A gorgeous Saturday called for a trip out SOMEWHERE. I’m at the point where long hikes are pretty much out of the picture for me… Those will have to wait now until after Baby Boy Springs arrives. We called up my parents to see if they wanted to get out and about and they said yes, but had to run an errand to Moses. We figured we’d go along with them, eat lunch in Moses, and then go for a short hike or walk somewhere.

We got lunch from one of our favorite haunts – Chinese takeout from Safeway, and took it over to the Japanese garden to eat. Unfortunately once we got there we saw signs posted that no food or drink was allowed (boo), but we just put out some beach towels on the grassy field outside the park and ate there. Evangeline is totally her parents’ daughter – she LOVES Chinese. :) Once she’s got eating with a spoon and fork down a little better, we’ll have to start her on chopsticks. :)

After lunch we walked around the Japanese garden (Tobin hadn’t been there before), saw the Koi (they were a big hit with Evangeline), then piled back into the car. We decided to drive the back roads to Soap Lake (out Stratford to Road 20). Tobin hadn’t been that exact way before, so it was pretty fun (and it’s been awhile since I’ve been out that way). Evangeline was just happy we were in Grandma and Grandpa’s car, and she thought all the livestock we passed was pretty neat too. :)

Stopped for coffee at Van’s in Soap Lake – unfortunately the woman totally botched our orders – Tobin and I paid for 20oz and got 16oz. Same with Daddy. He said something about it and she mentioned that she put more coffee in his. Whatever. Don’t know if I’ll go back – if I do I’m going to be a stickler about my drink, that’s for sure. :P

There’s actually a really nice walk/hike in Soap Lake over on the southwest side of the lake. Sam Israel apparently gave some land to the Boy Scouts (I can’t see that they use it that much), and there’s a road you can walk on for a bit along the water, and then it eventually goes to the water – and a pretty big concrete deck/platform above the water. It’s pretty nice. Easy enough for a very pregnant woman (though there is a tad of elevation gain, it’s not all flat). Evangeline LOVED going down to the water (there was a very small sandy shoreline – most everything was rock). She played in the sand and then hit her wall so to speak when we tried to head home. Tobin ended up carrying her most of the way back – except for when she wanted to walk (which was when Grandma got close enough to hold her hand).

It was a beautiful walk and I am sure we’ll do it again when we want to go for a short hike that’s close. It would be perfect to do after school sometime.

View all the pictures here.

Glory to God in the heavenly heights, Peace to all men and women on earth who please him. (Luke 2:14)

Merry Christmas 2010 and a very Happy New Year!

This has been quite a big year for us! Tobin received his Masters Degree in the Spring and completed his ninth year of teaching at Showalter Middle School in June. Evangeline turned one at the end of May and started walking this summer. Now she’s super busy and into everything. She keeps us on our toes! Tammie is still working for Biblesoft as their Senior Web Developer. She’s working half-time remotely (she’s been there seven years).

We had a good time this Spring exploring the Sound with Evangeline. Tobin backpacked her and we went all over the place including Tiger Mountain, Poo Poo Point, Dash Point, Carkeet Park, Cougar Mountain, Mercer Slough, Normandy Beach Park, Ripararin Forest, Saltwater State Park, Seahurst Park, and all the parks in Tukwila. It was a blast to get out of the house and hike as a family! :)

About a week after school ended, the High School Art job in Ephrata opened up (this was the first time it had been available in over 30 years!). Tobin applied for it immediately and by the end of the week he had the job. So rather than having the relaxing summer we were anticipating, we ended up spending the whole summer getting our house ready to sell. We did tons of yard work, and repainted the inside and outside of the house – all while moving our stuff to Ephrata. We listed the house at the end of the summer and moved to Ephrata right before school started for Tobin. Tammie is from Ephrata – and her parents and brother, along with his wife and daughter live here. Stephen and Heather were nice enough to open up their basement to us, so that’s where we’ve been living! :)  It’s actually been really fun all living together – Evangeline (19mos) loves Claire (8mos), and I’m not sure how they’ll handle it when our house eventually sells and we buy one of our own here in Ephrata.

We took a break from the house long enough this summer to go camping over the Fourth of July weekend (along with everyone else). We went to Dungeness Spit with Tobin’s family. Our huge new tent worked great and dwarfed everyone else’s. Not sure I’ll EVER camp with a baby again though. Evangeline couldn’t sleep in the tent, so of course neither could we. She did most of her sleeping when we were hiking or driving. One day we hiked the Spit – my GPS logged 10.5 miles that day – on SAND! I was a big jealous of Evangeline being able to catch a free ride. :) As if that wasn’t enough, the next day we drove out to Lake Ozette and hiked out to the water and back (8 miles). If you haven’t walked the board walk, beach and board walk at Lake Ozette, I HIGHLY recommend it! As a kid we just walked out to the water and back on the same boardwalk, but if you walk on the beach between the two boardwalks, you can see petroglyphs! That was pretty cool.

We took a bit of a break from hiking as we got our house ready to put on the market but there are definitely hiking opportunities here, and we’ve done a few – Beezley Hill, Caribou Trail, Douglas Creek, and Umatilla Rock. Once the temp started dropping and the snow started falling, we had to put away the baby backpacker – it’s just too cold to be outside for any length of time.

Right after we moved to Ephrata we discovered that we were expecting our second baby. We’ll find out the gender Dec 30 or thereabouts. We’re due May 24 -  four days after Evangeline’s second birthday. That’s going to be a really busy week for Tobin – that’s the week of Ephrata’s Fine Art Festival – of which Tobin will have a huge part. So he’s hoping that this baby comes a week late too. We’ll see about that! UPDATE (12/29): We just found out we’re having a boy on 5/23. :)

Well that about sums up our year. We wish you an amazing holiday season with family and friends!

Love,

Tobin, Tammie, Evangeline & Baby 2 (due 5/23)

We had Tobin’s family over for Mother’s Day at our house. Evangeline had a fun time being passed around. At one point we put out a beach towel on the grass and she was content to sit there – it was like her little island, no way did she want to touch the grass!

After eating, we thought it would be fun to walk Springbrook trail again. So we parked at the Waterworks Park top parking lot and walked through that, then walked the trail – it was a perfect length for a group of people. What a fun time.

View all the pictures here.

This was a relatively short and sweet morning trip down to Saltwater State Park in Des Moines.  Thanks to our GPS we drove right there (it really isn’t that far away from Biblesoft but I’d never been to this park before).

It was pretty windy, but we bundled up Evangeline in her jacket (and the lone mitten we could find), and walked down to the water, then along the path to the Northern boundary of the park (not very far at all). The path was paved, and there really wasn’t a lot of people (probably because we were there early enough and the weather wasn’t exactly warm).  Evangeline had a great time – and at the end of the walk when we pulled her out of her backpack, we snapped a few pictures (she was in a great mood).

She’s so adorable! I tried to pin back her hair, but it was so windy, that really didn’t last very long. :S

A few more pictures below – you can view all the pictures here.

Day two of  Tobin’s Winter Break! Today we visited the Washington Park Arboretum. Another park I’d visited in the past (with my family), but Tobin hadn’t been there.  I’ve just gotta say – I LOVE having GPS on our phones!  It makes these day trips that much easier as we don’t really have to worry about if we can find the place or not.  :)

We bundled up Evangeline and headed out around the park – there are a bunch of trails but we wanted to do a loop (which we did) out to the water and back.  It was pretty cool – because it was a weekday we pretty much had the park to ourselves! Out at the water there was a pretty sweet boardwalk set up through the marsh/wet areas.  I always think that is cool (reminds me of Lake Ozette which is REALLY cool and we might just have to go visit that this summer). Anyways, Evangeline had a blast – and we lucked out at the end of the park we found a bridge over 520 and enough sidewalks to get back to the car without having to backtrack.

Isn’t she sweet?  :) A few more pics below…