Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Lake Chelan via North Cascades Highway June 30 - July 2 2013

I have never been to Lake Chelan.   Bronwen ended up with a rare three day weekend, so we found a last minute condo deal and headed to the Lake.  We decided to take the North Cascades highway since I had never seen that either.

We could have cut over in Arlington I think, but decided to take I-5 all the way up to Burlington, so we could drive over the Bailey bridge that is temporarily in place over the Skagit River.

There isn't much to see until you actually get into the National Forest. Then it becomes amazing!

We stopped at a few places to take pictures and then stopped for lunch in Winthrop. It was probably 95 degrees there!  Thankfully because of the heat, we rushed to the first place that looked decent. It was more than decent. It was really really good!  I was shocked. I am not used to finding good food outside of the city.

On to Lake Chelan, we arived at the lake around 3. There was a car in our space! I tracked down the cleaning ladies and sure enough, it was one of their cars. Our room was nice and clean.

We rushed to pump up the floating recliners and headed out on the lake.  Ok, everyone was right, the water is COLD! but not too bad when its over 90!

That night we had dinner at a Thai restaurant, and, as I indicated a few paragraphs up, I got what I expected!

The next day we drove up to the end of the road, checked out the campgrounds along the way.  When we were ready to go swimming, it started to rain!  weird. We decided to go shopping! Found lunch on the way, again horrible! 

Finally the sun broke out and it was hot and sunny again. We headed for the lake.

Later that night, we watched the sun go down from the park.

Good trip, I really enjoyed Lake Chelan and hope to go again soon!

Lake Diablo

Downtown Chelan

View from room

B in the park

Sunset

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Jessica Peterson - Bainbridge High School class of 2013!

Jessica graduated BHS on a beautiful sunny day.

Crista, my mother and I were in attendance. Kelsey came to say hi and ended up sitting with us.

It was hot, in the direct sun and it was long, but it was a well done ceremony. The night before we were at James graduation, and the audio system was hard to hear.  We could hear it all today, the speeches were good.

Jessica is now off to Central Washington University to continue the tradition her great grandmother set many years ago. She plans on getting a teaching degree, just like Holly.

Its a shock that her high school career is over already.

After the ceremony, we found Jess out in the field and we took some pictures.    Then, after the family time is over, the kids get in buses and head off on their senior night.   They have no idea where they are going.

We had a similar thing in 1985, but we knew more or less what we were doing. We boarded the classic steamer Virginia V.

Jess and her class were shuttled off to the ferry, where they walked on! taht must have been a sight. Then they went to a downtown club for food and dancing, games. After that they went to Family game center in Tukwilla, where they played games all night and into the am.  Sounds like lots of fun!











Wednesday, July 10, 2013

June 1, 2013 - Jessica and James graduation party!

I carefully picked a day that would work well with Jessicas busy schedule.  June 1 was the day I picked. A nice Saturday, one week before graduation.  Jess leaves for camp very soon after graduation, so it was now or never.... And then I realized the Prom was Friday night!

Jess was a trooper though. She showed up on time even! I told her she could be late if she wanted.

Bronwen and I made chicken skewers and chilled prawns for the party.    Kelsey was a great helper,  keeping food rotated, checking temperatures of food that is out cooking off more skewers and refreshing the prawns as needed. It was very good.

Cousin Cap came up from California.  He was hoping to bring Joyce, but she was under the weather, so he came by himself and stayed at my house.

Uncle Ed and Blanche came. They gave us the news that there will be no Swalling picnic this year. This has to be the first time in 50 years or so... wow. I wonder if it will happen next year?  Ed is aging...  

A surprise guest, Cousin Craig came from Olympia! He made it just in time to see Ed and Blanche off.  I was happy to see him, in my recollection, this is the first time the three Cousin Craigs have been in the same place before!  It was the only picture I took!

The Three Craigs!
We decorated the place up with Bainbridge and North Mason colors and I created some posters of Jess and James over the years