1. Laura's brother Val and his family came for a visit from the Netherlands. The girls really enjoyed meeting their cousins. Here is a shot of Carina at a Mariners baseball game at Safeco Field in Seattle during their visit.
Carina and Gavin at the ballpark.
2. We enjoyed our weekly visits to our local CSA farm to pick up fresh fruits and vegetables and to play on the farm. The girls have been in "farm school" once a week, helping the farmer pick vegetables, move cattle and other farming chores. They also got to swim in the Snoqualmie River, which runs through the farm. Here is Natalie looking at the pigs. I'm not sure who was dirtier: Natalie or the pigs.
3. We went for a hike on Tiger Mountain, which is only three miles from our home. Once again we didn't see any tigers on the mountain. Fortunately, Natalie didn't cry about it this time. We hiked along this trail, which was crowded with ferns and blueberry bushes.
4. Lachlyn has discovered the world of solid foods! She has tried rice cereal, sweet potatoes, bananas, peaches and peas. We introduced peas for the first time today and she wasn't sold on them at all. Maybe she'll warm up to them tomorrow.
5. We went on a day trip yesterday out to the Olympic peninsula to visit the Olympic Game Farm in Sequim and to hike along Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park.
The game farm lets you drive unescorted around the fields where buffaloes, elk, deer, zebras, yaks, alpacas and peacocks live, and you can buy bread to feed them. The animals walked right up to our car and ate bread out of our hands. Carina and Natalie learned first hand that buffaloes have really bad breath and aweful table manners. There are also bears, lions, tigers, cougars, wolves, coyotes, bobcats, etc in cages. Some of the bears are former trained Holywood movie bears; if you wave to them, they'll wave back!
Hurricane Ridge is a ridge at the top of a mountain that rises up 5,500 feet from Port Angeles, which is a town in the middle of the north end of the Olympic peninsula. Looking out to the north from the ridge you can see Port Angeles, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Vancouver Island. Looking out to the south you can see a wide swath of the Olympic mountains, including Mount Olympus. Lachlyn really seemed to enjoy the hike, as you can tell from her face.
The view to the North.
Views to the South.
6. Lachlyn is mobile!
And not only can she drive the car, she can crawl! She mostly army crawls, but she can get up on her knees and move a little too. Right now she only crawls to reach things that are within a few feet in front of her, but it won't be long before she's cruising around the house serving as our very own cute little Roomba. She's already shown to us that we'll need to start vacuuming and sweeping constantly or she'll do it for us.
7. And a couple random moments from the month:
We caught Natalie "brown-handed" eating chocolate chips that she had pilfered from the bag in the freezer. As if we wouldn't notice. At least she had a good time.
Milkmen of the world, beware! You never know what might be lurking in that little box.
