Author: neil

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Gunners

After winning the league before Christmas with a 100% winning record, the second season, in Division 1 was always going to be that bit harder. By the end of the season, the Gunners had finished 4th in the league but that doesn’t quite tell the whole story! Firstly, although they finished 4th it was actually joint 2nd! It was only goal difference that kept them from being officially 2nd – so well done Gunners.

It could also have been even better. But for two last kick of the game goals in the first two games of the season which stopped the Gunners from winning and turned the result to a draw they would have been clear in 2nd place – just 3 points off the top of the table.

Obviously this is a completely impartial view but Harry was undoubtedly the player of the season and he finished the top scorer in the team with 9 goals, following on from 14 or so in the previous season.

This is the last season this team play together as some stay in the under 9’s next year and others have joined different teams. So congratulations to the Gunners, here is the squad list so we don’t forget them all:

Acero-Blyshak, Marcos
Bonnofsky, Ben
Burns, Benjamin
Buxton, Daniel
Guo, Brian
Isensee, Niclas
Lan, George
Linehan, Finley
Salgado, Daniel
Stickells, Harry
Walker, David

And this is the final league table – click to enlarge:

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Hand Stands

Toby is still going to Little Gym and learning all sorts of new skills. I’m sure none of us can forget the technically perfect forward rolls which he recently demonstrated and now he has moved on to the hand stand. This time the results are not quite as technically perfect but it is showing signs of potential:

httpv://youtu.be/LqhhaQax4xM

Not to be out done by his little brother Harry also took to the floor to demonstrate his skills:

httpv://youtu.be/u_-BgAmkmoM

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Gym Club

Toby has started doing Gym Club on a Wednesday instead of his Thursday afternoon soccer club. When I first heard about this I had a mental picture of Toby lifting weights and that seemed a little odd. As it turns out, Gym Club is gymnastics rather than weight training. This made more sense. This week he has learnt how to do forward rolls and very good he is too! Don’t believe me? Check this out:

httpv://youtu.be/tBPTs2ZlqCI

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Happy Anniversary

Wow! That was quick! We are now officially into our second year in America. In some ways it seems like a lifetime ago that we got in a cab from the Dovecote but in others it feels like only yesterday.

To celebrate our one year anniversary we had a BBQ. This wasn’t just any old BBQ though – this was a BBQ on our new BBQ. We didn’t quite go for the super-sized monster BBQs that you can get in Lowes and the Home Depot – we went for the more modest option. Sunday morning was spent putting the thing together ready for the beautiful weather on Monday and our anniversary.

Whilst munching away on British bangers, beef and blue cheese burgers and lamb kebabs we discussed a few things about the previous year and the lists went a little like this…

 

Question #1 – what have been your favorite things?

Harry – the day on the boat at Lake Chelan, Cannon Beach, Hawaii, skiing and the eagles on Grouse Mountain

Toby – playing outside, the view from Kerry Park, the view from our garden, Harry getting his butt soaked in the sea in Oregon, Mount Rainier and throwing a football which made him burp

Tracy – on the boat in Lake Chelan, Langley and Bellevue mall

Neil – San Juan Islands, the views of mountains and lakes and Mount Rainier

 

Question #2 – where do you want to go back to?

Harry – Hawaii and the seats we had for our last Sounders game

Toby – baseball

Tracy – Villaggio, for 6 weeks

Neil – the tulip fields and the Oregon coast

 

Question #3 – where do you want to go that you haven’t been to yet?

Harry – San Francisco

Toby – San Diego

Tracy – Alaskan cruise

Neil – whale watching

 

And so there we go! Year one – done. Year two – here we come! And we’ve started it off by booking an Alaskan cruise in July. Whoo hoo!

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Das Auto

We’re clearly becoming American. The reasonably large car that we got to start with is no longer big enough. We’ve been here a year and we want bigger! Getting a new car in America is different than the UK. The main thing is that they want you to take the new car immediately. If you so much as mention that you’re happy to leave the car with them a few days while they complete the minor enhancement we want, they give you a strange look, insist you take the new car away and bring it back when the work can be completed. Not taking the car is not an option.

In some respects this is good. You don’t have to spend a few days waiting for the Post Office to open so you can get tax discs, etc. but in other ways it’s not good. The main negative is that Tracy didn’t really have time to get her head round saying goodbye to the Tiguan. The emotion and sadness had to be condensed into about 30 minutes. It was very sad and I’m not sure she has fully recovered yet!

The good thing is we now have a bigger car and can start planning camping trips and the like. Year two in American is going to be larger and even more exciting that year 1 – and just because we got a new car!

Goodbye VW…

Now let’s just hope we get the rear view camera installed before there are any “whoopsies”!

 

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Upsetting Grandad

After a few weeks of adventures, this weekend was designated a relax at home weekend but we could actually call it, upset Grandad weekend. We’d started upsetting him earlier in the week by getting an American flag to put up in the house. Then today started with the Norwich, Liverpool soccer rematch. When they met earlier in the season it had been a very stressful time in the house with Grandad upsetting a couple of children! Fortunately we all went out and had champagne and everything calmed down!

This time Grandad wasn’t here, luckily for him, because the Canaries were snuffed out and lost 3-0. After this we went to get ourselves some retail therapy – we hadn’t been shopping since Wednesday!! First stop was Sports Authority where Harry got an American football and Toby got a Messi soccer ball. Their Christmas money from Grandad is still going strong and they are making some wise purchases – not tat anyway!

After Sports Authority we went to the Issaquah farmers market. It closed down over the winter but started again last week. It’s been almost a year since we had proper English bacon so we went straight to the “Proper English Bacon” stand and stocked up. We went for 4lbs of bacon, some sausages and a couple of pork pies. It all came to $54 so it better be good! Harry also bought a tomato plant which he planted later this afternoon.

Before heading home we stopped at Lowes to get some picture hanging wire so that I could hang the flag in the hallway. After getting home and putting the picture up it we were all ravenous so we went to Red Robins and spent our vouchers on burgers, root beer floats, wine and cheese sticks! Yum! As we hadn’t been shopping for at least a couple of hours we decided to go again! This time it was to the Home Depot where we bought something else to REALLY upset Granded – another American flag and flag pole to put on the garage! We also got some bark chippings ahead of a spot of gardening.

The flag went up:

And very good it looks too. There is an upside for Grandad though, within 5 minutes of the flag going up a bird had crapped on it! So it will have to come down for a wash! Despite this set back, the front yard looks a bit tidier. The lawn was cut – the third time since I’ve been here – the bark chippings went down – we need a lot more – and Harry and Toby collected the remains of the laurel bush clippings.

Progress has been made but more needs to happen tomorrow after more chippings have been collected from the Home Depot.

So there we go, two American flags and Norwich got thrashed – that should upset him!!

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Whidbey Island

The day after Tracy’s birthday last year the container turned up, was loaded with boxes and set off on its journey to America. The day after Tracy’s birthday this year, we all jumped in the car at 9:15am and set off in the sunshine for a day on Whidbey Island. What a difference a year makes.

After a brief stop off in Mukilteo to get me a birthday present (a bit early but that’s ok!), we boarded the ferry to Clinton. Unfortunately there were no leaping orcas or swooping eagle but it was a lovely journey in the sunshine nonetheless.

After arriving on Whidbey we went across to our usual beach just outside Langley. Being early in the year it was nice and quiet there, so we spent some time on the beach, finding crabs, sand bugs and enjoying the stunning view. At this point Grampy hadn’t been in a shop for a while so we went into Langley and visited the shops. A few modest purchases followed including a shiny rock from Madagascar, a top, a blanket, some sunglasses and a few other things that I’ve no doubt I’ve forgotten which obviously made us all very hungry. Ravenous in fact in the case of Harry who always seems to have his trips to Whidbey ruined by the fact that he is permanently starving!

We went to our usual restaurant – Prima Bistro – and between us enjoyed, tomato and clove soup, crispy pigs ears, croque monsieur and madame, risotto, noodles with parmesan, cheese burgers and a rueben. After that little lot we weren’t starving any more!

After lunch we had a short stroll along the beach and then it was time to head back to the ferry with another lovely Whidbey trip complete. Let’s hope the weather stays like this all summer – happy days!

And all the photos are here.

 

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Happy Birthday!

In the build up to her birthday, Tracy had been getting grumpy! She was not happy that there appeared to be a distinct lack of presents which wasn’t helped by me telling her I hadn’t got her anything – which to be fair I hadn’t! Anyway, a quick trip to Walmart and the purchase of a lovely red frying pan soon rectified that! How lucky can one girl be!?

After a day of relaxing the birthday culminated in the ultimate birthday present – a Mariners baseball game! And if that wasn’t enough, it was also the Ichiro bobble head night! Yet another fabulous birthday present!! So with a slap birthday meal of fish and chips, washed down with a couple of pints, the only thing left was her Fanboard Fanagram message! What a day!

How on earth are we going to top this birthday!? At least we have just under a year to plan it!!

The slideshow with more pics is here.

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Skagit Valley

This afternoon was a working from home afternoon. So after getting home just after 1pm we set off to Skagit Valley to check out the tulips. Having read the field report yesterday, weather aside, now was the best time to see the tulips. The first bloomers were out in full blast (or whatever the technical term is), the middle bloomers were on show too and the late bloomers were just starting to bloom. It was bloomtastic!

The weather was overcast but when we got there – after taking route advice from the lady in the tourist office – but we managed to see a few fields with the mountains for a back drop. Soon after however  the rain began to fall and then it hoofed it down. But never mind. The fields were beautiful and a return trip next year with the sun shining is definitely remaining on the to do list.

For lots more tulips check the slideshow.

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Sand Dollars

On our first afternoon we found some interesting “things” on the beach but we had no idea what they were. The next day in the Cannon Beach visitor center the very helpful lady told us exactly what they were. Now I can’t remember exactly what she said but I think it went something like this:

The term sand dollar (or sea cookie or snapper biscuit in New Zealand, or pansy shell in South Africa) refers to species of extremely flattened, burrowing echinoids belonging to the order Clypeasteroida. Some species within the order, not quite as flat, are known as sea biscuits. Related animals include the sea urchins, sea cucumbers and starfish.

I may not have got that exactly right but it was definitely something along those lines.

On our way home we stopped at a little place by the sea called Seaside. One of the things that Seaside is known for is a large population of sand dollars and so after doing some shopping (to keep Grampy happy) we went on the beach to search for some perfect sand dollars.

As luck would have it, we found quite a few:

Which was lucky because there were a lot of people out on the beach looking for them:

So now we have our collection of (what turned out to be quite smelly) sand dollars the only thing to decide is what on earth to do with them!

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Sunset Beach

So the title is not strictly accurate. It is a beach but it wasn’t sunset. We missed sunset by a few minutes and for that I blame the bullfrogs. If I hadn’t spent so long looking into the reeds trying to spot one of those noisy things then we would have seen the sunset but I did, so we didn’t.

But never mind. Despite missing it by a few minutes it still looked fabulous. It was a perfect temperature, the color of the sky was beautiful, the waves were crashing and the sea was just right for running in to (if you were a little boy!).

Check out the full sunset slideshow here.

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Cannon Beach

Cannon Beach is one of the most photographed spots on the Oregon coast and that was before I’d even started! I think the ratio of the amount of photos taken in the space of time spent there probably puts the beach and the Haystack up there near Yosemite. And I took an awful lot of photos at Yosemite!

We couldn’t go straight to the beach in the morning because Grampy was showing signs of shopping deprivation symptoms. So after a quick trip to the visitor center and some shops we then went and checked out the Haystack.

I won’t prattle on too much about the beach as I will let the pictures do the talking. If a picture speaks a thousand words then this slide show should equate to the works of Shakespeare!

The photo above was Toby’s best moment of the few days in Oregon, and I quote, “Harry getting his butt soaked by the sea”. He has also lived in his sun glasses since  buying them!