Grand kids visit; why are gold fish black; and a birthday party

E liked the swimming pool, too. And he liked the ants, the debris that falls from the oak tree, drops from the sprinkler and anything that he can fit into his mouth. He also likes life sans clothing when the temperatures are in the nineties. Maybe that is just human nature to want to be clothes-less when the the day is hot.

When the temperatures get into the nineties and even triple digits, the wading pool becomes real popular with the grandkids. Hey, the cool water even becomes pretty popular with their momma and grandma and grandpa.

G is so very socialable. Within minutes of meeting a new child his age or within a few years of his age, they are playing like they are the best of friends for years. He loves to play with his cousin L. She likes to play with G because he plays well and shares well.

"Little People Playing" The little guy standing at the playhouse is E. He is just learning to walk, but still prefers crawling because he can crawl really fast and when a door opens, he wants to get through said door really fast before it closes on him. He has invited himself to play with L and his older brother G. L loves to play with G, but she does not care to play with E because E has yet to learn any of the rules for playing. E even was so ghastly as to slobber on L's bunny. That was not cool. She came to me to tell me that she was upset with E for slobbering on her bunny and then wiped the slobber on my shirt. Nice, L! As you can see, L is bailing out of playing with the doll house when E barges in.

Here is son D assisting grandson M in his attempt to catch the black "goldfish". Anybody know why some of my goldfish are black and others are bright orange? They all went in bright orange last fall and about an inch and one-half long. Now I have four bright orange goldfish about six inches long, one six inch black "goldfish" and a dozen or so three inch black "goldfish" and one three inch orange goldfish. Mysterious. I told M that I would give him ten dollars for every black fish he could catch and put into the fountain in the backyard. He spent hours and hours. One of J's teacher friends (JoAnne) came to visit with her daughter to do a fitting for a bridesmaid's dress that J will refit for the daughter. The friend watched M fishing for the goldfish and caught his full explanation of what he was trying to do. JoAnne thought I was a genius because the task ate up so much of his time. The poor kid never did catch one of the black fish and it was not for a lack of trying. I gave him a pair of small Bushnell binoculars (10x25) that I have two of for some reason. He was pretty happy with that because he is a real birder. He carries his bird ID book with him everywhere and is really good at observing a ID'ing birds. He had a toy pair of binoculars to be used underwater. I am not sure of the value of underwater binocs and they really did not work well. Now he has a better pair of binocs, but certainly not what a birder would want, but the kid is nine and I don't think anyone wants to put an expensive pair of binocs in his hands at this time.

Picture of our friends Mason and Ria from The Netherlands. They visited for a few days while traveling through the Northwest. See earlier post about how we became friends. Mason traveled with Dean of McCall and some friends from New Zealand and other local friends on motorcycles for five days. Mason did not know where the trip would take him, but he was looking forward to renting a Harley in Boise and ride, ride, ride. Ria was to follow in the rental car. I don't think Ria's short legs would reach the pedals on a motorcylce and Mason was hoping his would. We introduced Mason to our grandchildren as the grandson of Santa Claus. The kids had to take a long look and weren't sure about that, but could see the real possibility. Yeah, he is nice enough to be the grandson of Santa Claus and his Dutch accent (both Mason and Ria speak perfect English along with several other languages) was enough to really intrigue the grand kids. I am looking forward to hear of the motorcycle trip. I will have to e-mail him after posting this blog. They leave tomorrow from Boise for The Netherlands. They start their school year about the same time we do in Idaho--about the 20th of August for teacher meetings.

J and I attendend a birthday party (the 80th) for Fred Beckman. He was an Ag. teacher (Future Farmers of America---FFA) at Weiser High School when J taught there. He ran a great program and was highly respected statewide and nationally. His daughter hosted the party for about one hundred guests. She and her husband have a beautiful Mediterranean home on about forty or so acres. The house is surrounded by dozens of fruit trees and a pasture of goats and sheep behind the swimming pool (Mediterranean style--Susan's husband is Persian). They built a house across the lane on their property for Mom and Dad so that they could look after them and assist them as they grow older. No pictures of the house. Sorry. Susan is owner of a skin care products business called Camille Beckman. All the products are manufactured in Eagle, Idaho in a green certified facility. Susan and her husband live within a couple miles of their plant and could easily ride a bicyle to work. I don't know if they to that or not.

http://www.relativelycrafty.com/main/camille.htm

http://www.camillebeckmanonline.com/

http://www.idahobusiness.net/archive.htm/2006/03/13/SUSAN-ROGHANI-Camille-Beckman-owner-committed-to-momandpops-An-IBR-Executive-Profile (For a story about Camille Beckman and her company's business philosophy see this story published August 10, 2008.) I love her philosophy because she will not sell to the big chain stores. Yeah, baby! The Wall Marts and their ilk (that is such a cool, nasty word) are sucking the hard earned dollars right out of the small towns and Susan is in the trenches fighting that trend to protect small businesses and small towns. Hope you all take time to read the article and support her business. The products are first class.

I have to tell you that J and I loved having our daughter and the three kids for a week, and having our friends from Holland visit and having them all to dinner including our daughter's husband who drove from Newberg for the weekend and our son and his wife and daughter L for dinner. Wow. That was so much fun and these old codgers were so tired the day after they had all departed. Can't wait for the next visit. J and I go to the Oregon Coast (Rockaway Beach) http://www.ezrbr.com/ for a week at the condo in September. S and family will probably visit for a few days. The grandboys will love to go crabbing. That is a lot fun and eating the catch----now that is serious fun.

Papa Coyote has got to go do something even if it is wrong. D and I go walking into three mountain lakes next weekend. Hum Lake and Thirty-Three Lake both have California Golden Trout. I had better tie more flies. One can never have enough.

Bye, Bye. Yeeeeeeeooooooooowwwww, Yip, yip.

May all your trails be gently downhill and the mosquitos all fly, fly away.