Our Vacation, Thy Creations, and Our Relations- Part 11

July 10 was Don't Step on a Bee Day and National Kitten Day. Creativity took over.

Jeremy's sister came to visit that day. It was nice to catch up with her.

Jet uncovered some slugs in grandparents' backyard. They weren't banana slugs but one was a leopard slug.

 

July 11 was Blueberry Muffin Day.

Road Trip!

When we went to Mount Rainier we saw where the Nisqually River came from the glacier. We wanted to see where the Nisqually River emptied into the Puget Sound so... Nichole, Jeremy, and I headed to Nisqually Wildlife Refuge. We love Nisqually Wildlife Refuge anyway. It's one of the places we always try to visit when we're in Washington.

 

Some highlights of this trip:

Bald eagle hanging out in what people told us was its usual spot, where we could walk right up to it... or right under it.

From its spot, we could look out and see seals sunning themselves on a sandbank. They were so fun to see. Adults and youngsters.

We also saw seals swimming in the water. There was a mama and baby swimming together that were so cute. Baby kept climbing on mama's back.

There were so many great blue herons out that day, both adults and juveniles. So many.

We went all the way to the end of the boardwalk, about a mile. 

From there we looked back at Mount Rainier which we had visited just two days before. So we went from where the Nisqually River started one day to where it ended another day. 78 miles.

As we were walking back through the forested area of the refuge, we stopped at a pond to see if we could find a frog. We found a frog then another then another. There were so many. I loved it.

We found out while we were there that this year was the 50th anniversary of the refuge so we just had to get a souvenir mug as it is one of our favorite places to visit in Washington.

I'll share more of our wonderful vacation later.

Kokanee Salmon

The National Days Calendar our friends gave us earlier in the year has a whole bunch listed for September 26, 2020. There's National Pancake Day, National Singles Day, Public Lands Day, Hunting and Fishing Day, Family Health and Fitness Day USA to name a few.

So for celebrating Jr. made us chocolate chip pancakes before we all set out for a drive with our water bottles and little packets of singles flavoring. Originally we thought about heading to a public land but we thought that it might be too crowded since it was free entrance that day. Like his brother before him, Jr. Jr. recently got a national parks pass so we can go to public lands as a family anytime for free for a year. We decided instead to go to Jordanelle Reservoir to the Rock Cliff Recreation area where we hoped it would be less crowded. We didn't go to the fish trap at Strawberry Reservoir to see kokanee salmon this year (and they're not doing salmon viewing events this year) so we thought we'd try this place which I recently read was a good place to see them.

 

There were boardwalks to walk around on to get our exercise in (health and fitness) and there were indeed some salmon in the river where we could see them from the bridge we stopped at (hunting and fishing). There were also trout swimming along to snatch up the eggs deposited by the spawning salmon for a nice meal. We learned about this because while we were there on that uncrowded bridge, along came a couple of volunteers from DNR to check on things in the recreation area since there had been flooding in the Spring and because it was kokanee spawning time. They were very friendly and very happy to tell us things about the salmon and about the area. It was very informative and they were great to answer our questions. 

Nichole was great to get pictures of the salmon.

At one point, Jr. fell down so I offered to give him a piggy back ride. He's not as small as he used to be. I thought it would be funny to give him a piggy back ride since he's taller than me now. I can still lift him.

"Will you marry me?"

If you look really closely in the background of these pictures, there is a great blue heron sitting in a tree. Nichole took pictures of the heron while I took pictures of Lucky.

We had a good time. Love that family bonding.

Busy Birding Week- Day 2

A couple weeks ago I had a busy birding week.

Wednesday, October 11, was It's My Party Day.  I could cry if I wanted to, but instead I took a day off.  Dawn to dusk, starting the day on the Southeast side of the lake and ending it on the Northeast side of the lake.



I spent some time birding along River Lane with a little walking along Sandy Beach.

Then I visited Bicentennial Park in Provo.  Last time I went, the boardwalk area was closed off, but it was open this time.  Hooray.

I spent some quiet time reading at the Orem Library, stopped at home for a quick break, then treated myself to a fast food lunch.

I visited Ashton Gardens at Thanksgiving Point to look at birds and flowers and for some personal scripture study in the Light of the World Garden.

When I left it was getting to be rush hour so I skipped the freeway and went to a park in Saratoga Springs next to the lake to finish off the evening.  The traffic wasn't nearly as heavy when I headed home.

It was a beautiful day and a well needed break.