Chuckanut

I just love the name Chuckanut...and if you say it really fast it has an Asian feel, though it's a native word for "Long beach far from a narrow entrance." For Father's Day, the girls and I went hiking with Shane. We peered out at the drizzly day and almost decided to stay in and make him chocolate chip cookies instead. But we have learned that even though it's raining at home, it could be just cloudy and even sunny in the next neighborhood. We packed a lunch and set out North on I-5 to SR 11 through some farmland and flat stretches. It was cloudy, so the mountain was covered some and as we approached Chuckanut Drive, it seemed like a completely different place. This area of Washington is so amazing-the mountains and the sea so close. We took the Fragrance Lake Trail, which is a good mile or so steadily up. The trees here are so tall that sometimes it seems like there are no branches until you lay down and gaze up.
This is a picture of the roots of a tree that fell over.


The trail circles the lake and has little benches to sit on for lunch.


We ended the day exploring the bay at Larrabee State Park.

Snowboarding 101

It's an interesting circle in life when your kids can inspire you to do things you would probably never try. It's also interesting, the paradox of the unknown; both scary and exciting. Saturday was International Ladies Shred day, which is a global event to get girls into snowboarding. Friday night, I spent quite a bit of time on You Tube reviewing snowboarding videos. It's a whole new world-the gear, the terminology, the skill set, the muscles I'm obviously not using, and the rush...when you finally get going, standing up and you can feel the glide of the board over the snow, sometimes touching, sometimes hovering, sometimes flying.