'll notice by all the white marker sticks that we have already transplanted and planted a lot of perennials and bulbs. We have also planted four new shrubs in the back gardens. We have also already power raked the lawns, cut most of them twice, trimmed the roses, planted ground cover plants between the roses and roto-tilled all the flower gardens and the garden.

Picture #2 is the front garden that we have started to edge, to try and stop the grass from growing into it.

Note to the Cooper grandchildren: do you see our flowers starting to bloom. It's not quite like Port Moody and your fabulous flowering trees and shrubs and etc. But it's pretty good for Southern Alberta this early in the year.

Picture #1 is the pond that I just drained yesterday. It's pretty gross and icky. So we'll have to clean it out when it dries. Maybe Mal will do it???

There you have it. Summer work camp has begun.

Till next time, Dad.

Well I have a few new pictures on the old camera taken in the last few weeks and days. The quilt is the one Mom is making for Mallory and Cody for the wedding. It's now almost ready to be quilted. Mallory chose the pattern and the fabrics (with Mom's help).

Next are pictures of our newest grandson, Cason, taken when we went to visit them. That's when I took the picture of Scott's new bike next to his fairly new truck with a small glimpse of Mandy's new SUV inside their new garage. Yes we're all probably a little jealous.

Last night Chad's dogs were going crazy and the puppy broke it's chain and fled to the front yard as a coyote started bothering them after dark. We could hear it yelping at the dogs, and Chad had to go out and release Tica who immediately ran towards the coyote somewhere out in the black. She came back and Chad put his dogs in their cage in the garage for the night. This morning after light about 7:00AM I looked out our bedroom window and the coyote was over by the dogs house (Yes, Chad has built them a doghouse. It's not totally finished yet, not too weatherproof. But I digress) eating the dog food. I woke Chad and he went out to shoot the coyote, but he had no shells left for his real gun, and had to shoot it with his 22. I think he got it twice, but it ran away. If it comes back, he's now prepared to take care of it. If we don't take care of it, it'll just keep bothering the dogs. We actually saw it a little later through the binoculars over near Meldrums.

No new pictures today, but Mom tells me it's been a while since my last blog entry. So I'll take a cue from Jens' last blog entry, which I enjoyed reading, and I'll just ramble for a while.

We have been fairly busy the last few weeks. We had a great time down in Great Falls a week ago Friday with Chad, Tiff and Mal. Mom and Mal went to buy fabric for the wedding and for the quilt mom is making for Mal and Cody. We ate at The Golden Corral for Chads' birthday, and the girls figured Chad ate about 1800 calories just in meat. Every time we go to that place it is bursting at the seams and this time was no exception. Hundreds of huge over weight people pigging out. We had fun.

We also stayed home to watch conference last weekend, and as always happens, our internet reception was like dial-up so we had to just listen to the audio. Oh well, one can sleep just as well either way. We had all the grandparents over for turkey dinner for Easter, and an excuse to open up our new table and use the new dinnerware.

We didn't find out that our next door neighbor Arvel Foote had died of a heart attack Saturday at noon until I heard about it at General Priesthood in Magrath Saturday night. We were very surprised to hear about it and Bev and I went down to visit Lynn and the Family after Chad and I got home from Priesthood. The funeral was just this last Friday and it was a very nice service.

We've also spent quite a bit of time lately getting Grandma Scott settled into the Good Sams in Magrath. Now that she has a permanent room we can do more to it and make it as nice for grandma as we can. Mom and I went to Lethbridge last Easter Saturday and bought Gramdma a new couch and a table and chairs, which look very nice in her room. Then yesterday I went to Lethbridge and bought Grandma some new curtains and bedding. Mom and I went and put up the curtains and etc after I got home. Now her room looks very nice and homey and I think Grandma is happy with it all.

The weather has actually been kinda miserable with all the wind lately. But last holiday Monday and yesterday, the weather was pretty nice in the afternoons. So we were able to take advantage of it and get a jump start on our yard work. I have power raked the two front lawns, roto-tilled all the flower gardens and the vegetable garden, Mom has cleaned out all the flower beds. And yesterday we re-transplanted all the flowers we took out of the flower beds we re-soiled last fall. Maybe we'll get this yard into pretty good shape for Mal and Cody's wedding.

The highlight of our weeks lately seems to be getting Steve's letters. I guess we're getting old. I hope you enjoy reading them when I forward them. Let me know any time you don't think it all forwarded properly. Yesterday Grandpa and Grandma Wilde told us they didn't know we were forwarding them to them.

Well, I hope this fills you in on the goings on at the home place. Bye for now.

Kids Convention

Well, what a week this has been. Em showed up with Tyler on Thursday night to visit for a few days. Early Friday Mandy had a safe delivery of a big beautiful baby boy, and Friday night Raeley and Mya came over to spend the weekend. Mom and Em and Tyler went to Medicine Hat Friday afternoon to pick up Raeley and Mya and to see the new baby Cason Reid. There wasn't room for me to go so I ended up going to Cardston instead to visit my Mom. Emily the master photographer took the pictures for us all.

Emily and Tyler left Saturday morning, and we were sad to see them leave. Tyler was a lot of fun and we could hardly believe how big he is getting. He's a pretty happy baby, who really likes his Grandpa. To bad we can't see all our grandkids more often.

We spent the rest of the day Saturday helping Mallory move her stuff to Magrath. We borrowed a truck and it took us three loads to haul all her stuff. I think Raeley and Mya were a little bored, although they were pretty good helpers. Bev is doing Great Grandma Wildes hair right now. I guess we'll take Mandy's kids home tomorrow after dinner. I'll get to see the baby in person then.

PS

PS - Ernie & Augusta are back - a real sign of Spring!!