Summer Fun!

Okay, okay...I know it has been forever, but the end of the school year is entirely too busy to breath. Top that off with the headache of switching classrooms and one day blends into the next. Not to mention the nightmare of mixing in 4 workshops the week after school was out!

However, things did eventually calm down (at least where school is concerned). My brother, Gene, and his wife, Sue, arrived in the state about the time school was out. They spent some time in Yakima before moving over to this side of the mountain. We got to spend a couple of days with them before we left for the Oregon coast for the Fourth of July. We all drove up to Everett one afternoon to meet Katie and Phil for dinner and see their new house. The next day the 4 of us did some shopping and then drove through Pt. Defiance Park and took in the beauty of the rose gardens there. The 5 mile drive was gorgeous.

On July 3rd Katie, Phil K., Phil and I left bright and early (6:30 a.m.) to beat the holiday traffic, on our jaunt to Lincoln City, Oregon. Our cousins, Chuck and Roxanne, have a beach house there and we joined them along with some of their friends for the 4th. We enjoyed shopping the outlet mall a bit, time on the beach, LOTS of good food, wine, Karaoke, hot tubbing, reading, watching a parade, and just relaxing in general. Eleven people and 4 dogs!

Eli with girlfriend, Morgan

Maddie with cousin Isaac on dock

Clancy, the Clown

Heidi

We left the beach on Sunday, July 5th, to head back home. Traffic was an absolute nightmare. It took us 7 hours to get home after only taking 5.5 hours to get there! I guess there has to be some kind of a downside to holiday travel.

Monday morning, July 6th, Gene and Sue came back for 2 more days. Monday we just relaxed around the house and visited. We also took them to Trader Joe's so they could stock up and fill their daughter's orders since they don't have that store close to them in Colorado. Tuesday we decided to take in the Railroad Museum in Snoqualmie. Of course we stopped by the falls while we were there and what trip to Snoqualmie would be complete without a visit to the big new casino? We had the lunch buffet and the food was great. Eight thumbs UP!!!
Taking in all the old trains

Snoqualmie Falls

Well, that pretty much brings you up to date. Stay tuned next month for our adventures in Missouri. We leave on July 31st and come home on August 5th. Katie and Phil K. will be going with us, so we should have a blast. Until then.....

Mother's Day Fun

I just brought my baby (Maddie) home from the vet, following a pretty big surgery yesterday (bladder stones again). As I sit in my chair with her warm little body snuggled in next to me, I thought it would be a good time to update and reflect on Mother's Day.

Mother's Day was magical for me. I started the day off with a phone call from Melanie and Luke, wishing me a happy day. We had a nice visit before I had to dash out to take Maddie to the groomer to get beautified. While she was there getting primped and fluffed, Katie and Phil came down to spend the day with us. They brought me beautiful fresh flowers from Pike Place Market along with a gift card for pampering at a Gene Juarez salon. I'm very excited to use that! Part of the fun of that particular gift is the anticipation and dreaming about which service I will indulge in. I'm leaning toward a pedicure that includes a paraffin bath for the feet. I'm told it's heavenly.


Katie had made reservations at Mama Stortini's for the Mother's Day Brunch, which I have always wanted to try. We arrived, were seated right away, and were immediately treated to mimosas. The food was all wonderful. There was sooooooo much! We enjoyed both breakfast type food and dinner cuisine. And then there was the dessert table! As Katie put it, "we rolled on out to the car," and took a little drive out to Van Lierop's bulb farm. Most of the tulips were already cut back, but there were still some pretty gardens to see. Here are some pictures I took.

After we left there, we drove north to pick Maddie up from her beauty appointment. She looked absolutely adorable all decked out in a turquoise scarf with a turquoise dragonfly on her right hip. We all went home, put a leash on Clancy and took a nice family walk in the neighborhood. This was followed by just relaxing for a bit and then a trip to Lowe's to look for plants for our containers. The flowers there were pretty picked over so we decided to wait.

Although we left Mama Stortini's completely stuffed and feeling like we could never eat again, we all decided we could probably fit in some ice cream for "dinner" so we were off to Cold Stone Creamery. YUM!!! I, of course, had my all time favorite...Coffee Lover's special. To round out the day, when we got home I received a phone call from Megan to wish me a Happy Mother's Day. I had a nice little chat with her. Needless to say, I felt very spoiled and was made to feel very special all day. I feel very blessed to have such a wonderful family and count myself a lucky mom!

A Full Weekend

It sure feels good to relax in front of the old television for a bit after a very busy weekend. It was so nice to have the entire weekend off with Phil. I'm feeling really good about a decision I made Friday to drop the Pro-Cert program I was in. It had become such a source of stress on top of stress at work. After doing some investigation, I discovered that I have a lot longer on my current certificate than I was being led to believe, so I have some time yet before I need to submit a portfolio to the state. Making the decision to drop was like a giant weight was lifted and I truly felt relaxed over the weekend.

Saturday we added a new member to the household. Phil's brother has been working construction jobs that take him all over and he has been looking for a good home for his little dog. We have been a one dog household for over a year and I have really enjoyed only having one dog so much that I was hesitant to take on another one even though we know he is a good guy. Roger's daughter took him for a while, so we thought everything was taken care of. Unfortunately, her boyfriend's dog didn't particularly like having him around and seemed to want to attack him. Therefore...we decided to go ahead and adopt him. Eight year old Clancy MacMurray joined our family on Saturday afternoon. Julie, Michele, and Tyler drove over from the Tri-Cities to deliver him. We had a very nice visit with them and all went out to lunch together. Maddie gets along well with Clancy unless he is heading for her food bowl. She does seem to have her nose a little bent out of shape, but she's coping.

Clancy

We spent today up north with Katie and Phil looking at houses. We went to several open houses and checked out a lot of neighborhoods in Lynnwood and Mill Creek. There is a lot to see and we difinitely saw a couple with some real possibilities. As the experienced support crew, Phil and I threw our two cents worth in and now it will have to be up to them. I'm sure all the information and options will be swimming through their minds tonight.

We finished our day up there with a feast at the Chinese Buffet. YUM!!! Almost bedtime now and then back to reality tomorrow.

Skagit Valley Tulip Festival???

Well, as I said we might, Phil and I drove up north today to the Mount Vernon area to check out all the beautiful tulips and the festival, which started April 1st. I'm sad to say we didn't find any. I was afraid they wouldn't be in bloom yet. We have had such a cold "spring" so far, considering we just had snow again a week ago! The 2 days of near 70 degrees that we've just experienced, simply are not enough to bring on the blooms. As you'll see from the pictures below, we did find a little color. Yellow to be exact...in the form of daffodils.

We also saw a lot of white. Huge flocks of snow white geese were abundant. There were hundreds of them. They would fly in a circular form over the fields and slowly land. We figured they were feasting on bugs or something. They stayed on the ground for a while and then something would stir them up again and they would go back to their circular flight path. They were very interesting to watch.

Another beautiful color we saw a lot of was blue - both in the sky and the water. We can't go to this area and not spend some time walking the streets of quaint little LaConner. It was quite warm and we enjoyed the views from the docks.

Of course the highlight of our colorful adventure without benefit of tulips, was our stop in the fields for yummy ice cream cones. Over 40 flavors to choose from, so there were many colors as well. As you can see, Phil and I both indulged and Maddie was wishing one of us would share! All in all it was a very nice day and we had a nice time. We may just have to make another trip up there at the end of the month after Phil gets home from Alaska to actually see the tulips. When we were done exploring LaConner, we headed south and stopped in Everett at Katie's place. She and Phil cooked us a wonderful dinner and we had a nice little visit with them.

Mount Baker was beautiful too. It stuck up against the blue, cloudless sky, resembling our ice cream cones and is so snow covered, you can't see anything but white. Definitely worth the drive up!

Tomorrow...back to reality and work!

Spring Break up-date

Holy Cow! I can't believe I'm actually doing this. I must be honest though...it's just another ploy of mine to put off doing what I really should be doing on a Saturday. That being homework, housework, laundry (which I did yesterday), grocery shopping, lesson planning...and the list goes on.

Truth be told, I can't imagine that I have anything much to say that anyone will really be interested in reading, so this may be very short-lived.

We just put Megan on a plane back to Fairbanks on Wednesday evening. She and RJ had been here for part of his R & R from Iraq. He returned about a week ago and Megan stayed with us until Wednesday. The good news is that he only has about 3 months more and he'll be home to stay. We had a lot of fun while they were here, but wished the weather would have been a little more cooperative to show RJ the real beauty of the Pacific Northwest. He seemed to like the area in spite of the rain. Here are a few photos of our explorations:

Megan and RJ caught unaware climbing the stairs at Pike Place Market.

The Happy Couple!

RJ ready to enjoy his "sampler" at The Pike Place Brewery. The last taste of beer until deployment is over!

Megan and RJ at The Pink Door as we wait for Katie and Phil.

Phil, Katie, Giselle, Phil, Megan, and RJ at The Pink Door in Seattle

They had been visiting his family in Pennsylvania for the week prior. It was Megan's first meeting and she fell in love with them, as we have with RJ. We ate out a lot to help satisfy RJ's cravings for good food, which he doesn't seem to get in Iraq. There was the need for good steak (Jimmy Mac's Roadhouse), seafood (Seattle Waterfront), Italian (Pink Door in Seattle), good beer (99 bottles in Federal Way & Pike Place Brewery), and Mexican (Mexico - top floor Pacific Place in Seattle).

We had one nice sunny day in Seattle when RJ was able to explore the waterfront, Seattle Aquarium, and Pike Place Market. We also showed him Point Defiance Park and the 5-mile Drive one day.

It's hard to believe that he is back in Iraq and it's back to business as usual for Megan in Fairbanks when they were just here such a short time ago. Sometimes air travel is still amazing to me!

...and speaking of business as usual...spring break will soon be over for me and it will be back to the business of educating young minds. I guess I've put off my Saturday chores for as long as I can, so I'll leave you for now. Phil and I may drive up north and see if we can find any tulip fields in bloom tomorrow. The Festival started 3 days ago, but our spring has been soooooo cold, I'm not sure there's much to see yet. If we find anything worth photographing, I'll add it for all of you to see too. Stay tuned.....