In the distance of this picture, you should be able to see the railroad bridge and the factory we can see from our deck. This foggy Thursday morning was really cool.

This is a picture from our deck on Thursday morning. We had the coolest fog on the river that morning.

Hey everyone!

Hi everyone...I'm still alive, even though I've been so bad about blogging lately.

There's lots going on with us. We've spent just about every weekend lately doing fun stuff, whether its boat races, concerts, doing things with our friends, or whatever . . . the last few weekends have been a lot of fun.

Today, I finally finished painting all of the trim on our house. I think I started that project a month ago, but either because of being busy, or the rain we had last week, I wasn't able to finish the painting until today. We painted all of the trim on our house white, because we saw my Uncle Ed's house in central Oregon last summer, which is the same color as ours with white trim. Ours was a dark blueish green and we weren't in love with it. When we saw Uncle Ed's place, we knew white was the right way to go. Thanks to having this project done, we now have two of our three major summer projects around the house finished up. The other is to clean and re-finish the deck. I don't know if we'll get to that or not before the rains hit, but maybe we'll give it a try this week. If there's time. Also today, I finally got a chance to mow my lawn, which badly needed it. I also got some Weed 'n Feed on it, so I'm feeling good about "my" yard again.

Yesterday, we went to Bellevue, Wash., for a boat race, and I was lucky enough to have another good day. 900-plus points, which I badly needed in order to keep my place in the Top-10 standings for drivers and boats this season. It's been my goal all season to finish the year in the Top-10. We have three races left, so barring some unfortunate luck, it looks good that I'll achieve that goal. My goal yesterday was to earn my way into the winner-take-all final heat by scoring enough points to do so throughout the day. I got two second place finishes and a third place finish, and achieved my goal as the fifth-highest scoring driver of the day. The best part about it was that Dawn was there with me, as always, and I got to share my success with her. This year has been by far my best year of boat racing, and it's been a lot more fun because of that.

I'm also working on putting together a race in Woodland. It'll be the Cascade Cup, which is a race where the winner gets to name the place that next year's race is held. I guess it's a little more complicated than that, but that's a pretty simple way to explain it. It's also a race that has a National Championship Sanction from the American Power Boat Association, so that's pretty cool, too. Sponsors have been pretty easy to come by, I think that's because it's a national championship.

Anyway, we're pretty excited about our upcoming trip to Chelan. It's one of our favorite places in the world, and we always have fun. There are a couple of places we always try to hit, including a little hometown pizza place in the town of Manson, and the Mill Bay Casino which is also in Manson. We enjoy playing blackjack up there. Our friend Ron Hartley told us yesterday that he was thinking about bringing his Jet Ski to Chelan with him next weekend, and that he'd let Dawn and I ride it if he did. So that's pretty exciting too. Having ridden one in Lake Havasu earlier this year, I can say how fun those things are.

Work is still going great, and I'm staying busy there, doing the work things I most like to do. All in all -- whether it's at home, at work, or my hobby -- I consider myself a pretty lucky guy.

Dawn

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CRAIG!

Last Friday Nelson went to the "Alumni night" for his 20 year High School reunion. He had a great time and saw lots of people that he hadn't seen since high school. I went out to dinner at a new restaurant in downtown Vancouver with Brooke, and then to a movie. We saw a movie called "The last kiss". It was about people's messed up relationships. I thought it was very depressing the whole movie. I think it got good reviews, but I didn't like it.

Saturday Nelson and I drove to Seattle for the Cougar game. It was a very exciting game the whole way through, and we ended up winning in the last few seconds of the game. GO COUGS!

On Sunday we went to the Amphitheater to "The country Jamboree.' It was perfect weather, not too hot or cold...good times.

This week has been pretty average. Nelson has been very busy at work and still loves it. I think I'm about ready to make an offer on a little coffee shop on SE Belmont in Portland. It's turning into a pretty "trendy" area. I'm pretty excited about that, so hopefully everything will go smoothly.

Tomorrow evening we're going to some kind of gathering at Esther Short park, put on by JD White company. We were invited, so we're not really sure if it's open to the public or what? But it looks pretty fun.

Saturday we're going to Bellevue for a boat race. Nelson's been working really hard on putting together a "National " race here in Woodland for October. He has already gotten lots of donations for sponsorships. It sounds like it's going to be a pretty big deal. He's been having fun getting it all planned, making brochures, etc. He should be an event planner, he loves that kind of stuff, and he's good at it.

Brooke and Luka leave for Paris tomorrow night for a week. Luka's mom is having a family reunion over there and I think has rented a villa for everyone. They're going to have a ball. I'm going to take care of my "grandpugs" for the week. I'm looking very forward to that.

That's all for now. You guys could tell us what you've been doing like we (sometimes) do.

Nelson at the Cougar game in Seattle last week. Can you tell he's a fan? We got lots of "honks" and "waves" on the way up since we were waving the flag on the car.

The pregame function before the game started. They charged $7 for a bottle of Coors Lite! Jeez, what is this world coming to? We had fun though.

At the game. We won in the last few seconds of the game.

Nelson's boss gave us tickets to the "Country Jamboree" on Sunday at the amphitheater. We had a great time. It was the first time we'd been there. It's really nice. I don't usually love country music, but Nelson does. But I really did have a good time.

Nelson, at the concert.

This is Carrie Underwood from American Idol, on the big screen and on the stage. As you can tell we had really good seats, lol. She is so adorable, though. It's obvious that "stardom" hasn't effected her yet. She talked about how much she missed her mom, aaahhhhh.

This is Phil Vassar. I had never even heard of him and only stuck around to see him because Nelson wanted to. I ended up not wanting to leave. He was really good. It's called "country music but it's pretty much "rock."

Dawn

Ok, Nelson left off on our camping trip, I think. Below are the pics from it. We had a great time. Then it was back to work. I filled in for Bonnie that week because she had the week off. It was really busy. Friday night we went to the Sausage Fest. We ran into a bunch of people there that we knew. It was like a big reunion party. We had lots of fun. The next day we sat on our rearends all day and were hungover and watched the Cougar game. We won, Yeah! That night we had some friends in town from Nelson's old boat club, Ron and Cheryl. We went out to dinner at Who Songs with them and then they came back to our house afterward. It was nice hanging out with them. They were a couple of our favorite people in that club. Sunday we went to somewhere around Seattle for a boat race. Nelson did really well. It's the first time he's ever actually won a heat. And he finished well in all of his races. He was like a little kid he was so happy. I was so happy for him, too. It was fun. I'm still keeping my eyes open for the perfect little business to buy. I met Nelson in downtown Portland today for lunch and we went and looked at this little pet supply business for sale near The Saturday Market. I inquired tonight about a coffee shop I saw for sale in the Hawthorne district. So, nothing yet, but I'm having fun looking for the perfect endeavor. This weekend we go to Seattle for one of our two live Cougar games we'll be seeing this year. Hope it doesn't rain. Sunday we're doing "The walk for the cure". There should be quite a few people there that we'll know too. It should be fun. And thanks to all of our friends who have donated. I'm off...

We kept the top cover off of our tent because the weather was so nice. It was awesome. This is the view from me lying on the bed. It was super nice at night too with all of the stars. All of you people who don't camp out there are really missing out!

Our campsite from our bed. Cozy, huh?

Turn your head to the left and you will see me and my precious puppy dogs. I was suppossed to have turned these before I uploaded them, sorry!

Lucy is helping Nelson...lose! I kicked his butt at Uno that night. Yes, we are letting our dog on the exact table that we eat on. And we don't care what you think about it.

Oops...if you turn your head to the right you will see a very cute picture of little Taylor sound asleep on her mommy's lap.

Brooke and Luka roasting marshmallows.

Nelson

Tonight, we both worked our butts off.

After we each had long, busy days at our respective jobs.

We're entertaining tomorrow night...our friends Gary and Karen Tortorello are coming over. Gary and Karen are some of our favorite people, and some of those friends who you always say you're going to get together with and do something, but never actually do.

So anyway, Dawn's been cleaning house, prepping food, vacuuming, etc. I've been working in the yard -- mowing, weeding, edging, sweeping, etc. We always like the place to look its best when we entertain, and I think we've gotten it there. Don't get me wrong, we normally keep the place pretty neat anyway, but you know how things go. These are the times when we go the extra mile at our place...you know, raking out the barkdust that had become matted down from the watering, de-hairing the couch (Lucy still sheds something awful), dusting behind TV's...that kind of thing.

We had a great Labor Day Weekend, and we hope you all did as well. We went camping at Battle Ground Lake State Park, which is really a long way from home. All of about 25 miles (tops). It was really a tough go, roughing it like that. We had a few beers, sat around the campfire, came home on Saturday afternoon to do our dishes, take showers and watch the Cougar game with a pizza, then went back to the campsite in time to enjoy treats over the fire and play Uno for awhile. On Sunday, we made a camping nice breakfast again (like we did Saturday), and then came home to take showers and do our dishes. Not long after that, we were back out to the campsite and a lot of our family joined us. My mom, Jim, my sister Nancy, and her kids, as well as Brooke and Luka all came to hang out with us. Brooke and Luka even brought their tent and stayed the night with us out there. We had stew cooked over the campfire and enjoyed each other's company for a few hours. It really was a nice time.

By Monday after breakfast, it was about time to get packed up to head home...where we could take showers and do our dishes again. :)

Hope you're all doing well! Keep in touch!