Weekend Update

Wheew! We actually stayed home this weekend. Well, we didn't stay at home but we didn't travel anywhere that we had to stay over night. We have been very busy lately. I've been going to bridal showers and baby showers. We also had a birthday party for my friend EJ's little girl Rory.

A few weekends ago we went to the Tri -Cities for a wedding for a friend of mine from EWU. We got to stay with two of Nate's friends from WSU. I even got to surprise my friend Becca's parents in Kennewick. During my first year at EWU I went down to Kennewick a lot to see Becca. It was kind of my second home that year. You still couldn't pay me enough to live there though! Too brown and dry!!

Last weekend we went to a family reunion in Boise. We got to see where Nate's grandfather and his family grew up. Nate's great uncle Richard, who is 95, came along for the whole adventure. Uncle Richard hiked a half mile with us up to the old homestead. Did I mention that the trail was narrow, on an incline, and had sagebrush, rocks and thistles along the way? Oh did I also mention that Uncle Richard has two canes? He is amazing. We got to tour a newspaper that Nate's Great Grandfather was the editor of many years ago. It was very impressive. We were the only youngin's there. We aren't sure where all of Nate's cousins were.

We feel that we were rewarded for being the only ones from our generation at the reunion. When we arrived at the Boise airport to check in, we noticed that our flight was over-booked. We asked the attendant about that and she said that they were looking for 3 volunteers to get bumped to the next flight. In return we would get free tickets to anywhere Alaska Airlines flies. Of course we said yes. Did you know that Alaska is flying to Hawaii starting in October? Oh, we do!! We are planning on going back to Hawaii next June. Ever since our Honeymoon we couldn't wait to get back! Thanks Alaska!! We'll let you know when we book our tickets. We won't wait long.

This weekend we decided to go canoeing again. We had a few errands to take care of first. We went to the Redmond Farmer's Market. I was looking for rhubarb, but no luck. Anyone have any they want to share?? While browsing a booth with photographs taken in Italy (ahh, we want to go!!), a woman came up and started talking to the photographer. As it turned out she was the mayor of Redmond. The photographer introduced us. She was a very nice woman and very down to earth. From what we gathered, she is in her last term.

And now, canoeing pictures. It is amazing how much the flora and fauna changes in a month.

Last time we saw goslings, but this time there were ducklings. Here are a few cute pictures of them. They weren't as friendly as the goslings where last time.

Here are some of the ducklings running and swimming around on the lily pads.

I couldn't resist a picture of some of the water lily's. I made Nate take this one for me.
While we were paddling along we saw this bird on a nest in the water. We thought it might be a turtle but once we got closer we saw that it was not. Does anyone know what the bird is called? I saw a woman with bird book paddle past us in a canoe. Where is she??

Here are some ducks just hanging out.

Remember these goslings from last time?

Check them out now! They weren't nearly as friendly. They also weren't looking for food like they were last time.

We had a little picnic lunch again. Here is our view. There was also a man near us with a dog and later he started playing frisbee with the dog. Unfortunately we didn't get any pictures of that but it definitley made us want a dog. We thought the dog might have been a professional frisbee player just because he was so poised and patient when he was waiting for his owner to throw the frisbee.
We got a kick out of this guy. He was in a blow-up kayak and had his dog riding on the front. He pulled into where we were eating lunch. We had to take a picture of him. He is under one of the trees. Look carefully.

Here is a heron we saw along the shore. There were some people near us feeding the ducks and this guy came wondering out of the grasses.

We will leave you with this view of Mt. Rainier from 520. We couldn't resist taking the picture.

One last bit of news. School is out for the summer. Our last day was on Monday, June 25th. Thank goodness. Cross your fingers for less snow and power outages next school year. This is my first summer that I'm not teaching summer school. I applied but I didn't hear anything back. I'm hoping that I will be able to work a few days a week this summer at Nate's shop.

Have a safe 4th of July! Talk to you all soon!