Green Thumb

I asked Troy where he got his Green Thumb from... unless you knew him 10 years ago, you don't want to know what he said! It was very very funny but it relates to his 'old' life. If you ask me in person, I will tell you! However, I know that he enjoys talking gardening with his Dad since Iowa can grow some great veggies in that humidity. Phew, Troy fixed the greenhouse this weekend since it broke 2 days after he built it from the rain puddling up on the roof. BUT that was a blessing in disguise because now it is even stronger and better than it was before.

Today it got mighty toasty in this little sauna. Alyssa wanted to grab a book and lawn chair and just breathe in the warmth. He is trying to tell me what is where.. I just wanted the photo.

Our tree blossomed in just 10 days. WOW. I love this pink and it only stays a few days before it turns red.

Babysitting Class completed

Alyssa has had 10 babysitting opportunities now, netting $120 , but I felt it was important for her to attend an official class. She completed the Better Babysitters Class. Now, she will take CPR/SAFETY on 3/13.

http://www.seattlechildrens.org/classes-community/classes-events/better-babysitters/

HIGHLIGHTS:
Surprised there were 5 young boys in the class with 15 girls.
Alyssa learned about cloth diapers. She never knew they existed. FUNNY.
Most importantly, NEVER SHAKE A BABY or you can cause brain damage.
Never walk away from a baby in a bathtub.
Don't yell at the kids, be kind.
Give options to kids such as, "you want to wear your red coat or your blue coat" as opposed to "do you want to wear your coat?"
If they don't want to brush their teeth, try to use fun methods to get them to want to such as, "race you to the bathroom".

Braces

Just needed an official posting of Alyssa's braces!

Before pictures.

Spacers put in 1/25/10

Braces put on 2/2/10 with estimated time of 18 months! I sure hope she appreciates this sacrifice. I am proud of her so far, for doing her 30 minutes of care for them each night.

I love WORDS

I love ordering Vinyl lettering from Amber Puzey's Pineplace. These are all the rooms in my house that have words. I don't like to hang many things on the walls, so instead, I like motivating words.

Master bedroom. "Where their is Faith, there is Love, where there is Love, there is Peace, where there is Peace, there is God. Where there is God, nothing else matters". Master Bathroom - Mosiah 4:9 scripture

Alyssa's room - Light fades, Stars appear, evening Angels, gather Here

Upstairs beam where we all exit our bedrooms and walk down the stairs. - I will go and do the things that the Lord has commanded. - 1 Nephi 3:7

Hallway by guest bathroom - Cherish yesterday, Dream tomorrow, Live today.

Kitchen - A person's true character is revealed by what they do when no one is watching.

The laundry room to garage, the last thing we see each day.

Now, I have this great big looming wall in the great room that I am digging deep to decide what can go here? Ideas?

Grand Canyon of 15 mile creek hike

This hike was by far, my most adventuresome one yet. I do not know how I did it, but I did! Words will never be able to describe what my 4-hour, 7 mile hike was like.


I had never driven up Tiger Mountain Road (off of Issaquah Hobart Road) and so I was excited to see if there was a place to park and hop on a trail. I knew I wanted to see this infamous Grand Canyon of 15 mile creek view.


I was nervous of where I parked, not knowing if I was blocking an important gate, but it didn't say NO PARKING, so I went for it. It was near street 260th on TM road. When I was loading my bag, a man startled me by saying, "Good Morning". I was already on edge about this day, parking where I didn't know, hiking alone, worried about my route, so I was super jumpy. This man and I spoke a bit about the day and trails and he offered to head me off in the right direction. So, in my nervousness and haste, I left without my sunglasses and Garmin, but I did make sure I locked the car. So, this man makes me go past the trail I wanted to hike on and he leads me to a bridge. He shows me all the storm damage from 2 years ago and what the creek did to the area when it split and created new paths. It was quite amazing to see what kind of forces had to be going through this area back then. He tells me non-chalantly.. "just head up this creek bed, you will cross it about a dozen times, see the waterfall, every now and then, look up to your right and you will see the washed away trail, now if you are brave, then when you get about 'here' there won't anywhere else to go in the creek bed, so mozey through the bushes (there might be red flags tied to trees) and you will come upon another trail, stay on that a while and then when you get to the end of that, you will take this unofficial deer trail through the bushes and you will come up to Tiger Mountain Trail (TMT). From there, you can do this or that or even this.. all are great, good luck". I ask, "now, why wouldn't I just go back and take the real trail and just get a view of the creek?" He explains, 'no, you want to do this creek bed, it is beautiful, fun, adventurous, you will see sandstone along the way and get the full impact of this canyon". Anyhow, off he goes up the West Side road and I am left shaking in my boots!


My pink highlighted route.
So, off I go, with some courage that I don't know where it came from. Roxy and I make our way up the sides of creek bed of Fifteen Mile Creek. You can see the little creek in this very large creek bed, with lots of storm damage. We cross the creek every so often when we run out of room on a side. The whole time, I am looking up the sides of the banks for wild animals peering at me. I was trying to decide if the Holy Ghost was telling me this is a VERY bad idea. I had my alarm around my neck, my cell phone in pocket, my gun on hip, I really was a wreck.

It really was pretty and I was trying to enjoy this experience.

I started to get more brave as time passed and as I crossed the creek. I kept remembering that Troy was more worried, I would break my ankle while hiking alone. About less than an hour into my hike, I was crossing the creek and I fell in all the way up to my hip. My cellphone did get wet and stopped working for about an hour. Both feet were sloshing. I couldn't believe it, but I laughed outloud. OF COURSE this would happen. Both elbows and ankle bones were scratched up. It really was a funny scene. I got out and kept on trucking along.. I was not turning back now.

This shows a hill slide of massive destruction from the storm. I am looking up the hill from the creek bed.

When I saw this, I thought, please tell me this is not THE waterfall. I mean, really...

A last... the waterfall. It was quite wimpy. So, I got to this point and thought... now what did that man say again? Keep going or do what? I couldn't figure it out, so I climbed a big boulder to get a different perspective. I looked around and sure enough, saw the real trail end where 'normal' people stop to view this silly waterfall. Well, for some unknown reason, I decided to keep going up the creek bed. It is probably a good idea I went alone since I could listen to my intuition and not be persuaded to do something that could have lost my way.

From this point, I hiked until I couldn't go further. Then, I found some PINK tied ribbons and Roxy had already spotted a scent, so we went up a VERY steep brushy hillside. I had no idea what we were doing. I wasn't scared, I knew parrellel to this creek was a trail somewhere. Eventually, we came upon a trail and I assumed it was Hobart Middle Tiger Railroad Grade Trail. It was nice and big and open and calming. Very easy walking through this area. Then, the trail just ends after about a .75 miles, so I find some more ribbons going up another steep hill. I climb this area too, thinking how funny and brave this all was. Finally, I see a TMT sign 1/4 mile more.. I hopped on the TMT and walked another .7 miles until I came to Charles Custer's Bridge. I crossed over to the West side of 15 mile creek. I just happened to run into 2 women who were doing the TMT from North to South. COOOOOOOL... now I have to put that on my list.

Finally, another sign.... so I hopped off the TMT and onto 15 mile Railroad Grade Trail, then onto Hidden Forest Trail. I ran into a family of 4 and said hello.

At this point, I was finally fully relaxed and enjoying this beautiful meadow hike. I could finally listen to my music since before I had to listen for growling bears and cougars. Now, that I was away from the water and there were no berries flowering. I wasn't worried since now other people were out and about too!

Self-portrait, relaxed and happy, the hardest part was over!

This is MIDDLE MOUNTAIN peak, that I basically walked around the base of it. I want to do this peak now, pretty easy only 1800 feet gain and easy to get to, now that I know my bearings there.

I finally came out on West Side road and ran into a Father/Daughter team. We chatted a bit and parted ways.

I do not recommend doing what I did, unless you are adventurous and want something crazy to live and tell about! BUT you should definately do the real trail and walk along the creek bed and enjoy our little "Grand Canyon" here in the PNW. However, f you want to do this, I will take you on this hike later this summer, by special request!

Theobroma Cacao

Alyssa's homeschool program arranged for a local Organic Freetrade Chocolate Factory tour. Theo's is located in Fremont, (Seattle) and has been open for 4 years. http://www.theochocolate.com/ This is a picture with Alyssa's WAVA online teacher Becky Norris, who happens to live here in Maple Valley too!

Alysssa, Kaitlyn and Tanner are all WAVA students. This photo is of all the Wright kids with Lys. Hairnets make everyone look HAWT. Chocolate History: Chocolate comes from the seeds from the Cacao Plant, called the Theobroma Cacao. Thus the name of this chocolate factory, Theo's. Back in the days of the Aztecs, it was reserved only for the rich and noble. Emperor Montezuma was said to have drank 50 cups a day. Chocolate really does have the LOVE CHEMICAL, phenylethylamine. Eating chocolate can induce feelings of love!!! First, the cacao tree must grow in tropical places. Unlike most other fruits, this one does not grow on the branches, it grows right off the trunk. This is what the cacao fruit looks like inside. The beans are covered in the white fruit. This is what you DONT want to know. In order to recover the seeds, the fruit needs to ferment for a week while microorganisms eat away at the fruit until just the seeds remain. GROSS. A last... the chocolate seed!! During the tour, we learned about all these steps of the chocolate making process.

Seeds being roasted!

Kaitlyn, Alyssa and Camilla trying chocolate nibbs. I thought they were wonderful. They are like unsweetened choc chips, a nutty taste. "Chocolate Nibs are the center of the Cocoa Bean, and the base of all chocolate. After the outer shells of the individual beans have been removed, the nibs are roasted and ground." They are very good heart food.

The warehouse is in a 100 year old building where the Seattle trolleys used to station.

Caramels in the making, live!

oh so close, but we couldn't cross the yellow line to get a taste...

Are you licking your lips now?

I am facinated by chocolate even more now! We tried 91% chocolate, spicy/chile chocolate, coconut/curry chocolate, cherry/almond, orange/dark, mint/dark, hazelnut crunch, but darn, I forgot to eat my favorite LAVENDAR!!

It was a great learning experience, we recommend it for all. It is only a $6 tour and well worth it.

grooming

Since I didn't go to BYU and since Brigham Young is my Great Great Great Grandfather, it is only fitting that we groom Alyssa to attend this great college. So, we will be sure to fit her with clothes until then so she keeps the lofty goal in mind always. AWWWW, this picture is beautiful for me to see!

Troy's 35th Birthday

OOPS, Troy had to wake me up today to tell me it was his birthday. I slept in till 6am and he did not like that Alyssa and I weren't up to root on his BIG DAY!! So, he told me, he may not have to work today. I asked him if he wanted to do something fun then?! He said with a REDNECK grin, "I want to get the garden ready". So, here is a picture of Troy getting the SUPER HUGE GARDEN tilled and ready. BUT now, I take you back to photos leading up to this point. Just one year ago, we tilled in February and got our first garden ready. We planted on Easter weekend. It grew into this beautiful garden, lush with thick green plants! Don't look at the patch of dead grass. UGH. BUT we outgrew that garden after just one season, we wanted to go bigger. We began moving the garden after the last harvest was pulled in October. It took a few sunny days to complete between October and February. (just a few). First remove the blocks. Then scoop out some dirt and flatten. Then fill with rocks and call it clean and done! Then, prepare to remove nice green grass. :( BYE BYE grass. Later, build up blocks to be able to hold dirt. Then, we covered for the winter to make sure it all DIED. Here is the final project today. Dirt is ready and only need 13 blocks to complete. My man knows how to get dirty. Just three days ago, Troy went to town on his seeds, getting them ready for germanation. He is wondering, did Heavenly Father give Adam one-on-one lessons on how care for the plants and grow them? Just 3 days later, we have germanation!!! WOW, that warming mat, really does work.

So, here we go, off to another great gardening season. I am so thrilled my hubby has a green thumb. What a great family hobby.