Washington Park Arboretum, May 23, 2010

We went for a walk today on a trail in the Washington Park Arboretum that goes over a couple of islands and runs along the ship canal. We did this last year and saw an eagle's nest and juvenile blue heron. This year, once we got to the boardwalks crossing to the island, it was washed out. So we turned around and wandered back through the arboretum. Still, it was a pretty, though chilly day.

We had Dagan, a friend of Maeve's, with us and the kids had a great time playing, giggling, running and looking around. We spent a good bit of time watching the ducks, including this Mallard couple, in one of the lagoons off the ship canal.


There was a nice overlook into the ship canal where we could see buoys and kayakers as well as the UW stadium and Laurelhurst across the canal.


We stopped for a snack in a meadow beside the canal. Maeve and Dagan enjoyed crackers beside the water while Silas practiced walking with Daddy.


He smiled a lot when they finally got to where I was taking pictures.

Near the Arboretum visitors center, Maeve and Dagan played in the spooky trees.







































They also enjoyed playing hide and seek around trees, counting to 12 (Maeve) or 5 (Dagan) and then yelling, "Boo!"

May 20, 2010
Silas has been cruising for a couple of weeks, and is now comfortable holding on with just one hand and using the other one to play. He's falling more, but getting closer to walking.

This photoshoot was to try to get a view of his teeth. His top left incisor came in about a month ago, and is a big white tooth. The bottom two incisors cut about a week ago and are little, unphotogenic, teeth bumps. His top tooth features in the second photo.

Mother's Day May 9, 2010


My mother's day present was a hike. We went up Rattlesnake Ledge, which is in the foothills of the Cascades. Maeve's longest hike yet, 4 miles round trip and about 1100 feet elevation gain. The way up was no problem, and although the last bit of coming down she was tired, she walked it all. We were out there last summer around Memorial Day with the cousins, and we didn't even get halfway up before descending to play in the lake. This is the limit of what Maeve can do - now I need to find more 3-4 mile hikes with 1000+ feet of elevation gain. Maybe by the end of the summer we'll do Little Si.

Rattlesnake Ledge is less than an hour from Seattle and was super-crowded. I'm still not used to the hoards that go hiking here. Likely hikes for us (short, not to steep, close to Seattle) are going to be super-crowded. By the time the kids are bigger, I'm sure we'll be ready to get a little farther from home to escape the crowds and dogs and hang out in quieter country.

Anyway, the day was beautiful, the kids were good, and the woods were variable so we had tons of stuff to look at and talk about with Maeve. She identifies snags, cut trees where you can count rings, mushrooms, ferns with and without fiddleheads, conifers, deciduous trees, pine cones, and anything else we can think of to keep her interested. This time we didn't even play hide and seek, which would have been a bit difficult since the trail was crowded and there were quite a few dogs illegally off-leash. Silas slept for an hour on the way down in the backpack. Yay!

The photo is part of the view from the ledge, which has 270 degree views of the Snoqualmie valley and Cascades. Lovely.

Family bike ride to Gasworks Park
May 8, 2010

This was Silas's first bike ride. He wasn't too keen while we were parked, but didn't fuss to much while we were going. Maeve has been on the tagalong for a while and pedals nicely. Silas will have to get used to his seat, but we're quite excited to be able to again use the bikes as a family.

Gasworks park, in lower Wallingford and a straight shot down Meridian Ave from our house, is on Lake Union and has great views of downtown and the ship canal and a nice kite flying hill. We took Maeve's red octopus kite and had a good time flying. Behind Mike and Maeve, you can see the Hwy 99 bridge and lots of boats. Behind Silas is the Space Needle. What a beautiful day.