Snowmageddon 2012!!!!

We were hit with the winter storm of the century/decade/year/month/week on Tuesday of this past week. We had about 10-12 inches of snow by Wednesday morning - and that was fine.

But then Wednesday night, the storm took a turn for the worse, and it started to freezing rain on us. The roads were bad enough that I didn't have to go into work on Thursday (thankfully, since the ride home Wednesday at noon was a death grip/white knuckle ride). However, the snow day that would have been a bit of fun quickly turned to no fun as the power went out.

We bundled up to stay warm, but eventually got a touch of cabin fever. So we all went out to play. Well, work for me since I had to shovel again. But it wasn't all work, I did dig out a snow cave for the kids to play in for a bit.

Since the sun sets by 4:30 pm, it was an early night for us. We had cold food by firelight. And since there was no light or heat, it was an early night to bed for us. Before I went to bed, I walked upstairs to close the bedroom doors (kids were with us so we could all stay warm) and looked out the windows. The orange color is just from somewhere with sodium lamps that still had power. Jealous!

I included this little photo below from a deranged killer mutant snow goon that a neighbor had made. The kids loved it! A fun mix of winter and halloween.

Thankfully, the power is back on after about 36 hours of none. It feels good to be warm again. Have a wonderful weekend everybody - we're planning on it!

Marc

Snow Day

After all the snow we had in December and early January last year in Germany, I was pretty sure that I wasn't a big fan of shoveling. Turns out I was right.

Thankfully we have a small driveway - not the triple wide behemoth we had in Thallichtenberg. But as much as I dislike shoveling, I really do love the snow! I'd been waiting for many months for a day much like today. On our first trip to Mt. St. Helens we stopped at a little roadside restaurant, where I discovered this crushed truck on the edge of their property. A reminder of the devastation. It sits on the edge of a parking lot and when I saw it, it was too dark to photograph it. I thought it'd look nice with a touch of snow on it. That day finally came.

I braved the roads (they weren't good) and made the hour and a half drive to the restaurant. Once off the interstate, I basically had the roads to myself

I think this old logging truck (that's a Weyerhauser logo on the door) got crushed by a tree that was blown over when Mt. St. Helens erupted 30-some-odd years ago. Somewhat apropos that trees are growing through and on the old logging truck.

I made a couple of stops on the way home. Basically when I saw something with nice light, I stopped and snapped some photos.

When I got home, it was time to take the kids sledding on a tiny mole sled hill in a neighbors back yard. They had a blast. Of course this culminated in a snowball fight and then making a snowman in our own back yard. Overall, a pretty good morning!

Have a great day everybody!

Marc

Had a great day

Leah had a nice birthday on Saturday. We all loaded up the car in our Sunday best and headed to Sears, I mean Toy's 'R' Us. Leah did some toy shopping, and after a full perusal of the goods, decided to get a guitar with her money. She came in right on budget - I think she'll be as shrewd a shopper as her mother. Note that the electric guitar is Leah's world favorite color - pink. The only way to improve this will be the addition of Hello Kitty stickers, which I'm sure are shortly to follow.

After a rough start to the day (I was grumpy, what can I say), I'm happy to report that all ended well. While Catherine and Nancy hosted a Pampered Chef get-together, I was entrusted with the kids. What was planned as a one hour soiré actually lasted much longer. Good thing the kids and I were having a blast in Olympia and came home late.

We made our way to the marinas in downtown Olympia. The sun was out, the mountains were out, plenty of people were out too! We walked out on a public dock to see the sights, turns out it was chock full of sea jellies/jellyfish. Temperature aside, today would not have been a pleasant swim.

Both Ian and Leah played very nice and posed for the camera a bunch of times. They got to have their fun too. They threw rocks into the Sound, built a fort out of rocks, explored for sea shells, and had fun trying not to get wet when the occasional baby wave came ashore.

Leah loves to ham for the camera. I didn't have to ask for this kiss at all. I love it when they give me free ammo.

This location should look pretty familiar - same spot as with our anniversary photos (and our Christmas card photos). I'll be back for sure, very photogenic!

Have a great day everybody!

Cheers,

Marc

New Years Day Celebration

A I wrote in the last blog post for 2011, we traveled with Nancy to visit some of her friends who live on Lopez Island, in the San Juan Islands north of Seattle. The only way to get there is by boat - we hopped on a ferry and got to ride across the Puget Sound at sunset. It was a cold and windy ride (outside, anyways) which meant I had the outside mostly to myself. If you look close you will see another ferry all lit up arriving at the Lopez Island docks at the junction of the upper and left thirds of this photo.

We did a fair bit of exploring on New Years Eve. This shot below was taken at the Shark Reef county park (I don't know about the shark bit, seal rocks would have been a more appropriate name from what we could see). The views were amazing.

The views were so nice I headed back for some sunset photos. The sunset kind of fizzled, but there was some nice color. These photos don't do it justice, but the Olympic mountains to the south were just visible and of course were very pretty.

On the way home, since we were passing the place buy, we headed into downtown Seattle on the off chance that the market would be open. It was not.

But that doesn't mean I can't gloat about my awesome parking spot!! Literally two blocks down from where they throw fish (except on New Years Day). That probably won't happen again in my lifetime.

Have a wonderful day everybody. Ours was wet, but nice. Cheers!

Marc