Chasing the Sun

This winter has been a really wet winter in the PNW.  We have endured endless days of rain and only seen 4 or 5 full days of sun since October.  We've had a years worth of rain in 5 months.  In February we made the record books for being the 2nd wettest and grayest since Seattle began recording weather.  It has been a crazy winter with snow totals as well.  One day in February saw hail, lightening and snow all in a matter of minutes.  Needless to say, we needed to find the sun or we were all going to lose our minds.  There were stand-by flights to Hawaii and Las Vegas.  Hawaii's forecast looked wet so Las Vegas it was.  We ended up renting a car and driving to Utah.  Of course we drove the Vegas strip first.  The kids were in awe of the giant sphinx, and other larger than life statues and bright neon signs.  Our intention was to go camping near Bryce Canyon but the temperatures at night were in the low 30's.  No problem, we found a cheap hotel nearby.     

Our first view at Bryce Canyon didn't disappoint.

 On our way to explore Bryce Canyon!  We decided to do a 7 mile loop hike to explore as much of the park as we could.  We were in awe of the red cliffs and blue skies.  

 The many hoodoos of Bryce Canyon

Enjoying cake and pie half way.  

 

 

 There were a lot of fun tunnels to hike through

I was impressed that this tree managed to live in the dry conditions.  

 On the second day we decided to drive to Zion National Park.  This has always been one of our favorite parks.  We did a shorter 4 mile hike on this day so we would have time to play catch and just relax.

 

The kids found an amphitheater and wanted to put on a show. 

 

We did a hike that had 3 emerald pools.  The kids loved standing under the waterfall and getting wet, I guess it felt more like home.

 

Finding cubby holes to hide in.

 

This is the lawn near Zion Lodge.  It is a great spot for a picnic, to play catch or tag.  

 

 

Zion you will be missed!

 Avery really wanted to stop at a cowboy museum that he spotted on the way to Zion.  They both really enjoyed looking at all of the cowboy memorabilia. 

House of Fools!

It's that time of year again, the one we all love....April Fools!  It was another year of laughs and clever, thoughtful moments. This year they were both watching the calendar and waiting for April Fools.  I made sure not to change my dry-erase calendar until today so they wouldn't be prepared.  Avery even asked yesterday, is it April Fools yet?  I walked over to the calendar, looked at it and said, "Nope it's still March."  Apparently that was enough to get them off the trail. The first trick Scott and I pulled was set up starting on Thursday.  When I was driving in the car I said, "Boy we haven't had brownies in awhile, I think I will make some on Friday."  

 I bought the brownies and started to bake them while they were getting ready for bed.  I told them they could have them after lunch on Saturday. 

 
 Once they were in bed, Scott dyed white sponges with a cocoa powder and boiling water mixture. 

 

 Then I frosted the sponges and added sprinkles.  I also did the same for the real batch in the background and cut out squares to make it look like we cut those sponge brownies out. 

 Looks just like a brownie! 

Here's Avery trying the brownie. He pauses for a moment, laughs and says, "That's mean."  At least I had a real brownie nearby.

 

We also filled the ice dispenser with jelly beans

 

and created a fake man to sleep on the couch.  When they got up and saw the fake man in the dark they were becoming suspicious and asked Amazon Alexa if it was April Fools.  She replied, "You missed the boat, it was yesterday."  Love that she was in on it too!  

The kids tried to get us too and we played along.  Avery re-arranged the bathroom and jammed my bathroom drawers so I couldn't open them.  Alia put tape on some of the door handles.  It was another fun year of laughs.  I know I appreciate a good joke.  It really takes thought to set up the perfect joke for someone because you really have to know them and their habits.   

Awana Grand Prix Car Night!!!

 All lined up and ready to race!

 And the speedy turtle takes the lead!  Alia wanted to get 1st place this year for design and speed.  She called her car the Speedy turtle.  Speedy turtle was very fast coming in on average at 2.9 seconds during her 4 heats.  She won every heat but wasn't the fastest over all.

 And The Shadow wins the heat!!  Avery was very focused on winning for speed this year.  He watched many videos on how to design the fastest car because he wanted to get 1st in the speed division.  His car averaged 2.89 seconds in the 4 heats but he was still unable to take the 1st place win home.  The fastest car won with 2.88 seconds.  He was so close!

 

 Avery took second for speed for the third year in a row and Alia took 1st for design this year.  They have taken home a trophy every year, the hard work has paid off.

The Shadow and The Speedy Turtle

Digging in the dirt

There are some things in life that you take for granted. Warm showers, flush toilets, automatic clothes washers all come to mind. Even if you have copious amounts of pure clean water, if you can't get rid of it, it really doesn't do you much good. That happened recently. Water just stopped going down.

What would you do? Well this is what I decided to do. I grabbed a pair of gloves, a shovel and started digging. And digging. And digging.

I dug not really knowing where or what I was doing but figured if I started from the house I would eventually find SOMETHING. I finally did find something. Lots and lots of ............"water". Water that unfortunately was not going anywhere. My septic had failed........... now what?

This is where being a civil engineer comes in handy because the quote for a new septic was $25,000! I spent 5 minutes talking to the septic installer and realized that there was no way I was going to hire him because he was telling me all of the ways he will make my septic "better". Things that were not spec but would ensure the system would fail faster. Good for business but bad for me. The only way this was getting done right was to do a full engineering design and do things by the book.

I started by doing a series of perk tests and found something alarming. The prior septic was hand dug and laid on top of a layer of limestone (that was too hard to dig through) that would not perk. Not good news. However, just under the limestone was pure clean sand! The other good news was that the prior septic was so small that I had tons of room for a new septic.

Yay, time to get dirty!

 Somehow the weather cooperated with us. During the rainiest month of the rainiest winter in over a decade we ended up with a clear, dry weekend.

It was a good thing it didn't rain because we made a mess. It felt like I dug up most of my back yard. I was happy for hard working friends because without them I never could have gotten this all done.

How deep? Doing math..........not my strong suit.

Drain field complete. Time to start cleaning it all up.

The kids loved all the commotion. It was a dirt playground full of great rocks and giant hills. They each made rock art and special sit spots to sit and watch the backhoe.

Time for topsoil. Avery took charge with transporting the soil. He loved being responsible for part of the project.

 Look ma.......no holes. Project complete. It was a great project that should function for a long time to come. It feels good to know that things were done right and that the system is designed for more than its share of use. (I may have "slightly" oversized it : )

Happy 8th Birthday Alia

 Alia and Banana 8 years old

 She picked out a chocolate strawberry cake from the cookbook Every Last Crumb.  It was a really great cake even though it had avocados in it!  

 Grandpa and Grandma Davis came to celebrate Alia's birthday.  We had an epic snow storm yesterday and got 7 inches of snow over night and through-out the day.  It was a really beautiful, heavy snow that was a perfect packing snow.   

 Everyone needs an igloo when it snows! 

The snow really caught us off guard.  We didn't realize it was coming our way until I got an alert from the school at 9 pm saying school was a late start.  It ended up being completely canceled because most of the roads were not drive-able because many trees came down due to the heavy snow.

8  year old Questions and Answers
1.  Favorite color:  orange but I like the other colors too.
2.  Favorite toy:  Koosh ball, Game:  Human untangle- this is where you go in a circle, hold hands and try to untangle from each other.
3.  Favorite food:  apples and oranges
4.  Favorite animal:  bunny
5.  Favorite book:  It's Not Easy Being a Bunny
6.  Favorite thing to do outside:  Play in the snow
7.  Favorite holiday:  Christmas because sometimes it snows and Easter because you get to find eggs.
8.  When I grow up I want to be a mommy because I want to stay home and not go to work.
9.  If I could buy anything in the world I would buy a unicorn pony.
10.  What do you like most about yourself:  I am sweet.
11.  Biggest accomplishment:  I hiked 25 miles.
12.  Favorite thing to do:  Play with friends at the park.
13.  I like to collect:  erasers
14.  What do you like to do with Mom:  Party with glow sticks,  Dad:  Cook Saturday breakfast
15.  Favorite family tradition:  Eating dinner together.
16.  Favorite memory this year:  Going to Jellystone in Wisconsin

Fisher Pond was frozen!

We've had a pretty fantastic winter this year on Vashon.  Temperatures have hovered around 35 degrees most of the time and it's remained sunny and blue most days.  We've enjoyed a few days with snow, built a snowman and watched the temp drop into the 20's. Fisher pond froze with the cold weather.  We are told that the pond really only freezes completely every 5 years or so.  The ice was pretty thick everywhere and the pond is only 4 feet deep in the deepest spot so we decided to take advantage of the beautiful day and skate. 

 

 This sign, frozen in the pond was what greeted us when we got there.  I love the laid back attitude the island has.  It's nice to see we are not restricted from it, but can make our own decision.

 

 There is a family on the island that brings 30 pairs of skates out for people to use for free.  Avery, Alia and I were all able to find a pair to use.

 

 Grab a seat and lace up.

 This was both Avery and Alia's first time skating and they did great!

 No crowds here!  The pond is about 1/2 mile wide and there were about 10 people there so we had lots of room to skate.

Scott was having a blast zooming around in his skates.  The pure joy on his face was fun to watch.