AUGUST 2011

This month started off with another terrible tragedy. Our sweet Elmo, our youngest cat, passed away on the 7^th after a short bout with increasing constipation, followed by a total blockage and possible twisting of his intestines. We’re so very, very, very sad. Our sweet, sweet baby. I loved him so much…

We buried him at Cape Sebastian. 

                                   

                                                           

Despite this we try to celebrate our 11^th anniversary on the 19^th. We're going out for pizza, have a campfire and spent some time looking through pictures of previous years. We’re getting old!

                                                                                                             

I also worked a few days in ‘housekeeping’ which means I helped cleaning cottages. Not my most favorite work but they were swamped and the extra hours pay for firewood, propane, electricity that we use ‘over’ our allotted amount and anything we like to buy in the store like beer or ice-cream. We might also use them to leave a little earlier at the end of our ‘contract’.

We're starting to think about staying in Oregon for the winter. Since we would like to go to Alaska next Spring it kind of make sense to not go all the way South to Arizona as was our plan but stay North and save a bunch on the gas that it would take us to drive there and than back up again.
Also, James brother Doug as well as his brother Todd and his aunt Esther could use James to do some work in and around their houses in Newberg, Vancouver and Whidbey Island for a couple of months so he can make some money over the winter!

James has started to work in the office on Tuesday evenings on his ‘group-stuff’ and picks up the phone from there until 9.30, which we have to do once a week, so I don’t have to do it at ‘home’. This takes a lot of stress of my back because I really hated to have to do that. I’ll never agree to something like it again!

One of our weekly day-trips brought us to the small town of Sixes this time, about an hour north of us. We took a look at the cute light house, the Cape Blanco lighthouse, build at the most western point of the USA and visited the nearby Hugh House, a beautifully restored Victorian, build in 1885.

On these drives and walks around the neighborhood and as close as around our own RV we’ve noticed that the blackberries are finally ripening!

The campground is practically surrounded by them and we started picking them every couple of days or so.  They’re great on cereal, yoghurt and ice cream and because there are so many of them (!) I ventured into baking blackberry pie, cobbler and buckle as well as muffins and scones! Yumm!

There goes our waistline!

                                                           

We also visited the Curry County Fair at the fairgrounds here in Gold Beach in the company of Phyllis, Cal and Carolyn.

It turned out to be your typical greasy food fest with some small town carnival rides and the inevitable blue ribbon display for some bored and sleepy animals, canned pickles and homemade oat meal cookies and a section with crafty quilts and crocheted toilet paper holder covers.
I think I'm quite done going to these events from now on.

At least I had some fun trying out a different spinning wheel, an Ashford traveller. I think I keep my traditional, I didn't like it very much. Not as smooth.
And I almost forgot the hilarious pig races!