Humpty Dumpty

Here's Ryan (with a new haircut) - showing you his humpty dumpty that he made. Part of his school work is to have stories and poems read to him. Then later, he makes a craft project about the story. His favorite part of all this was cracking humpty dumpty and eating part of him!!!

Goodbye Grandma & Grandpa (Dad's Parents)

Rich's parents have just finished spending a week with us here in San Diego and are on their way home to Seattle now. They had a great time watching the boys show off their swimming skills, showing them how much they can eat, and just having a good time together. We have a few chores to due today and tomorrow before the my parents come to town on Saturday.

Monday night excitement!!!

Here's an interesting time-line to follow (hopefully never again!!):

4:30 pm (Monday) - Bilge pump goes off - pumps out water (normal after a rain storm)

7:30 pm (Monday) - Bilge pump goes off again - Hmm - maybe just some leftover rain??

8:00 pm (Monday) - Bilge goes off again - NOT normal, lets see what's going on...

8-9 pm (Monday) - Invite neighbor Mark over to help determine what's going on. Find where water is coming from. Find small stream of water at base of bilge, that looks like it is coming through the fiberglass. Taste test to see if the water is fresh or salt - Answer: SALT (not good!). Decide we better get the boat to the yard to get it hauled out.... Contact Vessel Assist to find out emergency contact information for Shelter Island Boat Yard (Thank you Vessel Assist)!

9:00 pm (Monday) - Begin moving boat to the yard, the boat yard contacted us en route. They were there when Rich, Mark, and Evone (Mark's girlfriend) arrived with the boat.

10:00 pm (Monday) - Boat is out of the water on the sling - with a constant stream of water pouring from a small crack in the bottom of the keel.....

By Noon on Tuesday - Boat is repaired, back in the water, and back in her slip!!!

Whew!!!!

So... we know what you're all thinking: 1) How did the crack get there? We THINK it happened when we were anchored in Dana Point about six weeks ago. It was pretty shallow, and we could have easily scraped on a rock during low tide. 2) What would you have done if you'd not been in San Diego? Rich has this great putty stuff that mixes and hardens under water. He would've put on his diving gear, gone down and fixed it. It wouldn't have been as pretty of a job as the boat yard did, but it would've gotten the same end result.

First Test

Today was Kyle's first test that he had to take for 1st grade. The test consisted of math, reading, reading comprehension, and phonics. He and his dad are off to the post office to mail it in. Speaking of his dad, Rich is now at home with us everyday - no more work for him for a while!!! He definitely did not miss not hearing his alarm go off at 5:15 am today.

His parents are down here for this week, they head back to Seattle on Thursday. So far the boys have shown off their swimming and diving abilities and we've had some nice days together.

Science Project - Watch Them Grow!!!

Well thanks to some help from their friend Carson, the boys were able to watch their frog and lizard grow!!! Carson had his 7th birthday party this past weekend. A couple of the goody bag gifts were a frog and a lizard that grow to 3 times their size when placed in water. Kyle has actually been learning about how different things grow in his science book - so this fit in perfectly. Sunday morning the boys tossed both the frog and the lizard in the bucket of water. The pictures above were taken this morning (3 days later) and both of them have clearly grown! The instructions say it will taken 5-7 days for them to reach their largest size, so the boys put them back in the water so they could continue to grow.

Charts, Charts, Charts..

Everyone is always asking us if we have our charts. We always say yes, we have electronic charts that show on our chart plotter. The charts can be overlayed with radar images, GPS map, etc. Then the next question is always - Are you taking paper charts? Of course we're taking paper charts. It would be silly not to, after all, electronic charts are only good if your electronics are working!! Apparently some people think their electronics will never go out. For every system, it's a good idea to have at least one back-up.

In the past we haven't bought individual charts, but rather a chart book - which contains many charts all bound together into a nice little book. We have bought one for this upcoming trip that has charts from San Diego all the way down to Panama. We also have looked into getting some supplemental individual charts. For example, we don't have one big overall one that shows from San Diego to Cedros. We'll be getting a few supplemental ones, then we should have all the charts we need...

Outboard Repairs -

If you recall, over the labor day weekend, one of our outboards for our dinghy decided it didn't want to run very well anymore. We were lucky enough to be spending that weekend at the guest dock at our yacht club - and there are always people there that are willing to help you figure problems out. This picture is of Rich (in the dinghy) and our friend Alan (providing support and suggestions to Rich). Alan and his wife Khris actually used to own our boat before us!! They have since gone to the "dark side" and now live on a power boat. Anyway, between Alan and Rich, they cleaned the injectors, carburetor and fuel tank - still didn't run correctly. Finally we decided that maybe it really was a simple as changing the spark plugs. Off to West Marine I went to get two new ones. Rich put them in and it was like magic - the outboard runs great now!! I guess if he has to learn how to take apart the outboard and clean everything, it's better he did it originally here than in some anchorage where there is no one else to give you some welcome advice and support.... so thanks Alan!!!

Cousins!!

This is Kyle and his cousin Marissa - both very serious about playing with the Game Boys! Rich's parents are in town this month. Right now they are up in Dana Point for a few weeks where his sister Maryann lives, then they will be coming down here to spend some time with us before they head back to Seattle at the end of the month. This past weekend we drove up to spend sometime with all the family. We spent the night with Maryann and Chuck. Everyone had a great time - Kyle really enjoyed spending some time with Marissa and her new husband Daniel. Ryan's favorite seems to be his Uncle Chuck!!

The Intergalatic Sabot Race

That should get some of the geeks that read this blog excited, huh? Oh great, Carolyn, let's offend the readers before we even get started. Sorry sorry, I just assumed that a few of Rich and Debbie's friends are trekkies, my bad. Oh God, did I just offend them too. Ack.

So, if you are still reading, we had a fantastic sabot race on Labor Day. This is one of my favorite events at the yacht club. People from all different boating persuasions come together and race this silly race in a sabot. I believe I've already talked about how difficult a sabot is to sail. And this race just proves my point about 12 more times. We had very experienced racers that win almost every race they enter capsized in this race. Our Commodore (an experienced sailor and a good athlete) capsized. Many many more sailors capsized, and some (ahem, Rich) turned back around and didn't finish the race. We had 21 entries and 8 finishers. It is all laughing and posturing before, during, and after the race, and a good time had for all. And I guess, before I finished this paragraph I should point out that there were gusts up to 25 knots and sabots really only handle, oh I don't know, a lot less.

If this post sounds cocky, I guess I am. But I shouldn't be, I finished 7th. But I'm still strutting around because I FINISHED. So I'll stop blabbing now and show the photos!!! Debbie has more (nudge nudge, wink wink).

Wow - it's already September!!

Here's my honey... we're spending this long holiday weekend at the guest dock at our yacht club - Southwestern. He has a few little tasks to work on while we're here. Our dinghy motor has decided it doesn't really want to run anymore, so he gets to fix it. Also - with this being September, we realized we're leaving next month! So we really need to get our spares list put together and bought. I'm still working at West Marine on the truck crew, which gives me a great discount. I'll only be working there a few more weeks - so we better get to shopping!!