Easter and the park

Easter! I must say that Easter is just not the same without family. I guess that goes for just about any holiday, but the last few years I've been spoiled by having Easter in Hendersonville, NC with Papa Wadewitz and co. It is always a great weekend as Papa supplies a dozen eggs (each) for one to color and all the supplies to boot! Complete with an Easter egg hunt, and not too mention a whole lot of great food. That being said, we surely miss both our families! Here are some pictures from our first married Easter. (side note- We started a new tradition this year as we were invited to an adult Easter egg hunt by friends from church. It was at night with flashlights and headlamps and it was over in about 30 secs. It was crazy! We came away with a few candybars and suckers, OK... I came away with the most. I love anything like an Easter egg hunt!)



Learned from Dad early in life that flowers can make your wife pretty darn happy :)

Us in our Easter outfits ready for church. We had some great sunshine Easter Sunday. Fitting for new life!

Sunday best. Slick new tie and Mama's cuffs.

The egg prepping station... Amatuers compared to Papa's spread.

Finished Product of our egg decorating eggstravaganza. Schaefer has been a professional egg decorator for many years. Her's are pretty awesome!

 We had Easter dinner at our good friends, the Bennion's. These are Schaefers' works of art! Amazing salad and dessert that didn't last more than about 2 mins.

One random Monday a few weeks later we took a small walk from a nearby park down to the beach along Puget Sound.

The Sound at sunset

Looking back toward Olympia. You can (almost) see the Capitol.

This small cave was stuffed tree trunks and driftwood to keep people out... Strange

Driftwood tribute for Mama Abercrobmie.

The Olympic mountains in the background. We love the clear skies!!!

Wildflower rose bush. Don't smell the roses though. Schaefer woke up with a strange rash on her hand and nose the next morning. Thankfully, it is now gone.

This guy lives around the corner from us. For some reason his yard and all the colors make me hungry. One of the best yards around here. Right now the whole city is in bloom and it looks like Spring!

Out for a BBQ (for those in the west) or grilling-out (for those in the South) with our friends the Bennions. Taking advantage of this fantastic weather we are having as of late!

Aaron (the youngest) and I working on some hot dogs.

Kevin and Geoffrey making use of the coals for some smores. These two were pretty good marshmallow roasters!

I love this face! Aaron is full of funny and cute faces. Here he is devouring a smore. We love spending time with these guys. They took us right in the minute we moved here and have been our Olympia family. They are a great family with boys who have endless energy. We love it! Thanks Bennions for being such great friends and giving us a family here in Olympia.

 

 

Mom and Papa's Visit Part II

The next day of our adventures we headed 10 mins from our home to Nisqually Wildlife Preserve in hopes to see some birds for our visiting bird aficionados. We had some luck too, we saw a family of barn owls, bald eagles, and the bald eagles nest! Thanks to Mama A who was the one who spotted two elusive eagles!


The Refuge looking out to the Puget Sound

Eagle hunters. Like I said, Mama A was the one who spotted the eagle when we were at the very end of the trail. Thank goodness or it would have been a long walk without seeing them.

Another beautiful day for us! We were really grateful for the weather while Mom and Papa were here.

Mother and Daughter.
The eagles nest is in the background in the tops of these trees. With binoculars you could really see how massive the nest is.

One of the best weather days of the year so far. Clear and calm.

This is the boardwalk winding out a way into the Refuge. More attempts to be artistic :)

This was taken by Papa with his fantastic zoom. We spotted this guy on our way up the Olympic Peninsula. In fact, that day we saw 5 eagles on that drive. There is something about them that makes them so cool to see. Majestic or something... Thanks again Papa for the rights to post this picture.

This is a bald eagle we saw at the wildlife refuge. He was perched in the highest tree standing guard over his territory.

And this was the nearby territory! Right at the perfect moment, Mama A spotted something flying in the distance and we followed it right the the nest. Otherwise, we would have completely missed seeing it. This is a zoom shot obviously,  and if you look really close at the nest you can see a curious little eagle poking its head out the top. That was fun to see!

In the end we got to see much more than we expected for the weekend, and we wiped Mom and Papa out with our long days of driving, hiking, shopping, eating, and Spade-playing. (Rob and Steph ultimate champions). We were so grateful to have them with us and to spend time with loved ones that we surely miss. We miss them already and we miss you all as well. We can't wait to see you all sometime soon.

Mom and Papa's Visit to the Northwest Part I

We couldn't have been more excited to have our first guests out here to Washington!! Day 1 of our adventures we decided to head north up the Olympic Peninsula to a quaint little port town called Port Townsend.


As expected, our guests were greeted with ridiculous weather. However, not expected was being greeted by the local Port Townsend Deer Club.

It randomly snowed on us for about an hour, then it turned out to be 60 degrees the rest of the weekend. Mom and Papa can come any time and bring the great weather with them. It was fabulous! 

Also fabulous was the Fountain Cafe! You thought I was going to talk about the fabulous man in the picture. Don't worry I'm sure I'll find time for that later. As for now, I need to give props to Schaefer and to trip advisor for choosing excellent places to eat all weekend! Excellent clam chowder and sandwiches.

Schaefer bringing out the sunshine with her smile! Downtown Port Townsend has a nice little main street where we did plenty of window shopping. There is a massive bell in the background they used to ring for the sailors.

Port Townsend in the background. Blue sky, blue water... blue coats. We wanted to keep with the theme, I guess.

Portion of Port Townsend- still maintains a bit of a Victorian theme...

Mom and Schaef with the Puget Sound in the background.

Now a rare picture with Papa. He's usually the one taking pictures but we got him in this one. I'm glad he stuck with the blue theme as well.

This is technically where Puget Sound meets the Pacific Ocean at a place called the "Straits of Juan de Fuca". I don't know why, but I love saying that. In the far distance is Victoria, B.C. Also we saw a whole bunch of sea otters playing around out here.

How many times have you seen snow on the beach?? Mama A and myself looking for beach treasures along the Straits of Juan de Fuca. See it's fun to say, huh.

Looks like a Port Townsend postcard! Schaefer snapped this shot and it turned out great!! Too bad for the fence keeping us out though.

Day 2 of our adventures took us West across the Peninsula to the Pacific Ocean. More specifically a town called Ocean Shores. It was a nice little seaside town- also, this is day 2 without rain! The Wadewitz bloodline featured here.

The first time seeing the Pacific Ocean- together. The sand and water are a bit different up in the NW. We didn't see anyone catching any waves out here.

Gray's Harbor in the background. We learned there have been a whole bunch of shipwrecks out here.

We are on a jetty out of the harbor and if you look back toward the east you can see a great view of the Cascade Mountain Range. Look closely :)

There is a lot of cool driftwood on these beaches, much to Stephie's liking- unfortunately she couldn't take this one home with her.

Trying to be artistic... We were out looking for more beach treasures- sand dollars, shells, starfish, driftwood, rocks, etc... And we were successful!

Me and my honey! We were looking for gray whales while on these rocks as they are said to pass through here on their way up north. Obviously someone forgot to call the whales and inform them of this appointment, because they weren't there- however, after a long wait we did see a whale spout in the distance... Better luck next time.

Waterfalls of the Columbia Gorge (Part 2)

STOP!!!! This is actually part 2 of our blog this week, so skip down and read part 1 first- Cause like Fraulein Maria says, "lets start from the very beginning, the very best place to start..." We haven't figured out our blog software and have trouble loading all the pictures we want. Does anyone know how to load as many as you want in one post??





This is Horsetail Falls- aptly named. Schaefer has learned how to really get some great shots with the camera, especially with the water effects!

Latourell Falls. This one had a lot of color around it! We may just make a waterfall calendar with these pictures...

At the pools at Latourell Falls. It was great for taking pictures and will be even better with more sun and less rain.

The water effects turned out great in this picture!

It stopped raining for about 4 mins, the sun even tried to come out.

We love this picture! Bilbo and Gandalf came to chat with us, but they charged an unruly amount to have their pictures taken.