Oh My Aching...

Happy Memorial Day 2012!  Memorial Day Weekend in Western Washington can be dicey in terms of weather most of the time.  That being said, most everyone seems to escape the metropolitan area to find some sun and warmer weather.  So lots of people take Friday off from work in addition to getting Monday off for the holiday -- and they make it a 4-day weekend.  Well, Jared followed that theory, he took Friday off, but it wasn't to escape the city, it was to get a head start on our latest project.

When Kristina arrived home from work on Friday, she saw that Jared had removed a section of dirt alongside the driveway (by the way, our driveway is 100 ft long).  In addition, 8 tons of crushed rock had also been delivered and was sitting in the driveway awaiting dispersal throughout various areas of the yard. 

Kristina had a tennis lesson scheduled, so she headed out and left Jared to continue.  When Kristina arrived home from tennis, Jared had installed a border edge along the driveway where he had excavated the dirt, installed electrical wire for our driveway lights, and he had laid down landscaping material to hopefully keep the weeds out of our too be installed crushed rock.  That was a lot of progress in TWO hours!  Wow!

Soon after that, Jared ran out of daylight and energy and we decided to pick it up again Saturday morning.

Saturday morning, we got right to dispersing crushed rock.  First order of business was to fill in the border along the driveway and sidewalk.  So with their shovels in hands, Jared and Kristina got to work on the HUGE rock pile.  The front walkway and driveway went much faster than we had anticipated and in no time, we were done -- and it looked much better!

Looking towards the street...

Looking at our house from the street...

Next up was filling up a pathway that Jared had built the previous weekend.  Jared used pressure treated timbers to create a "Forest Service" like path from our backyard to the Tolt Pipeline Trail behind our house. Since the framework was there for the most part, Kristina cut and laid the landscaping material while Jared did a few tweaks on the structure.  After that, it was more hauling rock.  So once again, we loaded up the wheelbarrow and made several trips from the driveway to the backyard.  Once again, it went fairly quickly and we were done in no time.  The finished trail looked quite good. 

We filled in the rest of the pathway to the trail with more crushed rock.  We already had smaller river rock in this area, which drains well, but it tough to walk through to get where you need to go.  It is much easier to walk on now and it looks great! 

Here's a shot from the trail looking into our backyard.

The next order of business was to scrape out the mud, moss, weeds, and grass on NW side of the house.  We keep our trash can, recyclable can, and our compost cans on this side of the house.  It is always soggy on this side of the house and it practically gets no sun at all.  Since nothing really grows but moss we decided to put crushed rock here too.  It sure makes things looks cleaner, and it is much easier to roll the cans in and out to the street!

We had some extra rock, so we also continued on a path to the backyard along the dog run.  The plan is to install a border and get rid of that ivy, but for now at least the path is there, and NOT muddy!

As we continued to try and use up all of the 8 tons of rock, we decided to continue the border from the front of the house and along the SE side of the house.  Again, we had to first scrape out the mud and weeds.  Then we installed landscape material -- followed by more wheelbarrows of crushed rock!  Once again, it looks so much better. 

And last but not least, some more shots of the backyard.  It looks really good and we both definitely feel an "ahhhh" when we look at it!

Are we done yet?

Indy's Day out with Jared!

Today was too nice of a day to go to work -- or at least that was what Jared thought!  It was unseasonably warm (around 80 degrees), sunny, clear, and just one of those perfect Washington days.  So, after checking to make sure there were no emergencies at work -- Jared decided to take the day off and go scout some new areas.  Of course Indy got to go along and she couldn't have been happier to spend the day outside hiking around and exploring with Jared.  As one of our friends likes to say, "Days that don't suck!".  :)

Ah yes, it was a gorgeous day indeed.  Indy and Jared decided that they would head east towards the Cascade Mountains.  Specifically, they would head up the Skykomish River Basin towards Stevens Pass on Highway 2.  Jared's research had pointed him towards some major tributaries of the Skykomish, namely, Foss, Miller, and Beckler Rivers.

They made their way up the road, past the town of Skykomish, through a tunnel, and then off onto Foss River Road.  The road quickly turned from pavement to dirt and they found ourselves meandering up alongside the Foss River.  Jared headed towards "The Westfork Trail" but was quickly stopped by snow.  Jared sat there looking at the snow all over the road and in the trees and then looked at the outdoor temperature gauge that read 74 degrees.  What a strange combination... snow drifts and 74 degrees.  Jared and Indy flipped it around and went down another road.  It wasn't long before Jared started spotting snow alongside the road in little drifts, but then they came upon a bridge.  Jared parked and got these pictures of the Foss:

Look how nice and clear, regardless of all the snow melt!

They jumped back into the truck and back tracked a bit to where we saw a turn out for a trail head.  It was a nice trail head with a clean restroom and nice parking.  Reading the sign, they could see it was the Necklace Valley Trail and that it eventually leads to a string of alpine lakes... in fact, those lakes are in the "Alpine Wilderness Area".  One problem though; they didn't have an up to date "Northwest Forest Pass".  Indy wanted to go up this trail so bad it was just sad.  She kept running to Jared and then running up the trail.  It did look inviting, that was for sure!  And it was about 76 degrees now, so the shade of the thick forest was really nice!  Jared explained to Indy that they would come back and take that hike as soon as Jared tracked down a forest pass.  We hopped in the truck and headed back towards the town of Skykomish not far away.

Turns out they didn't even have to go that far!  Just a few yards from the turn off to Foss River Road, there was a ranger station... and of course they have passes!  Jared and Indy stopped, bought the yearly pass and received some additional info about the area from the ranger.  Then, to Indy's delight, they hit the road and shot back up the Foss to the Necklace Valley trailhead!

The trail was in excellent shape, easy to follow, and mostly clear of downed trees.  This may sound trivial, but in Western Washington, trails in good shape and that are not washed out, overgrown, under water, or filled with downed trees are actually more rare than you might think.  Here's Indy at the very start before Jared could get her leash back on her!

Woodpeckers?!  Is this a tree, or Swiss cheese?

One of many streams that come out of the side hill and across the trail.  Indy dipped her toes and drank at every single one of them!

This was the biggest side stream we encountered.  It was really roaring and made you question the integrity of that bridge.  Definitely wouldn't want to fall in to this one, as it kept roaring down the hill as far as the eye could see.

Indy tied up while Jared took pictures... she wasn't too happy about being left behind for a minute!

Ah, time to cool off.  Jared and Indy had hiked about two miles or so when we decided to turn around and head back. Indy found an acceptable stream and decided she'd lay down for a few.

They returned to the truck and loaded up.  The Necklace Valley Trail was really nice, but it is nine miles to the first lake, plus a 3500ft climb to get there in the last two miles.  Not sure we'll make it any time soon!

Next, they headed up Beckler River Road.  Beckler River is pretty large, and the road was really nice (all paved).  They drove for a ways and then stopped for a snack and to let Indy swim a little.  Then they flipped it around and headed for the Miller River area to sneak a peak before heading home.

The Miller River Road was quite nice as well.  It was all dirt, and the stream looked like it might be decent fishing once the high water recedes.  They drove up to were we crossed it at one point and it was very rough and fast as it charged down the canyon.

They turned around not far from here.  The road keeps going and eventually stops at a trail that leads into the Alpine Wilderness and to another string of mountain lakes.  There are tons of mountain lakes up there, and hopefully we all can get to one of them later this summer.  The 80 degree weather can definitely trick you into thinking the snow is gone everywhere, but the ranger Jared talked to said that pretty much every lake in the area was still snowed in... the one they checked recently was under eight feet of snow!  Maybe July or August.

Spring continues in Western Washington

It has been an good spring (after it finally arrived) in Western Washington.  The meteorologists kept telling us than the La Nina weather pattern was breaking up and going to be gone, but we really didn't believe them since it has been here since we moved here in May of 2010.  However, it seems as if they were right!  We have had dry weekends for most of April and all of May so far -- and the sun has been shining for most of those weekends too!  So honestly, there is nothing to complain about -- except having to go back to work on Monday.  :)

Here are some hanging baskets we put near the front door.  We bought these from the same guy in Woodinville that sells stuff out of his greenhouse.  Aren't they just beautiful?  They look like spring!

And here's another shot of the backyard, you can see it even looks better since the last post we made with regards to the yard!  That Jared is good!

Container Gardening

You would think that with a little over 3/4 of an acre lot, we would have plenty of space to put things in the ground.  However, we have so many trees that shade our backyard that getting enough sunlight can be a bit of a problem in the summer time.  Hence, we decided to put plants in containers so that we can move them around and get the most sun possible (obviously this was never a problem in Arizona -- in Arizona it was tough finding enough shade)!  Here are a few of our latest containers!

Kristina's Mom bought us this really nice container, so we planted several different plants in it to get different colors, heights, and textures.  We'll have to see how it looks as the summer progresses.  So far, it looks really happy and the hasta is growing quite well.  Thanks Louise!

In this one, we planted romaine lettuce.  There is a guy that doesn't live too far from us in Woodinville that sells the stuff out of his greenhouse every weekend in May each year.  We decided to check him out this year, and it was spectacular.  When entering his backyard, you felt an immediate "ahhhhhh"!  He has so many starter plants to choose.  It was quite impressive!

And here of course is Kristina's herbs.  She planted rosemary, thyme, and sage.  All of the standard herbs that she uses for cooking!  She also has basil coming up (she started it from seed) and some wonderful spearmint.  The spearmint really likes the weather around here.

So Fresh and So Clean

Indy was getting a little shaggy and needed to go to the groomers -- that, or we needed to bathe her ourselves.  So Jared made an appointment for her at our usual groomer, Cascade Kennels, to get all fresh and clean for Kristina (this was all she wanted for Mother's Day).  :)  Here she is "so fresh and so clean".  Doesn't she look like a puppy again with that short fur?

Here you can see her faux stub!  When her tail was docked (prior to us buying her), it was cut too short (in our opinion).  We never really liked it being so short because anyone that knows dogs knows that you can get a sense for what they are feeling by looking at the tail.  Luckily with Indy, we never really have to worry about that, so we decided it is what it is.  However, the last time we took her to the groomer, they cut her a faux stub.  It looks like she has more tail that she has, but if you were to grab it, it feels a bit like a pony tail -- all fur!  ha!

Yard Update

A few posts ago, we posted some pictures of our yard.  Jared had just de-thatched it and aerated it.  In addition he planted some more grass seed AND fertilized the yard.  That shared sure knows what he is doing when it comes to yards.  Here are a few pictures we thought you might enjoy...

This is a hydrangea plant that we just bought and planted.  They are a very pretty blue color and if they change color from blue it means that the soil isn't acidic enough.  Interesting, isn't it?  Hopefully these will keep their beautiful blue color and grow for us!