Mother's Day Weekend

I must say that it was a pretty awesome Mother’s Day weekend. On Saturday, we packed up Elaine and headed for Marymoor Park. This is a place that is outside Seattle, but is not the airport or a big box store like IKEA. Meaning that this is a relative first for us since we’ve been here. Saturday was Migratory Bird Day, and the folks at the park were holding birding events. Unfortunately, the events began at 2 pm, right in the middle of The Beautiful Time (Elaine’s nap time). So we went in the late morning, walked some trails, saw a few birds, had a picnic, and headed back home. I managed to not apply any sunscreen on myself or Elaine, so we both got a little pink. Later, we ordered pizza, and I popped the top on the first small bottle of my IPA. Lovely stuff. After Elaine went down for the night, Jill and I watched some bad television (season 2 of Heroes) and got to bed early.

Finding birds:


Sunday, I got up and got to work getting the house ready for a load of guests. We did Mother’s Day on Saturday so that I could devote Sunday to drinking and playing games. By 2 pm, several gallons of beer were on ice, the grill was going, and games were being set up. We hosted some friends in town (Josh, Jarrett, Miranda and Rachel), as well as some out of town guests, Jarred, Christine, Tim, Jessica, Jeremy, Josh, and Steven. Jarred, the guest of honor, is serving in Afghanistan as a contract officer in the Army, making sure supplies are allocated properly in the region. At least I think that’s what the job is. He’s a big fan of IPAs, which is what inspired me to make a batch. His crew was a fun bunch, and we look forward to having them back up again sometime.

People at the party:



The beer was very well received. One person said that he thought it might be the best IPA he’s ever had. Fresh beer can have that effect. I think next time, I’ll throw in an extra pound of malt, to raise the alcohol and sweetness levels. I drank it all day, and managed to avoid getting all sloppy like I do. I’m relaying Jill’s account here, as I’m no good judge of such things.

The dry-hopped fermenter, just before bottling:


I got to play Kingsburg, Ra, Imperial, and Carabande. The other table played Vegas Showdown and Pillars of the Earth. This was my second play of Imperial, and I learned a lot about using negotiation and alliances to get ahead in world domination. All in all, a fun weekend. Jill did a lot of behind-the-scenes work on Sunday, but she enjoyed her Mother’s Day on Saturday. She has expressed that she misses the real migration, back East. I’d have to agree--not much beats Magee Marsh for the migration.