Grandma's cabin.

August 30th, 2014

Three Emerys, five Scotts, Frank Bost, and Grandma decided to go up to Grandma's Cabin for the Labor Day weekend. It is located in the White Mountains of Arizona in a town called Pinetop-Lakeside. It is a place that Grandma brought and we have been visiting since I can remember. It is awesome. In the summer it offers cooler temperatures than Phoenix or Tucson. That means we spend time outdoors hiking and playing volleyball. In the winter it is used for skiers and snowboarders. I am not either, but I will still visit. One of the things I love best about the Cabin is that we all bring our dogs. The dogs love the cabin because of the outdoors activity and family.

After a night of bowling we got up 6 in the morning, Melissa, Bernie and had two things in mind: coffee and packing the car. The plan was to rendezvous with Frank, Dad's old college roommate and family friend, on the on ramp in Gilbert. It went off without a hitch!

Since we were all tired and hungry the trip was a little bit of a doozy. Just as we were leaving the phoenix area we found out that Carson and Megan decided not to go to the cabin at 6 in the morning. So now the trip is the three Emerys, three Scotts, Frank and Grandma.

We arrived at the cabin around lunch. By the time we unpacked the car the Scotts and Grandma arrived. Briana immediately started weeding weeds and raking leaves! Karen made delicious chicken salad with grapes and cherries on the side. Yum!

After lunch Bernie, Melissa, Frank, Karen and I went hiking. Grandma and Jim stayed to relax, Bre was still weeding! She wanted to get leaves ready for HOSA later that evening.

The hike was at Billy Creek a nice trail that can be as long or short as you like especially if you get lost, which has happened in previous travels. Also, on previous travels we stopped by the creek for a cool break. Carson and I were wading around in creek when we heard from the edge of the creek that were crawdads in the creek. The two of us weren't too concerned until something brushed by us in the water. We both screamed in panic and jumped on to a rock that was small for one but miniscule for two. After trying to balance together we fell back into the water. Neither of us stayed long Carson went to one side of the creek and I went to the other in record time. Needless to say the story is repeated every time we return to the trail and creek.

This hike wasn't as eventful. We walked about two miles in and turned around. We took a slight different route back and ended up trekking in the forest a bit when we ended up at the wrong trailhead. See its always fun!

We stopped at the Safeway on the way back for some supplies for Monday's breakfast. We ended up forgetting to get S'Mores supplies which caused a bit of a hoopla for the rest of the evening and dinner. So much so that Frank, Bernie and Melissa made an emergency trip to get supplies!

After the hike we did a little relaxing and a lot of chatting until it was time to make dinner. It was Grandma's meal but everyone pitched in and dinner was lovely. Streak, salad and baked beans; there was supposed to be bread but we used it on lunch!

While dinner was cooking Bre and Karen started the fire at the HOSA (hub of social activity) and they burned some of the leaves that Bre raked that day. At first it made quite a bit of smoke and Grandma was worried because its the first year in a few that the fire levels were moderate.

After dinner we sat around the HOSA and chatted about everything. There was also the emergency run to the store for s'mores supplies. So of course there were s'mores which was a task. Melissa was stuck supplying all. Karen couldn't eat crackers so she sandwiched the marshmallows between chocolate and it worked out as well as one would think.

Around nine everyone start to get ready for bed. Guess we were tired from getting up early and all the hiking/work. What a fun first day!

August 31st, 2014

My puppy Jojo loves to wake me up at 5:45 am every morning, so once again I was up before 6 am. I took him, Reggie and Angie (two other dogs) outside and sat on the porch so people could wake. One thing about the cabin is that the walls are thin so its easy to wake everyone up, so going outside was the only option. But it was cold! In the fifties. After a summer in Phoenix fifties is cold! So, I ended up sneaking back inside for socks, shoes and a jacket. I got some more water for the dogs while I was at it. When I was back outside, I read a little bit, but mostly watched the dogs run around and play. The neighbors dog was behind a chain link fence and the dogs played with him through it. 

Around 7 am, everyone else started getting up. Frank was packing to go, he only planned to stay one night, and everyone else was staring sleepily into their coffee cups. It was Melissa and Bernie's turn to cook a meal. They decided to make eggs and bacon; with raisin toast and raspberries as sides. Yum! 

After breakfast the two couples, Melissa and Bernie, Karen and Jim got ready to go golfing. Their tee time was 11 am. Frank packed his car. As for Briana, G'ma Mary Lou and I we were on a mission to go to the store. I needed to get Sangria ingredients, G'ma wanted to get Briana gloves because she was still doing yard work! And she was getting a washer for the hose. When Bernie sprayed down the HOSA, the night before, he said he got a shower from the hose.

The trip to the Safeway was not eventful, but we had to stop at the dollar store for the gloves and washers (which they didn't have but they had a new hose sprayer). Then, we went back to the cabin. I began preparing the Sangria. I had never made Sangria before, but the friend I got the recipe from said it was easy. It was! I was done in about ten minutes. It had to chill overnight (or at least an hour) so I left in the fridge. 

Then, I helped Briana with the yard work. By help I mean to say that I put four armfuls of leaves into the bags and then we were done! Woohoo! Just nickname me the Clean Machine. 

For lunch we had leftovers. I took some of the steak and made a sandwich, Briana had chicken salad, and G'ma made a large salad from the various greens we had yesterday. Briana set up the hammock and ate her lunch there then she read some of her book before taking a little nap. 

G'ma and I worked on a crossword after lunch, and I only looked up the answers a few times. Still the puzzle didn't get finished, and G'ma eventually said to throw it out! Then, we also decided to take naps. The dogs decided to nap too, hooray!

We woke up just as the golfers were getting back. Melissa, got an Eagle on a par three! Woohoo! We let her celebrate for a while, then told her that an eagle on a par three was a hole-in-one. She thought a Birdie was two under par and an eagle was a one under par. Jim also made a Birdie on a par three. 

With the golfers back I poured the Sangria. Everyone had some except for Bernie. It was delicious and I was told to make more! So I did, but by the time the hour-chill time had lapsed the girls were onto wine so it didn't go over as well. 

That night it was Karen and Jim's turn to cook. They made white-bean chili. It was made corn free so the meat was pork instead of chicken. It was delicious. I had two bowls, but I probably should have stuck with one. I volunteered to do the dishes and Briana helped me by drying them and putting them away. When we were finished, we went out to the HOSA. 

It was more boisterous this evening and we all said that Frank missed the fun night! We sang songs, made s'mores and chatted about many things from finances to retirement to celebrity nude photos being leaked from the cloud. At one point Briana and Karen made a dash to the corner store for milk and Kahlua so that G'ma could make White Russians, the drink is iconic at the HOSA, by the end of the night they were White Wussians.  

September 1st, 2014

Pinch and a punch, for the first of the month! 

Once again I was up before 6 am, but this time it was not Jojo's fault. Reggie came over and told me he needed to go outside. He would have gone back to bed afterwards, but because he woke me up he work Jojo up, and once Jojo is up he is up for a few hours. I made sure to wear shoes this time and then took Reggie, Apollo and Jojo out (Apollo is Karen and Jim's greyhound. He is older so I was surprised he came with us). 

After I took them outside, I went back inside to cut up some fruit and start my fruit salad. Briana and I were in charge of breakfast. We were making gluten free pancakes, fruit salad and bacon! The fruit salad was strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, raspberries and bananas. So I knew I only have a few things to cut up. So I left Jojo outside and Reggie went back to bed with my parents, for the most part, and I cut up fruit. I left some of the strawberries and bananas, because I wasn't sure if Briana wanted to make pancakes with fruit inside or not. (We decided not so I added the rest later that morning) After I cut the fruit I poured OJ over it and let it soak. 

Then I went back outside. I laid in the hammock and caught a few zzz's and read a little more. Jojo figured out that he could go under the porch so he spent a lot of time running under there. Reggie would stand on top of the porch and run around overtop of him, looking down at him through the boards. He could get under the porch as well, but he liked being on top better. Silly.

Once everyone was awake and had a cup of coffee, Briana and I made the rest of the breakfast. It was delicious. The pancakes were gluten free and corn free so I think they were made with rice flour. They tasted delicious, some gluten free foods do not taste good, but pancakes are fine! 

After lunch we decided to make it an early day, and so we cleaned up the cabin and headed off. The problem was that Briana had done so much yard work that we had ten bags of dried leaves. We spent some time trying to figure out where to dump them, and eventually we found a dumpster that didn't have a no-dumping sign on it. Though we still unloaded the bags, like we weren't supposed to dump them anyway! We all left so fast we didn't even say good-bye to any of the Scotts or G'ma!