During this past summer, Jim and I were able to have our three oldest grand-children with us for several different times in July and in August. It was our first time having them here on the Colville without a parent.
Jay brought them north in our Cessna 206 on floats, which was a momentous occasion in itself, since Jay had been looking forward to flying his dad's plane back to the Colville on floats for several years. Although he has had his pilot’s license for several years and even had the C-206 on floats in 2011, this was the first summer he was able to fly it north on floats.Shortly after arriving, the kids had fun roaming around and seeing everything since their last trip north a year ago.
As soon as weather permitted we were off on a boating adventure. Grandma drove the boat out and Dad piloted back, with stops on Teena Creek, and at the old sod house at the mouth of the Miluveach River, just off the Colville River. It was a chilly day, so we needed a big fire at lunch time.See albums below.
There was always lots to do, even when indoors, especially Legos and board games: Playing with Dad’s old Lego toys was Elisha’s favorite indoor pass-time.
Everyone’s favorite board-game was Generals:
Elisha got so good at it that Grandma never got to win anymore.After Jay returned to Fairbanks with Natasha and Elisha, then Melody got to stay for an extra week on her own with G-ma & G-Pa. She had a great time.
A week later Jay made a quick flight north and picked me (Teena) and Melody up to fly us back to Fairbanks. It was a beautiful flight, which I’ll tell more about on another post.
Then in mid-August, Natasha and Elisha returned to the Colville for their special time with G-m and G-pa. Favorite outdoor activities were playing “dogs” in the doghouse, canoeing, bouncing on the “bouncy balls” (old buoys), and pretend battles with old home-made warrior sticks.
One day Elisha got stuck in the mud on a walk across a sandbar…Oh, My, Thankgoodness Grandma was able to carry him back to the riverbank and then retrieve his boots.
Elisha learned that some mud is like quicksand and as long as you keep walking quickly, you don’t sink in, but if you stop and gawk around, you sink.When it was time for the two kids to return home, this time Grandma had to accompany them back to Fairbanks by commercial jet via Barrow and Anchorage.
While the kids were visiting the Colville “homestead”, Grandma made each of them a snowshirt or “kuspik”.
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