🔥Fire…

Well now the hills are black…

Last night about 8:30 we noticed a fire burning on the hill. Before our eyes it raced up the hill and the winds blew it west. By 9:30 the moon was coming up over and fire had spread up over the hill..burning the wheat fields on top. Not goin’ lie, it was scary! (Our hills are actually a huge bank that is flat on top, and then it gradually slopes down to the Columbia river gorge.) One of the natural disasters on the west coast is definitely fire. I can see the need of a “go bag”. There are fancy houses on those hills but with fire trucks at each one and they are ready for that with water trenches and evacuation plans.

It started low….
Then raced up the hill…

The moon rising…

 

Today we decided we were doing good on our service time and took a trip to the mountains. We wanted to take a practice run before Kyle gets here to see how long it would take us and where to go. It was lovely! We left at 9:30am and we’re back in time for a nap at 3:30pm.🤣 the weather down here in the valley was sunny and warm 85*. But we drove up into  the clouds at the top and it was 41*! Did not have a good view of Mt Rainier, but the drive was just beautiful.

That huge snowy mountain behind the smaller green one is Rainier.

Bryan hiking in his cowboy boots! 😆

I think Bryan got some better pictures I will have to post later. Love you all!

Once agan we are in love with Jehovah’s artistry! 🦋

Hello!🏕

Hello from the Evergreen State!

All is well here. Most of the same. Just waiting anxiously for Kyles arrival to the northwest!  But you know we love to take pictures of the nature around us. So thought I would share some.

Our ever changing hills! At sunset they turn orange!
The purple opposite sunset. It’s a real thing! Susan knows about it.😄

A couple of views from the lookout up on the hill behind Prosser. Hope you can zoom in on the 2 mountains.
A bird condo we saw in service.🏠
Bryan studying. It’s actually after 9:00 and still light out! Plus the sun comes up at 5:00am!
Older brother who’s health is deteriorating, but he wanted to do his bible reading.😍
Bryan helping a faithful little sister Irene with her iPad. 😍
Bryan and I… going native. 🤠

🦋

Tears of an angel…

Bryan and I had the privilege of working on a Kingdom Hall build here in Washington for the first time! It was the new design. So lovely!  At our table for lunch we figured out one of the brothers there was the father of a student in our SKE class! It was once again realizing how small the world is…when you are one of Gods people.

This Kingdom Hall build is in the middle of nowhere in a little farming town called Mattawa. There is only one congregation there and it’s spanish. So the friends feeding us are our Spanish brothers and sisters. They spoke very little English. That day was the 22nd anniversary of one of the couples. After lunch he wanted to show us (our small group at our table) a book full of pictures of the couple from their wedding day, to every year anniversary all dressed up. It was so sweet! Then in the back of the picture book were what looked like poetry…all written in Spanish of course. But in his very broken English we figured out these were songs he wrote for his wife! One was titled “Tears of an Angel” One of the brothers said sing it for us! As he sang the lunch room gradually got completely silent. Oh my goodness…it was so beautiful, in his clear baritone voice it gave you goosebumps. Even though the language was foreign, the feeling was not. I could only imagine that’s how David sounded singing to Jehovah at night in the field with the sheep. After he stopped everyone in the lunch room clapped and whistled! It was such an enjoyable day.🦋

Susan’s view of Mt Rainer on the way home from the airplane.

Visitors!

Hey guys!💕 we had our first visitors to Washington! Since we live only 10 hours away from our Montana/Wyoming family now…instead of 2 days drive, we planned to go over and see them when they all get together for the summer regional convention in Billings. Then we got the bright idea while talking to Susan one day, that she should fly out there and we could meet her there and she would come back to Prosser and fly back home from here! It all happened so fast! It was so fun to see her and all my uncle Al’s family! Good times were had by all!

Had to show you what a hat check in at a Montana assembly looks like.😂🤠

then on our way back to Washington we had surprising news that our other sister Cherol and husband Chris had drove their camper up to Prosser! So we had some major “sister time”.

Surprise!!

They got to see our fertile valley and even pick some cherries! 🍒

But one of the highlights of the visit was when the brother and sister from our Hall..who raise and sell quarter horses..invited us over to see all their baby horses.  They took us in their pasture(FYI:it’s so dry here everyone waters their pastures)…where the horses surrounded us, the babies being that close to humans was new to them. It was sensory overload. The sun was going down and it was a magical evening. My more than healthy fear of these large animals kept me in the 4wheeler. 🙄

They knew there were oats in the back of the 4wheeler

 

That’s their farm in the background.
The big chicken.🙄

 

Seeing family is wonderful! When are the rest of you coming out?? 🦋

 

 

Things are warming up…

Hello from the Yakima Valley!🙋🏻💕

We are now are enjoying warm weather and some interesting calls in the field service. We have been feeling like this is tough territory but this week Jehovah has fooled us and we have had some great calls! Bryan has shown the “why study the Bible” video a couple of times and two men have agreed to a demonstration of a bible study! We shall see! We also visited with an elderly man I had placed a magazine with who invited us in and enjoyed a few scriptures on the hope for the future and he told us he tries to pray every night. He also told us he was born in Oklahoma in a teepee! He is half Choctaw Indian. He lost his wife a couple of years ago, so we are going to go back and talk about the hope for the dead.

Having a Starbucks break in service.

Bryan and I took a drive down to Portland to see about a work car for him and as always, enjoyed the drive. The Columbia river is high from mountain snow thawing.

Here is a lock and dam near The Dalles, Oregon. The water was gushing thru there.
The view of Mt Hood

Love you all!….oh I won’t forget putting a few pictures we got from Kyle on here.

And then there is the Caribbean Icon….

🤣😂 that’s our boy!🦋

 

Just an add on…

Oh I forgot to tell you about our new doggy! (Well our landlord..) So for about 3 days a stray dog was hanging around our neighborhood garbage bin. Now the Easterlys had just gotten rid of their to big and disobedient dog even though they loved her and miss her. She was just to much dog and always bad. Ran Jimmy into a tree and broke his ribs.  They gave her to a family about 30 min away about 3 weeks ago. But Jimmy has been so sad since. So now this stray puppy…they put food out for her and she has seems to have adopted our little compound! She doesn’t seem to bark, is very obedient but maybe has been abused, because she is very skiddish and scared. She is like a small husky, with blue eyes!

                                                                  Making friends….
A beautiful moon coming up over the hills
Made this delicious meal with Avacodo oil and coco aminos and spiral zucchini. So yummy!

love you all! 🦋

A lost sheep…

hello!

We had our assembly last weekend. It was wonderful of course! It most definitely wasn’t in an assembly hall. Sort of looked like a huge shed, folding chairs. But it worked. Bryan gave the babtism talk with 3 out of the 8 babtized were from Prosser. Brother Lett was so fun to listen to. And even though we heard he was sick and not feeling well, he was out there greeting everyone in the long line that waited to shake his hand.

Our Prosser pioneers at the Pioneer Day on Friday
Here a group of us with Haylee (second from left) right before she got babtized

Bryan interviewing two from Prosser. Bryce 17yrs old babtized 1year and Bonnie, a pioneer babtized 54 yrs
This is Claire and her 13 yr old daughter who is holding her (Claire’s)1 month old son. I have the privilege of studying with Claire since she was just reinstated.

This week there was a animal fair that several of the young people in our hall had animals in. They raise and then show them at this fair and then people bid on them. It does seem to take a lot of their time, but they get school credit for it and make some money when they sale them.

Loren showing her pig Shadow.
Our car group today

So today in service we had a nice experience. We checked out a territory this morning and decided to work in it this afternoon. So there was a name of a sister listed who lived in this territory. We had never heard of her. So a sister in the car group told us she is inactive and had been for awhile. So Bryan and I went to the door to introduce ourselves to her. We have no doubt that the angels directed us to her today. She was so sweet! She takes care of her blind disabled brother and her husband has been disfellowshipped for 20 years. But he set up the Broadcast for her and expressed he would like to come back to Jehovah. (She’s telling us all this…) then she said that today she called out to Jehovah, something she had not done for a long time, and then this afternoon we came. 😭 I almost cried! She deals with depression and anxiety. Bryan shared some encouraging scriptures with her and said a prayer with her. We exchanged numbers and hugged her. I am very hopeful for her! Jehovah was reaching out to this precious lost sheep! 🦋

Oregon…

  • Hello!

We took a trip to Bend Oregon this past weekend. The Easterlys, who we rent from, have a daughter who has a place down there where we could stay. It was really, really nice apartment above a 3car garage. But the view of the 3sisters mountains was amazing! The whole feel around there felt like Colorado. The smell of pine and fresh crisp air and blue, blue skies. The ride down there, about 4 hours took us thru such interesting terrain, from sage covers hills to mountains and then down into the Columbia river gorge back up to huge  wheat farms, high dessert,and all along the west was the Cascade mountain tops (old volcanoes) standing snow covered giants, quietly praising their Creator. 🦋

It was a little cloudy at this point so it was hard to see the mountains in a picture. But that could be Susan’s house with a little elbow grease! This is at Goldendale Wash. beautiful place.

One of those is Mt Hood.

This shows the place we stayed and the view from their yard during the day and at night. Also a picture of a bridge we crossed on the way
The pointed peak of Mt Jefferson in the background

That is driving up to mt Bachelor. And a picture of a deep gorge we crossed(not the Columbia gorge)

Those pictures show the 3 Sisters.  (I could relate to that! 😜)

Otherwise life goes on as usual. We have our assembly this weekend and the CO visit in 2 weeks to it will be busy.

Meanwhile….in the Caribbean…

Oh..and I will throw in a picture of our favorite service baby, Cavyn watching a Caleb video

Love you all, keep up the good work!🦋

Rattlesnake mountain…

Brr! It was a cold windy day here! Bryan took some great pictures out in service today on the Rattlesnake mountain ridge. The highest point being about 3,000 feet about sea level. It’s the northern most part of our territory. Not many homes but a lot of cool old abandoned out buildings!

Love this barn! In the distance you could see clear to a Oregon!

Then down by Prosser all the Cherry trees are blooming.

love ya!🦋

 

Farm life…

We keep learning so much about farm life around here. This time of year they bring all the bee hives back from winters in California. They bring them back to pollinate all the fruit trees…apple, apricot, cherry trees. So there are bees everywhere in the country side but they have no interest in people, they have a job to do!🐝

Portable bee boxes

We also see all the farm workers working in the fields. I took this picture of some guys putting up twine for the hops (what they make beer out of) that will grow up the tall poles…

What is funny is I think they thought I was the immigration lady..taking their picture. The local sister said, “Great..they will probably all go into hiding.”

Car group…Bryan is trying to find where to click the camera🤣

love you guys!🦋