Getting Ready for Christmas!

Brian and I won free tickets to the Coeur d' Alene Lake light show, which was quite entertaining. It involves a boat cruise to the North Pole and Santa's workshop. We were also visited by the firefighting Santa in our neighborhood this week. We can't wait for Christmas, even though our shopping isn't quite finished.

Whidbey Island Week of Thanksgiving

Cutting down the Christmas tree

Winter wonderland

Outdoor night ping pong, complete with Bumpas car headlights

The mustache men, inspired by Jim Lee

Jamie's dog Griffey shows his respect by sitting on him.

Cheers to Jamie who just got his first acceptance into PT school in San Diego!

Mom and J take precautions as they head under the cabin to fix the pipes.

The North Cascades in the background, cold but beautiful.

Don't let it get your hand!

Easily a 20 lb chum, caught artfully on a fly rod.

Brian had a wonderful idea to take the whole week off before thanksgiving and go to Whidbey. We got up to Cabin one on Saturday night and spent the next five days constantly stoking the fire and trying our best to heat the cabin to about 60 degrees. We had about 3 days of abnormally low temps with a high of 25 degrees and lows in the teens. We also had a north wind blasting the front of the cabin and the single pane windows did their best but you could feel the breeze indoors :) We somehow managed not to brake any pipes at cabin one and by Thanksgiving it warmed up to 40 degrees and all the snow melted. We actually had enough snow for J, Brian and I to sled down the cabin one hill from top to bottom (actually I chickened out and only went half way because it was so fast). The snow, freezing temps and blasting winds did little to stop us from fishing two days on the Skagit river and catching some huge, albeit slightly ugly chum salmon, or having an incredible time with family which included some outdoor ping pong. Although the weather may not always cooperate for us, we seem to have an incredible time at Whidbey no matter the conditions. My parents were not quite as lucky and did have two pipes brake, but were able to fix them thanks to the handy work of Bumpa, Pam, J and Dad. One more adventure for the books.

Fun Weekend in Seattle!

At the beginning of November my childhood friend Liz got married so we drove over to Seattle to be a part of her wedding. It was a great time and Mom, Dad, Brian and I all stayed at the Four Seasons where Tran works in HR. Although I grew up only 30 minutes north of Seattle we rarely took time to explore the city. We had a great time going to Pike Place Market and enjoyed beautiful views from Liz's wedding at the Columbia Towers. We were also very impressed with the service and overall beauty of the new Four Seasons.

Halloween!

Our fishing themed pumpkins

Always time for football

Maggie is a beautiful ladybug

Nolan started as a monkey and transitioned to a football player

We had a great Halloween with our nehphews and niece. Bridget and Jon were nice enough to host us at their house for taco soup and a football. We were especially proud of our pumpkins this year.

Grande Ronde Oct 29-31 and Nov 5th

Hubie and his wild steelhead




Aaron and Vern

Brian got the opportunity to chase the elusive steelhead. He camped and fished with Vern and Aaron the first weekend and came up empty, although not Vern. Then on the 5th he was lucky to hook into a big one, but like all great fishing stories...it got away before a photo oppurtunity. His friend Hubie shows off a beautiful wild steelhead.

A great weekend with Pam and Jim!!!

This is my "new" old bike. We think it is a 1957-1960 Schwinn Corvette


This is the bike my Dad used to ride on his paper route

After two days with Brian and I...my Dad needed some rest

The beautiful log home Matthew is building on Loon Lake

A picture break on our 5 mile walk through farm country

Mom and Dad came over to spend a beautiful fall weekend with us. We went out to dinner, went on a 5 miles hike, went to the Lake to see the progress on Matthew's log cabin and spent a lot of quality time together. It was a wonderful weekend!

Taking the Boat out...the unofficial end of Summer.

The guys did rock-paper-scissors to see who went first


Matthew won and decided to go last...Brian was up first.

Matthew cutting hard

Jon cuts through perfect water

Matthew is a little nervous about the water temp

You know it's calm when you can see your reflection on the water

Brian has a perfect fall ski.

Jon, Brian and Matthew

The boys got one last ski in on October 15th before we took the boat out of the water for the winter. The first snow should be in a few weeks and by December the lake will be frozen over. The water temp was 58 degrees and the air temp was 55 degrees...no wet suits, tough guys!