Tom and I have reached our limits with running the Lake Chelan Boarding House for wayward teens. I don’t really like to cook and preparing meals for 15 plus people is my idea of purgatory. Our solution to this kitchen drudgery is genius—each of our three kids has their turn at a meal. How fun for them! Sort of like a new funny game. This of course includes, planning the meal, shopping, setting the table and of course, dish duty—no paper plates allowed and cold cereal does not make a meal. The first meal was rather tasty, teriyaki tri-tip, salad, and a fondue disguised as fettuccini.

My husband, Tom is a “regifter.” It’s the Christian thing. My thoughtful presents (to him) of Christmas past pop up like wayward boomerangs for the next celebration—baby shower or birthday, the occasion doesn’t matter. He is recycling. Recycling is big in our house.

T.I.T.S., a questionable acronym for “Thunder in The Sun,” a late summer festival held in Manson, Washington. Perhaps the acronym alone drew the two hundred or so Harley riders that surrounded us in the vast field next to the withered grass of barely playable MA-8 golf course.

Craig fancies himself a great fly fisherman as mosquitoes buzz around his head in Steheikan, Washington.

Husband and wife on a hiking trip . . . a humorous story about patience.

October in Seattle can be lovely, but most of the time it is cold and rainy. People here often try to escape the lake size puddles and the fifty-knot windstorms for a few days to a warmer climate. We often talk about vacationing on a “live aboard” dive boat, but fear we would be the laughing stocks of the boat, the perpetual scuba losers. Like skiing, I like to dive if the conditions are perfect. This is not asking a lot in a sunny clime where the diving is right outside your front door. But here, the diving is right outside the front door BUT the ocean with the “big crashing waves” are also right outside the front door.