Making the Journey Home, August 2013

Oh so sad that the summer is over, but we can't complain too much, because we did miss home, despite all of our fun. Sammi and our friend Torrin help boat us over to the mainland from the island, despite the pea soup thick fog. Thank goodness for iPhone GPS!!!

The kids and I had some time to killi n Bellingham while Jonah sold our car (we were so lucky... sold it only a few hours before our plane was supposed to leave... AND they met us at the airport. We did maybe forget to get sleeping Po out of the car before we sold it, but luckily the new owners noticed that there was a sleeping baby in the back before they drove all the way back to their home in Seattle). 

Anyway... with that time to kill in Bellingham, we got some Rocket Donuts and visited our very favorite museum ever, Mindsport. It is a Children's/Science/Art museum. Most of the exhibits are hand carved wooden works of art that the kids can play with and manipulate. There's also a working stream that the kids can build dams on and float little wooden stick boats down. It's the greatest place. And the admission is only $2 or something!

We were glad to get to the airport on time and get our bags checked (we had to be tricky because we were on Allegiant, and they have weird baggage rules. We may or may not have duct taped two bags together so they would only count as one...). BUT, then we found out that our flight was delayed by at least FIVE hours!! That meant we wouldn't be leaving BEllingham until 11 pm and not getting into Honolulu until 3 am!! Wow. And when we called the rental car guy that we had reserved a camper van with on Oahu, he just up and cancelled our reservation. It was awesome. 

But, we tried to make the most of it. We had brought a whole lot of food, including some crab that hadn't been eaten at Blakely, so we were all well fed. Allegiant gave us food vouchers and free drinks, so we were especially well fed. Plus, Bellingham is a small but newly remodeled airport, so we had nice accommodations. 

When we got to the Honolulu airport, we found a relatively quiet spot to camp out and we all slept on the concrete floor until morning. Well, Po got to sleep in her carseat. It was actually fine. 

In the morning, we found a rental van (the lady cut me a deal, but it was still outrageously priced) and took off for our 36 hour whirlwind tour of Oahu (the kids and I had never really been, except for stopovers). 

We drove around nearly the whole island...

Of course visited the beautiful Laie temple and BYU Hawaii campus...

 

And the kids had really missed the warm Hawaiian water, so we spent a good long afternoon at the gorgeous North Shore beaches as we made our way up the coast. 

We spent our one night at a friend's house (actually a roommate of mine from BYU Jerusalem 1999) on the north end of the North Shore. She and her family were so great to put us up. Ana and Cam were glad to reconnect with my friend's kids who they had made friends with when they visited us on Maui. I've actually been trying to convince them to move over to Maui, but now I'm realizing maybe its good to have some friends on Oahu...

We made our way back over to Honolulu side so the kids could go to an event in Waikiki where they met some actor from a Disney Channel sitcom they love. We made sure to see some sights along the way...

And had some amazingly delicious dim sum in Chinatown in Honolulu...

 

And visited the Royal Palace (I just finished a huge history of Hawaii, so I was especially interested in this...Jonah and the kids, not so much)...

And then, right before our plane was due to leave, we made a quick dash so we could see Pearl Harbor...from the fence (it was closed when we finally got there)...

*Not pictured: The loads of time we spent in Waikiki, which we liked a lot more than we thought we would. The kids especially enjoyed the Natatorium (the large ocean fed swimming pool) and the Las Vegas-like Waikiki strip. Cam also liked that his shoes were still there along the boardwalk, even though he left them under a bench the day before. * 

Oahu was gorgeous and better than we expected. But, it is amazingly crowded, even by Maui standards. The North Shore beaches are pretty off-the-hook-- stunning, uncrowded, great sand, and supposedly some of the best surf on earth. I also slightly envy the amount of cultural activities on Oahu... they have everything a big city would have. It would be cool to have a little easier access to that... 

But, we were pretty anxious to get home to Maui. Maui is still the best. Hawaiian Airlines helped us out and let us come home a day early. The friends who had rented our house this summer left our car at the airport, so we got in our good old car and drove it home. After two months, it sure felt good to be back in our own beds. Ahhh....

Blakely 2013

This was one of the best years at Blakely. Why? Because my sister and her kids AND my brother and his girlfriend AND his daughter came too! Everybody didn't exactly come at the same time... but we'll shoot for that next year, right Dad? In any case, all of the Fegert cousins were on the island at the same time for almost a week. It was rockin' awesome. 

We had so much fun. AND it was relaxing too. It was just great. And the weather couldn't have been better.

Cam and I above with some of our crab catch. LOVE all the fresh seafood we can catch and eat while we're up there. Jonah does a great job of making the most of the fishing opportunities while we are there. He even did some mean clamming. Mmmmm. I love me some shellfish. 

The three toddlers were the star of the show. All three of them wanted to be with Papa (my dad) every minute of every day, and would make sure they were on or in whatever vehicle he happened to be operating. 

They all got along so well, and they are so incredibly super cute. Po still talks about Reggie and Riley all the time and about "Papa's house at Blakely" and the four-wheeler, of course. 

We also had loads of lake time...

And plane rides in Papa's four seater...

And fun dance parties at Noni's (my grandma's) house with my fantastic cousin Samantha. (And also many card games and Settlers of Catan tournaments)...

Jonah did his best to do maintenance on all the vehicles. He even got some of the old bikes running again...

Po was SO excited for her turn on an airplane ride... and then promptly fell asleep about three minutes after takeoff. 

Reggie (whose real name is Gabriel, remember) was always ready for a ride. ALWAYS.

The three littles also begged for food constantly. Here is Papa divvying out some root beer float... 

But don't worry--everybody eventually got their own.

Cam and Jonah caught some awesome trout. (Cam also had a little fall on the razor scooter... on his face, of course).

Po became a master of the catch-and-release frog program at the lake beach. 

Reggie and Papa are special pals. 

Riley is sometimes not so sure...

Luke LOVED exploring all around and everywhere.

Luke gets a ride...

Sonna's cute kids.

My cousin Breanne and her husband Brandon and their three boys were luckily up on the island for part of the time we were there! I hadn't seen them in about three years, so it was quite a treat. Cam really hit it off with the boys, and he loved having so Fegert-side boys his own age for a change (but he still loves hanging out with you Ruthie!). Here are all the kids (minus Ana) that we had up there for about four days. Noni was definitely getting her great-grandchild fix. She was only missing Trista's kids!

Beautiful, fun, delightful, sweet Riley! I love this girl!

Tyler and his gorgeous, wonderful girlfriend Jerica finally made it up towards the end of our trip. Tyler hadn't been on island for about four years, so it was a blast to have him come AND have him show Jerica around. I think she's hooked...

We also were so fortunate that the Stewarts invited us to Anacortes for Meme's surprise birthday party. She turned 98! I can't believe we did a surprise party for a 98 year old, but I guess she can take it! She's a firecracker. She still picks up and holds my kids! And she dances and parties all night long. The only assistance she needs is a hearing aid. What a gal!

Here she is with her oldest grandson, my dad. 

And here is my dad's uncle Larry (who organized the party and took us there on his yacht), my grandma Noni (in the blue), my dad, Samantha (my cousin), my dad's aunt Pam and Meme in the middle. I wish Luke had been there-- he's Meme's youngest great-great-grandchild. She has a few great-grandchildren who are younger, but Luke is the youngest great-great. 

Tyler and Jerica. Isn't she cute?!

We left the kids back on the island painting piggy banks.

Cam occasionally needs some down-time-- he plays pretty seriously on Blakely. 

And Ana too...

We also took some fun family rides in the forest.

And of course did some sunset catching trips to The Peak. 

Ana built her traditional moss teepee at The Peak. 

And even let Elsie have a go! (What the heck!? First time ever anyone else has been allowed to go inside!!)

So so so sad to leave. So blessed to go from one magical island home to another. But man, or man, I miss that place when we're gone. Don't miss the winter weather, but miss the island. Thanks again Dad and Roxanne for hosting us for another memorable year!

The Quick Drive North, July 2013

(I think my big camera was packed away after we loaded the car and left Bear Lake, so these are all iPhone photos.) We had to hurry up to Sequim to turn over our old house since the last people we were owner financing had moved out in June. Usually we like to take three or four days to do the 20 hour drive from Bear Lake to Northwestern Washington, but we did it in one and a half-- we left at 4pm on Wednesday and got to Sequim on Thursday. We stayed at our friends' house about an hour past Boise and only stopped at rest stops besides to let the kids get out and run. We usually have a fun time hiking and camping and exploring history along the drive, but since we didn't bring any camping gear this year, maybe it's good we were forced to travel fast. 

We did take one detour this year, however, to see my cousin and her baby. They'd been living in Moses Lake for about six months, which is near Othello where my parents grew up and where I was born. 

There's the infamous Othello water tower. Sadly, we didn't have time to stop by in attraction filled Othello...

And again, I managed to leave someone's house without taking any photos. I missed taking photos of cousin Brynda's cute house and amazing view over Moses Lake, complete with her own boat access! Her daughter Brooklyn is about the cutest baby I've ever seen in my whole life. Seriously. 

The kids had a fun time playing with little Brooklyn and making some Lego people. 

We finally pulled into Sequim at about 10 pm. Our sweet friend Amy had gone over to our house and cleaned up a bit and set up beds for us on the floor. We owe her big time. 

We got up the next morning to quite the mess, but it could have been worse. We did have to mow an acre of three month's worth of grass (up to our chest), catch some wild cats that had moved into the basement, and scrub until our hands were raw. My old garden and hundreds of strawberry plants and most of the orchard and blueberries had been taken over and literally destroyed by weeds. They also had strangely cut down an old beautiful tree that was the centerpiece of the yard and my kids' favorite climbing spot. But the worst part was the paint jobs they had done:

What the heck!? 

Anyway, we worked like CRAZY for two straight and full days. The kids took care of priming and repainting the walls and removing rubbish. Elsie entertained Po. Jonah mowed and mowed and mowed. We all put in our fair share of hard labor...as in, 18 hours each day all of us. Oh, and six hours on Saturday. We had some sweet friends feed us and some other friends take the little girls for play dates. We were so grateful. 

We did take two hours to run errands and go see two friends who couldn't come by the house to see us (we really wanted to see our friends, but we had to say, "If you want to see us, come to our house because we can't stop working"). The photo above is from a visit to our friends' new house... and we also got to see their new snake!! Elsie's not afraid of any creepy crawlies. 

On Saturday morning, Jonah took the last of the loads to the dump and we signed papers and got a deposit from the new owners! We hope they are going to be the long term owners of the place, but if not, we'll go back and do it again, I guess. We should probably just sell it outright to someone, but it is so nice to be making the income through the interest we can charge by carrying the loan ourselves. Hmmmm.... 

Anyway, we were glad to pack up again and head up north for one final stop... In any case, our backs needed a break.