April

The month of April is always when the Tulip Festival is held.  So we headed up to Skagit Valley in Mt. Vernon to take pictures of fields of tulips. Over 300 acres of these gorgeous flowers are grown here in Northwest Washington.

Millie and I hiding in the rows of tulips.

Time for some sandwiches before heading home at our favorite sandwich deli.

Then a few weeks later we celebrated Easter with some very good friends we have made here on Whidbey.  The cakes and food were both beautiful and delicious!

All "the boys" were preparing the plastic easter eggs with toys and candy before the big hunt.  (A little bit of playing was going on too.  I think we had 250 eggs!)

Plastic eggs being hid all around the yard.

 

The kids are getting the Easter hunt briefing right before the "big dash" to load up their bags and baskets.

Off hunting for eggs!

Five golden eggs were hidden.  Here's Millie with her special find!

Counting up the eggs after a successful hunt.

My favorite people on Whidbey Island!  Such fun friends.

 

Being silly.

Enjoying good drinks, nice company, a strumming guitar in the background and the warming sun.

A great Easter day.

March days

We've been having some really nice days this winter.  Whidbey Island is definitely in the rain shadow.  Whenever we can, we love to hang out on the deck of our "island home."

We have a great path that leads to the beach.  Today we went down to get a little exercise and search for some crabs.

Millie and Mike looking for baby crabs.  Millie has become quite the expert at overturning rocks to find the little babies underneath.

Mike's hobby these days are feeding and photographing our huge population of hummingbirds.  We get so many, that some days they will nearly drain the entire hummingbird feeder of sugar water in one day!

Millie wearing the socks the Oma knitted.  They fit perfectly.

Crazy Dr. Suess Hat day at school last March! 

More art days

I've been meaning to post these pictures since January.  The second graders in Millie's class finally got to work with clay.  We used templates to make little flower or fish bowls.

After using lots of items to make some very cool impressions in our bowls, I fired all the items in the kiln.  I was so nervous, but I did not have to worry....

All their art projects came out great!  The kids were so excited to wrap them up and bring them home as Christmas presents for their family.

Valentines day we made some pretty hearts out of paper shapes and made them glossy with modge podge.  I loved the snowmen we made too earlier in the month.  We didn't get much snow here at all, but the hallways sure looked festive.

Two weeks in Germany

We spent almost 2 weeks in Germany with my mom and Detlef for Christmas.  It was pretty cold while we were there, but that did not stop us from visiting the Christmas markets.

They always have delicious foods there. 

...and hot glühwein to warm you up.

Millie opened her presents from Oma and Opa while we were there.

 

  

Living so close to Austria now, my mom and Detlef took us to Salzburg and later in the week we went back to visit the Salt Mines and to Konigsee.   

We also spent 2 days at the Bad Füssing spa, swimming in the hot water pools outside.  It was fantastic.  It's so nice that those pools are only a 10 minute drive from my mom's house now.

November days

Since Millie started at a new school, I have been able to volunteer every Tuesday in her classroom.  Every other week, I also volunteer as an art docent for Millie's second grade class.  I love teaching the kids art and they are so excited for the lesson on those days.  The first week we did the above project on mixing primary colors to make green, orange and purple fish.  We used acrylic paint and they all came out great.

After that I decided it was time to celebrate Fall and the changing colors of the leaves.  So I taught the class about warm and cool colors.  They drew the leaves using oil pastels.  They had to use warm colors- yellow, pink, red and orange.  Then, the class painted the background with watercolors.  For this they had to use cool colors-purple, green or blue.  The results were stunning.

Of course, since Halloween was fast approaching, it was time to learn how to draw a pumpkin.  We used chalks to draw these and the kids all learned how to blend colors and add shade.  A little bit of detail was added, and they were worthy of framing!

For November's class, I thought it would be fun to put away the paints and papers and introduce weaving to the group.  I cut strips into ordinary paper bowls and using colorful yarn and some beads, the second graders weaved a thanksgiving bowl. The next project is a big one.  We will make fish and flower bowls out of clay and I will fire them in a kiln.  Then the class will get to glaze them and one last firing in a kiln.  Fingers crossed they will survive my first ever use of a kiln!  Pictures to follow in a week and a half if they are successful.

We've also continued to lose teeth here at the Coombes house.  I guess Millie can be singing, "All she wants for Xmas is her 2 front teeth."

Family picture after enjoying the Christmas tree lighting in Langley.

And our blog would not be complete without a November sunset...