VOLUNTEERING AGAIN

This past weekend, we volunteered again (third year) to help with the cooking at Pines Bible Camp here in Grand Forks.  It was a 3 day family camp with people from the Lower Mainland, the Okanagan, Calgary and some locals.  We worked the 9:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. shift which covered off the lunch service and included some preparation for supper.

The first and second days, I made cookies--120 oatmeal raisin cookies and 150 chocolate chip cookies.  It was challenging to work with the large quantities and to use the large mixer.  There were 24 cookies on each tray and I had 2 ovens to bake in so the whole process took a couple of hours.  The third day I made Rice Krispie squares (using 32 cups of Rice Krispies) and that was a quicker job.

Stuart made a batch of buns (about 150) the first day he also worked on preparing the lunch meat, made a Mexican corn salad and sliced vegetables and other prep work.  We worked with the regular kitchen staff and another couple for all 3 days and helped serve the lunch meal each day.  We worked hard and had fun and will continue to volunteer each year.

At home, we’re mostly in maintenance mode, but are still doing a couple of major projects.  We have been harvesting beans, tomatoes, zucchinis and onions from the garden and are just starting on the carrots and beets.  It looks like we’ll have some good sized acorn squashes but not too sure about the butternut squashes, as some of them have been falling off the vines.  It has been very hot and dry this summer.

One project that Stuart completed was the replacement of our laundry sink and faucet.  The original one was white plastic and had black stains and scratches in the bottom.  We purchased a stainless steel sink and new faucet and Stuart installed them last week.  I helped out a bit but it was mostly his job.  He was able to attach the faucet to the sink before setting it all in place and that prevented a lot of confined work under the sink.  However, he had to install a new section of drain pipe and after an overnight wait, we found out that there was a small leak in the drain.  He changed one thing and waited a day but it was still leaking.  He finally used a liquid gasket product that made the seal and now our beautiful new sink is functional.

OLD SINK AND FAUCET

 NEW SINK AND FAUCET

We took a trip to Oliver and Osoyoos a couple of weeks ago to purchase some fruit and peppers and bought it all at one orchard.  The sixteen year old son was selling the produce and gave us a good deal on 2 types of cherries, peaches, apricots, peppers and he gave us a free cantaloupe as well.  We had lunch at an East Indian restaurant in Oliver that we have been to before and even had time to do a wine tasting at Gehringer Brothers winery.

Last week, we had to go to Trail for an appointment and went out for lunch at the Colander restaurant.  It has been a very popular Italian restaurant for over 40 years years in spite of (or maybe because of) a simple menu.  A typical lunch consists of a large bowl of spaghetti with 2 meatballs or 2 pieces of chicken for about $6.  The food is well seasoned and plentiful—those Italian cooks know how to prepare pasta.

Other than that, we’re playing more golf and enjoying the hot weather and sunshine.