Morning Visitor

This morning I stepped out onto our back deck to breathe in a little of Washington's moist musk and looked down only find a Banana Slug (Ariolimax columbianus) on one of our potted plants. They are amazing little creatures.

The upper tentacles on their heads are actually their eyes. The lower pair are used to feel along and detect variance in chemicals of the ground they are moving over. Both the upper and lower tentacula can be retracted or extended, very similar to a turtle's appendages.

They have a single lung called a pnuemostome. The opening of pneumostome is a hole in the side of the slug that allows for gas exchange to occur.

I think they are incredibly fascinating and I likely would not have dedicated an entire blog entry if it weren't for one detail, we live on the second floor. This slug climbed an entire story to get to our deck.

Riley

Fall in the Northwest!

This past weekend Riley and I had our first true Northwest Fall Weekend. It is now the time of year when the leaves change colors, the temperature drops, and the cool fresh air invites scarves, hats and gloves to come out of the woodwork. This is my favorite time of year. That is part of the reason it was such a great weekend! The other part was that we spent time in the company of family and of each other.

Saturday turned out to be a bright, sunny, cold day (not the forecasted rain). My mother, our dog - Rosie, and my brother, Jack, joined Riley and I for a morning on Bainbridge Island. They met us at our apartment, seeing it for the first time since we moved in the boxes, and then we made our way downtown to the Farmer's Market.



Lots of people were out and about. The farmer's market is just starting to taper off, though it does not seem like the produce is the determining factor. There were still crates and baskets full of beautiful peppers, potatoes, corn, carrots, lettuce, squash and much more. After stocking up on veggies for the week, we made our way around town stopping by the bookshop, the kitchen store, the outdoor store and amusing ourselves with the fun Halloween decor on the sidewalks...




We ate lunch at a fantastic little restaurant called Marché, visited the bike shop, the knitting shop, and finished off the morning with a scoop of ice cream! I had a flavor called "Jack-o-Lantern." It was pumpkin pie ice cream with chocolate chunks - delicious!

The rest of the afternoon was fairly low-key. Riley and I had a wonderful homemade dinner of fresh veggies and quinoa from the Farmer's Market before we headed out to our last stop of the day...THE PUMPKIN WALK. There is a nursery a few miles from our apartment that sponsors a pumpkin walk and games/mazes each October as a fundraiser for the girls and boys club on the island. There were hundreds of pumpkins to look at as we walked the trail...however I would argue that the people watching was just as entertaining! Here are some of the highlights from the pumpkins...





I have loved spending this time on Bainbridge Island. It is a special little community and we feel very lucky to be a part of it. Hooray for fall!

Cait

Dispatch!

On Friday night Caitlin and I had a quick dinner, boarded the ferry, and made our way to Seattle's Moore Theatre to see Dispatch. The trio hadn't released a new album in nearly 12 years and, while it's not my favorite Dispatch to date, they were full of energy and totally into pleasing the crowd. Many of their older songs brought about nostalgic memories of listening to the same songs over and over with good people throughout the years.

If you haven't listened to them recently, do, it may bring the same smile to your face it did mine.

Riley