Singing in the Rain

Rain is not really what I want to be blogging about in July but this was something else. Will and I were just having a lazy Saturday afternoon and we were playing cribbage. I was winning in case you were wondering. Anyway, we just kept looking around us through all the windows in the house and it kept getting darker and darker. We had heard some thunder and were debating on if we were going to get a major storm and would the races at the Skagit be cancelled. Well...... we did get a major storm and the races ended up going after with a bit of a delay. I tried to capture as best I could with the camera the torrential down pour that followed. During this time we were also seeing who could get the best picture of a Hummingbird otherwise known at our house as "hummers". I will do another post of just hummingbirds but I have a very cute picture of a little hummer after the rain.

Before:

Looking a bit like a storm huh?

 During:

Looking out our Living Room window.

After:

Our landscaping is running away. So sad!!!!

You can see just where the water traveled and washed away the mulch.

 Hummer:

Our little drenched hummer. Isn't she cute?? I think it's a she. :)

Drowned Hummer

This was our adventure yesterday afternoon. We had fun and it was a good reason to be lazy and stay inside. I am off now to finish beating Will at cribbage. I am ahead four games so hopefully I don't choke. This morning Will cleaned up as much of the driveway as he could but looks like we will be making a trip to the dirt store for more mulch. Cheers and until next time!!

JET

Survivor

What did I survive???? The Survivor Mud Run! You might be thinking "So what! It was a run in the mud." I am here to tell you it was cold, rainy, wet, muddy, smelly, dirty, slimy, tiring and so much more. I am not sure what I was thinking but I somehow convinced by two friends Nicole and Tara to participate with me so there was no backing out. Will's family was signed up and I figured if they could all do it I could do it. The problem is they all had a blast and would do it again and I, at least at this point, have checked that off my list of things to do although I don't know that it was ever on my list, and will never do it again.

The event was called the Survivor Mud Run and it was held at Remlinger Farms in Carnation, WA. We had a lot of fun getting ready for the event. We decided that we wanted to go into the start looking cute. Costumes were definitely welcomed so we went for a pink motif with argyle socks and tutus. People loved us and thought we were cute. They may have just been making fun of us but we did look cute so it didn't matter. Nicole and I went shopping and got our inspiration from what we could find at Target. She later went and picked up the materials for making tutus and made us rainbow ones which were fabulous!

Here is what we looked like before we got started:

AKA Mud Princess

When we got to the start area we were asked to be in the costume contest but in order to do so we had to start the race 45 minutes early. This was fine with us as we didn't want to wait around but we were concerned about losing our cuteness in all the mud. After the first few obstacles it was all over. There was no way we were going to make it back by the time the contest started and we didn't look anything like when we started as you will see shortly. Nonetheless we were off and running. The course was a 5K with 12 obstacles to get over, under, through or in some cases around.


Here we come! Nicole is all smiles at this point.

So what were the obstacles?? Here ya go:

1. Plank of death
2. Cobweb
3. Mud crawl under cargo net
3. Tire run with three walls
4. River run (brrrrrrrrrrrr it was cold!!!)
5. Wall climb (10ft wall)
6. Slime walk/crawl through a culvert
7. Wall climb (10ft wall)
8. Log swim/crawl with mud hills
9. Cargo net climb
10. Angled wall climb with sinking mud
11. Mud crawl under cargo net
12. Mud pit swim

Are you thinking you want to do this next year??? Will was able to catch us at the mud pit and get some priceless pictures. For those of you who know me don't ask. :) I don't know what I was thinking this is sooooo not me.

Here comes Tara and I. Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!

There we go. We look a little defeated and worn out huh??

Once we finished we were so beat but the carrot was waiting for us. We got to go have a drink. Everyone of age was greeted with a beer or wine and a brat. Before we did that though we attempted to clean off. They had a couple of tents made of pipe that had water coming down from a faucet but it didn't do a whole lot for us. We had mud everywhere and I mean everywhere. We ended up using some baby wipes that Chad and Nicole had in their car and even they didn't help much. We were pretty much a hopeless cause. We sat on the back of our tailgates freezing and eating cupcakes in all of our muddy glory. Also as you will see from our after pictures we had no chance of winning any costume contest.

Great mud bath!

My name has rubbed off my bib and you can see the grass hanging from my shirt and safety pins. Oh my!

The Survivors!!! We lost all of our color but hey we are smiling, I think. :)

The car ride home was long. I had to sit in all of my muddiness for two hours. I was so thankful to see the shower when I got home. I stood in the shower for 25 minutes and still found traces of mud in my ears for two days to follow. It is a great story now and of course one of the reasons for doing the race was for bragging rights and boy did we earn them. We had some war wounds to show off and even as I write this a week later some of the bruises are now turning a deep shade of purple.

Nicole and I decided next year it was Will and Chads turn. Tara said that her husband Bruce is definitely not interested and I can't blame him. I hope you enjoyed seeing and hearing about this latest adventure! Cheers and until next time.

JET

Peace Health Gala

It has been a while since I have been able to post anything. I have so many things to share and many pictures to show you all but my time has been very limited. Because I have a quick second before I start my next project at home I wanted to post a few pictures of our latest adventure.

Our friends Lexy and Peter invited us to go to the Peace Health Gala a week ago. This was a fundraiser and awards banquet for the hospital in Bellingham. They are going to be building a new Cancer Center. Whidbey Island Bank was a major sponsor which is where Peter works so we were fortunate enough to get to go and sit at their table. Will's mom is on the Foundation Board for the hospital so she was there too. She said she didn't invite us because we were not big enough spenders. At least she was honest. :)

Anyway this event was like getting ready for prom. It was black tie optional and Lexy and I decided that we would have our boys wear suits. Well, easy for Lex as Peter already has a few suits but Will on the other hand does not. I am lucky he owns a few ties. Anyway, Will and I went shopping and for those of you who know us and Will's opposition to looking cute, meaning clothes that are not shorts and shirts, it can be a challenge. I am pleased to say we were successful in finding him everything from shoes to shirt, suit coat and matching pants and it did not result in any wars. I will admit we had a fun time and I think he did too. He was a good sport and kept an open mind about it. All put together Will looked quite handsome so we had to have Chris take some pictures of us. It was a beautiful day too so we lucked out. The event was in a big white tent in the area of where the new Cancer Center will be. I decide it was like a scene out of a movie. It was probably the fanciest event I have been to in Bellingham. We had a great time! Enjoy the pics....

Don't tell Lexy I put this out here she will kill me but she looks amazing!!! :)

As you can see we had a great time and it was fun getting all dressed up. I love these types of events but don't get to go to them very often. Cheers and until next time which I hope is sooner than later!!

JET

Tip Toe Through The Tulips

It is tulip time in Skagit County! My friend Amanda and I went to Mount Vernon for a day of Tulip Festival activites. We started off at the arts and crafts fair and then ended up with a trip to Tulip Town. This was Amanda's first trip out to the tulip fields so it was fun to show her how beatiful they all were. As you will see by the pictures it was very wet, muddy and some tulips were not yet blooming but there were many others to see and the colors were amazing!!

This little guy was having way to much fun in the mud!!

Hope you enjoyed viewing our tip toe through the tulips as much as we did. Cheers and until next time.

JET

Take Me Out To The Ball Game.....

Yesterday I had the nice surprise of an afternoon off at the Mariners. One of my Loan Officers thought it would be a great team building exercise and he was offered some excellent seats. Now that I think about it maybe it was just an excuse to be out of the office... naaa!!! :) So off we went with a couple others to watch the Mariners beat the Blue Jays. Well, that was what we were wanting to see. No such luck!

Row 11 right behind the Mariner dugout. Pretty cool!

Go, go, go!!!

Good job boys, maybe next time you will get em!

We started off the game okay as it was tied up at 1 and 1 in the 3rd but that quickly went away and the Blue Jays kicked the Mariners butts. It was the 8th inning where they scored 6 runs that really was the Mariners dimise. Nonetheless it was a great afternoon of team building, networking, a couple of home runs, cheers and a few beers. I felt spoiled to be out of the office during the middle of the day with fabulous seats at the game. Cheers and until next time!

JET

Ski Utah

We just got back from our trip to Park City, Utah. We have been going for the last ten years or so and stay at a place called The Grand Summit at The Canyons. Will's Mom and Aunt's have a condo there which makes it quite convenient. We are a bit spoiled honestly.

The Grand Summit at the base of The Canyons Ski Resort

So what do we do for eight days??? We ski, play cards, drink beer, drink wine, eat great food, shop, go to the hot tub, ski some more, drink more wine, play more cards, go to the hot tub again, ski, shop.... You get the picture. This year Will and I got a few extra days by ourselves so we did somethings we had not done before. We have seen a lot since we have been many times but this year we went to a couple new ski resorts and we actually checked out the Olympic Ski Park which includes the ski jumps and bobsled track.

Just to confirm in case anyone is curious I am not a skier. I enjoy easy, easy runs and am in no hurry to get down them. I like looking at the scenery and at The Canyons the views are amazing as you will see in the following pictures. Will on the other hand gets his phone all hooked up with his GPS and trys to see how fast he can possibly get down the hill. He was fairly safe and sane this year and I am not sure he got above 40MPH but last year he was upwards of 65MPH. I just call this stupid honestly. Love you honey!! To Will's credit he does wait for me and well he waits some more and gets some pictures of me hanging on the hill debating if I am going to come down or not. His patience is amazing!

See me in pink? This hill is much steeper in person I promise!!

Who are the two dorks on the chairlift??

Isn't the view amazing? Just look beyond the orange coat. :)

Beer and skiing somehow go together. Here I am at lunch holding up the wall.
Ski boots are just not comfortable!

We went to Snow Basin for lunch this year which is about 45 minutes or so from the condo. The lodge there is quite impressive but the day we went it was raining so didn't get any good pictures. We did however also go and checkout Sundance which is about 45 minutes in the other direction of the condo. This is Robert Redford's ski resort and it was super cute. It has three lifts and the ski shop looks like an old barn. There is nothing flashy here but right up my ally I loved it. We decided we will have to go back skiing there or at least night skiing.

View along the drive to Sundance it was beautiful.

   



Main Lodge/Ski Shop

One day we made a trip to downtown Park City and did some Geocaching. Some of the caches were hard to find because of the snow but we managed to log a couple.

Downtown Park City

Yes it is a tree of shoes. One of our Geocaching stops.

Will found it! Good job!!

Writing our "Keystone Campers" on
the log in the capsule.

Our next adventure was to Olympic Park. They actually have Bobsled rides but Will wasn't interested. I thought for sure he would be in but not his thing I guess. There was also a ski museum there and we were both amazed at how far ski's and boots have come over the last 100 years or so. I can't believe what people threw themselves down a ski jump in. If I thought those athletes were crazy now they were crazier several years ago with the old school equipment. Yikes!!!

You can see the pool is frozen over where they do their practicing in the Summer.

What do you think? Should I try out to carry the torch?

Cards, cards and more cards. This time I taught everyone a new game I learned when I was in Arizona visiting Mom and Dad. It was called Screw your Neighbor or Up and Down the River or as my mom calls it Screw the Dealer. Will and I did play a lot of Cribbage too once Erika and Chris left.

He has a perma-smile because he wins all the time!!!!!



I probably was the blue pegs. Seriously I don't know why I play sometimes.
Will on the flipside thinks it is great because he wins and wins some more. :)



View from the condo. I told you we were spoiled.

Another fun and relaxing trip. We did a few snow dances and they finally paid off towards the end of the week and Will and I got 7 new inches of snow one night to ski in the next day. It was a lot of fun although I think sitting in the hot tub with the snow blowing sideways the night before was better than the skiing but that is just me. Thanks for reading my blog, cheers and until next time!
 

Life is rough but someone has to do it.
Left to Right: Chris, Erika, Me (Jen)

JET