Military Appreciation Day

Saturday, May 8, Phil and I attended the Military Appreciation Day in Milwaukie, OR. Our Home of the Brave and Hugs Projects had a vendor booth to get the word out on what we do. They had food and projects for soldiers and veterans to enjoy. There were also vendor booths of all sorts of services for those enlisted, deployed, returnees, veterans and their families to check out.
This "G.I.Joe" was one of the largest soldiers I have ever seen. It was fun watching him interact with all the kids.

Our Home of the Brave booth was toward the back of the field. We had the "fallen soldier" board and some of our quilts there so people could find out what our service is. Phil was a big help in not only helping us prepare for the day, but talking to soldiers and their families about the programs.

I was telling ladies how to make "hugs and kisses" for our soldiers. Hugs are cooling ties, kisses are helmet cooling rounds. They have special gel inside them that expands when wet and keeps their necks and heads cool in the hot deserts of Afghanistan and Iraq. We also are beginning to knit some of these as it is pretty cold in the mountains of Afghanistan and some of our soldiers there need just the opposite to help with it being too cold.

Here Kaye Hansen, our Home of the Brave and Hugs project coordinator for Oregon, talks to a gal from the VA hospital who is part of the bereavement program at the hospital. We are always looking for outreach programs to help or hopes that they can help us with information and/or people to sew the hugs. We have about 2,000 Guard and soldiers who will be deployed within the next year so more hugs and kisses are needed.

Even GI Joe is interested in our programs. Hope one of the hugs is big enough for his neck. :-)

This gentleman is an Air Force veteran of WWII. I was sharing with him how to make sure his cooling tie was completely dry before being put away. He was leaving for Hawaii with his bride of 64 years the next day so she received one as well. They just might need them in Hawaii.

We had a wonderful day helping those who stopped by. We received inquiries of how people can help us and we passed out patriotic hugs to our veterans and tan hugs to our currently enlisted men. Thank you to all of you who stopped by to share our day with us, especially all the soldiers, both currently enlisted and veterans, who have given part of their lives for our freedom. May God Bless all of you.

Clamming and Quilting

After our trip to MI to see Caleb, the Quilting Retreat and Men's weekend, Phil and I went clamming once again for the last clam of the season...unless they have one more which is possible. Anyway, we made our way to the Long Beach Peninsula at the end of April for low morning tides to clam. On the way, we stopped in Astoria, OR to eat at the Baked Alaska. I had won a $25 gift certificate and we decided that would be a great way to start our weekend.
This is the view from the restaurant doors of the Columbia River and the Pilot boat house next door.

The views were beautiful from our table where we understand the line in America the Beautiful..."purple mountains magesty." They are always wonderful to see and admire as we head to the beach.

Our meals were wonderfully prepared and very tasty indeed. Phil had barbequed salmon and I had sea scallops. We also had a very fresh salad and great bread to start our meal off. A little pricy but a good place to start our weekend away.

This picture is of Phil after our first clam day, Friday morning. We actually got our limit of 15 clams each in about 30 minutes. A beautiful and successful morning.

While the water was boiling and I awaited Phil letting me know that cleaning the clam prep was ready, I put together some "hugs" (cooling ties) for our Military Appreciation Day the following week.

This was the first day's take of clam meat. We had two more pans like this the rest of the weekend as well.

The flowers were blooming beautifully at the Doel house. These rhodies were just stunning to look at with the green background.

I love cala lilies and we had some in the house from the week before that were still beautiful.

While waiting for church to begin on Saturday night, we went out to the beach to watch the ocean and talk about our day. These guys were waiting for us to give them some food. But since they have stolen some of our clams in the past, we didn't treat them to anything.

This was the beach on Sunday morning at approximately 7:15 am. Yep, we had our pickings of the field where we would walk around to dig.

It was a tough clamming session. I had two blisters and three hot spots from our weekend. Was it worth it??? You becha!!!

This was our final dig take...some mighty big clams and one lonely sand dollar. Love it!!!

So, last week Wednesday, Diane invited us over to her home to have lunch and enjoy the afternoon of quilting together. She and her husband, Steve, had just finished remodeling their kitchen and she wanted to share the space with us. Her father-in-law is a cabinet maker and he completely designed the cabinets adding some great hide-aways for her to use.

The hummingbirds kept us occupied as we enjoyed seeing them quite often during the day. They actually perched on this feeder while drinking and keeping still for some pictures.

Becky and Cindy were knitting on their neck warmers.

Marilyn and Donna worked on wool applique projects.

Diane had a charm pack that she opened to work on a small wall hanging.

I worked on my embroidery for a special pieced wall hanging. Sorry, cannot show you more of it.

We also visited the yard to check out Diane's garden, raised beds and flowers. It was a beautiful day with wonderful friends to share our love of quilting. Thank you, Diane, for being a wonderful hostess and sharing your home with us.