Combine Time

Early this summer, our friends Zach and Crystalynn offered to let the kids drive one of their combines during the harvesting season. You can only image how excited Gavin has been the entire summer, telling everyone that he was going to drive a combine. Well, the day finally came.

We headed out past McMinnville and met up with a field full of combines busy harvesting clover. We piled in, we meaning Crystalynn, myself, her two kids, and my two kids, and off we went down the rows of clover. Gavin was intense in his concentration and studied all aspects of the combine, both in the cab and out.


I even got to drive! I felt like such a farmer:)

So here's a great big THANK YOU to Crystalynn and Zach for letting us share in the harvesting experience. Gavin will relive this adventure for months to come. Hey, even I might, it was pretty relaxing.

I may just go volunteer my time next year, the long hours of solitude may be just what I need:)

Movie PajamaRama!

Kyla celebrated her sixth birthday with a movie pajamarama party on Sunday. She choose the movie, Mary Poppins and invited some of her best buddies over for the fun.

We had popcorn, gummy worms, m&ms, yogurt covered raisins...the list of goodies goes on and on. The kiddos all came dressed in their pjs with their comfy blankets and filled their little bellies with popcorn and sugar:)


After the pajamarama, we had the traditional family dinner with the grandparents, aunts & uncles, and cousins.


Kyla decided she'd like Daddy's famous homemade pizza for dinner with white cake and chocolate frosting for dessert. Chad did his usual wonderful job on both the pizza and the cake decorating. She specifically requested rainbow colored flowers and wouldn't you know, he delivered:)


She tried out her new sewing machine too. Like mother, like daughter:)


Happy Birthday Big Girl!

Roughin' it in the Wild

Okay, not so much wild, but we were roughing it:) The Riddle Fam headed down to Silver Falls State Park for four days of camping fun. We pitched our tent, filled up the air mattresses, unrolled the sleeping bags and we were ready to go. Cold nights, sunny days, hot dogs over the campfire, sticky marshmallows, long hikes through the forest, and dirt, dirt, dirt! Each time we go camping, things run a bit smoother than the time before, we remembered pretty much everything and added more to our list of things to bring for next time, now if we only had a bigger vehicle to put it all in:) Kyla found a friend within the first 24 hrs and later we found out that they live close to us and even go to our church! What are the odds? We tried our best to keep Gavin's healing skin clean, a loosing battle if I have ever participated in one:) I was blessed with the opportunity to hike all ten falls by myself one afternoon, wow what a wonderful, quiet time:) I'll let the pics tell the story...

Silver Falls Camping August 2009

What a grand adventure!

Birthday Girl

Kyla turned the big 06 this past Sunday, while camping with Grandma L and Grandpa K. We followed that with a whirlwind take off for our very own family camping at Silver Falls State Park. She's had her fill of birthday camping and is excited to have friends over to help her celebrate her special day ( a week late:) )

Just a hint of what she can do:
Read simple words and some beginner books, Ride a horse, Ride a bike with no training wheels or assistance, Do simple math equations, Ttie shoelaces, Draw a horse, Answer the phone, Make pb&j sandwiches with no help, Whistle, Have bubblegum, Use her imagination, Buckle herself into the car seat, Wiggle loose teeth, Climb a tree...and the list goes on.

What seems like just a day ago

Happy Birthday to my sweet little girl!

A Painting We Will Go...

It's that time of year, time to finish painting the house. Fall is fast approaching and the need to get the house finished up is overwhelming. Yes, we realize that we had all summer to do so, but you know us, time just got away:)

We are blessed with my brother's help this weekend, he drove all the way from the Tri-Cities just to help out. He has painted quite a few houses while working at his last job, so his knowledge and expertise was much appreciated.


We were up early and outside scrapping (you would think we did enough of that last year, but alas, there was more to do), sealing (36 tubes of caulk and counting), pressure washing and then priming. It was a full day marathon and only half of the upstairs is left to prime.


Max spent most of the day hiding in the caulk box...strange cat.


I did feed the boys pot roast for dinner, with potatoes and purple carrots from our garden. They are right this minute enjoying rich chocolate icecream after their long day of labor.

I can't put into words the peace I have knowing that we are so close to being done with this project. Thanks to Josh for helping out, to Mom and Dad for taking the kids camping all weekend, and for all the others who have helped with this ongoing project.

We are off to bed after a long, hard day. So Very Close Now!

Ahhh, Summer

I went out this afternoon and picked our dinner from the garden:) Green Beans, Purple carrots, lemon cucumber, heirloom yellow cherry tomatoes, and a Sherbet Heirloom tomato. Oh it was glorious!

Quick Update

We have a follow up appointment tomorrow morning with our pediatrician, but in my opinion, Gavin is on the mend. Some of the blisters have popped (Don't worry, I won't show pictures:) ) and the skin is cooler to the touch. He played hard all day, it's not slowing him down a bit. I kept him inside for most of the day but he escaped outside with Grandpa K while I was making dinner, so his bandages got a tad bit dirty:)

Our Monkey, I mean daughter:)

He's cleaned up and re-bandaged and ready for bed now. Prayers for a goodnight sleep please.

1st Emergency Room Visit for the Riddle Kiddos

Well, we finally have gotten that pesky "first time in the ER" milestone over with this evening:) Today while Gavin and Kyla were at the Clackamas County Fair with their Grandma T, Gavin fell down while exiting the last ride and burned himself on the metal floor of the ride. I'll remind everyone that it was 100 degrees outside and the metal was just soaking up that heat. He fell on his left arm and leg and immediately received 1st and 2nd degree burns in the cool raised crosshatch pattern of the metal. The smooth and super quick ride attendant picked up him quickly and Grandma put him in a cool bath soon after, made him comfortable and then brought them both home. Of course, this happened after 5pm so the doctors office was closed, which always seems to be the case:)

This is how he looked when he got home, a couple of blisters and some redness but not a lot of pain thankfully. By the time we made it into the ER, the blisters were really swelling up and parts of the burn had darkened.

His arm - from his elbow curving around
and down to his wrist about 1.5" wide

His leg- from right below his knee to
his ankle about 1.5" wide

Before bedtime, I called our 24 hour nurse hot line to double check a suitable treatment/medicine for this situation and she immediately started repeating "Emergency Room!" I called our pediatrician, who just happened to be on call this evening, and he chanted the same harrowing phase, "Emergency Room!" At this point, both kids were in bed and on their way to dreamland, we scooped them up and plopped them in the car. A quick dash to to Beth and Bryan's to drop Kyla off, and we were headed to Newberg with an excited Gavin in tow:) After a short wait and an embarrassing amount of adoration from the female emergency staff, the dr (actually the same doc that treated Chad for his last kidney stone:) ) took a look and declared him cute as a button and the proud owner of 1st and 2nd degree burns. You can tell by his big grin that he was enjoying all the attention, he especially like the big bed and the special robe:) No crying for our tough little guy, just giggles and smiles!

After some miracle burn cream and yards upon yards of gauze, were were on our way home with a sleepy, but pain free little boy.

According to the reams of paperwork provided by the Newberg hospital, he should be feeling great in a week or so with a little help from the burn cream and children's Tylenol. I must admit, my heart is just now starting to beat in a normal tempo. Six years of parenting and we finally had our first ER run, not bad, if I do say so myself:) Now off to bed I go, in a futile attempt to get much needed rest in order to keep my 2 YEAR OLD BOY clean tomorrow, his bandages anyway! Mission impossible theme music is playing in my head right now, wish me luck:)