Here are some photos from our trip:

 The morning fog on the beach

 The harbor

 The morning fog on the beach

 The trees

 Alli eating lunch at the beach

 The flowers at lunch

 Mom at lunch

 The bay behind the jetty

 Alli at the harbor

 The park at lunch

 The lighthouse from the park

 Alli playing in the sand (she had a great time in the sand before she even got to the water!)

 Alli playing in the water

 Birds

 Birds

 The harbor

 Alli in the water

 Alli just had so much fun!!!

 Alli at the harbor

 Alli AFTER playing in the water

 Sunset

 The lighthouse

 Alli in the redwoods

The harbor

 Alli at the harbor

 The morning fog

 One of my favorite shots

Some photos from out trip to Crescent City

I should be making lists and cleaning things up, not posting pictures, but....guess what!  Pictures win!

Last night, Alli was watching TV with us, and Koori lay down in front of her chair.  Alli started off by gently rubbing her with one foot.

Then both feet got into the action.

Then, we got a bit wilder with the petting.  I had my phone in my pocket, so I got some pictures and a video, but not the best quality.  I was afraid that I would loose the shot if I got up and got the "good" camera.

We are off to Crescent City tomorrow morning for a few days.  I should be making lists of what I need to pick up and what I need to pack, and what I want AJ to do today (clean his room so Mom can sleep there is #1!)  He also has to bring Alli in to me for her therapy at 9:00.  I forgot that Alli's daycare was closed when I was at her last therapy, or I would have cancelled it today.  Instead, maybe I'll just worry about that tomorrow!

I think when I go to the coast this week, I'm going to run around in shorts and a t-shirt just to feel "cold".  It is HOT here!  It was supposed to be 106 yesterday.  I didn't see the final high, but it was up there close at least!  Meredith and the girls (Emma and Carolyn) came over for a swim and dinner.  The girls played video games with AJ and Dallas, and Meredith, Ralph and I watched for meteors.  I was eaten up by mosquitoes, but we saw quite a few.

The house was full of kids this weekend.  I don't know if the girls were here because I have a pool, or because I have teenage boys here.  There is also the possibility they were here because I have internet.  Meredith's internet has been down this week.  Meredith was worried they were outstaying their welcome, but I told her they weren't - it was nice to have girls over.  Girls actually 'chat' with me.  The boys aren't quite so good at that.  We have some good conversations, don't get me wrong, but the girls were fun to float around in the pool with and just chat.  (The boys are more apt to be splashing each other in the pool than floating around talking - boys will be boys I guess!)

When I wore my black and white scarf the other day, Marie from daycare loved it, so I told her I would make her one.  I had some yarn on hand that was a dark pink/purple blend, so I made that up for her, but she is much more of a 'pinky' girl than that, so I picked up a different pink yarn and whipped another one out.

I had a little help taking the picture....

I went out to get the paper yesterday, and the tracks on the walk from this snail were just too cool.....

With the fire over in Lassen Park, the sunrise was red yesterday morning.

This is supposed to go over a kitchen 'scrubbie', but since I don't have one of those, I think it will be just a plain old washcloth.  Since it is a sunflower, it will probably go to Mom's house anyway, so who knows how it will be used.

I'm sitting on the patio with a cup of coffee, AND blogging!  Cool!  AJ got a new laptop yesterday (long story) and I got his old one.  Now I, too, am a laptop person!  Since the only time I want to sit on the patio is in the early morning, it is very nice.  It is a cool 67 degrees now, projected to be 105 later.  I can sit out here with the noisy hummingbirds (they are almost out of food and are fighting and complaining!) for a while, and then get ready for work.

I was expecting a nice quiet evening last night.  AJ was going to Emma's house for a "Walking Dead" marathon, so I was planning leftovers for dinner, and an early to bed kind of evening.  So much for those plans.  AJ decided to ditch the marathon, and he and Conner came here.  I'm thinking I don't have enough leftovers for two (three if Dallas came over) teenage boys.  I stopped at the store and picked up some hamburger, and was making burritos when the phone rang.  "This is Emma, can we come over and swim?"  I ended up with three boys and two girls here last night, swimming, talking and playing video games.  I went to bed at 9:30, and I have no idea when the girls went home.  I haven't even checked to see if Dallas went home or if he spent the night,

Added to all of that, at 3:30 this morning, AJ came in - "Mom, the sprinkler is broken and is spraying water all over."  I asked if he had trying turning the sprinklers to 'rain' and he said yes, but it didn't help.  "Then that sprinkler is controlled by the system in the pump house."  "Oh."  Ralph got up and helped him deal with it,  Then.......one of the smoke alarms started chirping.  It wasn't a restful night!

Ralph was relaxing in the pool this afternoon, and looked entirely too comfortable.  So, I sent Ali swimming with him.  Then, Alex joined them.  After a bit of swimming, we decided to see if she would jump off the diving board.  Ralph took a video of the second jump.  Regardless of how it looks, I didn't push her!!  The last video I took, AJ did a cannonball, and soaked me - and got my camera wet.  (no damage done!)

We had some beautiful weather yesterday.  We ate dinner outside on the patio - not something that usually happens in August in Redding!  We also went to the movies - something else that I don't usually do!  Dawn, the boys and I went to see 'The Hunger Games".  Dawn had seen the movie before, and read the book after seeing the movie.  I had read the trilogy, but not seen the movie.  The boys hadn't done either.  I also invited Meredith and her family to join us (at the cheap theater - $1.50 each!)  She and Emma joined us for the 3:45 showing (they had seen it before.).  After the movie was over, I invited them over for dinner - impromptu tacos.   It was fun talking the move over with the boys and Dawn (waiting for Meredith to come).  Dawn wants to read the rest of the trilogy, so I had to be careful about the 'spoiler alerts'.  Like most good trilogies, the first book sets up a lot of things for the next books.  The movie was good, but it was nice to have read the books first, there was so much (of course) that couldn't be show in the movie.  We had a great discussion during the evening - fun!

Our nice weather held up this morning - it was nice and cool.  The clouds were beautiful around 7:30 or so - still nice and cool outside.

While I was out there, I thought I would show how badly my flowers did this year.  I really think there is something wrong with this pot.  I planted it twice, and they still died.

The box right below it is still alive, but not thriving.

The box planted at the same time that is out by the pool IS thriving - go figure!

I got a bird seed feeder this spring and put it out in the front yard.  It also didn't thrive - none of the birds ever found it, and the plastic eroded in the sunlight and the seed holders fell off.  Never mind, the pole is still good - a perfect hummingbird food holder!  I put is out in the rocks by the fountain in the back, and they love it!  Check out the guy on the right.

Maybe the other one is better???

I had a surprise visit from the HR Manager yesterday.  It's never (or hardly ever!) a good thing when HR stops by my desk - usually it means I did something wrong, or am late on a report or something.  This time, it was a little different.  Donna had parked next to me in the parking lot, and noticed I had a nail in my rear tire.  This was a good visit from HR! Well, sort of, at least.  I wasn't in trouble on the job, but now I had a tire I needed fixed.  I have free flat repair from Les Schwab on my tires, so I ran it over at noon.  They had a 3 hour wait-time.  I have a 1 hour lunch - they don't quite match up, do they?  I called Ralph, and he not only ran over to pick me up, but we went out to lunch at Casa Ramos too!  I was a bit late back from lunch, but it was worth it.

It turns out that they actually had longer than a 3 hour wait, and the RAV was ready at 4:30.  There was a bit of a problem with that too - Ralph gets off at 4:00, and I was the only one staffing the department yesterday after 4:45.  It worked out, barely - Ralph left work a little late and picked up Alli then came and got me and dropped me off at Les Schwab's.  I grabbed the RAV and rushed back to the office and got there at 4:44.  Whew!  In the mean time, I was also trying to work through a major upgrade on one of the software program we use.  As it was, I had to leave the  upgrade only half done.  I had an appointment at 5:15 for my nails, and couldn't get everything all done at work.   I need to go in earlier than normal today to get the upgrade done before anyone needs the program.    I'm ready for the weekend!!

Last night was the first full moon of August - the next full moon is a blue moon.

Here is the moon reflected in the pool.  (My feet created ripples when I was trying to cool them off!)

I also meant to post this earlier, and forgot I had it.  This is a picture of all the material for the quilt top I just finished - it looks great when all put together!