Family Reunion Time at Lake Almanor

Friday July 19th-Friday July 26th was the annual Perazzo Clan vacation, though this year we were sadly without Mom and Dad Perazzo as mom wasn't feeling quite well enough to come and Dad stayed home with her. We felt so bad, but the first few days the weather was sweltering, so I was glad they hadn't come because even if mom had been feeling well, I'm afraid the weather would have made her ill in and of itself. Luckily, Kathy was able to update them daily with photos and emails about our activities. Some of which activites included:

Everett was giggling very hard at cousin Megan, who had him sniff flowers

 We played a lot of volleyball this year. Alex is learning some mad skills, like serving.

 Glen and Kathy were keeping score from the sidelines

 Here is the horseshoe pit...with burned trees behind it. The area had been back burned last summer to keep last year's fire (which got us evacuated during our reunion) from burning down the camp.

Hannah hitching a brief ride.

Dallin, Ben, Andrew, Becky, Heather, Alex, Joseph, Maddie, and Glen
Heather's birthday was Sunday the 21st, and she and Andrew arrived just after midnight, so we had to celebrate on Monday with cake. Happy 21st Birthday Heather! Mom and Dad P made the sign.

Glen, Alicia, Everett, and Hannah heading to the lake--it's a very rocky beach.

 getting ready to go tubing and kneeboarding at the southern end of Lake Almanor

Jackie, David, Kathy, Joseph, Heather, and Andrew playing Pit (aka Spoons) in the pavilion

Another game we played was Reverse Charades...here Joseph, Andrew, and David act out "Totem Pole" for Glen

Alex, Glen, Beth, Andrew, Heather, and Hannah at Camp Conery

On Thursday, Hannah went with the Jamieson's to hike a bit on Mt. Lassen. Here are Becky, Joseph, and Ben

and here's Hannah

We had a fabulous week. Thanks Mom and Dad P!

5th week of summer--leisurely pace of summer

Glen and Hannah were gone most of the week to Young Women's camp, so it was Alex and me...except Alex spent half the time with cousins. So it was a lot of just me. I managed to have a good week, though it sure is good to have "everybody" home again.Sounds like Glen and Hannah had a wonderful time. This was Hannah's last year. As a 6th year, she helped the leaders.

We are missing Andrew and Heather, Eric, and Ryan, of course, but they all seem to be doing well. We do get to see Andrew and Heather in a week as they get to go to the Perazzo clan reunion for 3 days. We're excited for that.

Now that my cheese project is done, I wanted a new project and I decided to start learning about less common grains. First up was a grain called teff. Teff is the tradition grain of Ethiopia and is the smallest grain around.

I made a mistake in my choice of recipes in that I made Chef Brad's sweet teff French bread (Chef Brad teaches classes at BYU's Ed Week and has a show about grains on BYUtv). The problem was that the recipe used red wheat and teff...and I don't really like the flavor of red wheat. Silly me. I'll try again later.

My simple and quick craft project for the week was to make a necklace pendant from scrabble tile and scrapbook paper. Cut, glue, and then seal with something called crystal effects--it makes a glossy, thick coating on the top--then glue on a finding. Hannah liked it so much, she asked if she could have it. That makes the project a success.

Alex and I are participating in a 25 day drawing challenge that I found on Pinterest. Each day there is a new challenge--day #1 was to draw a self portrait, day #3 was to  draw your favorite sport (I did volleyball). Click here to see the google doc of the assignments.

We've added some more scrabble tiles to the fridge and have been having fun with them:

Made another Pinterest recipe--cherry bombs. It's a truffle type item with a cherry in the center. Easy (dipping them in melted chocolate is a bit messy though) and yummy. Though next time I'm adding cherry extract to the cake batter as the cherry flavor wasn't strong enough to my liking.
http://www.hungryhappenings.com/2011/02/valentines-day-dessert-sweet-chocolate.html


one more sunset from Monday:

4th week of summer--things are slowing down

First off, the mystery of the 2nd bike for Ryan arriving in the mission field was solved...a missionary leaving to go home had reused Ryan's bike to mail his own bike home--only he forgot to change the address on the bike box and wound up mailing it back to the mission office. That's about an $80 mistake depending on where he's from. But the mystery is solved and my brain can rest on that matter.

Glen and Alex were at scout camp all week. Hannah was gone half the time (to Auburn, CA, to Mammoth, NV, to Yerington, NV, to 2 different birthday parties, plus babysitting, dances classes and tennis practices), so I've had a lot of quiet time. It's been...quiet. Which is nice...for a while, at any rate.

Apparently there is a great photo of Alex climbing a rock wall...not a fake one, but a real wall of rock. I hope to get a hold of a copy of one so I can post it. Alex and Glen both had a wonderful time at camp.

I sewed a quilt for Alex's bunk bed as everything we had was too large for it. I used an idea I found on Pinterest--using jeans and flannel shirts. Well, I used flannel pajamas. Monday was Savers big 50% off of most everything sale. Hannah and I got there right after it opened and left 1 1/2 hours later just when it was starting to get full of people, so it was nice. I bought several pairs of men's blue flannel pajama bottoms to use, but in the end, only used one pair for the quilt.

The quilt isn't my best work, but it'll serve its purpose just fine. Notice what's under the bed if you can see that well...we took a bunk bed and removed the bottom bunk and put a bookcase and desk under there for Alex. The top bunk is for him to sleep, though when it's hot, he usually just sleeps on the floor.

There have been some gorgeous sunsets and sunrises lately. I didn't have my camera with me on the best sunset...the sun was a giant red ball setting over a mountain, but I did get some sunrises:

sunrise on July 2nd

sunrise on July 6th

The 4th of July party was held at Kathy's again this year (Happy 237th birthday America!). I didn't have my camera, so there's no photographic evidence, but we (the Fallon crew minus those at scout camp) had a great time eating, playing games, and chatting. I don't know that I won a single game, but it was loads of fun.

I made another batch of cottage cheese this week and it came out great. I tried making ricotta, too, but that project was a failure. I tried the recipe where you use the whey from cheese making to make ricotta (which was the original way to make ricotta), but no cheese formed. :( Next time, I'll use the milk version and not the whey version.

I've enjoyed a few naps this week. I didn't get a photo of me napping, of course, but the cat looked funny with his head on a pillow, so I took a picture of him napping: