Dog Days of Summer

Another week has gone by and it's been a hot one!  Actually, it's been pretty hot for weeks now and the forecast is for the 90's for the entire 10 day forecast.  Very unusual for our area.  Usually we have one or two hot weeks and then it's in the 70's and 80's.  I don't like heat.  Not at all.  For some reason the past few years I've felt it more, perhaps all the meds the doctors have me on?  Who knows?  I am ready for some cooler days though.  At least it always cools to the 50's at night at the lake, in town, not so much!

Nita's pretty flowers.  See that big plant in the back?  That's her zucchini that she has planted in a pot!  There are lots of zucchini's in there too with a few almost ready to be harvested.  You can see the faint blur from smoke over the hills in the background.  Lots and lots of fires again this year.

Do you see this little guy on the side of the tree?  He's making a mess of our campsite every. single. night.  How one little squirrel can tear up so much is astounding.  At least it's just pinecones that he's chewing up and throwing around and not our furniture!  I'm not kidding, every morning ours and Paul & Lori's spots are completely covered with pieces of pinecones.

This is Dennis' new baby.  We've been looking for a smaller trailer that was reasonably priced to use to go on trips since our trailer is pretty permanently placed at the lake and I don't want to pull something that big. We stumbled upon this one last Saturday.  It's a 2009 but the stove,oven, refrigerator and microwave were never even used! It seriously looks as though it was only used once or twice.  We will be letting others use it to take trips too.  We feel God has blessed us and we want to share that.

It is smaller than our lake trailer but still has a queen size bed, although curtains separate it, not a true door.  We don't care about that at all.  The table also makes into another bed.

Kitchen area and bathroom door.  It has the same exact appliances as our lake trailer and they have always been reliable.

The bathroom has a tub and shower and more counter space than our lake trailer.  It also has a huge closet to the left of this photo that you can't see here. I honestly think this camper has more storage than our big one.  Maybe we should full-time RV in this one!  :-)

 

We're already going to use it next weekend when Alicia, Jeremy and the boys come to visit.  We've rented the spot across from us at the lake and will take this trailer there for them to use.  When Jamie and the kids come or when Mandy, Brad and Piper visit in the summer, we can take this up to the lake and not have to run back and forth to town every night.  It's like a little guest house. :-) We're hoping it gets lots and lots of use.  A bit of advice for anyone wanting to buy a trailer?  Wait until this time of year or later.  They are trying to get rid of them before winter hits and boy, can you talk them down, down, down in price.  I was really surprised at how cheap we got this.  We've been watching Craigslist for months and not finding anything that wasn't damaged or filthy,  This one is like brand new.  We are really looking forward to sharing this blessing with others. :-)

Dennis and I went shopping last night for all of the hoses, adapters, pillows, kitchen stuff for it.  Goodness!  It was like outfitting a small apartment!

Kim from Napiersknits sent me this book.  Andrea is the daughter of Max Lucado, Dennis' favorite author so I'm really looking forward to reading it.  Thanks Kim!

I finally finished my beaded shawl. It is the Asana Shawl by Helen Stewart.  I really do like this pattern.  Every pattern of hers that I've done has been very well written and easy to understand.  She even provides the number of stitches that you should have at the end of each row so you can check yourself.

My problem was the yarn.  I don't even know what yarn it is since it was given to me years ago from someone's stash.  I blocked this thing like crazy and look at it, still curled up.  I could tell it was going to do this, so I bound off several rows early.  I spent soooooo much time knitting this and I'm so disappointed.  But, it is a beautiful pattern and don't let my yarn issues stop you from knitting it yourself.

Look at that beautiful pattern.  It really is a fun knit, just not worth wasting time with this yarn.

I also knitted four more pair of mittens this week and started a pair of socks.  I'm sure not getting much accomplished this summer.  I think this disappointing shawl makes me want to tackle some smaller projects.  There is a KAL going on for double knitting next month and I've never tried that.  I may just go pattern browsing and try to find something simple to try to learn something new.

I hope you're all enjoying summer and all of it's fresh produce.  I picked 3 gallons of raspberries last week and froze them.  That will be a nice reminder of summer in the snowy days ahead. :-)

Have a lovely week my friends.

"Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." Psalm 139:23-24

Blessings,

Betsy