June - Time For A New Blog!

Well it has been almost three weeks since I last blogged. We have been pretty busy, to include a trip to Seattle for a week. We visited with Ethan and Heather and Eliza and Liam; and also got to see Sue Santos and Nicole and their family. Had a wonderful time. Seattle is such a beautiful place, and I don't know where everyone gets the idea it rains all the time. One day of rain (Sunday) in a week, very similar to our lst visit there in the fall.

Anyway, Aaron and Beth and I flew out and were met at the airport by the Ethan Bratt family. We brought little gifts for the kids. Beth found a little camera for Eliza that would actually flash and say things like "You're so pretty". Eliza loved it and was constantly taking pictures of everything and everyone. Here are a couple shots:

This is Eliza taking the picture of me taking her picture:


Here are a couple of her sneaking up on a squirrel and taking his picture:



We spent some time at the locks between the sound and Lake Washington - pretty interesting - Heather has a lot of info about that on her blog site.

We celebrated Eliza's 3rd birthday:




Here are pictues of Heather's Mom and Dad and also of Liam with Aaron. The BBQ was in the Bullock's backyard which is gorgeous and lush:




We went to the beach and of course Aaron had to try out the water. What no bathing suit? No problem:


We, Aaron and Ethan and I, along with Mike Jeremica - Ethan's friend from BYU and Mike's Dad, Vern, went fly fishing in eastern Washington. We had a great time. Vern, who is a professional fly fisherman, took us all out for the day and even supplied the equipment. We really can't thank him enough for his time as well as Mike. It is very much appreciated and very much enjoyed. Although the only one to actually catch any trout was Vern (4 or 5 beautiful 14-18 inch rainbows) we all got to hook one and lose it. Learned an awful lot about fly fishing though. As you can see the scenery is much different in Eastern Washington than around Seattle





While fishing Mike spotted a rattlesnake and that is all Aaron needed to know. While the rest of us continued to fish after a quick look, Aaron spent the next half hour trying to get closer to it. We finally left the area and later retuned only to find the rattler stretched out. Aaron pinned it's head to the ground with a fishing net and then I held it down while he took a knife and cut off the rattles (doesn't hurt them) and then we let it go - prabably 24 to 30 inches long, and a little angry when it left.





We also went geoduck (gooeyduck) hunting and Heather and her sister, Katie dug one up for us to see.


As I said, we saw Sue Santos and her family. Their daughter and son play the cello and guitar and gave us a very nice family concert. I am sorry i did not take any pictures of them.




All in all, a wonderful trip. Here are a couple more pictures of the grandkids:











As you can see I do get a little carried away posting pictures - hope you all enjoyed.

By the way-on a different note- I was "chastised" about my Mother's Day Blog because I failed to mention people outside of my family. So kudos to all you mothers out there - and specificlly, Shanna Watkins, Sue Santos, Susan Smeltzer, and any others that I have failed to mention. I love you all.