Snowflake Lane

For the 2nd year in a row, we made a trip to Bellevue to Snowflake Lane! The bonus was Mama and Dada got most of their Christmas shopping done. :-)

Brennan's love for drums and drumming can be traced back to Snowflake Lane 2012...this year was no different. He loved it! It was very, very cold! But fun. 

Click here for all the pics

Whistler

Julie and I were able to spend 3 days in Whistler. It was beautiful and each day was different. Thursday was a partly sunny day, Friday it snowed all day long and evening (the village was right at freezing...it finally started sticking at night), and Saturday was clear and sunny. Saturday they opened Whistler for skiing, although only 4 lifts were opened. Still it was kind of fun to be up there for the buzz of opening day.

Highlights: just getting away and being together. We were able to eat at one of our favorite spots up there - "Elements" (a tapas place). The food was great.

Click here to see the full album

Our Hotel - The "Sundial Botique"

Fall Colors, Sunsets, and Life in B'ham

I've been enjoying the amazing October we've been having by dragging my camera with me almost every time I leave the house. It's been an amazing Fall, and unusual for us in the Northwest - unusual rain in September, and unusual sun/fog/no rain all October. Most importantly, we haven't had any wind (until yesterday). All of that has made for a gorgeous, "long" fall, where the leaves stay on the trees a long time, giving us a wonderful display.

Now about these photos...I'm posting them in reverse order, with the most recent album first. All the pics in this album were taken yesterday, on a long walk around downtown B'ham with Brennan. We were treated to an amazing sunset, which we weren't expecting...really, the best sunset I have seen in a long time.

The second album, a much larger one, is a collection of about 4-5 outings all lumped into one. Enjoy all the pics! And of course, there are some pictures of people sprinkled in too.

Album 1 (sunset, walk with B)
Album 2 (all the other pics from the past month or so)

Granville Island, Artist Point, and Whidbey Island

So I have three albums/collections of photos from the past 2 months that I just never got around to uploading/blogging, so here they are! Pretty significant trips too...for various reasons. Below you'll find three links to three collections, along with a few of my fav's as always. NOTE: the Whidbey pictures even include some photos of the Ulstein clan (Steve, Jeanne, and granddaughter Naomi). In reverse chronological order, (most recent to oldest)...

- Granville Island/Stanley Park (all three of us) - this was a weekend trip that Julie, Brennan and I all took. It was B's first time up there so we did the market (think food, and street musicians), had fun sleeping in the hotel, enjoyed all the sights, and then on Monday we went to Stanley Park. One totally impromptu/spontaneous adventure found Julie and Brennan swimming in a cool pool/water park. Also took a train ride, and enjoyed the day.

- Artist Point - this was just a day trip, but was big because it qualified as Brennan's first real "hike" (as in he did all the walking himself). He did GREAT! The incredible thing was we managed to find a 2-hour window right in between huge rain-storms...(thanks God). The clouds lifted so we made a run for it. Brennan made it all the way to the top, and back, all on his own.

- Whidbey - these are pictures from our week-long trip to Whidbey Island all the way back in early August. Highlights as always included lots of boat rides, fishing, and playing on the beach. But perahps the biggest highlights were playing with Bapa, Aunt Traci, and Uncle David.

Granville pics here...
Artist Point pics here...
Whidbey pics here...

Brennan on a boat ride...(one of those water taxis)

Street music was a hit...esp the bagpipes

This musician was having Brennan participate with him

On the train, getting ready to leave...

B spent a lot of time digging with this toy

B and Mama sitting on top of an old fire-truck

Totally spontaneous...let's go for a swim!

It's a very large "infinity pool" in Stanley Park

B and Julie looking at stuff

Mad it all the way to the top of Artist Point

At Whidbey with Aunt Jeanie, and cousin Naomi

B learned how to ride is bike on this trip

Side trip to Coupeville

Julie and Dad trying to catch a salmon

It got quite foggy this day...very cool to see