5th Anniversary of my Retirement

Hired at Metro 8/9/77 retired at K.C. 1/31/08
 

This month marks the fifth anniversary of my retirement from King County Metro.  It occurred to me that I have now been retired longer than I was Supervisor of Scheduling. Wow.  My successor, Jon, has been a supervisor a year longer than me.

2013 begins with a New Year Celebration with the gang.  Here’s a pix looking down from above. 

I didn’t realize that we had instructions to all wear blue. . .

 Father-in-Law Al turned 87 and celebrated with a visit from Lil and Bree and Guy’s family. 

Miles and Austin size up the pony ride

 

Niki shows Al and Bree pictures from her phone

I wanted to show a picture of the loading dock that Roger built last Fall.  It has an outdoor sink perfect for bathing the dog, also we’ve moved the worm compost system here from its original setting behind the shop.  The dock has been very handy for many projects.  Here’s a picture of my willow harvest this winter.

Four kinds of willow plus some plum

 

The weather this winter has been fairly mild, but we have had a few frozen days.  Here are some pictures—of the frozen waterfall at Eric’s and a picture of the path to the pond—compare this to last July’s picture.

 

 

 

Click on to enlarge

 

Roger has been busy rerouting the railroad around the boiler to meet up with the new loading dock.  He has also been collecting up to 18 eggs a day from the two chicken flocks.  And he’s been getting the nursery ready for Spring.  The Grange is busy making plans for the year including a seed exchange.

 I managed to finish a basket this month.  And I got to go to our annual spa retreat with Liz, Jeannette, and Michelle.  And last weekend R and I went to Seattle, visited the new new MOHAI, and celebrated Diane’s big 6-0.   Mine will be coming up soon enough.

Celebrating the 60's

 

The month of January was filled with family, friends, projects, natural beauty . . .

 

It looks as though this retirement thing is working out just fine.

  

2012 Retrospective

I skipped out of a Grange Meeting to work on my blog.  Last week I jotted down some important events of the past year thinking I would make a top ten list like they do on the radio.  But the list got very big and unwieldy so then I categorized them into:  milestones, home improvements, trips, visitors, and crafts. But even these subdivisions bled over into one another.  What’s a blogger to do?  I do feel a need to document—but why bore people with details that many of you already know or can refer to in earlier posts? 

My quick summary is starting to look like any other Christmas letter.  Drat, Blogger is not working properly for me to upload pictures from my computer.  I will have to reuse from past blogs.

I’ll start with visitors—since the all time big event for me was the Family Reunion centered on Dad’s 90^th birthday.  So, 72 people here on the island in June.

 

Other visitors include:  Liz, Guy, Jay, Marc, Nancy, another Nancy, Loretta, Don, Lynn, Diane, Craig, Barry, Karen, and Bjorn’s family (Bjorn, Ethel, Lenora, Iliana, Audrey, and now Corbin.)  I know I’m forgetting someone.

So, you’ve already guessed some milestones.  Our grandson Corbin born on March 13^th, My Dad’s 90^th birthday on June 10^,  Also, some sad passings, our nephew Drew in March, my friend Olivia and my first husband George in May and June.  And a couple great weddings as well, Abe and Hilary’s, Lindsay and Greg’s.

We also took some memorable trips in 2012—two to the Oregon Coast, two east of the Mountains (one all the way to Boise), and my big trip with friend Liz to Missouri to visit family and sightsee.

 

On the home front, we made some progress at Thornbush, mainly by getting ready for the big reunion.  I painted the bedroom and bath upstairs.  And Roger built a loading dock on the back of the house—complete with outside sink and dog bath.  I also made a mosaic bowl for the fountain.  But that brings us into the realm of craft.

 

This was a big year for craft.  I got to weave quite a bit, even bought a table loom --an 8-harness to augment my 4-harness floor loom.  I also made several baskets and attended the Columbia Basin retreat at Rockaway Beach, Oregon for the first time.  You may remember the cedar hat I showed off in October.  And now there’s the crow’s nest which the girls were eagerly decorating last week while up for Christmas.  I also participated in the Trashion Fashion show at the County Fair and hope to build on that success in 2013.

 Roger managed to run his business, lead the Grange, and improve Thornbush with loading dock and several improvements to the garden chicken run.

 So you see, quite a laundry list with out even including all the fun gatherings we went to through out the year.

 

Besides more trashion fashion, this year I will be President-elect of the Textile Guild, Roger is once again Master of the Grange. Goals mainly are for more home improvement, attending a weaving conference in Bellingham in June, and a short road trip to Canada to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary.  I am turning 60 in May, you are all welcome for a big potluck at my house.

(and I hope Blogger is working next month so I can show off with new pictures!)