Kristine's Graduation / Spokane Road Trip

One of my half-sisters, Kristine, graduated from high school on Friday, June 11. It would have taken something extreme for Michael and I to miss such an important event, so we packed up the car, left Flynn in the hands of a quality kennel, and took off for my birthplace: Spokane, Washington.

Kristine, and another of my half-sisters, Madison, have lived their whole lives in Spokane, but I left at an early age. I think I was about two years old when my mom and I moved from Spokane to Salem to be near my grandparents. I have only been there a handful of times as an adult and it had been about four years since my last visit. Kristine, Madison and I were all born at Deaconess Hospital and it was one of the first things Michael and I saw after we cruised into town.

We were cutting it close in terms of making it to Kristine's graduation, but decided we had enough time to grab a bite to eat at Carl's Jr (thankfully, they have salads!). As we pulled into the parking lot, I was remarking to Michael "I was born here, you know," meaning the city of Spokane, when I looked up and saw Deaconess Hospital looming large on the hill right in front of us. I started laughing and pointing, saying, "That's where I was born--right there!!" It took Michael a moment to put together what I was saying and then he laughed too. We both thought how funny it was that we happened to see the hospital at the exact moment I was talking about being born in Spokane. Too funny.

The graduation was being held at a large auditorium not far from the Carl's Jr. and we made it just in time. I ended up changing my clothes in the car, since we didn't have time to check in to our motel before the ceremony, but I think I did a pretty good job of it--hopefully not too many passersby got an eyefull! ;)

This trip was important not only because we would see Kristine graduate from high school (a huge accomplishment in its own right, and made even more so by the fact that she has overcome some pretty tough times in her personal life), but because my extended family on my father's side would be there to commemorate her achievement as well. My aunt Bev flew in from Denver, CO, and my aunt Betty from her home in Salem, OR. Another of my aunts lives close by in Spokane Valley and she would be there as well. Madison would be there too, with her mom and her sister, Marion. And Kristine would have her brother Casey there, as well as many friends wishing her well. All together we would make quite a cheering section!

We didn't get to talk to Kristine until after the ceremony, but everyone pointed her out to us as the girl with the long, platinum blond hair. Once I saw her in the crowd of her classmates, it was pretty easy to find her again. Her hair was blond--almost white! I thought it looked nice on her and admired her for her bravery . . . I have never been so daring.

Me, Kristine and Madison

Casey and Kristine

We were pretty tired after the ceremony, and Kristine had an all-night senior party to attend, so Michael and I headed off to find our motel and get a good night's sleep.

The next afternoon, we all met up at a favorite park to have a picnic and celebrate with Kristine.
Casey provided sandwiches, cookies, a couple different salads, beverages and of course, a graduation cake. It was quite a spread!

She looked mighty proud of that diploma--and we were mighty proud of her.

Michael, Bev, Kristine, Betty, Marion & Madison

After the picnic, Michael and I headed to downtown Spokane to check out the Davenport Hotel, which Aunt Bev said boasted a candy shop famous for its soft peanut brittle. We met her, Betty and Madison there and had fun walking through the grand old hotel. I sent my mom a picture text showing the hotel and she wrote back, saying that she had had a job interview there some 30+ years ago to be an elevator operator. This was back before the hotel's renovation. She was offered the job but had already accepted a position with a different company. It was neat to have that little bit of trivia from my mom's history and to associate it with the beautiful hotel we were touring. Michael and I were amazed to discover that a night at the Davenport was only about $30 more than we were paying to stay at the Holiday Inn Express . . . we couldn't believe it, given how luxurious the lobby of the Davenport was compared to our simple room at the Holiday Inn. Needless to say, we definitely know where we will be staying on our next visit to Spokane!

We found the candy shop and Michael and I ended up buying sampler packs for our dads in preparation for Father's Day--ours are both hard to buy for, but both have a sweet tooth, so we figured we would be good with candy samplers. :)

The picture Maddie liked best of the ones I took of her and Bev.

That night we went out to dinner at a Chinese restaurant that had been one of my father's favorites. Kristine and Madison both remember him taking them there on many occasions. After our food came, I could see why he liked it--everything was amazingly good! I had my first taste of tempura and Aunt Bev said it was the best she had ever eaten. We spent a wonderful time talking and sharing stories and memories. I listened intently and wished more than one time that I was writing everything down. I don't have many memories of my father and it is always interesting to me (and very bittersweet) when I get together with that side of my family and hear stories about him. The girls learned some things from my aunts about how he was as a child, and my aunts learned more about how he was as an adult, and I learned both! :) It was a good time all around.

Donna, Michael, Madison, Betty, Bev, Kristine

The aunts and the nieces

Before we left the next morning to go home, Michael and I met Betty, Bev and the girls at an IHOP for breakfast. We had one last round of picture-taking and then they were off for a day and a night in Leavenworth, WA, and we were headed back down the highway.

It was so fun to visit with my aunts again and for them to get to know Michael and vice versa. Can't wait to do it again!

It was only the third time I have seen Kristine and Madison, and I was glad to get to know them a little better. I am very proud of the young women they both are and are becoming, and I know our father would be too.

Our Garden Part I

Two years ago, Michael and I planted our first garden. For beginners, we had astounding success. We had no problems with pests wanting to eat the fruits of our labor and everything grew beautifully with only a little organic food here and there, and of course, adequate watering. Last summer we never got around to planting a garden (being the jetsetters we were from April to June, we were not home much) and I sorely missed having veggies fresh from the garden. I especially missed my tomatoes; there is no comparison I have found to tomatoes warm from a day in the sun. Tomatoes I bring home from the grocery store (even store-bought organic tomatoes) lack a certain something--a juicy freshness--that I crave.

So this summer, I started talking early about a garden in order to get Michael prepared for the work he would need to contribute to help bring those tomatoes to our table. :) I started in February or March with some seeds given to us by Kathleen and Matthew when they headed down south last year. There were all kinds of organic, high-quality seeds, but they were intended for planting in 2008 so I wasn't sure if they would grow into strong plants or not two years after their "best by" date.

I got some seedlings started and fussed over them for the next few months, while I waited 1) for the weather to become somewhat spring-like so they would survive in the ground and 2) for them to grow big enough to make it on their own outside.

In May Michael spent a few hours assembling some planter boxes out of some old boards from our deck (we are currently in the middle of a do-it-yourself deck remodel) and when I came back from the retreat, I spent a few more hours lining the boxes with plastic so as to avoid any contamination from old paint or stain left on the wood. The finished products turned out pretty well . . .

Catching Up!

It's been quite some time since my last post . . . lots of exciting things have happened in my life in the past few months, and I decided it's high time I sit down and catch you all up. :)

One of my biggest adventures took place in late May when my mom and I spent a few busy days in North Carolina, Tennessee, and even a short stint in South Carolina. We were there mainly so I could attend a retreat, but my mom hadn't had a "real" vacation (by that I mean other than camping or spending a week at the beach) since I could remember and she was long overdue one. The bonus to our trip was that we got to see some very special people whom we hadn't seen in quite some time. :)

This trip was huge for my mom, because it had been 35+ years since she had last flown--the last time was when she was 18 and flew to Texas to marry my father. Crazy! So she was understandably a bit nervous about getting on an airplane. I had joked with her beforehand that we would get her a bloody mary or two before boarding and the rest would be a piece of cake. We ended up skipping the cocktails since we left Portland at 8:30am, but my mom did a great job anyway--she only dug her nails into my arm or leg a few times over the course of the day. :)


We spent all day Thursday, May 20, in the air or catching connecting flights. The soft-spoken United Airways ticket agent in Portland was nice enough to arrange our seats so we could sit together on all three flights, which I know eased my mom's fears about flying. Aside from having to conduct a mad dash from one side of the airport to the other in Charlotte, N.C., it was a smooth day of travel and we had a nice time relaxing and catching up with each other.

We landed in Asheville, N.C. around 9:30p.m. and my friend Matthew met us there and then drove us to nearby Greeneville, TN where he lives with his wife, Kathleen and their little boy, Jackson. I was Kathleen's doula for Jackson's homebirth two years ago, and she and Matthew are the friends who flew Michael and I around the country with them last summer, to GA, NC, NY and for me, FL. It had been nearly a year since we had seen them, but right away, it felt like we had never been apart. It's like that with good friends, I have found. :)

We were able to chat with them a bit over tea before we headed for bed. They showed us around the 100 year-old farmhouse they are renovating for some friends back in Oregon, and introduced us to their brand-new baby chicks! The little peepers were temporarily housed in a cooler with a heat lamp, food and water and lots of straw while they grow big enough to make the move to the great outdoors. Jackson was asleep for the night, but I heard him the next morning as he greeted the chicks in their cooler with a hearty "Baby Chickens!" It was so neat to see him a year older and so much changed from the baby he was last year . . . I loved hearing him talk and the way he said "okay!" at the end of each sentence: "Ride in the red truck, okay!" It was always a declaration, never a question. Jackson took to my mom right away and kept taking her index finger in his whole hand and pulling as his way of asking her to come see something.

Friday morning I awoke to a beautiful, sunny day--so different from the rain and gray skies we'd been having in Oregon for weeks. We all gathered on the back porch of the farmhouse and I glided back and forth on the porch swing while I sipped my morning herbal tea. There are no visible neighbors from the front, back or sides of the farmhouse and I reveled in the peaceful seclusion. My mom picked a huge bowl of strawberries from a patch near the house while Kathleen and I planted an army of tomato plants. Jackson ran back and forth between us and Matthew who was using the weed whacker--he'd only have it running for a few minutes, then would shut it off as Jackson came running over to see it.







That afternoon, Kathleen, Jackson and my mom piled into their car and headed to Asheville, N.C. where my mom and I spent the next few days while I attended my retreat. We stayed at a lovely old inn called the Grove Park Inn. What I noticed right away upon arriving at the inn is that its website definitely does not do justice to the beauty of the place. I loved the red roof in contrast with the dark stone walls and the lovely old pieces of pottery, china, quilt samples, and antique furniture displayed throughout its halls. I am a sucker for places with history and this inn is certainly one of them. There is even a plaque mounted on the door of the suite where Barack Obama stayed (I believe) the night before his speech at the democratic convention. :)


There's my mom looking very small in comparison to one of the enormous fireplaces situated at either end of the Great Hall at the entrance to the inn. And a stunning view of the mountains taken from the dining area where we had breakfast each morning.

My retreat ended on Monday and my mom and I hopped in our rental car and drove to Anderson, S.C. to meet up with my half-sister, Christi and her daughter, Elsa. It was only the second time we had all seen each other in person (living across the country from each other makes visits infrequent), and it was good to sit down to a nice lunch and talk a bit. When Michael and I were in Georgia last summer, we ate at a Cracker Barrel restaurant (down-home southern cooking) and since there was one in Anderson, we decided to take my mom there so she could experience it. She loved the rocking chairs gracing the "front porch" of the restaurant and wished we could somehow bring one home with us. It was very warm and sunny after we finished eating and we went outside so Elsa could run around. She had a blast exploring the landscaped area in front of the restaurant and especially loved smelling all the flowers.



Elsa was so sad when it was time to go . . . she cried and kept signing "more, more" in ASL. It was precious.

It was almost immediately after Christi and Elsa drove off that the heavens opened and the rain started pouring down. My mom and I took refuge in the restaurant gift shop until the worst seemed to be over. We headed back to Kathleen and Matthew's house in Tennessee where we would spend our last night before leaving Tuesday afternoon to fly home.

It was clear skies as far as you could see the next day (I'm telling you, I got SO spoiled for good weather on that trip that it's making me rethink life as an Oregonian) and we had some time to kick back and relax together before leaving for the airport. Matthew took Kathleen, Jackson and me on a ride in their Scout (which Michael helped him fix last summer when they stayed with us). I was loving every minute of it (yes, even the pollen from something out there that was making me sneeze), and trying to soak up every second in the sunshine.

The baby chickens even got to come out and peck around in the grass for awhile, which Jackson loved.



Then Matthew took my mom, me and Jackson for a ride up the hill near the back of their house. It's like a meadow rising nearly straight up in the air and the three of us held on tight to the Scout to keep from sliding out the back as we ascended. The view from the top was just gorgeous and I did my best to capture it with my little camera, knowing as I did so that I was coming up short.


Much, much much too soon, it was time for us to head for Asheville and the beginning of our trip home. We promised each other to not wait so long for another visit--can't wait to see y'all again!