Where do you keep your ferry schedules?

Seating on the Klahowya 

We've got them in our purses.
Dangling from car visors.
Hanging out in glove compartments.

They are stuck to our fridge with magnets.
Lounging around the doorways of local businesses.
Folded and unfolded in the spare change basket.

All of us Washintonians who commute and travel by Washington State Ferries are bound by our Ferry Schedules.

We start to memorize departure times only for them to shift by 10 minutes with the season change.
We know what time we want our guests flights to land at SeaTac so we will have enough time to pick them up and still make the ferry home before midnight...

The funny thing is that Sean and I used to have the most tense mornings. We almost always got in the car and were frustrated or fiesty with one another.  "You are the reason we are running late!" we each though to ourselves.

But now that we cannot be late, not even by a minute we don't fight over departing.  The boats, and having someone else decide when we leave have relieved us of the need to blame each other.   That's one I didn't see coming!

Oh...looking for a copy of the ferry schedules. There ya go.

Vashon Style

Nothing Says Pacific Northwest like Birkenstocks.
Nothing says Vashon Island like KVI in the warm sunshine.

Fair Isle Vets...

Our poor Maggie-dog got hit by a car.
Yes, she was chasing deer.

I let her out and she took off.
I couldn't chase her, suprising the infant and toddler left me unable to do so.
So I just let her, assuming she would return.

She got as far as a neighbor when I saw her limping.
I carried her home.
She wasn't bloody but just not moving hardly at all.

The next day they took her to the vet.
And, they were so so good to us.
No shaming, trying the cheapest simplest thing first.
Good caring for Maggie and then being so kind when I kept having to haul the kids and the dog into the office.

Maggie is not totally better.
And, she is currently at the spa (Nana and Pop's house).
But I feel really good about the care these folks provided.

Vashon Laundromat

In spite of my total charm of this island, I have found the underbelly.

The laundromat.
Half the machines broken.
The change machine broken.

The whole thing is bad...and I'm not talking Island rustic charm just a crappy place to (kinda) do your laundry.

And the bars on the windows. Seriously! Seriously?

nytimes.

Here is an article from NYTimes about Vashon from March 2012.

Thriftway Bags

There is an underground currency on Vashon Island: Thriftway Bags.

Buying kindling at the Senior center all piled into a brown Thriftway bag.
A used Christmas gift for a sweet toddler is stashed into a Thriftway bag.
We toss our recyclables into the mouth of the transfer station and below are hundreds of Thrifway bags.
For Christmas we will invert our Thriftway bags and decorate them with red and green and then we will wrap our little surprises up in Thriftway bags.

There is a thriving industry in thriftway bags.
They are the lifeline that rescues our arms from our new purchases,
and save our guilt from plastic bags drifting in the wind.

Vashon does Halloween

Of course the Vashon Island community would not just let Halloween be a family or even neighborhood holiday. It is much too creative and playful for us to leave that one!

So Vashon town center closed down from traffic and most of the businesses open their doors and welcome trick or treaters.  From the senior center to the thriftway grocery store most everyplace was open!

It was really fun! People of ALL ages (seriously ALL) were dressed up.  I personally loved a Hula Zombie Dad and one of the businesses has people "haunting it." In general, it was really easy to handle our three year old despite the crowd of High Schoolers, Older kids, adults etc. 

All in all, we will go back next year- without a doubt. Hey, we even saw someone we knew so that was nice/cool.

Oh, I forgot, the Vashon Island Roasterie had hundreds of carved and lit pumpkins outside it was super super cool! We ALL loved it!

We didn't participate in this, but our neighborhood also had trick-or-treating.  We were pretty much done coaching our three year old through, "say trick-or treat," "Say thank you." etc. But it's cool that the houses around our neck of the woods  have a tradition too.