Water World

PADDLING ABOUT:  Though we'd had a big Sunday, with about 7+ hours of pride parade activities, Monday morning we were up and out early, ready for another adventure.

Our Honda Fit was due for a recall-related service, and we took it to Seattle Honda, in the South Lake Union neighborhood. Knowing we'd have a couple hours to kill, we decided to use a Groupon we had for a couple of double kayak rentals at nearby Moss Bay, in Chandlers' Cove, at the southeast 'corner' of the lake.  

The staff was friendly and efficient and we were on the water in no time, Christian and Annabelle in one kayak, CJ and I in another.

I'm not gonna lie, I was a little afraid at first. It was my inaugural kayaking tour, it's a busy lake, it was choppy, planes are landing in the water by is, huge ships (some moving!) are around us, then there were dozens of other pleasure boaters and paddlers. My (crappy) pictures reflected my unease, so I don't have many to share. However, after about 20 minutes, we settled in to a not-terrifying pattern, thankfully. :)

Here's one of the Kenmore Air's planes coming in for a landing near us.

We paddled past the Museum of History and Industry a couple of times. It's one of our favorite spots to peruse as landlubbers (the building on the left, with the blue stripe.

We ventured semi-near the Aurora Bridge, but it would have taken more than our two-hour newbie paddle to make it there and back in our 2-hour rental window. 

We got a good look at the bow of the old Duwamish, a 123-foot, 1909 riveted steel fireboat that patrolled Seattle’s waterfront until 1985. It's parked near MOHAI now.

We saw an old Navy ship, the Assertive (the one on the right, below), a Stalwart class  Modified Tactical Auxiliary General Ocean Surveillance Ship on the east shore of the lake.  I found an eight-year-old Seattle Times article stating the ship was going to be converted to a NOAA research vessel. Looks like that's a long way from happening by my eyes. 

So I found a Wiki article about it and the NOAA project was a no-go, as were a couple of other proposed uses. It sounds like the poor ol' Assertive isn't going anywhere anytime soon. 

All in all, it was a wonderful couple of hours on the water.

FAB BOOK: On my last trip to the library, I spied a brand new kids' book about The Beatles! I snatched it up quickly!

Although CJ and Annabelle are pretty well versed in The Beatles since they completed a college course on the topic, there is still plenty to learn, as they found by reading this book. Also, the illustrations are really fun. :)   In addition to being entertaining, the book consciously made an effort to tie in with national curriculum requirements for studying social history of the 1960s in primary grades, and it shows how The Beatles influenced (and continues to influence) generations, showing their music in the context of a decade of social and scientific breakthroughs. 

OVERSTATED: A few things to catch up on. For starters, this weekend we took a walking field trip over to Lawton Elementary, where I recalled they had a big map of the U.S.A. painted on their playground. I thought it would provide a good opportunity for CJ and Annabelle to practice placing states on a map. 

We played a game where they had to work their way across the U.S., coast to coast, but could only progress if they were naming the neighboring state they were stepping onto. It proved a little challenging in that darn Midwest and Mississippi delta region.  ;)

Also worth noting: Lawton has recently repainted the murals on the concrete walls lining the playground. We four all deemed them a big improvement over what was previously there.