Rain, green rain

For three nights in a row and a fair amount of the connecting days, we had rain! Finally, water replenishing the well, replenishing the gardens, replenishing the grass and trees and chickens and all else! I was beginning to wonder how long it would be before the rain returned. After the rain comes and goes, and the sun returns, everything green leaps up - like the potatoes! They are now all a foot tall seemingly over night.

What else have we been up to? I assisted with my first real search! Because Tilly isn't up to snuff yet, she stayed home to avoid distracting, and because I'm not up to snuff yet, I got to help man the base camp, meaning hang out and eavesdrop on the radio chatter and run errands such as picking teams up from one area and delivering them to another, or going for pizza. All-in-all, not bad and free pizza is always good.

Back at home Tilly and I tried to walk all the way to Freeland along the beach and got to the next big point before there were a suspicious number of "no trespassing" signs and a house in view. Next time we will start from Freeland and walk back to see if that is the only problem house and thus worth sneaking past, or if it continues to get more crowded.

As we were walking the beach, I saw a medium critter bounce past at full speed, looking suspiciously like Tilly, but then a second critter even more like Tilly was bouncing right behind and I looked again to see the first critter was a Tilly-sized baby deer. "Tilly! Come!" and with that magic word, her head and body snapped around and continued full speed but changed the trajectory for straight to my feet, coming to a skidding halt for praise. Far more than I expected from my little rebel!

On other projects, I've got the pig barn almost finished. Now we need the roof, and the attachable run area and we will be all set for Oliver, the 11lb micro-pig. This barn also suitable for use with new mother hens and clutches of chicks or sick birds needing isolation.

Crafts On Whidbey held the first official crafting class! Which turned out to be my friend Cassidy and I hanging out and having a lot of fun chatting and felting. No complaints there, though making $50 while hanging out would have been a plus.

Mom and Dad come tomorrow, Uncle Joel leaves today, but MOST EXCITING OF ALL: I am going to join Tim and Joe and Woody up on the m/v Whiskey Creek commercial fishing in Bristol Bay, the edge of the Bearing Sea! I AM SO EXCITED. I am excited to see my husband again, and I am excited for the challenge, for work to be proud of! And the pay check will be quite nice.