A Baby Shower for Johanna

The hostess, Amy, with her trusted helper, husband Dan.

Dan helped document the event.  Kathleen, Johanna's Mom, came all the way from Spokane.

Marla, Johanna, Colleen

Brianna made Mojitas to tie in with the green and white theme.  

Lots of interesting and yummy food

Johanna, New Mom to be soon - Anticipated Date September 12

My daughter, Amy, hosted a baby shower for her cousin Johanna yesterday at our house in Granite Falls.  All the guests managed to find their way around our annoying detour.  What is normally a one and a half mile trip into Granite is now 12 miles while the County replaces the 3' culvert under the road for Coon Creek with a 30' culvert.  Seems kind of like overkill to us, but shovel ready projects are hard to find.

There is no sneaking around this - it started as a gorge 100' wide and 30' deep - as you can see, welcome progress!

Amy and Dan worked all morning to prepare some very exotic food for our midday brunch/baby shower.

Frichetta wrapped in prochetta - (I am sure both are misspelled)  I think Amy will post the recipe on her blog:http://seasonallyseattle.blogspot.com - I do know it involved Dan chopping 5 pounds of Shitake mushrooms and Amy separating 18 eggs to use just the whites, and hand wrapping and tying with chives when the egg/mushroom mixture was solid enough to cut into squares.

Lakes of Snohomish County

There are 463 lakes in Snohomish County.  To document all of them would take years.  So I am starting with those closest to my home, and those where power boats are allowed.  There are only 5 of these.  Some are pretty well-known:  Lake Stevens, Lake Goodwin, and Lake Shoecraft.

Today we took a motorcycle ride to the two that are nearer our house, and that are less well-known.   The first is Lake Roesiger, site of a homestead turned into a park.  It is the 4th largest of the lakes in the County.  The park is well maintained and has a very nice swimming area, sandy beach, restrooms, and hiking trail.

Lots of interesting historical information, old growth fir trees, and even a spreading chestnut tree for shady picnics.

On to Flowing Lake, the smallest of the power boat lakes in Snohomish County.  It has a very nice park area, complete with a big play toy for small children, a picnic shelter, rest rooms, picnic tables in both the shade and the sun, and a good swimming area.  There is a daily charge of $5 per car.  Best access now is off Dubuque Road, as 3 Lakes Road is closed part way for construction.

Picnic Shelter at Flowing Lake

Fun for the kiddos!

Canning Tomatoes to Live Locally

Amy at step 1 - heating tomatoes so skins would slip off.

My daughter, Amy, and son-in-law, Dan, are on a mission.  They are starting on September 22 (the fall equinox) to eat only what they can find within a 100 mile radius of their home in Seattle for one full year.  You can follow their quest to become "locovores" on Seasonally Seattle.

Since they couldn't face a week without tomatoes, and tomatoes aren't available locally year round, today they brought two flats of tomatoes to our house to learn the art of canning.

Step 2 - Dan peeling and paring and packing tomatoes in jars

Part of the fun is working together to produce the beautiful jars of bright red tomatoes.

Follow Amy and Dan's progress on their blog, http://seasonallyseattle.blogspot.com where they will share sources, budgets, recipes and more.

Motorcycle Ride to Peninsula and Whidbey Island

The sun was shining and it promised to be a hot summer day when we left the house at 8:15 a.m. today on the motorcycle.  We fully intended to go to Sol Duc Hot Springs and, hopefully, rent a cabin for the night.  Ron worried it would be too hot to go hot springing, which turned out to be the least of our worries!  By the time we got 10 miles down the road where we lost about 200' of elevation, we were in dense fog and the temperature on the bike thermometer had dropped from 64 to 57.  The fastest way to get to the Olympic Peninsula from our house is to take the freeway (Yikes!) to Edmonds where we could catch the Kingston Ferry.  Traffic was heavy and it was foggy and cold so we were happy stop when we got to the ferry dock.  One of the real advantages of riding a motorcycle in the Pacific Northwest is you get preferential boarding on all ferries.  Many of our best motorcycle rides involve ferries, and we never worry about ferry schedules when we are on a bike.  After a 45 minute wait for the next ferry, we picked up a ferry schedule.

The fog lifted as we got off the ferry at Kingston, and it was sunny but still cool (59 degrees) when we got to the Hood Canal bridge.

The scenery is spectacular on the entire peninsula - Puget Sound is in view.  The road winds and twists around bays and harbors keeping the water or the Olympic Mountains in view all the time.

Lots of timber land

Port villages and small settlements dot Highway 101 which goes from Olympia to Port Gamble.

Port Gamble

Discovery Bay

Lavendar Farm near Sequim
One of several - the lovely smell of lavendar filled the air.

When we got to Sequim, it was nearly noon and we were ready for lunch.  When we stopped to eat, we consulted our map and realized it was still a long ways to Sol Duc Hot Springs.  If we got there and they didn't have a cabin available, we would have a long ride home or we would have to settle for some boring hotel somewhere along the way.  So we borrowed a phone book at the restaurant where we had lunch and called Sol Duc.  They were booked solid through the weekend.  We decided to head home, going via Port Townsend, taking the ferry to Whidbey Island, and then either taking the Mukilteo ferry or driving around by Anacortes.  

The Sound was full of sailboats in all shapes and sizes 

We once again ran into the problem with being spontaneous - we watched the 2:36 ferry pull out of Port Townsend and spent the next hour waiting for it to come back for another run.

Finally, at nearly 5 p.m. we landed on Whidbey Island and decided we had had enough of ferries for the day and we headed north on Hwy 20 heading to Anacortes.

A hotel/restaurant in Oak Harbor

Farm overlooking the Sound near Coupeville.

Whidbey Island is beautiful - farms and quaint towns, and always water on all sides.  Still chilly - the highest temperature we saw before we got inland after Anacortes was 63 degrees.  By the time we got to Mt Vernon, it was 75 - just about perfect for riding coatless, but we were so chilled by then  (it was 55 degrees when we got off the ferry on Whidbey) that we left our coats on all the way home.  We arrived home at 7:30 p.m. - a very long day for only riding 130 miles.  (Of course, the bike odometer doesn't keep track of all the miles on the ferries!)

What's Blooming in Early August

Geraniums

A yellow rose given to me by my sister, Molly

Roses

Clematis

Clematis - Part of my "Amy Garden"

Dahlia - Oenesta

Dahlia - Yellow Star

Dahlia - Pretty in Pink

Dahlia - purple and white variagated

Dahlia - Key West

Hydrangea - this one was pink when my daughter, Amy, gave it to me for my birthday a few years ago.

Many more dahlias have buds and will be blooming within the next few days.  It is my favorite time of year, where everywhere I look I see color and smell flowers.

Petunias - in a cement planter we made a couple of years ago using a cardboard box and a flower pot for a mold.

Gerber Daisy - saved from last year.

Most of the lilies are done blooming, but I found a few.  This one is nearly black - first time it bloomed was this year.  I can hardly bear to dead head it the blooms are so pretty.

My favorite lily - Stargazer.

Canadian Motorcycle Trip - Osoyoos to Sumas

We took the motorcycle to see our kids in Eastern Washington, and then returned home via the trans-Canada highway.  The kids live within 30 miles of the Canadian border, so the Canadian route is an option for crossing the Cascade Range.  Here we are resting after the 250 mile trip from our house to the kids'.

We followed Tony up to see the house he is working on.  It is really looking good.  Great views, huge big house.  The last time we saw it it was pretty rough, but he has accomplished wonders with it already.  Tony is putting tile in bathrooms and kitchen now.  Then countertops, carpet and trim will finish the job.  Look for it soon on Tina's website.http://okanoganvalley.blogspot.com/

We started our Canadian venture in the city of Osoyoos, on beautiful Lake Osoyoos.  As we climbed out of the city on Canada Hwy 3, we stopped at an overlook of the city where we could see 

Lake Osoyoos is definitely a resort town.  Many boats, jet skis, and swimmers in the water.   A beautiful brick walking path surrounds most of the lake, with many park benches, fountains, and plantings everywhere.

vinyards overlooking Lake Osoyoos.  We were on the official "Wine Route" across British Columbia.  Unfortunately, we were a bit early for a nice lunch and wine tasting at a vinyard.  Most weren't open until noon, and we were passing through around 10.  Haze filled the air from wildfires of the past few weeks.  It was warm and sunny though, with the temperature on the bike reading 78 or 79 most of the way.

The scenery was spectacular - mountains, rivers, wildflowers and a windy twisty road, perfect for a motorcycle ride.

The clouds gathered and we wondered if we might get wet as we crossed the Cascade range on several passes.  The highest was 2129 meters, well over 6000'.  We did get a few raindrops, and the temperature dropped to 68 degrees, but we soldiered on and didn't stop to don a jacket and we were soon back in sunny 78 degrees.
Taking the Canadian route home added about 100 miles and 3 hours to the most direct way home, but was worth it!