I started the morning with a run. Well, first I took a bunch of pictures/videos because the mountains were out for the first time. And so beautiful…

I started my run so very early for me, before 10 a.m.

The marina was full of sailboats going out and some were already motoring back in. Early risers.

I stopped to look at the sea lions again, because why not? I was desperate to get a shot of somebody getting up onto the sea wall and tried my best but it just didn’t happen.

However, the sea lions were having a splendid time.

After that Mom and I went to the Ballard Farmer’s Market and enjoyed some pastries.

The market was crowded but not unbearably so. I took a video of a guy playing music nearby and was amused watching it just now because my mouth and nose are covered in pastry crumbs and powdered sugar. That video will never see the light of day.

We stopped by our place before heading over to Stan’s house and a whole lot of sailboats were out in the harbor.

At Stan’s, we met his very nice son Jeff. He and his wife had made lots of delicious food for us.

I don’t know why I didn’t take a picture of Jeff, more than his arm. We had meatloaf, corn casserole and cheesy potatoes, all things that I never eat. Such a treat. Plus somebody from Stan’s church had brought over half a hummingbird cake. This is Bev’s favorite cake, and it was quite delicious. It’s kind of like carrot cake only even better.

Different people stopped by while we were at Stan’s, and when we left we stopped on Magnolia Drive and I got this terrific photo – that’s Mt. Rainier in the left background, and way over on the right near the bottom is a bald eagle! Doesn’t get more scenic than that.

When we’d pulled off to look at the view we didn’t even see the eagle but luckily a woman there pointed it out to us. Quite something.

When we got back to our place, Sharon and Michio came over and we had wine and snacks and enjoyed the day some more.

A very busy day full of so much beauty…

And just now it dawned on me that we were there three months ago. C’mon, Grace, wrap it up already. But in my defense, I’ve spent the time since then in some kind of medical crisis or doing lots of weeding.

It makes me sad that Stan won’t get to see my photos, but I’m pretty sure I shared many of them with him.

Meanwhile, around here right now…it rained almost two inches and I went running out in the rain which was kind of fun because the rain made it so cool. It would have been a good day to get some more weeding done, but instead I had to go to Prompt Care, which took a while, and when I got home I wanted desperately to do this.

This time it was for a rash I got from unsuccessfully wearing a heart monitor for a while. I actually only wore it for four days before my chest got red and painful, and then I took it off for a week and put a different kind on, one for sensitive skin, and then I got stung by a wasp and my chest immediately started to burn again, and I waited another week and within two hours I was in pain again. That was Monday and it started getting worse instead of better yesterday so today I’m glad I went to the doctor and got drugs which will hopefully start working soon.

It’s been a summer of annoying medical things for sure.

But there have also been good times and SOON I will post them here.

ok then,

mrs. july 17th hughes.