Voyaging With Kids: Interview with Delos and Totem

This is a great informational series on cruising with kids. If you or your family have questions about this topic, check this out! There are 8 videos in the series:

Check our their blogs:
http://www.sailingtotem.com/
http://svdelos.com/

Brokers and Sea Stars

Yesterday morning's sailing adventure to go beyond the point for some open ocean sailing started off with a surprise guest on board.

Zach is shown gently returning the sea star to the water (even though it was no longer alive). We figured a sea gull had dropped its lunch mid flight sometime between Wednesday's race and yesterday morning.

**Ok, Jared just mentioned it is not called folding the sail, but flaking the sail. Correction made honey.**

While preparing to get under way, we received a call from our broker. He may have some leads for a few boats to check out next week! With that exciting news, we headed out into the bay.

Cadence fell asleep while watching for dolphins. Stef carried her down below to continue her nap.







The wind picked up quite a bit towards the mouth of the bay and we began to have a bouncy ride. We decided that with two kiddos napping, we would just stick to sailing the bay for the day. It was a calm sail the next couple of hours.

Eventually, we headed in to our slip to hang out for a couple of hours and just enjoy the sunshine. We had an appointment later that afternoon with the local dive shop and wanted to pick up some fresh fish from the harbor for dinner.

Matt is bringing us into the harbor with the conch shell.


 This is what our kids do while hanging out on the boat!

After tidying up, we headed out to the Monterey Fish Company and then to our local dive shop to set up our certification courses. Jared, Matt, and I will start with open water (up to 35 feet), where as Zach has to start in the pool (only 10 and up can start in open water, so he will work on other skills in the pool). Cadence will have to wait another year until she is old enough, so she and Zach will get certified for open water while we are out cruising.

 

They always have fresh seafood for sale!

The rest of this weekend entails yard work and school supply shopping (we still have about a month left before it starts, but I always get our stuff early. It is one less thing I have to think about while setting up my classroom). We are planning on making a trip to check out a few boats next week, if all goes well. 

Making Progress

We made progress on the de-cluttering this week. Since storage was emptied, we had a few tubs of stuff on our back deck. Okay, make that around 10 tubs and various boxes and containers. Since we need to tear out the back deck in order to start on the addition, it meant I needed to get in gear and sort through it all.
I started this early yesterday morning and after a few hours later, I had loaded the trailer for the donation center and landfill. The rest of it is either going to our storage unit (keepsakes and things we will use when we return from our adventure) or friends who wanted certain items. I have a friend who is starting her teaching career in primary grade levels, so the rest of my kindergarten classroom stuff went to her.

The building was open today, so we dropped off the load there instead of driving all the way out to the landfill area (like last time).

The kids were not keen on making another landfill trip. Zach actually donned one of our painting masks. Geez... these kids. Anyway, it was a successful and quick trip. After a quick trip to the donation center on our way home, we were back home in time to BBQ dinner and have a family movie night.

Now, we are through that mess, we can move on to the addition project and get this house ready for sale next year (I would love to try and rent it out, but that all depends on how finances are when we leave). Either way, we need to get a move on with this! Our only hold up is the city--waiting on their "historical home" review (which by the way, our home is not considered historical) so that we can finally get our building permit.


I can't believe it is already the month of July. Where is the summer going? I stopped by my classroom earlier this week, just to put the furniture back from where the custodial crew moved it for cleaning. Matt helped me, so it went quickly. While I am trying not to think about classroom projects too much at this point and enjoy the summer, I know that I need to at least make my "to-do" list and get copies made for the month of August (before everyone else returns and is in the copy room).  The first day of school will be here before long (in about 5 more weeks).

Hope everyone is doing well and wishing you all a wonderful Independence Day celebration!
~Stef