Christmas Forest

Every year we go to the Red Lion Hotel to view the Christmas Forest as part of a fundraiser for Providence St. Peter's Foundation.  The trees this year were beautiful as always. 

Polar Bear theme

Teddy Bear theme

The girls in front of the Sock Monkey themed tree.

American Girl tree

Puppy theme

Nutcracker Theme

Sock puppet wreath

Scott & I by the Mistletoe tree.

Penguin theme

Corey in front of the Snoopy themed tree.  This was my favorite.

Santa tree.   Somehow Scott's name got put on the good children list........mighty suspicious!

Later that evening we put up our Christmas tree.  This was Gabby's year to put on the angel.

Christmas Lights

On Friday the blustery weather we've been having finally went away so we decided to take advantage of this small reprieve and put up our Christmas lights.  As always it involved a lot of digging through boxes, untangling stings of lights, frustration, arguing, and debate.  Ah, Christmas!

Gabby deciding where to put the lighted penguins.

Scott manning the staple gun.  He managed to shoot me in the hand with it.  Luckily it wasn't my eye.

Corey giving advice.

On to the fence....

Corey was determined to write "Ho,Ho,Ho" on the fence with the lights.  She did a good job!

Here I am putting more lights up on that sad wood-pecked tree.

Twanoh State Park Hike

Another Yoh!tastic hiking adventure today at Twanoh State Park.  Click HERE to see pics & video from today's hike.

Puyallup Volksmarch (#16)

Today we completed another 5k volksmarch in Puyallup.  This was the 4th one in Puyallup this year.  As usual it was very unexciting, but at least we finished before the rain started thanks to Jared & Jennifer who made us walk quickly.  Afterwards we had lunch at Applebee's then stopped by Krispy Kreme for donuts on the way home. Not a bad way to spend a cold & windy Saturday morning.

Jared, Jennifer, Susan, Clarissa & Corey

Corey at Applebee's

Staircase Rapids Hike

Today Pam & I hiked at Staircase Rapids.  The skies poured on us, but we still had a wonderful time!  Click HERE to check out pictures from today.

Kennedy Creek

I hope everyone enjoyed that extra hour of sleep last night.  I know I did!  We woke to fog which eventually turned to sun.  It was surprising because they had forecast rain today.  So to enjoy our short reprieve we headed down to Kennedy Creek to see if we could spot some salmon heading upstream.  We did manage to see a few.   It's pretty amazing to be able to see the salmon spawning just a short drive from home.

The Chum variety of salmon return to this creek every year.

It was hard to get a clear picture of the salmon because my camera kept focusing on the closer items (ferns/trees).  You can see in the middle a long gray blob in the water...that's the salmon.

Two salmon in this picture.





The Three Little Pigs, Revisited

For her language arts class project, Gabby was given some wooden toothpicks.  She had to create something out of them & then write a story about it.  She decided to make a stick house and then re-wrote the story of the three little pigs....

Once upon a time, there were three little pigs. After they all “became of age,” their dear mother, although she loved them very much, kicked them out of the house. The poor, uneducated pigs were forced to build their own homes. However, each would live in a separate house, for these three musketeers never got along.

Now, I know you know the rest of the story. One built a house of straw, one built a house of sticks, and one built a house of bricks. But that’s where the famous tall tale goes wrong. You see, the “big bad wolf,” wasn’t actually big and bad. On the contrary, he was the pigs’ best friend. The group did everything together: played racquetball, rode bikes, walked to school. They were inseparable.

Around the time the pigs were becoming independent, the wolf…let’s just say he was having some problems. He was having nightmares every night, and he just couldn’t shake them.

So one night, he asked the pigs to come over. After explaining his predicament to his friends, they agreed to help him. The game plan was set, everything was arranged. Obstacles were tackled in advance and boundaries established.

That night, after the wolf fell asleep, the pigs turned on the television to stay awake. After about an hour, there was a loud growl from behind them. The wolf had “awoken.” Actually, he was still deep asleep, having another nightmare. During his nights of restless sleeping, he had taken to sleepwalking.  The pigs sprang into action. Plan Whatever’s-Going-With-Wolfie-Must-End was put into action.

The pigs knew at once that their friend the wolf was sleepwalking. Immediately, they set the traps. Bubble wrap laid out in the hallway to the front door, a bucket of cold water that would drench whoever twisted the doorknob, bright spotlights to shine in the escapees face.

The brothers knew never to wake a sleepwalker, so they crouched in the corner of Wolfie’s living room, intently gazing at their sleeping friend.  Wolfie was in such a deep sleep that all of their booby traps were useless. The bubble wrap’s loud popping was ineffective, the cold water unsuccessful, the spotlights of no use. He proceeded to walk down the driveway and up the street, towards the three brothers’ homes. The pigs raced after him.

Once the wolf reached the first brother’s house of straw, he began to huff and puff. Then, BOOM! His sneeze blew the place down.  “No!” cried the first brother.

Wolfie raced on, the pigs close behind. “No more houses shall be lost tonight,” the first brother proclaimed.
Eventually, the foursome reached the second brother’s house of sticks. The wolf began to huff and puff and CRASH! The house collapsed on itself.  “No!” cried the second brother.

Wolfie began to race off down the street once again. “Quick! We must follow!” yelled the third brother. He did not want his house to be demolished, too.  As the wolf reached the third brother’s house of bricks, he began to huff and puff. But there was no KABLAMMY! No bellow of protest. The house of bricks withstood the wolf’s sneeze.

The rest of the story is fairly obvious. The three little pigs, naturally, were quite upset with their friend the wolf. After he awoke, they called the police, and, like the backstabbers they were, had Wolfie put on trial. Luckily for Wolfie, he was found innocent and eventually cured of his horrible nightmares.  Unfortunately, our four characters never made up. And, most likely, never will.