Tag Archives: Spokane

Sunday at the Feis

Auntie Lolo captured some great stills…

 

This dance competition was a ‘shuffle’ where the dancers are grouped with dancers from other schools of dance that they’ve never danced with before. Addy’s group earned a third place for their performance together.

This was the final dance of day.

What a enjoyable Feis. It was great toe be together to cheer for our Addy!

Uncle and Auntie flew in on Saturday morning and flew back home Sunday afternoon.

Some of us gathered for lunch at an Irish Pub just down the street from the convention center before we dropped Josh and Laura off at the airport. It was a appropriate finale to our Irish Dance Weekend!

I had just enough time to recuperate from our busy dancing weekend and now I’m on a plane today to Southern California for a Bridal Shower! It will be another weekend where I’m absent in bloggy world. September has been and will end as the busiest month in a long time for me. I’m leaving the PNW in the Summer and returning on the first day of Fall!

Saturday at the Feis

First there were some soft shoe reels and jigs.

A quick shoe change and it was time for the hard shoe dances.

Here are Addy’s people who came out to watch this time around.

The first day of Feis At the Falls was in the books for our crew. Sunday would be another morning filled with dancing.

We all drove to a great Mexican spot, Birriería El Sazón Spokane on Sprague in Spokane Valley for our lunch. Addy was the most famished of all of us after all her nonstop dancing and shoe changes! We highly recommend this spot but beware…the portions are huge!

Back at the hotel there was an afternoon of swimming before the crew landed in our room for Charcuterie that Dan and Jamie hauled to Spokane in their trusty cooler. It was quite a spread that we all enjoyed including home made pickles, sourdough and summer sausage!

The orange watermelon from a friend’s farm was so delicious!

We had a nice large corner room in the hotel so it was comfortable to gather and enjoy each others company before we called it a night. An early night since our little dancer would be on stage bright and early on Sunday.

Since our hotel room only had 3 chairs available both Josh and Dan rolled the office chairs from their rooms to our room for our gathering. Josh and Laura were 9 floors up from us and Dan and Jamie were 5 floors up from us so they made quite a sight rolling their chairs and the cooler down the elevators and down the hall to our room!

The littles decided they would ride on their way back to their rooms.

Uncle is always ready to accommodate these two.

 

Spokane

We just returned home from 3 days in Spokane. It is Sunday evening and I have little energy and less creativity to compose a post for Monday. I’ll leave you with this fountain on Spokane Falls Blvd. We walked by this fountain on our way to the restaurant where we enjoyed a meal Friday evening. Our Saturday and Sunday were all about the Annual Deirdre Abeid Memorial Feis hosted by Haran School of Irish Dance. Our granddaughter is part of the Haran School of Irish Dance.

Soon I’ll share what we experienced on Friday in Spokane and then I’ll share about our family time at the Feis on Saturday and Sunday.

We had a nice hotel room with some sunset views that we enjoyed.

I have not been visiting blogs since we left on Friday. I hope to catch up soon.

Have a great new week.

 

Along the Road

On Saturday we made a trip to Spokane for some big store shopping. On our way home we stopped in Deer Park for a meal at Master’s Brewhouse. We had their Teriyaki Rice Bowl and their soup of the day. The rice bowl was delicious and especially the fresh Asian spiced coleslaw. It’s hiding under the chicken. The soup of the day was a Mexican corn chowder. We always enjoy their soup of the day.

Along the highway from our lunch stop there were some sunflower fields and we pulled off to enjoy some closer views. The fields were a little past their prime but it was a nice sight nevertheless.

 

From the fields we continued north into Chewelah. We are still basking in the views without smoke.

This mural honoring Veteran’s is on the front of the American Legion building in Chewelah right on the highway. We get a good view when stopped at the one signal in the whole town.

We continued home and enjoyed a quiet evening.

On Sunday we had a great morning church service and then a relaxing afternoon and evening at home.

Happy Monday to you all.

Spokane Celebration

We gathered together to celebrate these two at the Rusty Moose in Spokane.

We enjoyed our meal and our time together.

This little guy had a cavity filled before our lunch time celebration so his smile was a little off kilter. He did great for the procedure but wasn’t a fan of the numbness and the ‘weird’ feeling as the novacaine wore off.

The restaurant that we gathered at was in the neighborhood of the airport so Greg and I took the opportunity to stop at the airport before our lunch and apply for our TSA Pre-check. It was a smooth process and we are happy to have it done.

Handel’s Messiah 2025

On Friday November 21st, I joined three ladies from our church for a trip to Spokane to hear Handel’s Messiah performed by Spokane Symphony and Chorale. The Performance by the orchestra and chorale was hosted by the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist.

Handel’s Messiah is an oratorio that tells the story of Jesus Christ through three parts: his birth and miracles, his passion and death, and his final glorification in heaven. Composed rapidly in 24 days by George Frideric Handel in 1741, the work uses verses from the King James Bible. Charles Jennens wrote the libretto, or text, (not Handel) comprising passages from the Bible. It premiered in Dublin in 1742 as a benefit concert and has since become a holiday staple known for its religious narrative and powerful choruses, like the famous “Hallelujah” chorus.

Messiah was originally conceived as a work for Easter, and its world premiere was given during Lent.

In July of 1741, Charles Jennens, who had written the libretti for two of Handel’s oratorios wrote the following in a letter to a friend–the earliest mention of Messiah:

“Handel says he will do nothing next Winter, but I hope that I shall persuade to set another Scripture collection I have made for him, and perform it for his own Benefit in Passion week. I hope that he will lay out his whole Genius and Skill upon it, that the Composition may excell all his former Compositions, as the Subject excells every other Subject. The Subject is Messiah…”Few masterworks of Baroque music can rival Handel’s Messiah for its eternal popularity.”

We found our general admission seats and then we wandered about the cathedral which included climbing the spiral staircase to the gallery below the Rose window and some of the pipes of the organ.

While Messiah is a large-scale oratorio that takes almost 3 hours to perform in its entirety, it is not Handel’s longest work.

Few masterworks of Baroque music can rival Handel’s Messiah for its eternal popularity.

The U.S. premiere of the complete Messiah was performed by the Handel and Haydn Society on Christmas Day in 1818 at Boylston Hall in Boston.

I’m adding a couple YouTube videos to give you a hint of what we heard.

No. 17. Chorus: Glory to God

The presentation we enjoyed did not perform all 53 movements in the original Messiah but performed 45 of the 53. The Hallelujah Chorus is movement #44.

The performance on Friday did end with the last movement, No. 53 Chorus: Worthy is the Lamb that was slain.

Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed us to God by His blood, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. Blessing and honour, glory and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever. Amen. [Revelation 5:12, 13]

It was a grand location to enjoy this God honoring, Christ proclaiming Oratorio. Hallelujah to our Risen Savior!

I was thankful that Bethany drove for the majority of miles and that I only had about 5 miles to drive home at the end of our evening.  I pulled into our garage at midnight! That is late for me.

In October of 2017, Greg and I ventured off of our usual route from Kenmore to Colville to view this church. We were pleased to find the doors open so we could explore the inside of the church. Click here to see this beautiful cathedral and some of the stained glass windows.

 

A Full Saturday

Our first event of the day was Addy’s basketball game.

Those dribbling skills are really coming along this year.

After lunch we piled into our vehicle with Dan doing the driving for the rest of the day.  We were headed to Spokane for an afternoon performance of the Nutcracker. Granny Great bought the tickets as a Christmas present for each of us.

As soon as the show began there were no more photos. The sets and performances were top notch.

Addy appreciated the dance moves and JJ enjoyed the more acrobatic part of the show. We all enjoyed the show and were ready for dinner. We managed the extra traffic leaving the show and all gathered for dinner in North Spokane.

At dinner our selfie taker, Addy, stepped in for Auntie Lolo since Auntie was on the other side of the mountains.

Since it was a long day these two started fading and needed cuddles with mom.

We got home at bedtime for most of us! Thankful for safe travels there and back again.

It was a full day and we were thankful for good times with family and friends of family.

A Day in the Life

Joyce From This Side of the Pond made this announcement; “ I’m hosting a link up here for anyone interested in sharing a Day In The Life post. These are always fun to read and help us remember all the ways we’re connected as we go about the everyday ordinary business of living. Hope you’ll join us! 

Joyce’s plan going forward is to do these seasonally, so maybe four a year.  Watch for the next date sometime in the early part of 2026.

This is the first she’s hosting and my first endeavor. I chose to share the events of my day on Veterans Day, November 11, 2025 which was Tuesday. I took a couple of the morning photos on Wednesday which show accurately what happened on Tuesday, too.

Up at 5am and my dear hubby makes my coffee when he sees my groggy face walk in.

Our Bunn coffee maker excels at a fast brew time.

Coffee in hand this is my morning first stop. Yep it’s still o’dark’thirty outside.

The rest of these photos were taken on Tuesday, A Day in the Life. 🙂

I had an early eye appointment in Spokane and we set out from our home at 7am. It was a foggy drive. It takes roughly 1-1/2 hours for us to get to Spokane. We arrived a little early for my appointment and since Trader Joe’s is across the street from the office we did a little shopping.

Check in and wait times were over the top on this day because the offices are introducing a new computer system, ugh. We did have a nice chat with a man who was waiting with us. Come to find out he had a connection to a couple who are part of our church.

With eyes dilated we stopped at Hobby Lobby (no purchase), Home Goods (2 small items purchased), and Costco for gas and to order new glasses (big purchase$$). We also bought a King comforter and some real maple syrup that were both on sale.

This is Master’s Brewery in Deer Park. We usually stop here on our way home from Spokane for a meal. Deer Park is about 20 miles north of Spokane and on our route home.

Stroganoff Soup was the soup of the day and we enjoyed it with a salad and bread stick. The daily soups at this spot are always excellent!

I’m adding many views from the road home from our lunch stop. We had about 55 miles more to go to get home.

These shots are from us coming down into Chewelah.

Chewelah is about 20 miles from Colville and it has the only stoplight we encounter once we are on Highway 395 from Spokane and  before we reach Colville.

Coming into Colville. We love seeing the big C on the mountain along with the Cross.

Stopping to pick up mail even though it is Veterans Day and there is no mail delivery. LOL!  That’s our home in the distance. We made it home at about 3pm.

We had a delivery to our front door while we were gone. It was a very heavy box. We drug it in and then emptied the contents in our entry and brought all the parts into one of our spare rooms. Assemblie will commence on Wednesday. Mystery will be revealed soon.

Greg had a meeting at church that started at 4:30. While he was gone, I worked on this tough puzzle. I’m a glutton for punishment.

Time to put my feet up and enjoy a little ‘Escape to the Country’ until Greg came home. I noticed that people all across the states were posting photos of an ‘Aurora’ event in the night sky. When Greg got home at 8ish, we went on the deck to try to capture some of the images.

This is one of my favorites. What an end to the day!

“The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” Psalm 19:1-2

Thank you for coming along for this day in my life.

Early October Days

Sunday the 5th of October we made a quick trip to Spokane after church. The scenery was spectacular with clear skies and fluffy clouds.

A neighborhood cat without a tail visited while our grandson JJ was here on Monday afternoon. This was the friendliest cat that has ever visited our yard.

On Tuesday while I pulled some weeds I noticed this garden spider. Yikes!

On Tuesday our Colville kids had us over for a belated birthday celebration for Gramps!

Addy made sure Gramps was the one to blow out the candle.

After our meal and dessert JJ was excited to launch his rocket for us to see.

The first launch was very successful and didn’t land in the trees but the second launch was not as hazard free. They will have to wait for a big wind storm to free the rocket.

On Wednesday several deer came to visit.

We had some nice warm days that started with very chilly mornings.

Friday morning started with a beautiful sunrise.

Happy Columbus Day to all in the United States of America and a very Happy Thanksgiving to our friends in Canada!

I can’t let this day pass without acknowledging this historic day!

UPDATE: Waking up to news that after 738 days all the Israeli hostages have been released. What a glorious day for the hostages and their families and friends and nation!

All living Israeli hostages officially freed from Hamas captivity.
President Trump made a promise on the campaign trail:
“We will never abandon them — and with God’s help, they will come safely home.”
Promises made, promises kept.

 

Feis Day Two

Day Two of the Feis was Deirdre Haran Abeid Day.

The Haran School of Irish Dance was founded in Kettle Falls by Deirdre Abeid over 45 years ago. Her daughters Caitlin Trusler and Claire Worley have continued in her footsteps, running the Kettle Falls and Spokane branches of Haran for the past 25 years.

All signed in and ready to dance

 

There are breaks between the soft shoe dances and hard shoe dances.

Both Addy and JJ appreciated Uncle and Auntie being at the Feis on Sunday. I appreciated it, too, as Laura could get up close and take photos and videos that I was not able to.

Soft shoe, hard shoe and then it was time for another soft shoe competition.

There is a trick to lacing the soft shoes!

When all the traditional jigs and reels and treble and Hornpipe were completed it was time for the creative water/sea dance. The dancers who wanted to participate in this dance had to come up with their own costume and dance.

This is the outfit conception that Addy came up with thinking about water, ‘under the sea’. Here was the completed outfit Addy and her Mom created.

It is so good to have the support team of mom and dad in the dancers corner.

Waiting for their solo performances. I wish I could share the video Auntie Lolo took of Addy’s dance but I’m unable to on my blog. It was a wonderful performance and we found out while we were out to lunch that Addy had received a 1st place for her outfit and dance!

We gathered for lunch before taking Uncle and Auntie back to the airport for their flight home.

After lunch on their way home Dan and Jamie stopped by the convention center to pick up Addy’s prize for her creative under the sea dance and costume.

Her 1st place trophy!

After getting home Addy donned all her awards from her first Feis!

Well done, Addy. Your hard work was rewarded. Hmmm, I wonder if she’ll want to sign up for another Feis?

Thanks for coming along and for all your kind comments.