Swanson Snapshot

August seems to have flown by. We were so happy to have both our college students home for part of August. We got Kirsten for 4 months and Karl for a couple of weeks. We had wonderful adventures and feel blessed to spend time together. Although we love fall, it is hard to say goodbye to our college kids.

Kirsten practicing to be Katniss and getting pretty good at it!

Lenore's new ride: Flame. Now we have his and hers and can go out moose hunting or anything else. Yeehaw!!

Flame and Brutus on the trail behind our house. Spoiled ATV's (and riders).

The last days of summer are filled with flowers, green grass, fireweed and beautiful views!

Claire's first day of sophomore year! She is an awesome student and ready to learn, ski, play soccer and generally succeed.

Lenore had some fun creating a cammo birthday party for Josh Lockwood. Even the Kale chips match!

Last few days of Livingstone daisies. They do love the sun.

Awesome August view from our house.

Baby blue eyes love autumn.

One more s'more and fire out in the yard.

Kirsten and Claire enjoying a fire and some yummy s'mores the last few evenings of Summer.

We made 3 1/2 cords of wood while we had 5 Swanson's home together. We are almost ready for winter.

The final product after cutting and splitting all day long. YEAH!

Karl is packed up and ready to go back to college in his new WRX. He is a Senior but has 3 more semesters to complete his 2 degrees: Mechanical Engineering and Math.

Yesterday we took a boat ride across the Bay to pick blueberries. We had a great time enjoying our new (to us) boat, "Finding Remo". We found berries, bear scat, mud, dying humpies (pink salmon - who were at the end of the spawning cycle upriver) and a lot of fun.

Captain Kirsten Swanson takes the helm of "Finding Remo".

Tonight we take Kirsten to the airport to fly back to San Diego for another year of college. We are 3 weeks into our own school year. Pete is enjoying being the principal at McNeil for the 14th year and Lenore is teaching Music and PE to all K-6 grades and afternoons of 2nd grade Science, Health and Social Studies. Have an awesome fall and come visit us in Alaska anytime!

We had an awesome trip to Montana and Idaho for the 34th annual Stonoff Family Reunion Campout. We missed Karl this year as he was still out commercial fishing. We flew to Seattle and had the whole day to play tourists before catching our hop to Missoula, MT. We took the train to downtown, the rail to the Space Needle, visited Pike's Place and met our cousins Elbereth and Kurt and their daughter for dinner.

Breakfast at Panier bakery on Pike's place.

We ate our brunch at the park. We were blessed with HOT weather! We Alaskans basked in the sun!

Beautiful Seattle views and an amazing warm day in the city.

While Karl was fishing salmon in Alaska on the Copper River, we were walking through the Pike's Place market and found his fish!

The park had blue trees! We sat and listened to a band play live music on the stage.

The girls cool off a little at a beautiful fountain downtown.

Gazing up at the Space Needle in downtown Seattle.

Kirsten's future roommate for sophomore year Ashley (on right) met us for dinner (she is from Seattle) and Beth another PLNU student and friend.

We made it to Idaho! We are preparing for a White Water Idaho Adventure. Robert and Shelly Miller and family (our cousins) flew their plane from Flagstaff to Salmon and camped 3 days with us. We loved our Salmon River White Water Rafting so much we plan to go again next year!

We had a nice quiet camp to set up our tents.

Jackson, Kirsten, and Logan getting ready to embark on the river!

Kirsten and Claire have been doing a squat routine all summer. They add 5 each day. They talked some of their cousins into doing it with them while we waited to launch our boat.

Ready to set sail. I took my camera along on the trip, but Pete and Signe dumped their boat and my camera was in Pete's pocket.

At the 1/2 way point, we stopped and checked out an old mine with our guide Nick! A very fun and sunny day. In fact it was one of the warmest days all summer in Salmon. Perfect for rafting and swimming.

We put the Millers back on their plane and headed out to meet mom and dad at the old meeting place. The Miller's would drive up later in the week.

We took the girls fishing and Kirsten learned to fly fish. We had a quiet 8 days with just the four of us and mom and dad.

This dandelion was HUGE!

Pete had fun riding J.R.'s TW 200 all over the trails.

Flyfishing out at Big Timber. One of my all time favorite ever places.

Dad got in on the fun and rode down to meet us after a day in town buying groceries, ice, laundry and SHOWERS!

Claire loves riding the wheelers and is an excellent driver.

We rode up a trail to a 9000 ft. peak. Pete and Kirsten walked out the trail and found 3 elk. We saw antelope, white-tails, mule deer, moose, spruce grouse, bears, and all sorts of raptors.

Finally Summer's family arrive to join us at camp. We all fell in love with the newest addition baby Flynn.

Kirsten, Aiden, Kendra, and Colby have fun on a 4-wheel ride.

J.R. and family arrived the next morning, followed by all 3 of my sisters (who surprised us) and 3 of the Cromer cousins families.

A small group of us hiked the 9 miles into North Fork Lake (8500 ft.) We beautiful country!

Early one morning before we had to leave, Pete, Lenore, Robert and Shelley left on an early morning ride. We were gone over 4 hours and covered some of the most beautiful country every. Dairy Lake was Amazing!

On 8-mile creek we checked out the ruins of old mines.

Shelly skipping along the bridge.

Back at camp, Pete found some dead Mountain Mahogany that he cut up and brought back to AK for smoking salmon. Alaskans bring strange things on flights!

It was great fun having all of my sisters and parents together in ID. It has been several years since all of us were together at the same time. (Katrina, Lurinda, Spark and Lenore)

Camping near Sula, MT in the rain.

And dinner is.....cereal in the back of the car in a downpour!

Filling up our water bottles with spring water near Salmon. Thinking of Nelda and Enoch who were the reasons the Stonoff family started coming to ID 34 years ago.

Kirsten helps collect fire wood.

Claire had an interesting bite on her arm. Before we left for ID she had been visiting friends and was bit by a Python. REALLY!!! It latched on and wouldn't let go. It took the owner several minutes to get it to release. How many AK girls can say that?