Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Weigh anchor and hoist the mizzen or ye be a son of a biscuit eater!

Our good friend from LeTourneau, Jamie Zaehring and his wife, Michelle came to visit us for four days over the weekend. It was lovely. It would have been nice if the kids (and then us) weren't sick with colds, but we made the best of it. A huge shout out to the Lobner family who drove a long way to watch our sick kids while they had family visiting so we could go somewhere respectable for dinner with the Zaehrings. We have a deal where Ben teaches their oldest guitar in exchange for free babysitting. We LOVE this bartering system, it definitely meets a need for us.
Jamie made us lots of good food and they graciously tried my spicy Indian food. It was fun to have late night talks with friends and dream of living near each other in the Puget Sound. Six years ago, Jamie took me and Ben on a sailboat trip there. I've been all over the world, but this vacation, to the Puget Sound in Washington state was my favorite. Although I can't swim and large bodies of water scare me a bit, I found heaven in the slow rocking of the sailboat as we fell asleep at night. I learned about phosphorescence the tiny glowing plankton in the water that lit up when disturbed. The two others (shown above) that joined us on our sailing trip went on a paddle boat ride one evening after dark and every time they pushed their oars through the water they left a glowing path behind them. It was like a fairytale!

We sang sea shanties and practiced our pirate vocabulary. Whales followed our boat, we ate crab and fish that was alive two minutes previous and I bought a cool alpaca bag that is still my favorite duffel. I'm pretty sure the older Clifford series on PBS was based on the little islands off the coast of Washington, like Friday Harbor where Jamie grew up, you should watch it sometime. It's a charmed life on the islands and I can't wait to go back someday, maybe to stay!

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