More Snow

The snow has continued slowly but surely over the past few days. Nothing has melted, so it just keeps accumulating. We have shoveled the patio and front walk a couple of times, and it just keeps coming back. I would say we have between 10-12 inches, though it is hard to tell from the pictures.

This one is from the second story of our home looking into the backyard. The wall is 10 feet tall.


This one is looking over the wall at the safeway parking lot behind our house.

Winter Wonderland

We don't get a lot of snow in the Portland Metro area, our specialty is rain. Once in awhile though, things line up just right and a cold front coincides with some moisture. Over the past week, the weather hasn't been able to decide what it wants to do. It's been cold and dry, warmer and wet, it has even snowed, but just hasn't piled up yet. Well, last night it started snowing big fluffy flakes and it was cold enough to stick!! It has been snowing off and on most of the day today and we have about 5" of snow by 5:00 pm Saturday night. It's still snowing, but is supposed to turn into freezing rain sometime tonight. To many areas of the country, snow is just a fact of life and something to deal with every year. To us, it's just plain fun!

Amy demonstrates how to use a poor man's snowboard.
















Matthew is up next...
















Matthew contemplates his next run down the driveway...



December 20, 2008

Miracles do happen!

3 months ago, if you asked 100 people how much they thought gasoline would cost at Thanksgiving, I will guarantee you not a single one would have been close. No one thought it would EVER get below $2.00/gallon again. I guess it goes to show you what a struggling economy and the recent near $5.00/gallon gas prices can really do. Where will it go from here? Will it go back up to where it peaked once the economy recovers? I don't know, but I do know that if we begin consuming oil like we used to, OPEC will surely make us pay.

Certainly not the cheapest gas, but it illustrates the sub-$2.00/gallon prices.

Sharp Shooter

Boys will be boys.....Some of the best memories I have growing up were from living in the country and heading out into the woods with bb/pellet guns, bows and arrows and even .22 caiber rifles and pistols. Those were the days......My friend Pat and I would spend countless hours out in the woods on his parent's property and other nearby woods seeing how much fun we could have with our guns and bows. You can imagine my delight when Matthew came home from cub scout day camp just over a year ago and couldn't stop talking about his chance to shoot the BB guns and the bows. His face just lit up when he would tell Karen and I about shooting. Memories from my childhood flooded back as he shared his passion for shooting. I knew then that it wouldn't be long before I would have the opportunity to spend time with Matthew shooting guns and bows. We spent some time going to a local archery shop to try out some bows and seeing if the time was right to get into archery. In the end, we decided it was a better time to get a couple of bb/pellet guns. On Christmas day 2007, Matthew and I both unwrapped new rifles. It wasn't long before we were out in the backyard taking our first shots. We both used Matthew's gun and video taped our first shots. You might be surprised at the results.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3FFUM-yJH4
It was no fluke, Matthew spent many bb's that day and since then, and he is an excellent shot. As you can see, our backyard is no endless acres of woods, but it will do for now.

Fishy, fishy.....

For the past couple of years, I've had the opportunity to go out on the Washington coast and do some salmon fishing and a bit a crabbing. We always go during the second week of August. We head out to the coast the evening before we are going fishing and the next morning at O'Dark thirty, we are on the boat, heading out to sea. There are generally about 8-10 of us and the charter boat can handle 16. It's nice not having a full boat!

First, we catch the fish.....

Then the deckhand cleans the fish...(Don't worry, we tipped him well!)

On the way in, we pull up the crab pots and see what crawled in.....

Generally, we were pretty lucky and the crab were plentiful. Very tasty too!

This crab insisted on having his picture taken with me..... :)

Time to get started

I've wanted to start a blog for quite a while now, but just haven't pulled the trigger. Well, now that fall is here and the weather is colder and wetter, I guess it's time to get started. The title of my blog---Pacific Northwet is not a typo. It just seems fitting.

The kids started school just over a month ago. Here are pictures we took on their first day of school.

Amy is now in middle school and in 6th grade.















Matthew is now in 4th grade.