Life at Sister Roxy's

This morning Sister Roxy and I went to JoAnn's Fabric Store and bought some lining for capes for her little grand-daughters and the notions to make them some muffs. She had a couple of pieces of washable velvet in burgundy and purple that someone had given her that are just about big enough for a short cape for each of the girls. And she had a hunk of delightful white faux fur with pink hearts that we'll use for the muffs.


We went from there to Borders where I bought Roxy a copy of the America's Test Kitchen cook book as an early birthday present (only a month!). She wants to learn to make bread and I thought she needed a cookbook with good pictures and explanations.


Tonight the household is quite ambitious. Sister Roxy is trying to do her farming on Farmville, but is getting a bit of competition for the warmth of the computer on her lap --



Forry's struggling with the gosh-awful puzzle that Roxy and I started yesterday --



And Brother-in-law Rich is in the den --

As you can tell by the pictures, I am definitely the only one really working...!

;-)

And Not Such Good News...

Well, we drove back down to Uhlmann RV in Chehalis late this morning (I hadn't packed up my coumadin when we left to come to Sister Roxy's yesterday...) and talked to the guys at the shop. It was not real good news. Seems that no one has the necessary parts in stock for the lifter and H & H has to manufacture them...! Sounds like it may take three weeks ;-(


When they finish the other repairs, we should be able at least to move back into Auntie Violet for the wait. Just won't be able to put the slide out. At least Sister Roxy doesn't seem too unhappy about having house guests -- we're already planning a trip to the fabric store tomorrow!

Not the Best Day

When we were on our way to Vancouver last week, we had stopped at a rest area and I noticed that the slide on the passenger side was sticking out about an inch. Forry let it out a few inches and then retracted it again and it was fine. Today we left 99 RV Park on our way to Uhlmann RV in Chehalis to have a couple of things taken care of before we leave for points south.


When we parked at Chehalis, the slide seemed to be fine, but by the time we unhitched the toad and the crew drove Auntie Violet to the back side of the shop, the slide was out a couple of inches again! When Lew (one of Uhlmann's crew) saw oil dripping, he opened the slide and oil just poured out!


Lew and Forry emptied the bay and Lew crawled in trying to figure out where the oil was coming from --

He couldn't see the source, but he ended up with a pretty good pan full --

It took some checking inside with a flashlight and some moving the slide in and out, but Lew finally spotted shiny oil on the hydraulic lifter on the side behind the cover. It seems the seal on the lifter had blown out.

Forry had seen a few drops of oil in the bay earlier this summer, but couldn't figure out where it came from -- and then never saw any more. We are extremely thankful that when it finally totally gave way, it happened right at the repair shop! Someone is watching over us!

We had planned to meet my Sister Roxy and her husband Rich for dinner tonight. When I told her what had happened, Roxy invited us to come and stay with them at their home in Olympia while we wait for parts to arrive.

Today's Project...

For the second time, part of the wooden frame around the closet broke loose when Forry brought the slide out last week. We think it caught on the drawers of the bedside table which had come partially open while we were driving (we had been on some extremely rough and rutty roads). At least this time I wasn't the one opening the slide...

We had gone to Hubbard to Zion Mennonite for church this morning and when we got back to 99 RV Park, our friend Bill came over and helped Forry glue and clamp the frame back in place.

Forry will leave the clamps in place overnight and then put the closet door back on in the morning before we head up to Uhlmann's RV in Chehalis to have some work done on Auntie Violet.

This evening we walked with Bill and Leslie and his daughter and her friends over to the shopping center a couple of blocks from the RV park and had dinner at a roadhouse there (we decided that the definition of a roadhouse is any place where you throw peanut shells on the floor). I ordered the "senior" plate of BBQ'd ribs that was still more then I could eat.

Grandson Micah's Soccer Game!

This morning we ate breakfast with our friends Leslie and Bill, who arrived at 99 RV Park with their RV Serenity last evening. We went to a restaurant called Elmer's in south Vancouver. They had eaten at this chain before and highly recommended it. If nothing else, the portions were huge -- and the food was good too!


We were on our way to the Middle School in the little town of Colton, where our Grandson Micah was playing a soccer game at noon. His Dad, Todd, coaches the team of fourth grade boys.



There are eight boys on the team --

This is the first time I have ever used the 55-200 lens that came with my Nikon camera -- and the first time I have used the sports setting. It was quite different to try to snap quick shots. I got some good pictures of Micah -- when I didn't chop his head off! This is the goal-making kick that Micah made! (I got so excited that I didn't quickly get a shot of the ball actually going into the goal...)

In this shot, Micah's playing defense --

Awaiting the kick-back by the opposing goalie is serious business --

And a guy just has to keep hustling --

Gotta keep that ball moving --



There's a good kick!

The kids from Hubbard and the boys from Colton had a pretty even game during the first half, tying it up 3-3. During the second half, Todd's boys showed their stamina, making another four unanswered goals.

After the game, we went back to Daughter Dawn and Todd's and had lentil soup and biscuits for lunch. Grand-daughter Kyra had been given a copy of "Rabbid Go Home" for their Wii. It's such a silly stupid game -- you just had to chuckle at the kids' antics as they attempted to get their "rabbids" to the moon.

Fort Vancouver

Today we went to explore reconstructed Fort Vancouver along the Columbia River. It's one of the National Park Service Historic sites. They have a really great audio tour that walks you around the restored fort. Established for the Hudson's Bay Company in 1825, the Fort was the fur-gathering center of the northern Pacific Coast.

This was the Chief Factor's Residence where Dr. John McLoughlin and his family lived. McLoughlin has come to be called the "Father of Oregon."

This is a view of the Fort and the palisade looking across the kitchen garden, planted with the same varieties that were grown during its heyday.

The British flag of Hudsons Bay Company flying in the breeze this afternoon --

We toured the bakehouse, the carpentry shop. the counting house, the dispensary, the Indian Trade Shop, the jail, the blacksmith shop (where two volunteers were actually working), and the bastion (the corner building that is two stories high and houses the cannons that were used to salute arriving ships). By then I was tired! That's a LOT of walking!

Just Out Walking...

99 RV Park is an older park that has probably been here beside Hwy 99 for many years. As we walk about, we can't help but notice that the trees are quite aged and beautiful.

As we were walking about, we noticed this sort of ring around the sun -- I think it's called a "sun dog."

The trees vary from shades of orange and red --

or shades of gold --

or yellow?

I'd say this one was actually shades of bronze --

What ever color you might decide any one of the trees is, they are gorgeous!

Time for Another Blood Draw...

At least I'm up to just once a month now, but today was time for another check of my prothrombin level. (I'm still taking warfarin due to the blood clot I had last summer.) I've learned along the way that it's much easier to go to a hospital lab to get the required blood draw then to go to a clinic. (The hospitals are used to having people coming in with orders for blood draws while the clinics seem to think I should see one of their doctors first...!)

When I googled hospitals in Vancouver and checked on the address of the lab for Southwest Washington Medical Center, I discovered that they had a "draw center" not very far from 99 RV Park. It sure made it convenient! There was only one lady there -- she functioned as both the clerk and the phlebotomist.

The only bad thing about getting it done at this satellite is that they still have to send the blood sample over to the main hospital lab for processing, so it'll be tomorrow before I hear about any possible dosage changes.

Wonderful Project Completed!

One of the really nice things about the last Alpine Coaches that Western Recreational Equipment made was the hand rail along the stairs coming into the coach. It was one of those ideas that made us all wonder why they hadn't done it in the earlier coaches (like ours!).

Engineer Mike, who is a member of the Alpine Coach Association, developed a hand rail that could be retrofitted into older coaches. We ordered one from him when we were at the ACA Desert Rat Rally at Quartzite and had it shipped to Daughter Mary Mae's in Mount Vernon this summer. We have been carrying it along with us this fall while Forry figured out how he was going to mount it.

While we were at Sister Sherry's in Touchet, he took advantage of her shop equipment and got it bolted in. (The nice thing he discovered was that since our coach was made towards the end

of the 2007 year, they had already started using a firewall that had a hole for mounting the bracket on the 2008 models, which he was able to use.)


The next part of the project was to put the paneling back on. A hole needed to be cut in the paneling in order for it to slide up and around the new handle bar. It is a given that NO project can possibly be finished without the purchase of at least one new tool. This job was no exception!

So, this afternoon, we made a trip to Lowes and bought an orbital jigsaw so that a hole could be cut into the paneling and it could be re-mounted.

It looks pretty nice, don't you think? It works great too!

A Conference Call and a Quiet Day

I started this morning off with a two hour long conference call with the Racial Healing Task Group that I am part of. We had a lot of feed-back from the presentations we had done in Pittsburgh last month to process, plus plans for this summer.

It had started raining during the night and kept up ALL day. It did range from light showers to a pretty good downpours, but it never stopped. We didn't do a whole lot today. Well, Forry did take the garbage out and he charged the batteries, so he can take credit for a few things.

We got word today that an old friend of ours is now in hospice care and is not expected to live much longer. We have not been close to Jerry for several years, but it was still pretty shocking to hear. He is only 65...