Life over the Last two Weeks 2015-8 & 9

First, I must say that although life has been just about the same level of crazy as always, my time has been further consumed by my addiction to The Great British Bake Off.

Season 5 is currently running on our public television station and I was thrilled to find Seasons 1 through 4 on You Tube.  Unfortunately, my housework, cooking, and blogging has suffered accordingly.  I have managed, however, to keep up with the laundry so we are not walking around naked!

As I left off two weeks ago, Sophia was home for my birthday weekend (rather a big birthday this year as I am now, drum roll, eligible to eat off the Senior Menu is most places - very happy that my sense of humor has not waned over the years).  We spent the day (Monday was a holiday in honor of my birthday...just kidding, it was Presidents' Day here in the USA) browsing and eating our way through Bainbridge Island and downtown Poulsbo and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.  We ate crepes for lunch and browsed through Churchmouse Yarns & Teas - although I am hopeless at any type of yarn craft, I do love to look at the wool.

Strawberry-Nutella Crepes for dessert

Beautiful soft yarn

It was up early and back to business on Tuesday morning.  Vic went off to work while Sophia, MudLynn, and I hit the ferry and headed back up to Bellingham with a stop on the way to get Sophia a new ID card.  She can keep her military benefits for another couple of years while she is a full-time student.  I dropped her off and headed home and enjoyed a couple of days getting the house back in order.  I broke a nail rather badly (don't you hate that when they are all the same lovely length and then, bamm, one of them is destroyed) so I booked a manicure and then went to an organizational meeting for the ship's Family Readiness Group in the evening.  I managed to keep my mouth shut and not volunteer for anything at this stage; happily, there were enough volunteers to make a full board of officers so we are up and running.  The Family Readiness Groups' popularity has waned in these days of rapid communication through text, Facebook, Skype, and other social media, but it's still a great time to meet other spouses at social events while the ship is gone and work on the best activity of all - homecoming.

On Saturday, Vic and I took off on another road trip - this time along the scenic Highway 101 with Forks as our destination.  Sophia was the big Twilight fan in our household but we were all caught up in the Team Edward/Team Jacob furor some time ago and thought it would be fun to see Forks.  We stopped on the way at Lake Crescent which was beautiful and we'll be heading back there when the weather warms up.  Forks was a bit of a disappointment - turns out that none of the movie was actually filmed anywhere in Forks so the sights were only from the book.  Since I never got around to the book, I was expecting to see what I remembered from the movie.  It was a lovely day out though as Vic enjoys driving and it gives us a chance to talk about everything and nothing.  We took a quick detour on our way home at the Hoh Rainforest and enjoyed a light hike along the Hall of Mosses.

Lake Crescent

First Beach at La Push - home of the Quileute Tribe

Vic outside the Visitors' Center in Forks with Bella's trucks - one from the book and one from the movie

Bella Swan's house which was for sale

Hiking the Hall of Mosses - our first Washington hike

Vic had duty on Sunday and had discovered that his truck radiator was leaking so I dropped him off and then picked him up when he got off work on Monday.  It was a week of early mornings as we haven't had the time to take his truck in to be repaired but it was a little walk down memory lane as we only had one car when we were first married.  The only difference is that then we had Sophia in a car seat in the back and now we have MudLynn!

I spent Tuesday through Thursday mornings at a COMPASS training session.  COMPASS is like Navy 101 for spouses, everything you ever wanted to know.  It gets its name from the concept of navigating your way through Navy life.  I've taken it before and after almost 21 years, you'd think I pretty much knew everything I needed to know but it's also an opportunity to meet spouses in the local area and to take advantage of the Local Insights segment which is always helpful when you move to a new part of the country.  As it was, I met three other spouses from our ship so that was a bonus.

Thursday night was our anniversary and we went out for tapas and paella which was delicious.  We came home and spent two hours going through souvenirs and photos of our first years together which was really special.

And to round out the week, we headed to Salem, Oregon on Friday for the IHSA (Intercollegiate Horse Show Association) Regional Competition to see Sophia and her teammates ride.  This is the culmination of the 2014-2015 season and successful riders now move on to the Zone Competition for the western states and then ultimately, to the National Competition.  Sophia and two of her teammates were in the same class and all three received ribbons although only Jill will move on to the Zone event as only the top two riders in each class move forward.  Sophia had her toughest ride of the season; even to my untrained eye, the horse was just not cooperating.  It turned out that her horse, William, was not a Prince after all.  All in all, a great year and as I said on Facebook, a huge thank you to everyone who has supported her with messages of good luck and congratulations throughout the year.  Social media has given her a huge fan club and it's just wonderful.

So, here we are, ready to tackle another week.  It's a pretty quiet one with just a few things on the calendar but that should given us an opportunity to get Vic's truck to the repair shop and go back to being a two-car household.