We are finally home for a few days to catch up. Since the last blog, we have been to the Tri-Cities in Washington, Victoria, Canada, Kalispell, Montana, southern Idaho, and San Jose, CA.

We met Brian in Prosser the week end after the 4th to 'hand off' the boys. I would have loved to have kept them longer, but Mom was due home from her 3 weeks of active duty in Arizona, and I think they were all a bit anxious to see each other. The boys and Brian swam in the pool, we went out for pizza, and we adults did a bit of wine tasting over the week end.

Jeff and Bev Schuler spent a few days with us during the week of the 19th of July. We took the motor home to Long Beach for two of those nights and enjoyed the sea breezes. We dropped them at SeaTac on Friday, 7/23, and drove directly to Port Angeles to get on the ferry for Victoria where we spent a very fun week end with Gary and Carolyn Ousey. We were thoroughly wined and dined and spent hours just gabbing. There was a vintage car show on the waterfront, so we took that in on Sunday. We were given the tour of Gary and Carolyn's brand new Monaco motor home and it is lovely. In fact they are traveling in it at this moment and we are hoping to see them here tomorrow.

While traveling back from Victoria, Keith called to say they were in the process of purchasing lakefront property in Montana and would be in Kalispell on Friday if we wanted to join them. Of course! So left here Wednesday afternoon, stayed overnight in Ritzville, and arrived in Kalispell on Thursday evening. Checked out the property (1 acre with 145 feet of frontage on Little Bitteroot Lake) and we all declared it to be wonderful. I believe as of this week, they now own it, and will wait for 20 years for retirement to live there. But this trip was a bonus to see all of them a second time since they were here at Easter. And that lakefront lot will very nicely accomodate our motor home!!

Our next commitment was rafting on the North Payette River with the Idaho Kirkwoods. So we saddled up the motor home and headed south. The day on the river was great. We encountered about a half dozen class 3 rapids and Nolan sat on the front of the raft through all of them. Warren wasn't so sure but what his parents and grandparents had lost their minds and we were all going to drown. We headed back to Mt. Home AFB on Sunday and stayed for a couple of days to continue our visit.

On Monday, August 16, Sheila and the boys, and their friends Pam Hoover and her 3 daughters came to Steilacoom for a quick visit and a day of shopping at IKEA. We had just about every bed filled including the motor home and the treehouse, and we had a great time. On the following Friday, Ken and I drove 13 hours to San Jose and arrived in time to have dinner with the Schuler family as the start of a week end to celebrate Jeff and Bev's 40th wedding anniversay. We spent Saturday at a bocce ball court trying to master the game while enjoying wine and food. We got to see several of our friends from the days when we lived there. We spent Sunday and Monday nights with John and Carol Nicoletti who were our neighbors across the street from us in our old neighborhood. We took a more leisurely drive home by dividing it between Tuesday and Wednesday. And here we are on Thursday.

We don't plan to leave town again until the week end of September 24 when we will fly to San Francisco for a VP 46 Navy reunion for Ken. So if any of you want to catch us at home, now is the time to do it!! We need to stay put and do some yardwork and catch up with the garden output.

Colleen is going to work at her old job in Colorado Springs for 3 weeks in September while they have a change in personnel, and then she goes to New Zealand and Australia in October. We see Craig once in a while when he comes by for lunch or after work, but his job is very busy at the moment. Ciao