Beachcombing

Shirt draped over a driftwood log on the beach at Olympic National Park

Our landlocked visitors were particularly interested in seeing the Pacific Ocean, so we spent quite a bit of time on the beach during their visit. Having lived near (or on) the ocean for most of our lives, F & I generally take the beach for granted, but we had such a nice time there that we've resolved to get out to it more often.


Rocks collected on the beach with F's niece


A dead starfish found washed up in the tidepools


Puget Sound: our guests went crabbing!

Lavender Hills

We visited the Lavender Hills Farm festival yesterday-- the farm is about 10 minutes up the road from us and the festival is one of the town's most popular events. I don't have enough photos to do the grounds justice-- besides the "U-Cut" lavender field pictured above, they have a cut flower field with sunflowers, sweet peas, and gorgeous dahlias. During the festival, they bring in jazz musicians, food, and craft and garden vendors. The coffee booth even sells three varieties of lavender ice cream! The weather was beautiful and it was a really nice afternoon.

After the festival, we went to see The Fantastic Four. I don't have much to say about it, but isn't Ioan Gruffudd awfully cute? He played the title character in the Horatio Hornblower movies on A&E (based on the C.S. Forester novels), and I'm always thrilled to see him in anything new, even if it's just a superhero flick ;-)