Been Busy...

I feel like I have been M.I.A. from the blog recently.  My nephew was in town for three weeks which meant that if we were not at work we were filling our time with adventures.  At the end of his three week stay with us in Sitka we (all 5 of us) flew south to Seattle.  My parents just purchased and moved into their retirement home on the Washington coast and my own family and my sisters family were all going to convene on Ocean Shores, WA to help my parents settle into their new forever home.

Its been a week of painting rooms, unpacking boxes, organzing the garage and setting up bedrooms.  It was exhausting but I feel really good about all the work we did with them.  They have purchased a gorgeous home that is sandwiched between a lake and the Pacific coast.  If you know anything at all about where my Trav and I grew up and where my parents just recently left then you could easily understand why they chose this area.  

The new house

Coming from the Mojave Desert of southern California to the Pacific coast has always been a dream of theirs for as long as I can recall.  To be able to help them settle into this beautiful area has been a pleasure.  They now own a gorgeous house, on a lake.  We can all lay in bed at night listening to the rain or the frogs on the lake.  We rise in the morning to birds, geese, beavers, deer and racoons enjoying the habitat that the lake offers.  We bird watch, a family favorite!  We walk the beach in the evenings collecting shells and sand dollars while enjoying the breathtaking sunsets.  Life here is vastly different from life in the desert and I will no longer dread having to return to the desert to see my parents.   I am so happy for them and proud of their desire to attain a better life outside of the brown, windy, dry, hot desert.  

This is our family paver at the Astoria Column purchased before we transferred out of Oregon in 2005!

Aside from all the work we put in this week, the family has been able to enjoy one another immensely.  We have cooked out, laughed, celebrated birthdays, drank lots of beer, eaten tons of fresh seafood and completed 18 holes of minature golf.  We took a day trip to Astoria, Oregon and overall had a great time.  Its not frequent that all of us can get together at the same time.  When we do, it is a blast.  

  

Tomorrow my Trav and I will leave to head home.  We are taking a short overnight detour to Port Angeles, WA to survey the area (possible retirement spot)  and also hit up a few stores, can you say Target, REI, the mall and Cabelas before we fly home Saturnday.  I am very anxious to take a quick road trip up the coast to the Olympic Peninsula.  The kids will be staying here with the grandparents for two weeks.  Trav and I will have to find ways to fill our time.  What do a couple of 30 somethings with no kids do...I guess we are about to find out.  

I will miss my family.  I will miss the warm feelings I get in my parents home.  I will miss hearing the laughter of cousins fill the house and the converstations between the adults.  It is always good to come together but on the flip side. two weeks with my husband and no children is likely to be a great time as well.  

Cousins....

We rarely have family come to visit with the exception of my parents.  I won't lie, it gets disappointing when we go extended periods of time without seeing anyone at all.  We make an effort to travel "home" once a year but if it is a transfer season or we want to take a family vacation ourselves we will likely go two years without seeing anyone in our families.  This is not an attempt to lay guilt, we understand that it is life and family just can't travel at times. We do enjoy and desire sharing our lives, our home and our existance with people.  It allows us to help them understand how we go about living in the different towns and places we are sent to by the Coast Guard.  With that said,  when my sister agreed to let my nephew come and stay with us for a few weeks this summer we were very excited.  Having family come to our home feels good.  The kids have been so excited to have RJ come up to Sitka. We were anxious to give him an adventure and help him experience living up here and how different life on this island is.   We made a list of all the places we wanted to take him and all the experiences we wanted him to have.  

He arrived two weeks ago and we have been making steady, swift progress and checking things off our list.  Trav and I still have to work and manage duty schedules which requires us to accomplish a good bit of the activities after work.  We also have to contend with the inclimate weather we have been having but it hasn't been to bad.  Luckily RJ is easy going!

We took RJ out to Ft. Rousseau/The Causeway on Tuesday.  We hiked to some of the old, abandoned WWII bunkers, beachcombed, ate dinner and had a rock skipping challenge.  This area is only accessible by boat which makes it that much more incredible.  We use our canoe to transit from our anchored boat to the island. This is probably one my favortie places to go in the Sitka area.  I know he enjoyed himself.  It was cold and slightly rainy, but that definitely made for a goregous sunset with the storm clouds and the setting sun.

Rock skipping competition

                                         

                                         

We climbed the first of two mountains we hope to summit.  Once again, after work we packed dinner and headed out.  It took us just under two hours to reach the summit and hike some of the ridge.  Considering we had three kids, I was pretty impressed with that time.  It was cold and the clouds layed heavy on the top of the ridge but it was beautiful.  We saw signs that bears had recently been in the area, but saw no bears.  Taylor, who is not the least bit interested in physical exertion did outstanding.  We stopped for dinnter at the top and then turned around, spending 1 hour and 40 minutes making our way down.  We had great converstion coming down and the kids were physically exhausted. 

Bear Viewing in Katlian Bay.  Isn't this a stunning landscape?

 This picture is blurry but I love it!  We seem to keep finding reasons to Cheerz!

I mean really...is this not an epic picture for a 13 year old kid!?!

We have also been fishing, bear viewing, hiking to waterfalls, giving educational tours of the historic parks in town, playing darts and board games.   

This morning as I sit here, my body is physically exhausted.  I feel like Trav and I have been going non stop to make the most of our time with my nephew.  Its a good exhaustion though as I think he is having a great time.   He is just an outstanding kid.  I know he is enjoying his vacation.  Life in Alaska is very different from his life in the Mojave desert of Southern California.  He makes a point to let us know how much he appreciates each night we spend together and all the various things we do and see.  I love that my children are making good memories with him.  

As a family of four, we have a very close bond but I often wonder how life will be when our kids are older having lived their lives away from family that they do not see consistently or often.  Will it be ackward?  Will they have no close relationships with their cousins, their aunts and uncles?  This time with RJ has reassured me that even with distance, the kids still love one another and enjoy each others company.  Perhaps even with the bonds of extended family, absence makes the heart grow fonder .