Tasty Butter Braids

Hello,

The cooperative preschool (Peter Pan Preschool) that our children Kate and Joel attend in Boulder is having its fall fund raiser. This year's fund raiser involves selling Butter Braid Pastries.



Joel and Kate are only just learning about money and marketing so we are helping them out. They really enjoy their time at the school. I like it because I get to take them there in the mornings on our bike/trailer setup. But I digress... these pastries taste great. Someone put a taste sampler out near the door where parents bring their children to the school. I had to return a number of times to the table before I finally left the building. If you love good quality baked sweets... this is for you.

If you would like to purchase one or more of these delicious pastries, here are the details:

1. each Butter Braid Pastry costs $9.00
2. we need to have our order in to the school before the morning of October 19, so please sign up before then.
3. contact me at alfred.sawatzky@gmail.com (you can contact Becky, too, but I don't want to give the spammers her e-mail on this blog) and tell me how many of each of the following you would like (click here list of ingredients and nutrition information)
   
• Bavarian Creme Chocolate Icing
• Cherry
• Apple
• Blueberry Cream Cheese
• Cinnamon
• Cream Cheese
4. we can arrange payment when you contact me. Ideally I would like payment before the October 19 deadline, but we can also discuss other arrangements.
5. I will be receiving the ordered pastries on November 1st and will get them to you as soon as possible after that.

Thanks for helping out our preschool.

Regards,

Alfred Sawatzky

Summer 2007 is nearing its end

We finished off August with two camping trips. The first one was to the Maroon Bells Wilderness near Aspen Colorado together with our friends Beth, Ian, Owen and Abagail. The weekend after that we went camping closer to home at Golden Gate Canyon State Park with Graham, Deb, Marina and Seth and about 20 other friends.

The camping pictures you can find here and round out the remainder of our August photos.



September started out with Joel and Kate starting preschool and graduating from tricycles to bicycles. We also got to celebrate Grandpa's birthday in Boulder. Pictures from those events are here.

September 2007

Enjoy.

landscaping progress

To get a better sense of the progression of our landscaping project, I have created a new album that you can refer to from time to time to see how things are going. You can also click on the picture below (or here) to be taken to the actual album.

July/August 2007

Can you believe that it is middle of August already? We celebrated Joel and Kate's 3 1/2 year birthday today.

Final July photos are here...

From July 2007

And we have started August pictures here...

August 2007

We had a great vacation in Estes Park last week and those pictures are included in the August 2007 Album.

Yesterday we rototilled all the green manure (buckwheat, rye, sunflowers) that were growing in our yard back into the dirt. It actually looks like we have soil now instead of just hard-packed dirt that we started with. I hope to have a new album soon that shows the progress of our yard.

Enjoy.

we're back

It has been almost two months since I last updated this blog. A lot has happened since then and we have a bunch of new pictures to show for it.

At the end of May Alfred's sister Marlene and her son Alexander came to visit. But we actually had overnight guests at our house the week before that. And then throughout most of June we also had various family members stay with us.

During all that time we were busy reviving our yard. As you may be aware, we had over 30 cubic yards of gravel spread on it and our goal was to get rid of all the gravel without sending any of it to the landfill. I think within the next week we will have realized that goal. Thanks to Becky for her determined push to find recipients for the rocks and her skill in coordinating mechanical and physical labor to move the rocks.

In July we started amending the soil by adding horse manure, rototilling the entire yard and then planting buckwheat, sunflowers and winter rye. Then we are covering the entire crop with mulched straw to keep the moisture in and the weeds down. We plan to turn all this "green manure" under in August in preparation for landscaping later in the fall.

You can find the last of the May pictures here...

From May 2007

The June pictures are here...

June 2007

And some of the July pictures are here...

July 2007

Enjoy!

Tree Planting

Back in the summer of 1988 I spent a summer tree planting in northern BC. My dad recently sent me a link to a 15 minute video produced by CBC that gives a good reflection of what it was like for me that summer. Click here to see the video.

May pictures and Mother's Day camping trip

The May pictures have been started in a new album. Click on the picture below to browse to the album.

May 2007

On the Mother's Day weekend, we went camping with friends to Wellington Lake. Most of the friends were Alfred's friends from previous jobs, but we were specially invited by Deb, Graham, Marina and Seth. Graham is a friend from Alfred's GE days and he and his family live close to us in Boulder. Their two children and Joel and Kate are friends so it was great to have them all camping together.