Category Archives: Travel

The Best of the Birds

When our family of ten were in Arizona we enjoyed our time at the Wildlife World Zoo and Aquarium.

Not a problem for our time at the park.

Addy did not appreciate some of the animal odors.

Posting all our Arizona adventures for our family archives.

On Thursday we drove south to Spokane to buy a new toilet for our Master Bath. Besides the Home Depot we shopped at Hobby Lobby, Total Wine and Costco. On our trip south we listened to a sermon from Grace Community Church by John MacArthur. 2020 Clarity. We found it encouraging. We returned home and our new toilet was installed before 6 PM! Thank you Dear!! Friday evening and Saturday morning Dear and I are attending a marriage seminar at our church here in Colville.

Hope you all have a great weekend.

Arizona Log Ride

We had planned on a family trip to Disneyland this year but plans changed and it worked out to have a family week in Arizona instead. This isn’t the log ride at Disneyland but it was just right for our almost 4 year old, Addy. This ride was at the Wildlife World Zoo and Aquarium.

 

It was a fun way to end our time at the Wildlife park…being a little wild!

Arizona Getaway

We flew away from Washington State to Arizona for a family birthday getaway. For the record we wore masks at the airport and masks on the plane. Here we are flying over the Grand Canyon. So much going on with our family bubble.

Our son and his partners have this fabulous Arizona getaway that we are enjoying.

Our daughter and daughters in law enjoying the poolside.

Today we visited the Wildlife World Zoo and Aquarium in Litchfield, Arizona and we got to feed some giraffes! Amazing. More animal photos to follow soon when time permits! Masks were worn at the Wildlife center.

Lunchtime at the Wildlife park.

Today is our daughter-in-law’s birthday, tomorrow is our middle son’s birthday and Tuesday is our oldest son’s birthday. Many celebrations are afoot!

Time to Party Hodgepodge

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It’s Wednesday so it’s time to answer the Hodgepodge questions from our gracious hostess Jo From This Side of the Pond. 

1. What advice would you give yourself as we begin this new year?

I’ll borrow this paragraph from our Christmas letter and say continue doing this!

“We are digging deep in our Bibles and some trusted commentaries, soaking up the Truth of the Gospel and asking God to increase our faith and our love for God the Father, Jesus Christ the Son who is our Lord and Savior, and the Holy Spirit who is our Comforter. We don’t want the ‘oil in our lamps’ to be nonexistent when the “Bridegroom” returns.

2. If you could throw a themed party for yourself what would the theme be?

Oh how I love a themed party! I’ll choose a British Pub Party with all the trimmings and don’t forget the bunting!

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Way back in November of 2013 we put on a British Pub dinner party as a thank you to our friends who let us use their parents home in Cornwall for a few nights on our trip to England in September of 2013. We traveled with our son Josh and DIL Laura.  It was so much fun to try to turn our home into a British Pub. We called it The Three Birds Pub and I added the link to my post if you’d like to see our old house converted to a pub.

3. Tell us where you were and something about what life was like when you were 20- 21.

I was living in my parents’ home in La Mirada, California. I was commuting to college at Cal-State L.A. completing my degree in Home Economics with a fifth year program of student teaching to earn my Elementary (K-8) Teaching credential. I was working part-time for Montgomery Ward at their appliance servicing center. In late Spring of 1972 when I was 21, I met Dear who was part of a Christian Band that my best friend auditioned for. The band toured England that summer. When they returned they needed to replace an alto and I auditioned for the group and became part of the band. Something sparked between Dear and me and we went on our first of many dates in October of 1972.

4. What’s on the menu at your house this week?

What menu? We fly by the seat of our pants.  It might be high time I planned for a week. I know that part of our meal on Tuesday will be artichokes and a Caesar salad with leftover chicken. On Wednesday I think I’ll pick up a couple curry dishes from ‘Thai to Go’ since I’ll be in town for a portion of the day. Red Curry for Dear and Yellow Curry for me. We do have a birthday dinner party planned for Sunday evening in honor of Dan and Jamie who both have birthdays soon. I’ll let them choose the entre they would like.

5. What should you do more of this year?

Walk

Less of?

Wasting time…

6. Insert your own random thought here.

21 and in love…

Thank you Lord for creating us as man and woman and loving us and sustaining our love all these years!

Coeur D’Alene Resort

When we checked into the resort we were informed that they had given us an upgrade to a room with a partial lake view. This was our partial view and we enjoyed it. Our room was on the 17th floor with only the Penthouse above us. Sunday was a beautiful day.

As the sun was setting…

We enjoyed our restaurant experience at Beverly’s on the 7th floor of the resort. We started with Calamari. I ordered a salad and French Onion Soup and Dear ordered the Rib-Eye and shared some of the meat with me.

 

This over the top ice cream surrounded by cotton candy arrived at our table with Happy Anniversary wishes.

After my dessert drink arrived our server informed us that our meal had been paid for by our children. They had called the restaurant ahead of time to arrange that. We were so surprised and grateful for their thoughtfulness. Brought tears to my eyes.

After dinner we got our coats and gloves on to go out and walk along the docks to enjoy the extensive Christmas lights that the Resort puts up. It was well below freezing so we kept walking with few pauses.

The following collages will give you an idea of what we saw.

The interior of the hotel was nicely decorated as well.

This could be a good alternative for a Santa photo in this year of no sitting on Santa’s lap.

On Tuesday morning we watched the sun come up or tried to see the sunrise but soon the fog rolled in and socked us in. These two shots of the water taxi and looking east toward Montana were the clearest shots of the morning.

The hotel staff and restaurant staff all wore masks. Overall our Anniversary was wonderful and it was refreshing to get a night away and to be served a delicious meal in a fine restaurant.

On our drive home we made a few stops at HomeGoods, Harbor Freight, and TJMaxx.

Thank you to everyone for all your kind Anniversary wishes.

Ever Lovin Saturday…

Looking back to some photos dating back to 2009. Our daughter at Forest Lawn in Glendale. Hoping we all can travel to the end of the maze we are on and come out better than we were before. If you find yourself in Southern California sometime in the future a trip to Glendale Forest Lawn will afford you lots of great art.

The statue of David with a little perspective on just how huge it is.

Indeed!

These 5 photos are just a taste of what you can see.

Hope you all have a great Saturday.

Over the Columbia and Through the Cascades…

…to fa-mi-lies homes we go.

We arrived at sister Lana’s and BIL Steve’s house about 5:30 in the afternoon on Monday the 5th of October where dinner would be delivered by the family crew staying at our son Josh and DIL Laura’s.  My sister Kathy’s family was staying at Josh and Laura’s home. My brother Leonard’s family would be staying at Steve and Lana’s for their time on that side of the mountains. I would be staying with our daughter Katie and her hubby Andrew.

Our crew that drove the 400 miles brought a special cabbage salsa our Daughter in law Jamie made for our meal together. We all enjoyed it with chips as an appetizer. Sadly our Colville kids could not make the trip this time around. Addy was disappointed that I would be seeing Auntie LoLo but she could not. Everyone found a spot to sit and enjoy their chili, cornbread, honey butter, and fruit salad.

This was the beginning of several days packed with activities, meals together and many good conversations.

Regrouping

Back home after spending a few days on the “Coast” with all these loved ones. It took me seven hours to get home on Thursday with a couple stops at Home Depot and Costco in Spokane. I’m a bit slow in the brain but I hope to be refreshed soon to share some of the joy that has been experienced this past week.

At the RV Park

Last Thursday we met up with my brother’s family at the Tamarack RV Park in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho for an overnight before we guided them up to our home. It was so good to finally see them in person. The last time we were together was at our Pop’s funeral in 2018.

We were impressed with all the steps that need to be taken to settle a RV in.

Andrew was excited to show me his skateboarding skills.

We made a quick trip to Costco and brought in a meal of Rotisserie Chicken, Mac n Cheese, Caesar salad and fresh baked bread. We had the meal together in the cabin that Dear and I rented in the same RV park.

Me and my brother.  I’m #4 in our sibling order and my brother Leonard is #8. There’s a twelve year difference in our ages.

We all made it safely to Colville and the Reflection will be parked in our front acres for a few weeks before my brother’s family leaves for their journey south through Oregon and California.

While they are in Washington they will travel without the RV to a couple of our National Parks and of course get their obligatory family selfie photo in front of the Capital building in Olympia. They are trying to see as many National Parks as they can and they are also trying to make it to the capital of each state they visit. While on the West side of the Cascades they are staying with our sister Lana and her husband. Leonard and Lana are twins.

More to come from our time in Colville and the Western part of Washington.

I’m on the road again today so I won’t be participating in the Wednesday Hodgepodge.