USA Trip Day 13

Saturday, August 13th. 

Dad made oatmeal for breakfast. I made the girls each try a tiny taste of mine, but they said they didn't like it. After breakfast, Dad checked on the honey. A couple dozen bees had gotten in and were drowning. He fished them out in the hopes that at least some might recover. 

Next, Laureva went with Grandpa to check on the chickens. Five were outside the pen and had to be herded back in. Laureva helped by chasing them towards the gate.

Following chicken care, the girls helped Grandpa dig up a bed of potatoes. They filled a large salad bowl to overflowing with their harvest. Then they set to work assembling two more beehive boxes. They each got to glue and nail one box.

After a lunch of fried garden potatoes and leftovers, we loaded into the van and headed to Big Cedars County Park, which had been recommended by Dad's neighbor, Sarah. The girls and Grandpa waded a bit in the Little White Salmon River which is quite shallow at that point. We wished we'd brought their water shoes. They also did some rock skipping and some tree climbing in one of the big cedars.

Back home, it was time for a chicken check. Laureva held several different ones that Dad picked up and handed to her, and finally managed to pick one up herself. Sylvain walked back to see the deer we'd driven past on the way home. 

At some point, Sylvain couldn't find his phone. He swore he'd put it down in the house after we'd come back from the park. We looked all over, but it did not turn up. He finally went outside and realized that it had been in his shorts pocket and he'd gone out to sit on the front deck while we were down at the chickens. He looked through the cracks in the deck and saw his phone underneath. Luckily, the girls were small enough and willing to crawl under and fetch it out for him.

The girls did some dinner prep with Grandpa, helping to make a vinaigrette for the black chick pea salad. To supplement, Dad and Pam also prepared sweet corn, summer squash wheels with cheese and locally caught sockeye salmon. It was quite a Saturday dinner feast.

After dinner, we went on a deer walk around the neighborhood and came across four or five at the end of the road at our turn around point. Back home, we did story time for the first time since leaving France. 

Before turning in, I disinfected masks in the oven. I've been throwing my germy Covid masks away when I change them, but I had the masks from the beginning of our trip to disinfect.