Swiftwater Certificate

Well at long last can say I have my swiftwater certificate. Battered and Bruised I have a great respect for the cold fast moving waters of our local rivers. I knew rivers were hazardous, heck I have rafted the Grand Canyon, done several Eastern Washington raft trips, and even paddled my kayak 100 miles of the Missouri River. I learned a lot about how a single person floating in a river current will feel. Now imagine falling off your inner-tube or out of your raft. Wow, cold and nearly impossible to stay above water even with a river life jacket. Absolutely impossible for weak or non swimmers without life jackets. With thermal protection and a helmet I had an ice cream type headache most of the time we were passing through rapids.

Vacation Prank Season

See what some have to deal with when they return to work after a little vacation.
CLICKY HERE

Boater Education Card On-Line

20 and under and want to drive the jet ski or boat????
This summer new age restrictions and the Boater Education requirement took affect in Washington State. Washington is one of the last states to require this card. You will need this education card to drive a motor boat, unless you have one from another state or Canada. This card will also satisfy the requirement in the other 50 states and Canada waters. If you already took the Coast Guard Auxiliary course and can still find your certificate, that counts too. There are several ways to get educated. Of course I can teach you by talking for 8 long hours or you can go to one of the two FREE sites the state added. I listed them below, if you want to pay for the class room option because you love to sit on hard chairs and watch cheesy power points that option is available too at the State Parks Class Schedule site.

Below are the two sites that do not charge to teach you the boater information needed to pass the exam and the EXAM is FREE. After passing the exam print out two copies of the certificate, keep one and mail the other to State Parks with the application form and $10.

I have the state books that have the study material. Both my boys were able to study the book, do the pretests and go straight to the test receiving a passing score.


Two FREE EXAM sites.

1) Online provider: Boat U.S. Foundation Online Boating Safety Course
Study material needed: Online Course Manual
Practice test available: Yes.
Practice quizzes are offered after each section and allow unlimited free tests.
Pay online for the education card: No. Boaters need to mail the application form, copy of completion certificate and $10 fee.
Cost: No charge
Customer Service: (800) 336-2628

2) Online provider: PWC Safety School.com
Study material needed: JetSmart Safety Handbook
Practice test available: Yes. Practice quizzes are offered after each section.
Pay online for the education card: No. Boaters need to mail in application form, copy of completion certificate and the $10 fee.
Cost: No charge
Customer Service: (206) 682-3699

Here is the link to the Boater Safety Education card APPLICATION

April, May and June showers bring Julia Flowers

Rain and more Rain! Wonder if the sun was ever going to shine. Well here are a couple photos to lead us towards summer. This is RAIN....




















This is a discovery of sunshine late one day.























This is Julia's Flowers in beautiful bloom on the first day without rain and a little sunshine.

Bicycle Ride to North Carolina

Will McMahan, a member of Grandma K's Church has set off on a little bicycle ride. Share his adventures by clicking on the picture to visit his Blog.

Key Art Award -

Julia's nephew Rob Hammond and his friend Andre are up for awards in the Motion Graphics category at the KEY ART AWARD. This is for their work on the "trailer" for the movie Shoot'em Up.

More later

Go Cruise'n NOVEMBER

After almost 2 years of flapping my lips about how I want to go on another cruise, I found myself sitting in a traffic jamb in Eastern Washington, wondering why I had not made this vacation commitment. I dared to ask Julia who was sitting next to me, why I don't just make it happen. Not long after we stopped at the Indian John rest stop by the side of I-90, with traffic crawling like the worst rush hour jamb ever seen, I flipped open my phone and called my Carnival Cruise lady Jennie Zak, of course I keep her number in my phone, don't you have Carnival's number in yours? I left a message to call me and make this happen.

Tuesday Jennie called and I made my reservations. 2 rooms one for us and one for the boys.

I am hoping family and friends will join us on this trip.

The price is low now but as the ship fills rates WILL go up.

When: November sailing
Ship: Triumph

Call me for my cruise contact information

Julia Gets a New Desk

Julia Started her new job this week. Months and weeks of study finally pay off. She is now a proud employee. She even has an office with a door. Here is a small peek at her desk.

Sarah's Relay For Life

Sarah's Team raised a great deal of money to aid in the fight against Cancer. Sarah place 5th as an individual.

Great Job !

Dogs need water too

Do I know how dogs need to drink, I am sure most owners know dogs need to drink and drink the do... City dogs often find water in many many places that we would never consider drinking ... like this young doggy finding his fountain of youth in a fine cold porcelain dish. His owner often polishes it and protects it by sitting on it and even cuddles it on nights she has been laughing out loud keeping the neighbors up.

Less fortunate city dogs must resort to public drinking fountains such as one might find in a park or along the street. These dogs are often glad to have this water.

Others need to settle for lakes, ponds and pools to find a drink.

While other dogs must resort to tricks such as drinking out of a creation designed to turn on only when the would be drinker presses his nose against the magic button. Humans find this very amusing to watch the smart little puppy getting a drink.

Some dog owners even teach their loved pets finer living. They teach them how to live with the human to the point we almost forget they are our four legged friends. Our best friend at times but none the less a dog.

When humans begin to get all nature freaky pets find themselves doing the strangest thing for a drink of water. This is truly disturbing behaviors dogs must endure. I have chosen to devote my life to the study of this bizarre ritual.

I have seen humans drizzling water bottle while some poor doggy needs to guess when and how much water will be allowed to quench their thirst.

Still others only allow a cap full of water at a time.

Other tricky humans use modified bed pans as wilderness drinking containers.

But then there is the most bizarre of all the human behavior, the "Larissa move" for her doggy Woody. Larissa denies this behavior but often forgets the world is full of cameras. She assures everyone she is normal and Woody, her best friend would never stand for such behavior. He has his own bowl -- or does he?

WWU Sarah's "Relay For Life"

Sarah Haggerty, Julia's daughter at WWU has joined one of the teams raising funds for the American Cancer Society - "Relay for Life".

Her team "Relay Committee" is doing great work - if you would like to help click on the Relay For Life logo and donate to her team. Your contribution will not only help fight against cancer but will give credit to Sarah and her team for this great fund raising effort.

Off the web site; Each year, across the nation, one event brings together entire communities to take part in the fight against cancer. That event is the American Cancer Society Relay For Life®. It’s a time and place where people come to celebrate those who have survived cancer, remember those we’ve lost, and fight back against a disease that touches too many lives.

Won’t you join us this year and be a part of Relay? It’s not just an opportunity to celebrate, remember, and fight back - your involvement will help the American Cancer Society work toward a mission of eliminating cancer as major health issue and will support much-needed services in your community. Thanks in part to the donations from Relay For Life and other events, the Society is saving lives, helping those touched by cancer, and empowering people to fight this disease all over the world.

Julia's Birthday week...

WOW I have never had so much fun in one week. I am sure Julia had a great week too. We started the week off with a fantastic 50th birthday party for Deneese. Here we all met at MacAroni Grill Alderwood Mall Deneese of course was surprised, not! We ate visited and ate some more. Elizabeth's cake creation was a beautiful spring basket full of flowers. It was equally tasty too. Little too bad Deneese needed sooooooo many candles we could hardly see the cake through the blazing candles.

On Friday afternoon I enlisted the FBI's assistance for a little cake at Julia's FBI Citizens Academy on Wednesday night. This was a great night for this because it was actually her birthday that night. The cake had to be picked up and delivered before 1100 Wednesday AM. This meant I needed to have the cake bought and ready before Spin Class on Tuesday night and I could not let on that I was up to something, which is incredibly hard for me. Yes Julia continues to be a spin monster and puts most of us in the class to shame. I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of the cake for everyone to see, it was chocolate with yellow and red roses, very special like her. I included a party hat too. FBI was great and let her wear the pretty party hat while they all broke out in a wonderful number you might recognize as the Happy Birthday Song. Julia also had her own surprises for me too. Wednesday she called and told me her garage door had broken. I called my favorite garage door supply company in Everett. Julia dashed up to Everett and was so fast I could not get them prepared for the birthday girl. After work I was talking to Julia once again and should not have been surprised when she told me she did not want to go to the FBI class... WHAT! No way, she had to go.... garage door or not. I jumped on the I-5 and drove straight to her house. We fixed the broken door and she could now go to class... Whew! PARTY On girl, I could hardly keep from cheering as I watched her drive off down the road. Garage door fixed I returned home to finish wrapping her presents before she stops by the house and accidentally finds her gifts. Oh I got her great stuff too. It was hard to wait but wait we needed to do.... since she was already wearing the first gift that I could not wait to give, wait we did... until our Saturday. Which started very early 0600 wake up for a surprise and special trip to McLendon's Hardware. Yes indeed what a surprise. here we bought wonderful huge Fuchsia baskets. Crazy as it seems we bumped into my oldest sister, seems she beat us to the sale by almost 15 minutes. After our 0700 shopping trip we when to breakfast at Maltby Cafe. Here I gave Julia her red Porsche, who would have know she wanted one ... Costco came through too... so a red Porsche she got. I also selected some other cool stuff too but she needed to wait until later in the day to open those gifts. If fact I made her wait until just before we left for dinner to open the big gift. For dinner we went to a great place called Pasta Freska. This was a wonderful place on Westlake Avenue, no menus and extremely personal service by the owner and his crew. Here we were treated to wonderful food that was nearly endless. Dinner was followed by dessert and candles and that wonderful song "Happy Birthday" once again. Julia was showered with gifts and great company.

Happy Birthday.

Julia is a good sport for all the endless pictures I take.

Happy Mothers Day to all

Hugs and Love to all moms.

2008 Mandarory Boater Education 20 and under

Remember this year everyone 20 and under needs a Mandatory Boater Education card to operate a motor boat.

If you don't want to paddle or row you need this card.

10 or more Family, Friends or church group, college buddies or what ever I can come to you and teach the 8 hour class FREE.

Call me or look on line for the classes near you.

soon something new

Yes I know again I am behind... Summer is chasing me and I shall quickly improve on my task as editor. I have photos of Arron running in his final track meets ending his running season for 2008. Flowers Blooming, pressure washing, Birthday celebrations and FBI sing-a-longs and if that doesn't sound like enough I still have more ... can't wait to share it all. Pictures, ahhhh yes, I am pretty sure they will tell much more then my little words ever could ... oh yes I am in my element with this.

Don't forget Mothers Day either...