Catching Up . . . Again

What it's been? About a month since we last updated our blog? Sorry about that. I assure you, we never intend to let it be this long between posts.

So, what's been happening with us? Let's see, Richelle's student teaching has had her constantly sick, and I've been excelling at being a totally dismal hunter.

Duck Hunt
Opening day of duck this season was disappointing. Philip, Tyler, his brother Justin, and I got up super-early and setup decoys out in Farmington bay before sunrise. Unfortunately, they don't let you start shooting until 8am on opening day, and while the sky was filled with ducks from 6:30-7:30am, the sky was pretty empty by the time 8am rolled around.

Tyler and I tried again a few other days, but those days were even worse. It appears to have just been another bad year for duck hunting. Oh well.

Deer Hunt
For the deer hunt, most of the MacKay family headed out to Vernal (to Tyler's parent's house). Again, we got up super-early and headed up into the mountains, where we all split up. There were deer everywhere! But unfortunately, they were all does. We'd see them in groups of 9 to 20 at a time . . . I easily saw 60+ does that day. The only buck I saw (a 2-point), was shot by someone else before I could get a good shot. Brigette did shoot a deer, but she hit in the rear flank. We spent a couple hours trying to track the blood trail, but it dried up, and we never found it. Considering the number of other hunters out there, we're positive someone else got it later.

Lights
We did hear a pretty humorous story from the MacKays a week or two ago. Ever since they'd moved into their home, they'd had problems with the lighting in the kitchen, and the dining room. They'd tried buying brighter bulbs, messing with the wiring and everything, but couldn't figure out why they couldn't get the room any brighter.

Well, they've started to remodel their kitchen a week or two ago, and before they started, they pulled all of the furniture out of the dining room. In the process they removed several sets of book shelves that covered one of the walls. Behind them, they found a dimmer switch that controls the lights in the room . . . a lo, and behold, it was turned way down! We all thought that was pretty funny.

Grape Juice
Yesterday, Richelle and I went to her grandma and grandpa Allen's, to help them make grape juice. They've been making grape juice for as long as everyone can remember, but it's getting pretty hard for them to do it themselves. I spent about an hour and half picking grapes while Richelle and her sister cleaned and seperated them in the sink in the house. It was pretty cool.

1) pick the grapes
2) fill the sink with water, and seperate them from the stems, leaves, and everything else

3) we used this cool pot to make the grape juice. It's got three compartments. The bottom compartment is full of water. As the steam rises through the middle chamber, they cook the grapes in the top container. A funnel in the middle section collects the grape juice, as it drips back down into the middle.

4) then, taking a hot canning jar (it needs to be hot so it doesn't break when you put the hot grape juice in it . . . that and it helps seal them), you open the spout coming from the middle section, and fill the jar.

5) then you place a lid on it, and clean it up. An wha-la! Home made grape juice!

After about 4-5 jars, you refill the water and replace the grapes. It went pretty quick, and was pretty need to see how it was done.

Pumpkin Carving
On Saturday, we had our 3rd annual, Lloyd sibling Pumpkin carving extravaganza. I don't really remember how the whole thing started, but it's been a lot of fun to do the last few years. We've gotten pretty good at making some pretty neat pumpkins . . . as the pictures attest:

2nd row: Karl's, Christi's, Steve's
1st row: Richelle's, Jake's, Leslie's