A Taste of Winter in June

Am I back to blogging? I hope so. I took a vacation this summer I guess. It was just too hard to find a moment to sit at the computer, especially because wifi is not dependable when one is on the road. I am going to try and post every other day until I am caught up. Watch me now, hey!

After our sunny, warm and fun trip to Victoria shortly after arriving on the mainland, I figured we were in for a  glorious Northwest Junes where it’s warm and pleasant and the flowers are blooming. We had two days. The rest of the 12 days were sub-50 degrees! Brrrr! We were so thankful for our friends who let us stay in their vacant heated house because I don’t think we would have survived camping outside. Well, okay, we would have survived, but we would have been angry the whole time.

Jonah worked on getting all of our vehicles (2 SUVs, 1 station wagon, 1 utility trailer and a boat) ready to sell in one way or another (these are vhicles we were not able to sell before we moved to Maui last October—they were all in storage on various friends’ properties). We only succeeded in selling the boat (for nothing, since it died because of a faulty oil injector on the first test ride of the summer) before we had to head south, but more on that later.

For now, I will go through these photos and call it a night.

Soon after getting settled in the house we were staying at, Jonah was anxious to get the boat in the water… which didn’t go too well when it quit suddenly while cruising at 55 mph and he had to be towed in. We had some good times in that boat, so he just fire sold it and called it a day. Goodbye sweet Ski Centurion!

But we didn’t let it ruin the day and had a nice time at Lake Crescent with the Allens, even though it was a bit cold. We had soup for lunch cooked over a camp stove. Some of the braver people even went for a quick quick swim.

For the two weeks we were in Sequim, we would generally play in the house, go help Jonah at the shop where he was fixing one of the cars, go swimming (Ana and Cam had passes at the indoor pool, so I took them to do a swim team-type workout every day), visit with friends, and sometimes go to the park or Costco.

The kids also got into some good Luchador wrestling in the big furniture-less living room. Nothing better for kids than a big empty carpeted room--especially when you can make some great underwear-on-the-outside costumes and beat up on your siblings.

Po’s attempt at a costume—upside down dress.

Elsie’s chalkboard creation at the day care at the indoor swimming pool.

Park time. Do you think it was cold?

The kids also made some feeble attempts at their homeschool. But they were not feeble in their preparation for our trip to the Seattle Science Center King Tut exhibit which the homeschool group had organized for the last day of “school”. I have been to Egypt and seen many Egyptian artifacts at museums, but this is one exhibit I have always longed to see, and the kids must have caught on to my enthusiasm. I had ordered an Egyptian craft and art kit and the kids made all sorts of projects, including these “stained glass windows”.

So, after a couple weeks, we left Sequim and went to Seattle to stay with my Aunt and Uncle the night before the big King Tut event.  I love the view from the ferry when you come into downtown. Gets me every time.

It was pouring rain when we got to the Seattle Science Center, and the kids were getting restless while we were waiting for all the homeschoolers to assemble, but I think it was just because they were so excited (or was that me?)

And yes!, we even had Egyptian inspired temporary tattoos and face masks. After spending some time with his burial artifacts and jewelry, I can say that King Tut would have most definitely appreciated our festive attention to and appreciation of the commercialization of historic personas. He was a most excellent pharaoh.

But seriously, I get emotional when I’m in these Egyptian exhibits thinking about all the time and talent that went into these royal and religious pieces of art. Maybe one of my ancestors worked on this very statue and look at how it’s stood through the ages! And besides all of that, they are gorgeous.

I don’t think I’ve seen this much gold in person. And look at the detail. Just extraordinary.

I also really liked how the exhibit was set up—jus the perfect amount of art, history, and awe.

After the exhibit and a iMax show, we were free to leave the homeschool group and wander around the Science Center on our own. We were anxious to see as much of it as possible before we had to get on the road to get down to Southern Oregon before too late, so we did a lightning fast tour of the museums.

Great stuff! And even though the weather was a slap in the face (as it always is in June I’ve come to accept), we sure do love the Northwest!

**So, to get your bearings straight, we just finished June 9th-22nd, and now we are in the packed overflowing 1981 Mercedes 400td station wagon that runs on used vegetable oil, heading south to Medford Oregon to spend the night at Gary Cobine’s house…

To be continued….