Month: June 2020

In the past, missionaries serving from the church were only allowed to call home two days each year: Christmas and Mother’s Day. Recent changes give the missionaries more leeway in their communication, and Elder Schroeder told me this morning he’d like to call for Father’s Day. Sweet!

He showed up on our video chat munching on a bag of candy corn. Typical.

We had a great chat, and he told us stories about things he’s been doing on his mission in Oklahoma: talking with people, making videos, wearing a mask, etc. I was surprised to learn he’s been teaching himself to play the piano! He shared a few songs from memory.

At one point he launched into a crazy story about a car chase involving a Honda Odyssey, followed by some parkour stunts while wielding a samurai sword. It was a very animated story.

Turns out it was all a dream.

It was from his dream journal, which he’s been keeping since he took a psychology class in high school. His dreams are… interesting.

We talked for over an hour, which was great. It’s good to hear he’s doing well and loving missionary life. What a good lad (as he would say).

You’d think I’d get tired of taking pictures of the sunset over Flathead Lake. But you’d be wrong.

Tonight as Kyra and I were playing an intense game of Bomberman on the theater screen, I looked out the window and noticed a gorgeous orange sunset. I told her she’d have to wait to blow me up while I took out my camera.

After the March windstorm, the forest has thinned and we can see Woods Bay to the north, and the Salish Mountains on the northwest horizon. If those trees were still there, we wouldn’t be treated to this view. Not surprisingly, the sun sets pretty far to the north these days.

The photo above was taken at 9:30; within a few minutes the colors had deepened and the sky turned breathtaking shades of red and violet.

Just… wow.

A couple of weeks ago, we embarked on some demolition work in our kitchen to remove the old countertops. Things definitely looked interesting after we’d finished.

The stone crew came in with three enormous slabs of white marble and laid them in place. Because two of them had to make the ends of the “L” shape, they had to be joined at a seam. A set of huge suction cups, and an air compressor acting as a vacuum pump, were attached so the glue between the slabs would seal everything tightly.

Our house has a very open floorplan, and sounds can be heard pretty much everywhere, so let me tell you how fun it was to have an air compressor running for 24 hours straight, including all night long. The crew said if it stopped for even a few seconds, they’d have to re-set and re-glue everything. Fortunately it didn’t, so the next day they came back to grind and smooth everything.

The end result is amazing. So long, black granite and big clunky island!

Hello, beautiful bright white marble and an island that flows into the great room!

It’s been fun exploring northwest Montana, but Pepper and I felt the need to go on a trip somewhere. It’s an easy jaunt west to Wenatchee, so we headed out for a weekend with Thom, Katie, Julian, and Sefton.

The last time I saw Sefton, he was my little buddy. This time, Pepper was the favorite. He was always calling out, “Auntie Pepper” and showing her stuff. And when she wasn’t around, he’d ask where she’d gone. Very cute.

Since we had our bikes hitched to the car after the Hiawatha Trail, it was easy to take a bike tour of Wenatchee. We took the Canal Trail one evening, and the 20-mile Apple Loop Trail a different day. Those were both really fun.

And of course we went hiking. We climbed Devil’s Gulch one day, and later went up a local mountain overlooking the area. Here’s Julian surveying the landscape:

The hills around Wenatchee are really cool.

In fact, near the top of the mountain it’s possible to see Thom and Katie’s house! Here Katie points it out to Pepper:

Again, Julian strikes a pose above the valley.

Not surprisingly, Thom pulled out his camera. I’m sure his photos are better than mine. As I watched the master at work, I wondered if maybe I should use the Raised Pinkie Method…

Off in the distance, the Enchantments were wreathed in clouds. I love that area, and I’m hoping I can snag a permit in September for a backpacking trip with Pepper.

Here’s the fam with the mountains in the background. What a great group.

Right on the Montana-Idaho border is the Hiawatha Trail, a bike route that follows an old train track through several tunnels and across a handful of trestle bridges. Since we were driving right past it on a trip to Washington, Pepper and I decided to take a look. We hung our bikes off the back of the CR-V and headed out.

The first tunnel is 1.6 miles long and straight as an arrow. You can actually see a tiny pinpoint of light in the distance. Because it’s dark and damp, the tunnel is also really cold– I’d guess somewhere in the 40’s. It’s interesting to be riding through 70-degree sunny weather and enter the freezing darkness.

Oh hey, a waterfall!

The trail was really easy… it’s literally fifteen miles of a 2% downhill grade. Other than the tunnels and trestles, which are flat, I think you could coast nearly the entire way. So it’s definitely not a bike trail that you’d take for exercise. But you might take it for the views, which are spectacular.

From this lookout you can see a logging road (center) and in the far distance, part of the bike trail (left):

We stopped for a light lunch on one of the trestles.

It’s cool to look down nearly 200 feet and see the trees in the valley below. This time of year, the fir trees have their “spring tips”– the light green growth of new needles.

After a leisurely two-hour ride down, with plenty of stops, we rode the shuttle bus back to the top of the trail and put up our bikes. The tunnels are all wet and muddy, so we were pretty dirty at the end of the day.

We agreed that next time, we’ll start at the bottom and ride up the trail, then turn around at the top and coast back down. We’ll get some exercise and still have a chance to enjoy the views!

I saw this astounding graph last night.

Ten years of job growth, wiped out in two months. It’s strange to think how interconnected everything is, and how fragile our society may be.

Last week, Cil and Jim reported seeing a grizzly bear in our driveway around 9:30pm when they were coming home from a dinner at our friends’ house. The bear ambled across the driveway and into the brush. Frankly, we were kind of bummed we didn’t get to see it.

Well, tonight Kyra and I had our opportunity. On our way to the lake we turned around the bend at our cherry orchard, and a medium-sized black bear darted across the driveway right in front of the car. I was amazed how fast she moved.

I say she because I’m pretty sure it was mama. When we came back from the lake about two hours later, coming up the driveway I saw motion in a tree ahead. There were two black bear cubs climbing the tree! We stopped so Kyra could lean out the window and take a picture. You can see the little tykes up near the top branches.

It was incredible how quickly they climbed. When we first spotted them, they were probably halfway up the trunk, and by the time Kyra took this picture they’d gained twenty feet. Here’s a grainy photo of the pair, courtesy of Kyra zooming my phone (I later told her you never use digital zoom on a camera).

Finally, to give a sense of how amazingly high these guys had gone, here’s a shot of the full height of the tree with the bears indicated by arrows:

I’m guessing mama wasn’t too far away, so we continued up the driveway. A few weeks ago, I kind of laughed when a friend suggested we take bear spray with us when we walk down our driveway to get the mail. I’m not laughing any more. I’m not sure I ever imagined living in a place where I might run into a bear while getting another form letter from Geico…

Since we blew a nice afternoon tearing up our kitchen, I felt the urge to get out on the lake this evening. After some homemade pizza for dinner, Kyra and I headed down to Yellow Bay. Sure, it was after 8pm, but we still had plenty of daylight!

We toured up the shore until we were due west of our house, and I called Pepper from the water so she could look out to see us. She had some binoculars and we waved from a mile away. We continued up the shore and pulled up to the dock of my friend Allen. He happened to be coming down his driveway to the boathouse, and was surprised to see us, and we had a fun chat. Then we went on our way, cruising up to Woods Bay.

At 9pm we felt like it was time to head back. (You can tell we’re going back because Kyra’s heading the other direction in this photo.)

I think we pulled the jet skis out of the water around 9:20. How awesome to have light so late! And how awesome to have a daughter who loves being on the water as much as I do.

To prepare for our upcoming kitchen countertops, we have to remove the existing black granite tile countertops. This afternoon, Kyra and I were lounging around and I told her I was going to spend a few minutes working on the island to see if I could figure out the easiest way to remove the granite.

“A few minutes” turned into a two-hour project that involved me, her, Pepper, and Cil and Jim (who are visiting). After removing all the drawers in the island and stripping the trim around the edges of the tile, it was clear that there was no easy way to pop those tiles off.

“I notice there’s a chainsaw sitting there,” you might be thinking. Yep. We decided the best way to remove the top portion– so we could get to work on the main part of the island– was to take a chainsaw to it. I cranked it up (how many people can say they’ve used a chainsaw in their kitchen?) and cut the length of the bar on the island to remove it. Sawdust everywhere. Jim and I carried out the bar, which probably weighed well over a hundred pounds (quarter-inch granite plus a half-inch of cement atop inch-thick plywood).

The top surface proved resilient. As we work on various projects around the house, we’ve learned the builders were quite thorough in their work twenty years ago. Everything was built well, built sturdy, and built to last. But this island was no match for our gift from Thom and Katie:

Some strategic sledge-hammering eventually freed the top, bringing with it some of the particle board and ripping out a few screws. But in the end, we were victorious. The island lays bare, ready for a new stone countertop next week:

I thought that might be enough demolition for one day, but nope, we kept going. Jim and I pried off the trim on the main countertops, and I started chiseling away at the tile.

Jim disassembled all the plumbing under the sink. I hate plumbing.

Tomorrow’s supposed to be really nice outside, and it seems a waste to use a beautiful day on tearing out countertops. So we’ll probably finish the job on Friday. More to come.

On Sunday our friend Pattee suggested we check out Holland Lake and the accompanying Holland Falls. Since the weather was nice today, after some yard work we hopped into the car and headed south. I’m glad we did; it was amazing.

Near the start of the trail, Kyra and I posed overlooking the water. The photographer, who shall not be named, didn’t do a great job centering on us.

A different photographer captured me and Pepper pretty well.

Cil and Jim joined us. Even though they’re both in their 70’s (and Jim has two artificial knees) they didn’t have too much trouble with the trail.

Holland Lake and the surrounding scenery is gorgeous.

There were several kayakers making their way across the calm water. The weather was just perfect, and we wished we’d brought our yaks. Next time.

The trail was really quite easy, and we were surrounded by majestic pines.

Near the falls, there’s a magnificent overlook of the lake. Wow.

You can hear Holland Falls for quite a distance along the trail, but (like many waterfalls) they kind of sneak up on you: you turn a corner on the trail and bam there they are.

The picture doesn’t really do it justice– the first waterfall is easily 50 feet high, and it continues a few hundred feet downstream across steep rocks. Kyra and I hiked up some slippery rocks to get closer.

The spray was intense. There’s a lot of snowmelt runoff, which means a lot of water is gushing over these rocks. Within a minute, the two of us were drenched. It was cool and refreshing in the warm sun.

I attempted to use some dark neutral-density filters to capture more of a “flowing” water shot of the falls, but there was simply too much water– it just looked like a tower of white. More to the point, the spray covered my camera and I couldn’t keep the lens dry. Oh well. I did manage to take a ND shot of a smaller stream along the trail:

And just for fun, a tiny branch budding off a larch.

After the hike we enjoyed some dinner at Burger Town, a local haunt that everyone says is amazing. Our consensus: it’s very much “meh”. And then we spent some time soaking in the hot tub, enjoying sunset over Flathead Lake.

A great ending to a great day.