Garden Prelude

With my slug's pace in posting, it's almost impossible to show you an up-to-the-moment view of the garden. Will you settle for some within-the-last-couple-of-weeks pics? First up, Silas peers out from behind the beans. I just made a been and tomato dish with a few pounds of them yesterday.

Below: Yes, we will have a couple of pumpkins this October!

This is Silas' magic beanstalk. He is pointing up to the clouds in anticipation of how high he expects it to grow.

Broccoli:

This is the as-of-yet unknown flower that cropped up just about everywhere. It looks pretty in this picture, but trust me: it's not that great. The flowers are only open for a few hours in the morning. The rest of the day, it just looks kind of... blah. I think it might have to find it's way out of my garden, though I expect I will never be totally rid of it.
Soon, I will post more pictures of another much different garden that we visited with my parents, who are visiting from Wisconsin. Till then...

New header

For those of you who read the blog through FaceBook and don't actually see the blog itself, this is the blog header I've used since last fall:


And here's my new one:

I love love love the old picture of my boy with his curly blond locks, but it was about time for an update.

Hike to the light house!

There we are: A happy little family enjoying the view from the top of the Dungeness Spit lighthouse. We don't look a bit frazzled, over-heated or exhausted.
Well, maybe a bit. It's actually a hike of over 5 miles to get from the mainland out to the end of the spit, where the lighthouse sits. Here's a view from the mainland:
Can you see that tiny speck way out on the horizon, just to the left of the trees? Probably not, but that little speck was our destination.
As we started out, we thought, like all the other times we'd come to the Spit, that we'd just walk a ways and then turn back. After all, it was only mid-morning and already verging on intensely hot. But as we got a mile or so away from shore, a breeze picked up and it became bearable. By the time we stopped to eat lunch, we were far enough along that there was no sense in turning back, and we decided to go the whole way.
We made a deal with Silas that if he walked all the way to the lighthouse, Drew would carry him back.
We were all very proud of ourselves when we beheld this sight:
Still a 10+ mile hike with no shade did leave it's mark, although Silas was magically spared sunburn. Poor Drew was sore for days after carrying our 35 pound son on his back for 5 miles. But it was all worth it.

The Spit is a national wildlife refuge, particularly for birds. Along with a few seals, we saw...
A Bald Eagle...
a Peregrine Falcon (much bigger than an eagle, which I wasn't expecting)...
And a lone Brant.

Silas has spent the past week talking about lighthouses, and this morning, we built one out of blocks. This hike definitely left an impression on all of us :)

The Olympic Mountains behind you, the Canadian coastal range in front and water all around...If you are ever out on the Olympic Peninsula, DO NOT miss Dungeness Spit. Even if you don't go all the way out to the lighthouse, this is still one of the most gorgeous places you could ever find yourself.

Merymere Falls

...a few pictures from last week's adventure: Marymere Falls, near Lake Crescent.
Checking out the river...
...and crossing the old, narrow log bridges.
Goofing around on the river bank...
...and hanging out on moss-covered boulders.
That was last week's adventure. This week's: the Dungeness spit, where we will hopefully catch a breeze off of the water and have break from the heat.

Until next time...

Hiatus

I'm taking a bit of a hiatus...again. No Book of the Month this month, and expect infrequent postings...We are minimizing our computer usage in favor of, well, everything else.

Enjoy the rest of your summer!

Edmonds / the ferry

Last Sunday was my final day of vacation and we decided to spend it out and about. Silas loves taking the ferry, so we took the Kingston/Edmonds run and spent the day walking around Edmonds.
We had some time to kill while waiting for the return boat, but quite conveniently, there is a park adjacent to the ferry terminal, complete with a large sandy beach, and a cast iron canoe.
It was warm enough to ride on deck on the way back. Silas described to us what waves are like (above) and was his usual hug-filled self.
Even though I'm back at work, we are still doing plenty of fun summer things. Today we went to the Kitsap Arts and Crafts Fair and we saw a reptile show featuring all kinds of cool critters. Silas got to touch two geckos, a 5' long snake, a baby alligator, and his favorite, a kimono dragon with two tails (the only known one of it's kind in the world).

Hope your summer has been a lot of fun too!

Big mountain, little hiker

Last week, we took Silas on his biggest hike to date: The Hurricane Hill Hike in the Olympics.
We brought the backpack carrier but didn't end up needing it. Our little mountain man walked the ENTIRE 6 plus miles, and perhaps not unexpectedly, managed the 1,700 feet elevation gain better than many of the adults we encountered on the trail.

On the way back down the mountain, we ran into many exhausted people who asked if he walked the whole way. "Yes" I said, "and if our 3 year-old can do it, so can you!"
We saw a lot of wildlife, including an overabundance of deer. They were everywhere! Look I spy one now:
And there's another:
This little chipmunk was so tame, she'd run across our hands and nibble our fingers. Even so, we resisted the temptation to drop a few bits of granola bar her way.
I recon that Silas hasn't seen snow since we were in Wisconsin in February of 09, so getting to touch some of the permanent snow was a big deal for him:
Look son, over yonder...
Now that Silas has completed this adventure, we are hoping to get a few more hikes in before fall, including one along the coast.

Si's room, phase 1, Complete!

Silas' room received a make-over this past week. In addition to taking out the old baseboard heater and doing some electrical work, Drew painted it and I rearranged everything.
I can't tell you how much better it feels in there. It's just the way I imagined his room to be :)
Silas really seems to like it too:
As a comparison, here's a shot of the room prior to painting: The same drab color the whole interior of the house was painted when we bought the house, which we are painting over room by room.
Phase 2 will be putting new flooring in his room.

We painted the bathroom as well, and I suppose I will post pictures of that at some point too.
We also went to the mountains a few days ago so expect to see some pictures from that day as well.

Lookin' up

Our sunflowers are already taller than Silas. We can't wait for them to bloom!
Also, the plants all around the sunflowers are an as of yet unidentified perennial that came up in late May. If anyone knows what it is, let me know! Here's a close-up:
If it flowers, it may be easier to identify and I might just fall in love with it. If it doesn't flower, I'll do my best to remove it. It's cropping up everywhere and seems to spread way-too easily.

Here's another one that was a mystery plant until I found a picture of it in a book on perennials, just yesterday:
It's acanthus, or bear's britches. Another interesting but fast spreading plant that will have to be kept in check.

And, that's your garden update for the day :)

In the works

Silas is very excited because we are painting his room this week. As a result, our dining room (minus a table) has become a temporary playroom...
I will share a few before and after pics of his room, once it's completed.

Yield

One of the first things we did after moving to this house at the very end of March was build a raised bed so that I could get my veggies going. My humble little garden was not helped along by our cold, dreary, and seemingly endless spring weather. I made novice mistakes, putting out plants when it was still too cold. A pepper plant was lost as a result.

But summer really is hear now, and things have begun to perk up. One of my favorite things about veggie gardening is that when we want a salad, I simply go outside and pick an assortment of greens. Silas, as always, is my little helper.

He is very keen on picking peas and will eat them with gusto, pod and all.
We aren't the only ones who like to hang out in our garden:
Expect more garden-related postings as the veggie yield continues...

In which Silas makes pizza

Last night, Silas made pizza. He cut the veggies:
We rolled out the dough together, and then Si put on the toppings:
It turned out delicious!
Thanks for your help, Silas!