Mailbox shelter

Joel took a complimentary bus ride up to Seattle this week to fulfill a special request -- to use his expert wood working and mini architectural skills to produce this first in a series of 100 limited edition mailbox shelters made from reclaimed wood, ordinary shingles and repurposed mail containers. Get in line for the chance to secure a spot and experience forever these handcrafted masterpieces for your home or private collection today.

Thank you, Z's!

We had an incredible time living with Joel and Mandy for the month. Besides the spacious house, cuddly cat, and amazing meals, we enjoyed their company and great conversations. We are so grateful to them for allowing us to share their food, toys, car, and especially space, and for inviting us in on their lives in Tacoma. We will miss them!!

Farewell, Frankie.

Maybe the one thing Joel will miss about Tacona more than the market routine -- the Frankie routine. Joel feeds her, brushes her, brings her in at night and lets her use him as her lazy boy. (pun intended)

Tacoma Farmer's Market

Joel's favorite part of the month in T-town was the market. He met some really great people and got a behind the scenes view of the farming community in Tacoma. Thanks to Mandy for hooking Joel up with Janie who helps run the market! Tuesdays and Thursdays with Janie, Cayenne, Christine, Sam and Drue...you will be missed!

As a parting gesture of gratitude for joel's man power and volunteer work, the market gave us the gift of $50 in market tokens! And Joel got his very own market sweatshirt. Talk about an awesome trade!!

Where's Waldo?

Joel's creative eye inspired this series of shots.  

Can you find all 7?

Salmon Beach

Joel satisfied his curiosity, and finally got his wish of being invited over to a friend's house he knows from the market. Being invited over for dinner wouldn't be such a big deal, except these friends happen to live in THE Salmon Beach district, which "offers a rare glimpse of the waterfront lifestyle from the first part of the 20th century...The original community was a collection of approximately 100 cabins built on stilts at the base of a steep bluff."

The single line of homes are connected by a small trail and are accessible only from boat or the 200 stairs that lead to the parking lot.

A view of the Tacoma Narrows bridge.

The neighbors to the south.

Joel took a racing canoe out for a spin...all the while wishing he had the kayak he built, and that he lived here.

Frankie, the un-vegetarian.

Frankie doesn't often get to eat her dessert, if you know what I mean.

More from Paradise

Dinner in the trees -- we took along a camping stove and enjoyed a secluded dinner on the side of the mountain in lieu of pork tenderloins in the lodge.  We even used our Element tent as a barrier to keep our buns dry from the snow. Not only did we save $50, but we had a perfectly strange variety of food dinner and will remember it as a highlight from the weekend. 

A few more shots from Paradise Lodge at Mt. Rainier...over 15 feet of snow left on the ground didn't quite allow for the same views at Reflection Lake, but that just means we'll have to come back for another photo shoot someday.

Mt. Rainier

Not quite as he remembered it, but at least our sunglasses show some evidence of the reflection Joel was so excited about for the 2 hour drive.

"Stop! Stop stop stop! Let me get out. Ok, go."

Built in 1906 with horses carrying the tree trunks, the Paradise Lodge has not changed much since its inception as a haven for extreme hikers and lounging tourists alike. We were somewhere in the middle, leaning more toward the latter of the two.

Our submission for Rainier Beer 2013 billboard. Look for it next year off of I-5.

Camping on the beach

The photos explain it all...

...on the Olympic National seashore.

Tide pool hopping.

The "key hole" at low tide.

Allie's amateur catch.

Good eye, Joel.

Just before the tide came up and left us stranded.  We had to wade back in wearing our only pairs of shoes.  Lake Michigan doesn't do that!

Fixing our deadliest catch.

The tide's a comin'.

Joel's new iWood4S phone that he found at the AppleTree Store.

Flowers!

A perk of Joel's volunteering at the market -- a fresh bouquet of local blooming beauties.

Kayak Sunday

New life lesson learned: having toys doesn't bring happiness, but having fun friends who have toys is even better. Joel Z and his college buddy, Ian, we're our guides to the waters near Deception Pass. We put the boats in at Rosario beach and made our way around small islands, sea onions (kelp), rocks encrusted with barnacles, and even saw a couple seals. (No orcas....again.) On the way home we stopped for ice cream near the Ray's Leeks farm and shared a giant waffle cone with Lopez Island wild mountain blackberry ice cream. Another weekend in Washington with beautiful weather and fun activities.

Salmon Wednesday

Gourmet dinner night: fresh salmon with homemade mango chutney, spicy quinoa pilaf, farmer's market asparagus, sautéed kale, olive French bread, and wine. Phew! Nothing better to do after that but sit in bed and blog and read Harry potter...

Go Rainiers??

Joel Z didn't get to join us at the mariners game, so it was our genius idea to hit up the local triple-A team for round two versus the Albuquerque Isotopes (yes, this is for real their name). This time we scored awesome seats which were lawn seats on special sale anyway and were transferable to almost any seat in the house. We got greedy and took the sixth row behind home plate. And yes, we got caught when some promotions guy asked something like how "J&S Associates" were enjoying the game so far...we said "good! But we're not them. We'll move if you want us to." He said we could stay as long as we didn't swear at the players. Not a bad deal!

Go tigers?

Baseball game #2 vs Los Tigres. We almost left early since no one had scored in 5 innings, but the mariners ended up scoring their only runs of the game in the bottom of the ninth to tie the game, then some guy bunted to advance the runner to third, then a different guy hit a ball out to the outfield so the runner could tag up and slid in to home plate a split second before the catcher tagged him to WIN. we felt like we were at the world series. Except there were only 2,000 people at the game.