New Crew For Eolian!

It's a boy!

Abel Grant Salnick

On March 2, 2017, we welcomed Abel (Abe) Grant Salnick to Eolian's crew!  He arrived with displacement 8 lb 12 oz and a LOA of 21".  Mother, son and older sister Annie are all doing very well.  Father  is ecstatic.

Annie is very gentle with Abe

New Crew For Eolian!

Inventiveness

Boats have a lot of systems - way more than your average suburban house. For example, Eolian has four electrical systems...

• 110V shore power
• 110V inverter power
• 110V generator power
• 12V power

But this isn't a post about electrical systems... well not exactly.  Where I was going is that living on a boat has a higher-than-average need for inventiveness, for MacGyver-ing if you will.  Because of all those systems.  And because of the cost of marine mechanics, electricians, etc.

As a consequence, MacGyver-ing is a highly appreciated skill in the marine world, whether or not it is recognized aloud.  The ability to fix something in impromptu fashion using the materials at hand is a trait that has saved many mariners.

With that in mind, let me introduce you to my 5 year old granddaughter, Eliza.

Eliza noticed that one of the Christmas decorations in her home, an electric candle, was "broken".  So, she studied on it, and picking it up discovered that when held in her hand, the light came on!  (It turns out there is a photocell concealed in the body of the candle that turns it off in daylight.)

So, she fixed it, in a way that is imminently logical, using materials at hand... a toilet paper tube:

Broken...                            And Fixed

Tho you can't see it in the picture, she even decorated the toilet paper tube in keeping with the season.  She drew no attention to her feat, which was discovered by her mother later.  She was just doing her part to keep the household running.

This girl clearly has a boat of her own in her future!

Inventiveness

The Renaissance Man

Tom Steinbach 1932-2014

In 1975, when two young kids drove cross country from St. Louis to Chewelah, Washington, they were beginning an adventure that would last a lifetime.  But they didn't know that they were following in the footsteps of another adventurer.

We first met Tom Steinbach (and Dorna, and Teena, and John, and Mike - it was a family business...) in 1980 when we contracted with Steinbach Construction to pour the foundation for the house we were building.  But because of Tom's outgoing and inquisitive nature, the relationship grew.

Pretty soon Tom was helping me with difficult framing issues - have you ever built a house?  Framing is solving one problem after another.

And grew.  Tom and his family essentially adopted us...  he became an older brother to Jane and I, and he and Dorna became surrogate grandparents to our children (since their real grandparents lived 2500 miles away).   Our children were part of Teena's wedding, and the Steinbachs hosted Easter egg hunts for Adam and Erica.  Tom and John even participated in the Christmas Eve toy assembly ritual at our house.  He introduced me to goose hunting and trout fishing (but alas, thru no fault of his, I am no good at either), and flying (yes, Tom was a pilot).

Above all, Tom was curious.  He was always thinking.  Some of our best conversations involved the Big Subjects:  the meaning of life, cosmology, etc.  But not always big, tho always from an unusual angle.  One particular thought that comes to me in that vein as I write this was a remark he made as we surveyed a woodlot he held behind Quartzite mountain - he asked me to imagine the tons of wood that were being created literally from thin air every month in that woodlot.

Tom was gifted mechanically - he was an inventor.  Have you ever been to a real sawmill?  I suggest you go to one, and then contemplate the fact that Tom built his own.  And I remember that he stole a march on the power tool industry when he came up with the idea of using propane to power an air nailer instead of compressed air, the idea being that this would be an internal combustion tool, burning the propane one explosion at a time to drive nails (my small contribution was to use a piezo ignitor as the trigger).  Dragging an air hose around not required!

I cherish the memories of those discussions.

Tom was also a collector of what today might be called practical knowledge:

• How to hammer a saw blade (look it up)
• What varieties of wood were best suited to each purpose (use locust for fence posts - instead of rotting, it will take root)
• How to run 3-phase tools on 2-phase power
• How to straighten a warped cast iron saw table by building a fire under it and then cooling it slowly
• How to build a metal-cutting chop saw using an automotive power steering pump for the hydraulics
• How to supply his house with all the water it needed from a small spring way up the hill behind the house
• He ran a few cows occasionally butchered one.  Have you ever cut up an animal?
• His house was heated with a wood-fired thermostat-controlled furnace... that he built.

And as if that weren't enough, he was an artist:

Tom carved this squirrel on a yellow locust log harvested from his property on the Flowery Trail in Chewelah.

Tom was a true Renaissance Man, and the world will be a poorer and drabber place for his passing.

The Renaissance Man

Memorial Day, with Annie

First of all, I must apologize to my hundreds 40 two regular blog readers for letting you go so long without writing.  My only excuse is the Memorial Day weekend, which rolls over into Monday.  Then followed by all the stuff that it takes to move...  when you live on a boat, moving the boat to a new location has all the same little niggling tasks associated with it that moving to a new house does.  With the added complexity of the logistics of things such as making sure that there is a car waiting for us at the new location (you Narrow Boat folks will understand this better than most).

So.  For the Memorial Day weekend, Adam, Kaci, and Annie joined us for a cruise over to Poulsbo.   The weather was forecast to be cold and rainy (well it was Memorial Day in Seattle...), meaning that this cruise would be like every other cruise we've had Kaci on, unfortunately.  But as the picture above shows, it turned out way better than the forecast.

We needed to top off with diesel, so while Jane watched Annie sleep, I ferried Adam & Kaci to shore and gave them walking directions to the Valholl brewery.  And then I schlepped 5 gallon diesel jerry cans back and forth from the fuel dock ($3.89/gal) until we had 3/4 tank on one side and 1/2 on the other.

And then, with perfect timing, I got the call that A & K were ready to return to Eolian.  On the dinghy ride back out, I learned that they had run into one of Adam's co-workers who just coincidentally happens to be one of those two regular blog readers I mentioned.   As it turned out, they were on the docks at Poulsbo with their yacht club.  So, shortly here came a dinghy  and we were graced by a visit from Chris and Deb of m/v C-Shel!  And more brews were consumed, of course.

The next morning is a tradition aboard Eolian:  we watched the Indianapolis 500 mile race.  And as is also part of the tradition, now that we have digital TV, it was almost a stop-action viewing, since the tide had turned the boat so that reception was marginal.  (I much preferred the old analog TV - when reception was poor, the images degraded gracefully with increasing fuzz.  Not this perfect or nothing, with digital garbage thrown in.   Because of the poor reception, we always take our audio feed from the AM radio.)  It was an exciting race, and went 149 laps before the first yellow flag - unheard of!

Then the weather decided to comply with the forecast and the drizzle started.  For a change of scenary, we motored over to Manzanita Bay on the west side of Bainbridge Island and spent the rest of the day and night there.  It was a good, cozy, family time, with the talking in the cockpit going far into the nite - to far, in fact, for this old geezer, who retired early.

We returned to the dock at Shilshole the next morning at the slack at 10:00.  Adam pointed out that this would be the last time we would dock the boat here...  and I was hit with a wave of nostalgia.

Able Bodied Seaman Annie steering a course of sou' sou'west with a firm hand on the wheel

Memorial Day, with Annie

The waiting

The pink flag flies for the third time!

Ah, the waiting.

I've said it before - the waiting is just plain hard.  As a grandparent you are one step removed.  You are not in labor, but you know that someone is, and that person is painfully busy in the process of bringing a new life into the world.  

Now don't get me wrong - the waiting is nothing compared to the labor itself.  Anyone calling the female gender the "weaker sex" has quite clearly never been present at a birth. 

Annie Leonabelle Salnick

But finally, at 20:09 December 13, the waiting was over.  After 30 hours of labor, Kaci & Adam gave life to their first child and our third grandchild - please welcome Annie Leonabelle Salnick!  Annie has a displacement of 7 pounds 3 ounces and an LOA of 20 inches.  With that displacement/LOA ratio she should be fast!

The waiting

Stitch 'n glue

Step 1: one side and one end glued

We're doing a little stich n' glue construction here aboard Eolian.  Well, maybe not so much stitch, but plenty of glue for sure.  These are gingerbread houses under construction here.  The glue is powdered sugar with just enough water to make it barely fluid.  (If you should decide to try this, beware - it takes less water than you might think, and the slightest additional amount will make the "mortar" too runny.) 

We are making three of them - one each for Hazel and Eliza (Ken and Erica's children).   We are also making one for Monkey  - Adam and Kaci's child, due any day now! - called "Monkey" because the gender will be a surprise - how great is that?  We have both the blue and pink flags at the ready.  (How's that for a sneaky way to announce an impending addition to the crew of Eolian?)

Step 2: Assemble with more mortar

Step 3: Call in the roofers

Step 4: ... and the decorators

This was really fun to watch!  Hazel (standing) is 3½ and did a wonderful job of decorating.  But Eliza, at 2, was much more interested in eating the decorations.  In fact, the construction manager's primary responsibility was to keep enough marshmallows in front of Eliza that she could be persuaded to actually put the occasional one on the house.

Ta da!

I wonder if they will make it to Christmas...

---

Update...

Nope

 Monkey's didn't make it - Rainier The Raider did some counter surfing and left behind only the paper plate foundation...

Stitch 'n glue

Searching for love, on twisty mountain roads

Not everything is about sailing; there are other things.

This weekend was the 2013 Dude Tour - where men of indeterminate age (I think I get the award for the oldest) take their (mostly) classic cars out and actually drive them (oh, the horror!).  And this is not just driving, but driving at (some would say ridiculous) speed thru twisty back mountain roads.  But we're not crazy - these must all be paved roads.  Nobody wants gravel rash on their baby.

And there is camping.  And adult beverages, of course (by now you must know me well enough to believe that I would give the event a pass if this were not true), campfires, and daily turn-by-turn recounts of the driving.

Here are this year's participants (from left to right):

• VW Golf R32 (Phil)
• 1966 Karman Ghia (Ken - my son-in-law)
• 1969 TR6 (Adam - my son)
• 1973 Riviera (50,000 original miles - Jeff)
• 1968 GTO (me!)
• Porsche Boxer (Kerry)
• 1959 Austen Healy Sprite (with monster rotary engine, and a tiny 9 gallon gas tank - Brian)
• 1969 Fiat 850 (Piotr)
• Porsche Boxer (Kirk)
• (Not shown:  late model Corvette - Brian's dad)

If you are noticing something strange about the Riviera - yes it is photoshopped in - it died along the road with a failed water pump.  We made a valiant effort to effect a roadside repair (yes, we all travel with tools...  of course), but when three of the bolts snapped off in the disassembly attempt, it became clear that this was the end of the line for the Riviera - it was going to have to go home on a trailer.   We split Jeff's stuff up amongst us (to be fair, I had the biggest remaining trunk in the GTO...) and Jeff finished the tour along with the rest of us.  As he should have.  But I lost my pace car - I have always relied on the fact that if Jeff can make it thru a corner, then I can too.  Now I was on my own.

The route - 514 miles, by Piotr's odometer

After leaving the Seattle/Tacoma metro area the route was the twistyest (sp?) road you could imagine, with lots of big suspension bottoming bumps hiding along the way.  Perhaps the most spectacular turn was the one where, with the sun in your eyes, the road made a sharp 15 MPH turn to the right (trust me, no one was going anywhere near that slow).  No guardrail (actually, no guardrails anywhere).  And straight ahead?  Empty space.  I have no idea how long the drop was I didn't have time to look), but the opposite side of the canyon had to be a couple of miles away. 

The route took us over Old Man Pass, where Adam made your correspondent pose under the sign.   Thankfully, I am assured that all copies of this photo have been destroyed.

It was a wonderful time.  All the cars except the Riviera completed the trip on their own wheels, and the GTO is parked comfortably in the garage once again. 

 We now return you to your regularly scheduled sailing blog.

Searching for love, on twisty mountain roads

Homecoming

When you have been away from home for a while, returning to home releases such wonderful feelings.  It's like they were trapped in there somewhere under pressure, and then the pressure is gone.

It is a release, a relief of kinds - the return of the familiar.  Familiar smells.  Familiar sights.  Familiar friends.  A nite in your own bed.

Ahhh.

When we got out into the open air last nite after returning from a Cheyenne Wyoming wedding, Kaci expressed it like this: "My skin loves the air here!"  Now certainly a part of this was the wonderfully perfect humidity and temperature of a Seattle mid-summer evening.  But a part of it was surely the homecoming release as well, brought on by that perfect air.





And as for me?  Well, sitting in the cockpit at sunset with a long anticipated IPA pretty much says it all I think.

Homecoming

You never know when you'll need it...

You may already have ponied up the money for the Navionics iPhone app (if you haven't, I recommend you give that decision another thought...).  But if you haven't, you will still need tide information.  Now, at most locations you can find a little annual booklet with tide information for free or for a nominal cost.  But these are not easy to use if your destination is not one of the primaries documented in the book, requiring you to use the offset tables.

What's an iPhone owner to do?

Enter Shralp Tide - an app dedicated to just this purpose.  Based on the gold standard XTide software and ported to run in the IOS environment, Shralp Tide makes tidal predictions all over the world available right there on your iPhone/iPad.

Everything you need is right there on the screen -

• Current tide height
• Direction of movement (ebb/flood)
• Times of next/prev high and low tides
• Heights of next high and low tides

And two very key features:

• It's free.
• No internet connection is required.

And for the visually-oriented, if you turn your iDevice to landscape mode you get a graphical representation which will be vaguely familiar to XTide users. 

Oh, and did I mention that it's free?

But if you are willing to pay a paltry 99¢, you get an improved version that also includes tidal current predictions.  I've been using the free version for years, but because tidal currents are a big part of navigating Puget Sound, I recently went to the paid version.  They're both excellent.

And you never know when you might need to have this app... last Saturday while working in the garage, I got a call from my son.  He and his wife were hiking Washington's wild Pacific coast and needed to know when the next high tide was coming in order to decide whether to round a headland with a minimal beach.  Shralp Tide provided me the information while standing there covered with grease and a long way from the boat and her GPS or a tide booklet, because it was right there in my hand, on my phone.

You never know when you'll need it...

New Year's at Nason Creek

A little more than half way down the east side of Cascades, our three days at a snow-bound cabin at Nason Creek had it all:

• The advertised snow. There was 3-4 feet on the ground, with more in places. We had to dig down to the lid on the propane tank, and had to shovel out the swings on this playhouse.
• Snow angels.
• Sledding. 
• Snow ice cream
• Dogs going nuts in the snow.
• Skiing at Stevens Pass (20 minutes away).
• There were ample adult beverages.
• There were Christmas presents.
• There was the infamous incident of the shot-ski.
• There was hot tubbing in the snow.

And there was family time. Lots of family time - it was the sea we swam in for a time.

But I will cherish forever a magical time-stopped moment when Grampa and Hazel, separated by 64 years, had a quiet conversation while sitting side by side in two swings out in the snow. The subject, you ask? I promised not to tell.

New Year's at Nason Creek

Networking

So here I sit at a Global Internet Portal (Starbucks), in Stanwood, WA no less. Yes, they are everywhere. I'm doing what cruisers do everywhere when at a GIP: sucking mightily on the Intertubes.

For the last several days we have been at the Camano Cabin, where internet connectivity is essentially non-existent. Well, not completely - I can intermittently reach a cell site on Whidbey Island with my iPhone, and use the phone as a network device, but everyone should know the suckiness of using the virtual keyboard on a phone... and then there's that helpful little imp, Mr. Autocorrect, who keeps changing what I type.

But here, ah here I can type freely at my normal blazing ordinary two-finger speed, and the letters stay on the page right where I put them. It's a joy.

But I have nothing boating to talk about - we've been away from Eolian for a long time. Days and days. A week even. And we won't be back for another week at least. I think I am starting to feel the first symptoms of saltwater deprivation.

But we had a great Christmas at the cabin, just Jane and me. And I have put in some quality time in the shop:

• Pulled the engine and tranny out of the 1959 Impala
• Bludgeoned the stuck piston out of the engine
• Separated the engine and (cast iron!) tranny
• Disassembled the engine and cleaned various parts

So it's been a good week, including a day of skiing at Stevens Pass. More of that to come...

For Christmas last year, we gave the kids some time in a cabin just over the crest at Stevens Pass - a skiing jump-off place. It's well high enough that there will be snow (a lot!) on the ground so the grand-munchkins can get some snow experience, and dogs are allowed. This means that the whole happy clan will be there - kind of like Thanksgiving at the Cabin, but with snow. And did I mention that its only 20 minutes from Stevens Pass?

Should be a lot of fun. Maybe there'll be pictures...

Networking

I am thankful

I am thankful that our whole family could be together for Thanksgiving

I am thankful

Family hiatus

To me, with our continuing great weather, winter seems a long way off still (or maybe that's just wishful thinking).  Nevertheless, because I will be away from the dock for a while, I have prepped Eolian for the next season.  I have our winter fenders installed (+3 fenders), and all of our docklines are doubled up (+4 lines).  Maybe being ready will hold off the first winter storm...

For the next week I will be travelling all over the midwest visiting family.  So life aboard Eolian will be taking a backseat for a while, tho life certainly will not!



bob

Family hiatus

Thru the eyes of a two-year old

Two year olds are precious.  If you spend time with them, they will provide you with something of inestimable value:  a unique and fresh view of the world.  They have enough language that you can communicate with them, and yet they are young enough that each new day brings new experiences to them.  Every day is an exciting adventure!
 
Last weekend when we had Adam & Kaci onboard for an overnighter, we laughed about what the following weekend - this one - would be like.  Because this weekend we would have Ken & Erica and our two grandchildren, Hazel (2Y 3 Mo) and Eliza (9 Mo) onboard.

This wasn't Hazel's first visit to Eolian.  Aside from this visit (which she probably doesn't remember), we had Hazel and her family onboard for a dinner at the dock a little while ago, as kind of an introduction to Eolian for her. And Hazel is not a stranger to boats in general, because Ken & Erica have a beautiful little classic 16' Larson run-about which she was out on a lot last summer.

Here's a little insight into the way a two-year old's mind works: for that dinner visit when she was exploring above and below decks, she referred to the cockpit as "the boat".  And when I tried to lead her up the side deck to the bow, about half way up her courage failed.  Then later she called on Gramma to accompany her.   But when they got out there on the side deck, she held up her hand in the classic "halt" pose, and told Gramma "Do self".  And she did.

Ah, but this weekend was a much bigger deal.  Hazel was so excited that she couldn't sleep.   Good parents that Ken and Erica are, they spent time 'priming' her for the events to come so that there wouldn't be surprises.  First, there was a bus ride - her first ever.  She was amazed that all you had to do was stand in a special place and the big machines would stop - just for you!


Next, after a three-block walk thru downtown Seattle, was her second ever ferry ride.  Another big event, and another blast of excitement.

Uh oh... I don't like the looks
of that dinghy

After the ferry docked in Winslow in Eagle Harbor, there was a four-block walk along the waterfront, with all the harbor views and smells that entails.  Finally the family reached the public dock, and Grampa was waiting with the dinghy.

Now here I think I made a mistake.  Ken handed me Hazel and I put her down in the dinghy.  But she was so nervous about it that she was trembling.  It would have been better if Ken had gotten in first - that way she would at least have had support from her Daddy.  But Ken got in right afterwards and she settled down.  Once Erica and Eliza (in a pack) had boarded, and all the gear had been stowed as best as was possible in an 11' dinghy, I warned Hazel that I would be starting the motor.

As I may have mentioned before, the outboard is minimal - one of the things that was omitted in its weight saving optimization was sound deadening.  It's pretty noisy - that's why I warned Hazel.  She didn't like it, but she buckled down and endured it.

And then finally there was Eolian - now christened "Big Boat", and Gramma was waving at us!  Once Hazel was aboard, she was not interested in any way in getting into the dinghy again.  Ever.

With everything stowed and the adults equipped with celebratory welcome-aboard beverages, Hazel immediately tackled her fear of the companionway ladder.  She must have made 500 trips up and down that ladder over the course of her visit.  As her fear lessened, she took to carrying her pink and blue bunnies in one hand while she climbed and descended, making her grandparents pretty nervous in their turn.

Our plan was to try to take advantage of dying wind to sail from Eagle Harbor up to Port Madison where we would anchor for the night.  There was a lot of interest in the anchor hoisting process, with Daddy standing by to keep little hands safely away from the wildcat and chain.  Sadly, there was no wind.  So we motored up the whole way.  The engine noise did not bother Hazel (it's a lot quieter than the dinghy), but the heaving floor down below as we crossed wakes caused some consternation.  Hazel kept talking about "Boat moving."

Water, water...
Just the ticket!

Finally, the anchor was down in Port Madison, the sun was shining, and Jane's amazing insight into what makes the little people tick paid dividends.  Gramma set up a water play arrangement in a tub on the stern which kept Hazel busy for an amazing length of time.

Then there was an event on the bow where crab was served.  Hazel had seen and talked about crabs at the beach - she was quite interested in finding out what they tasted like - and enjoyed the novelty of eating them. 

Finally, there was the hustle and bustle of preparing dinner in a small space, and then eating.  These were familiar activities with familiar utensils (she brought her own sippy cup and silver ware), in an unfamiliar setting.  It worked out well.

There was not going to be any going to bed early tho  - no one wanted to miss out on anything.  But finally all the big people went to bed and Hazel sacked out in her sleeping bag on the settee in the main saloon - the lee cloth worked well to keep her from tossing herself onto the floor.

Curious George and Blue Bunny
save the day

All of us slept in.  Until Eliza went off, that is.  But it was pretty late for her, about 06:30 as I recall.  Still, Hazel had not really caught up on her sleep.  After a breakfast of cornbread and blueberries, about the only thing that was going to be a calming influence for this little girl was a dose of familiar Curious George, which Ken had thoughtfully put on Erica's phone.  Curious George is like soma to Hazel. 

Zzzzzzzzz

Finally, when it was time to leave Port Madison, the wind had kicked up prodigiously (20+ kt).  I put up only a reefed mainsail on the reach, in order to not make the sail too lively.  You see, the lack of sleep had finally caught up with Hazel - as soon as the sail went up, she fell asleep -  sitting up. Her Daddy gently laid her down and she slept thru the entire passage back to Shilshole.

Eliza working on a figure-eight

Finally, two postscripts.  First, it is clear that Hazel is going to be joined as crew on Eolian.  Eliza is already boning up on her knots, working on a figure-eight here.

And second, Jane vacuumed up an amazing quantity of Cheerios in the aftermath.  Really, why aren't these called Purina Kid Chow?

Thru the eyes of a two-year old

It's here!

Just like clockwork, summer arrived in Seattle on July 5.  And it was like a big weather knife switch in the sky was thrown - the change was sudden, profound, and welcome.

I know that much of the rest of the US has been suffering with triple digit temperatures, but we up here in the upper left hand corner of the country have had high temps in the 50's and low 60's for our "summer"...  up until July 5.  Then BOOM!

And we have Adam & Kaci out on the boat this weekend - the timing could not be better!  I've always wanted them to be able to experience true summer cruising, but it seems that we've always picked crummy  cold or cold/rainy times to have them aboard.  I'm really looking forward to this weekend!

It's here!

The pink flag flies again

I never would have guessed that one of the toughest things about being a grandparent is the waiting.

When you are directly involved in the process of creating a new life, there is waiting of course, but still.  You are involved.

Ah, but as a grandparent, you are at arm's length.  You want to help, to know - but you can't.  You must just  ...wait.  And given Erica's mammoth 47 hour labor for her last baby, the waiting this time was filled with more than the usual amount of anxiety.

As it turns out, the anxiety was unwarranted. 

After a brief (comparatively), 7-hour labor, Erica and Ken introduced to the world at 1:30am Elizabeth Pearl Prentice.  She will be called Eliza, and is 8lbs 11.7oz, and 19in long.  Mother and baby are recovering well.  Father is still hyperventilating.

And the grandparents are proud, relieved, and slowly relaxing.

The pink flag flies again

Beautiful sunrise this morning

Three things coincided to make this possible:

• Our neighbor happens to be gone this morning, leaving us with a clear view to the East
• The days are getting shorter and shorter. This means that sunrise happens when I am awake and sufficiently caffeinated to see and recognize a worthy scene
• We are sitting around on the boat this morning, waiting for news that Erica's labor has started.  (Did I mention that Ken & Erica are going to have a second baby?  No?  Sorry.  We are hoping that things are easier this time.)  No news yet...

Beautiful sunrise this morning

And then two were one

The deed is done

(After a brief period of rest, we will return you to our regularly scheduled living aboard blog)

And then two were one

Wedding planning

We are rapidly closing in on Adam and Kaci's wedding, and not only am I running low on free time for blogging, but worse I am running out of spare intellectual capacity.  It seems there is a limit to the number of things I can keep active at once (and that number seems to be decreasing...).  Huh.  Who would have thunk it.  Blogging is going to have to get scarce for the next couple of weeks.

View from m/v Skansonia
(snagged from their website)

In case you might be interested, the wedding will be performed aboard the m/v Skansonia, a vintage wooden ferry boat which is moored at the north end of Lake Union - a wonderfully scenic venue for a wedding, and one which is suitably nautical for the PNW and our family.  Kaci has been blogging about the planning, and we are getting excited.  But there is a lot to get done...

Wedding planning

Fathers' Day reflections

Erica & Adam aboard DejaVu III, ca. 1985

It is so awesome.  No, not as in the now-common parlance, but rather in its original meaning:  AWEsome. Being a father, that is.

You bring these small, completely helpless creatures into the world (well, OK, the mother does have a small part to play here, but this is Fathers' Day, after all).

And then they rapidly become *people*.  People with dreams and hurts.  People with skills and shortcomings.

As a parent, as a father, it is your job to smooth the way for them (not to do for them, because this steals from them the joy of achievement), to hold their hands and help them over the rough spots, and to guide them.  But the best guidance is not what you say, but rather what you do.  It is far better to model the behavior that you want your children to adopt than to simply demand it (although sometimes both are necessary, realizing up front that you are then modeling autocratic behavior).

But the most important thing about parenting is this:  Children inherently trust and love their parents.  Never, NEVER betray this trust; never take advantage of their love.

And yes, I do believe that there is a marine gene.

Fathers' Day reflections