July

The activity day girls hiked flat top and Tom went as a chaperone and took these pictures. Celia still talks about that hike. She loved it so much.

Also in July, the Blue Angels came to town for the airshow. Instead of going out to base to watch the whole show, we went to the roof of a parking garage downtown to watch them fly over. It was the perfect compromise. Not to long. Not too loud. And no crowds at all.

Then it was dipnetting time. My favorite time of year! We arrived on a Wednesday evening and Tom got right in the water. He only caught 4, but they were gigantic. Each morning you can legally start fishing at 6am. I heard people talking about how they were catching, so I nudged Tom and we headed to the water. Tom caught 23 that morning in 2 hours! We filled up our coolers with gigantic fish and had to stop (even though the fish were still coming!). Our total for the year was 27 making 87 pouds of edible meat. The smallest fillet was 12oz and the biggest was 40oz (the biggest on record for us!). 

We all had an absolute blast. Celia proved she was a true Alaskan by being able to correctly identify the sex of all 27 salmon correctly. Sabrina proved her Alaskan roots by participating in the tradition of throwing the salmon eggs up into the air to watch the seagulls dive-bomb to grab them. 

This was also the first year that we had a real amount of raspberries. They're successfully taking over the garden. Last year we just got a handful, this year we got to enjoy eating them every time we played outside. The girls invented "summer sushi" where they wrap a raspberry in kale or lettuce or spinach.

Before and After Britain

Before we went to the UK in 2016 (two years behind...), we hung out in Seattle with the stocks. Ted had an old tube big screen TV that came with the house that no longer worked, but he found out that there is a giant Fresnel inside the tube TV, so he took it apart and framed the lens so they could play with it. They lit all sorts of fires, broke the birdbath, and cooked one tiny part of an egg. It was very hot, but only in one tiny place so instead of cooking things or roasting marshmallows, it would just burn a tiny spot really fast. But everyone had a fun time with Science in the Summer with the Stocks!

After the UK, we headed to the Trusty family reunion in Oceanside, OR with Marel's family. We did the annual photo in the mini loaf van and eating ice cream and the kids played themselves silly at the beach.

Oceanside has a parade each year for the 4th of July. The only requirement to be in it is to meet at the top of the hill at 10am. The Trusty kids always make a big showing.

Then we got to watch the fireworks from one of the cousin's rental houses. And Tom spent the evening capturing the fireworks. He was able to put together this pretty amazing picture from what we saw.

Kids Art End of School 2018

Here we are catching up on all the kids art for the year. Enjoy the file dump and the kids comments on their own artwork:

Caleb's Art:

"That's me. That's ME. Oh. That's um, Keenan."

"It's a guy with a little egg-snapping hand and a big egg-snapping hand. I did it at Church with Celia. Celia helped me. Celia drawed the legs and I drawed the rest of it."

"I remember drawing that. That guy is me and with swirly hands like this (flapping his hand fast). Windy hands like this hand (still flapping). This hand makes wind."

"I colored it with crayons. It's a person that is little. I made it from the Greatest Showman. It's a little guy. The little guy is from The Greatest Showman."

"That's one of the climbing rocks (Brimham Rocks in England). What are they called. Oh! Brinham Rocks."

"That's a poky dinosaur! With cleats on it. Cleats are poky things on dinosaurs. I mean, that's Alaska with me in Alaska!"

"That's a twirling guy like this (twirling). He's twirling on his tippy toes like this (twirling then falling). Oh! I tripped. I will try not to fall this time (twirling). I didn't fall that time! I will try it on the other tippy toe! I will try it on both!..."

"That's Keenan. I made that the day before this day. I did make that the day BEFORE this day. But then that glue dried! That glue did. I made it after the bath at Mommy time. I mean at art time with Mommy."

"That is what I made with Church. I made me again with hair here (head), hair here (shoulders), hair (legs), hair here here here here. Hair everywhere. Even on our foots."

Sabrina's Art:

"That's a baby horse from Felicity, an American Girl."

"This is a fire-breathing chicken."

"A Ballet Pig."

"A Fingerprint Star."

"A baby bird."

"A Pirate Ship."

"Another horse from Felicity."

"A deer in the winter. And a crow that's scared of nothing. (It was going to be a background for a scarecrow Thanksgiving decoration in the fall and the crow was going to be scared of it.)"

"A drawing of Pocahontas."

"A picture of Bushy - a McDonald's toy that I got."

"A picture of my family."

"A PJ Masks of 2 of the nighttime villains. I couldn't get it done."

"These are the PJ Masks. I drew it for Caleb because he likes PJ Masks."

"This is my alien chef."

Marel comment: I had to add this one because this is totally Sabrina's humor. She invented a weird looking guy that shoves candy in your mouth when you stick your finger up its nose and your toe in its ear...? :)

Celia's Art:

"That's the leaf that I made at school for fall."

"That's my Halloween costume selfie."

"This is a family of elf sisters that control the seasons and they each have their own pet."

"That one wasn't even... I never even finished that!"

Marel comment: I love the dynamics of these two and this picture captures it so well. Caleb acts totally different with Celia than he does with Sabrina. With Sabrina he's wrestle and be crazy. With Celia he will calmly hold her hand and do anything she says.

"It's a comic strip that I drew."

 "That's a little timeline of an elf in a story that I was supposed to write in third grade."

"That's my Seussy art that I entered into a Seuss art competition."

"That's my square art."

"My unicorny, doggy, dragony, monster. It's Chinese."

"That's my birdhouse picture and I painted the sky with watercolor and I painted the houses with normal paint and the birds are collage."