Ever Northward

Continuing from last week as we head northward.

One more missionary we caught up with in Provo, Elder Roberts.

As we stopped and saw people all during this trip, we gave them bags of citrus.  I knew starving students would love it, but we passed it out at the hotels and even a gas station or two.  I loved that cause I know lots of  it would have been thrown away if we hadn't taken it with us and you know how I hate wasting food!

As I mentioned last week, we went through a session with K Keller in the Logan temple.  This is the temple where my parents were married and so holds a special place in  my heart.
From there we drove to Seattle.  Idaho and western Washington are plains or low mountains with little greenery.  However there is a pass you cross as you drop down toward Seattle that is gorgeous and cold.  There was ice at the edges of the freeway and a variable speed limit adjusted to the weather which I found fascinating.

As you can see there was fog or rather a misty rain.  We were glad we were through it before sunset.

 We were glad to arrive in Issaquah and meet sweet Penny! She is a sweet heart !  I loved hugging and holding a tiny one again, and spending time with our kids!

It is so fun to see our cute kids as parents.

What a darling Daddy!

Pop Pop loves his cuddles with her too.  She is a popular girl!

We spent our mornings helping get the house ready to live in.  The wall texture had been poorly done.  It seems as though it hadn't been sanded or knocked down which left sharp bumps, and it didn't look very good either.  Soooo Rod used a 4 in putty knife to scrape off the bumps on all the upstairs walls, plus the stair well!!

Just a little dusty.

 Meanwhile, I pulled contact paper out of the kitchen cupboards and put new on, scrubbed doors and painted Killz on the wall stencils ...3-4 coats worth.    I also plied the neighbors with the last of the citrus.  I took bags to almost every house on the street.  People were so kind and appreciative.  I think they will be good neighbors to our kids!
We spent afternoons with Elena at their apartment in Seattle holding Penny so that Mommy could nap.  We did throw in a few dinners out and a little shopping.  We found the coolest marshmallow roaster!  It will be unveiled at the next camp out. Elena and Aaron hosted the Blau cousins for grilled hamburgers one evening.  It was so fun to see them!  The last project was scrubbing the bathrooms and kitchen floors.  That kitchen floor took almost 6 hours.  Years of floor wax came up in sheets... again with the use of the putty knife plus lots of ammonia.  We were glad that little Penny would have a very clean floor to crawl on in a few months.

We went to church with Elena and Aaron and were impressed with this tree.  There are flowering trees every where ( at least in April) but this one was amazing because it had two totally different kinds of flowers on one tree.  See the branch at the bottom of the frame? They were white and small flowers, but the rest of the tree had big, pink flowers.  It was wonderful to meet their Seattle ward members!

After almost 2 weeks there, we headed home.  We are so blessed to have such wonderful kids and are so grateful for the opportunity and strength to help them out a little.