Walking Down Memory Lane

Last week Gary came over and loaded a file of old family pictures onto my computer. These pictures start in the early 50's, several years before I was born. Watching them now on the big screen via Apple TV, it takes me back to a happy, carefree time. Not because I necessarily remember the picture being taken, (I was still pretty young in most of the pictures that have me in them) but I mostly remember the good times growing up when we would get out the slide carousels and projector and have a slide show in our living room. I can still remember the comments that we would make every time we saw certain pictures.

As I was looking at these pictures yesterday, the idea ran thru my mind that many of these pictures are blog-worthy. I am going to share some of them in the coming days. I hope you all enjoy. Since this is Easter weekend, today's theme will be Easter's of long ago.


I'm thinking (judging on the age of Randy) this may very well be the Easter of 1957. The date would have been April 21st that year. Donnetta looks like she is enjoying an Easter egg treat in her cheek, Cheryl seems to still be searching for one last treat in the grass.


Another photo of my two OLDER sisters. I love all the detail on their matching dresses. I'm sure my mother sewed them. She made most of our clothes growing up. Check out our car in the background. It's sweet!

It's also been fun for me to look at these pictures and notice the things in the background. Rexburg changed dramatically after the flood in '76, many of these pictures help me remember what Rexburg looked like when I was growing up.


I'm now an official member of the family. That is me, sitting on my mother's lap. Again, judging by ages, Sunday clothing, & spring looking weather, I think this might be Easter of 1959 (March 29th).

I want to add some of my kids Easter pictures from the 80's & 90's, so Brad, Em & Kimball can remember the days of their youth. I'm in the process of scanning some of those pictures right now, stay tuned for more....

Capturing the Flavor of Seattle

Yes Ryan, you were right. As soon as you walk off the plane at SEATAC, you can smell the coffee!

Here are some more photo's that we took over the weekend in Seattle.

Snoqualmie Falls, a short drive east of Seattle in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains. Salish Lodge & Spa is above the falls, on the left.


It was quite entertaining to stand & watch the fishmongers at the market.


Pike Place fish market


The gum wall - Post Alley


Close up section of the Gum Wall


Adding my contribution to the Gum Wall


Alki Point Lighthouse - West Seattle


This is Brian who works at the La Quinta in Everett where we stayed. Very friendly. We talked about the "Mormon's" with him. He was familiar with our religion, told us that he wrote a paper in college on the Seagull Miracle. He had a copy of the Book of Mormon & knew about Joseph Smith & Brigham Young who is on top of that church in Bellevue. (We were able to correct him & let him know that it's Angel Moroni on top of the Temple in Bellevue)




The tree branches were all covered in moss. It looks so neat, I took lots of pictures.



Barry! The reason we came to Seattle


It wouldn't be a trip to the coast without a bowl of clam chowder!


Fresh fruit market across from Pike Place.


Gary - I took this picture for you. We sampled some cheeses at the Farmers Market, but didn't buy any, because I didn't have any way to keep it cool.

Next, some interesting people we saw on the streets:

Cheryl asked this guy what his instrument was called. He told her a Piano. (???!)


We saw these two when we went to the Farmers Market in Ballard. A couple hours later we went back over to Pike Place, and Voila! There they were again.


We saw quite a few people dressed up on St. Patrick's day. This guy won the prize for being most "spiffy looking".


Nice hair! (complete with green St. Patrick's day flower)


This should bring back fond memories to all who went on the 2001 Alaskan Cruise.


Draw bridge that we waited at.


The space needle is so fun. Made me want to come home and watch old episodes of "The Jetson's"


Saw this quilt I liked in an antique store. I need to make one like it some day to use up some scraps.

More from the city of never ending rain

I finally have a little time that I can post more- it's early afternoon, not 2:00 am in the morning.

I didn't want to take the time the other nite to relearn how to post embedded video's. It was just too late. So here you go. Sorry, it's on the side. Turn your head. The concert was Barry fine. Our seats were 11 rows back on the floor, and mighty fine!



It's cold, and Rainy. Some other things that we have done: Farmers Market in Ballard, then back to Pike Place Market. It's much more fun when it's not closed down for the day. We had some wonderful clam chowder at Pike Place Chowder, located at 1530 Post Alley. (Note to family - my heart is still with Moe's in Newport Beach, OR)

Drove over to Mercer Island. Stopped to see the Seattle Temple on the way.




Tonight we are staying in Downtown Seattle, not far from the Space Needle. There is a break in the clouds right now, I can actually see sunshine out the window. It's time to go out for more adventure.

No Sleep for us in Seattle

I arrived in Seattle last nite along with my two sisters and my traveling companion Garmin. It's been a typical day in Seattle. Rain! Here's what it looked like when we woke up this morning and looked out the window of our motel that is just off I-5 in Everett:



Ever heard of Archie McPhee's? It's one of those places that you probably should visit at least once when you come to Seattle, just so you can say "been there, done that". We did find some fun items to buy - Maybe you will be the lucky recipient of one of these things in the near future. Go to their website and check them out.









This afternoon we went on the Underground tour. That was a lot of fun, and very interesting to learn about Seattle's early history.

If you want to know more about this, check out their website also! (Sorry, it's late, and I don't want to take the time to go into a lot of detail, so you are going to have to do your own homework if you wish to know more)


Here are some of the 'fine' folks that were on the tour with us. You can see some stuff hanging down from the top of the picture, is it moss growing down from the skylights that are in the sidewalks above (street level).


Then we walked down to Pike Place Market. Things were just closing up for the day, which was disappointing. I hope we will get another chance to go down there.


One of the flower markets we saw


I thought this was pretty, the flower boxes with daffodil's blooming in them.


Last stop of the evening! It's always fun to walk into a Trader Joe's. Here's something I purchased:


Here we are in the land of Starbucks - everyone you pass on the street has a cup of coffee in hand. Probably because it is so dang cold here, they need something to warm their hands & tummies. Trader Joe's had a HUGE assortment of coffee, and one little tiny section on the bottom shelf with this one brand of cocoa. I went back and looked a couple times before I finally even found the cocoa.


This picture has two stories. #1 - I bought this cute little mini daffodil at Trader Joe's. It's a fun touch of spring! #2 - We went to Albertsons to get a bottle of salsa to put on the omlets that they have on the continental breakfast here at the motel. Just inside the door at Albertson's is a self-serve place where you can buy coffee from a machine. We stood & looked at it, and decided it would be nice if we had some of those coffee cups for our hot chocolate. So we helped ourselves to a cup, lid, stirring stick, & little cardboard thingie to go around the cup. Tomorrow we will look just like every other person in Seattle!

Goodbye Winter

Last December 15, we had our first significant snowstorm of the season. The following morning I went out to get the paper, but it was no where to be found. It being buried somewhere under mounds of snow.



I'd been trying for about a year to get the newspaper person to put my newspaper by by back step, but apparently, that's too much effort for them. Their preferred delivery method is to toss my paper out their car window as they drive past. There was also no consistency to where the paper happened to land each morning. So much for customer service. This particular morning, I didn't even try to find it. I Just called and made them bring me another one. I did ask the lady when she brought me the new paper if I could "PLEASE" have my newspaper delivered onto the dry cement under the carport. (She was a new carrier). She was more than happy to tell me she could do that, and that was where she put it for two days. Since then it's just been thrown out on the end of the driveway. I give up! I delivered the Post Register for several years when I was a teenager, and can tell you story after story about how nasty & ornery people can be to newspaper carriers. I prefer not to be like one of those kind of people.

Early one morning this past week, I ventured out to gather up the paper and found that the last of the snow had finally melted and the long-lost missing paper was laying in plain sight out on the dead grass. I brought it in the house & took it out of the plastic bag. The date on the newspaper was December 16, 2008. Yep! that was the missing paper all right.

The past couple days have been warmer, so today I went out looking for spring in my yard. I found some very early signs!

Crocus blooming


Rhubarb poking up


Lilac bud's (thanks again Gary & Jenny for the Lilac bush hand-me-down)