Parked at Lucy's House, Playhouse, Birthday Party

Thought you might like to see our 40' motorhome parked behind Lucy's house (and the neighbor's house).

 
Dan drove down the alley and parallel parked between Gretchen & Rodney's blue garage and the neighbor's brother's small travel trailer. And there is a chain link/wooden fence on the other side of the motorhome. Several times he has commented, "I don't know how I did that."

 
Just another view of the narrow alley and the local "campground".
 
 

We are really enjoying being right in the kids back yard. Lucy and her mom have had breakfast with us and it is so nice to be able to go back and forth between houses. Makes it a lot easier to prepare meals and share food. We've enjoyed playing table games at our house after Lucy has gone to bed (with the baby monitor on); and it's nice to have our own space to retreat to without having to drive to a campground. Plus we get to sleep in our own bed every night. :) And it feels more like family time rather than just visiting. Erin has really enjoyed playing with Lucy and is earning some babysitting money.

Grandpa has been building Lucy's playhouse, so I've included some pictures. It now has a roof. The back wall is not on yet, and the door will probably be installed tomorrow or Saturday. Grandpa has been visiting the shipyard to see a fleet of ships that came in this week; and the Blue Angels are at the airport. So for those of you who may not know, Dan has a real interest in ships and airplanes, so he gets time off for some fun.






We celebrated Lucy's second birthday yesterday. The Adams family, Frank, Maggie, Bridget, Nick and Matthew came to supper along with Ella and her mom and dad, Pauline and Bill. More pictures of the birthday girl and her friends.


Notice the "Pin the Tail on the Donkey" on the side of the playhouse for Lucy's birthday party.

Terri, the neighbor who is sharing her backyard with a motorhome, gave us some bing cherries from her tree. Erin pitted them, with the cherry pitter, and Rodney showed Lucy how to put them on her fingers. Of course she now has to put her cherries on her fingers before eating them.








We are really enjoying this time in Seattle with our family.

More later......

Wading Pool, Airplanes and Chalk Drawing

If "Variety is the Spice of Life", then being in the company of a two-year-old provides lots of spice. Yesterday afternoon we walked to the neighborhood park about three blocks from Lucy's house. (I haven't forgotten that Lucy has parents, Rodney and Gretchen) - It's just easier to type "Lucy".

For those of you who may not know, Gretchen is our fourth child, and third daughter. She is married to Rodney and Lucy Marie is their daughter. Lucy's middle name is the same Gail's mother's middle name. Gretchen moved to Seattle in 1997, met Rodney and subsequently Lucy was added to our family.

Now, back to this post. Two dogs live at Lucy's house. Jack is sixteen years old and came to live with Rodney during Rodney's college years. Jack is getting very feeble, blind and deaf. He is living out his life as the senior member of a very loving family. Murphy was adopted by Gretchen when he was five months old, not too long after she moved to Seattle. He is a Golden Retriever/German Shepherd mix. Murphy didn't really interact with Lucy until she started crawling and walking; and now he certainly is her dog. She climbs on him, tries to ride him and just generally gets along well with him. And he is very tolerant of her. She leads Murphy down the sidewalk all by herself. As you can see from this picture, she is leading Murphy. He slowly trots along and she runs behind holding his leash. If she so much as tugs on his leash, he stops and waits for her to start again. They really do have a unique relationship.





Lucy loved playing with her cousin, Erin, in the wading pool.




Today we went to the King County Airport to see the display of planes celebrating the airport's 80th anniversary. Since grandpa has such an interest in airplanes, Gretchen thought he might really enjoy this. Here's a few pictures of the day.

Lucy following Grandpa up into a plane


Erin and Gretchen dressed in part of the Airport firefighter's gear. Hope we don't need them in a emergency.


Lucy and a firefighter in the cab of the fire truck


Grandpa at the controls of a small aircraft


Lucy in the same plane Grandpa had been in; listening to the chatter from the tower


The Chalk Corner in the children's area



Erin and Lucy drawing with chalk around Gretchen



Lucy wanted Grandpa to draw around her feet



Not much else to report for today. Nap for the toddler, played a new game with Erin, Rodney cooked steaks for supper, had S'mores for dessert. Gretchen, Rodney and Erin have gone to a park to see an outdoor movie, so Grandpa and Grandma are babysitting. Lucy is sleeping and Grandma is getting this post done. Sorry about the sizing of the pictures. Not sure what happened, but I uploaded some directly to the blog and some were copied from Web Albums. Please forgive the different sizes. I'll do better next time.

More later.....

We're in Seattle :-)

Hip, Hip, Hooray!!!! We arrived at Lucy's house (our soon-to-be 2-year-old granddaughter) about 1:30 this afternoon. So glad to be here. Grandpa drove down the alley behind their house and backed the motorhome into the space behind their backyard. I'll post some pictures tomorrow to give you a sense of the space he had to work with. Gretchen & Rodney's neighbor's brother has a small trailer parked next to us, so we have our own little campground.

Walked to the park about three blocks away with Lucy and Gretchen so Lucy could play in the wading pool.

Dan and Rodney are going to an air show at King airfield on Saturday. Nothing else planned for the weekend.

Just relaxing.

More later.........

Trees and Water

After much debate (not really debate, more indecision), we decided to drive to the South Side of Mount St. Helens to see the old-growth forests that were not damaged by the eruption in May 1980. We drove south on I-5 to Woodland and then on Route 503, then Route 90, for thirty miles up the Lewis River Valley to Cougar, WA.

The scenery was beautiful and really different than the drive on the west side of the mountain. The trees are much larger and taller, and the undergrowth much denser. The whole area has a more mature look. There are two dams across the Lewis River which makes for two beautiful reservoirs, Yale Reservoir and Swift Reservoir. Both have day areas maintained by the state of Washington with picnic sites, boat ramps and beaches. Since both reservoirs are surrounded by mountains covered by forest, the water is VERY clear. No cultivated field run-off or pollution from chemicals.

 

 

 

 

We also visited an area called the Trail of Two Forests, which is about 10 miles from Cougar. A boardwalk path meanders through what looks like a very lush, green forest. But there is a story to this forest. The visible forest and the trail are on top of an old forest that was orverrun by lava flows from Mount St. Helens almost 2,000 years ago. Mount St. Helens is an explosive volcano and typically does not expel lava. But 2,000 years ago, lava poured down the south slope of the mountain and covered the trees. Most of the trees were felled and all were killed. The lava hardened, the trees burned away, leaving molds of them behind with the imprint of bark still showing. The current forest has grown on the thin soil on top of the hard lava flow. You can actually look down into some of the tree molds. We saw snow in the bottom of one of the molds.

After leaving the Trail of Two Forests, we drove on up the road until we reached a barricade across the road. The road is closed due to some unstable edges and some rock slides. But we did see the south side of the mountain and a little stream rippling down the mountain.




A beautiful sunny day appreciating all of Nature's glory and in awe of how powerful Nature can be.

More later....