Seaside United Methodist Church

We have found a church...Seaside United Methodist Church.
Today was the annual church picnic and it was a joy to participate.

I have already volunteered Barb for the choir and there is a delightful choir director who alternately goes by the name of Debbie or "Sparky" as she is known at camp.

I have been getting to know the church members and so far I have met "Ron" who is a retired United Methodist pastor, "Irene" who sits in the pew ahead of us, and Rich, the faithful video guy, whom I have offered my services.

I neglected to mention Rev. John Tindell who is the pastor of Seaside United Methodist Church.  His sermons are plain spoken and widely vary from week to week. One of the things that attracted Barb and me is the way they close the service singing "Let There be peace on Earth and let it begin with Me."  I love that touch.

Today, at the church picnic, we also met "Walter" and his mother, "Cathy"...and "Amy" and her almost 20 year old daughter "Nora".

The organist sits up front and she has a service dog...a poodle.  She also participates with the choir which will be meeting every Wednesday evening at 7 pm.

We are still getting to know our new church and shortly we will be transferring our membership from Epworth UMC.  So far, we have found them to be very friendly...just like Epworth.

Tuffy, the cat

We have a new kitten called Tuffy.  You may remember that this was the name given to Tuffy and Taffy who were my parents' cats. We are hopeful that we will have the same luck with our kitten.





He is only four months old, but he has gone from hiding (perhaps because he was spayed yesterday) to coming out of hiding in record time!

He is into everything!  He is very entertaining and he has a very good appetite!

It was a few hours ago when he ventured out of his hiding places and he allowed me to stroke him on the bed of the our first bedroom.  Since then, he has been a purring machine with a motor that never stops.

Matt and Mary Louise visited

We recently were visited by Matt and Mary Louise.  We love them both!

We spent much of the day exploring parts of our region to the north starting with the bridge that connects Oregon to Washington state pictured to the right.  We wanted to try a seafood restaurant which specializes in exotic foods and it was a real treat.




We began our trip by visiting Fort Stevens State Park which features on old shipwreck...the Peter Ireland.  It was blown off course when the captain was trying to get the crew to make it to port early when the ship was not loaded.  It ran aground at the ocean.

This is what it looks like today. Most of the ship has been cut up for salvage, but they left the bow for tourists to view.


While we were at Fort Stevens state park, Matt and Mary Louise went exploring next to the Columbia River.  For those of you who haven't seen, this Columbia River is very wide at this point and the view is fantastic.  It gives the appearance of looking into the ocean, but it is still the river.



We encountered these blue berries while were we touring the nature preserve at the state park.

From there, we visited the Lewis and Clark National Park and saw the recreation of Fort Clapsop where Lewis and Clark wintered during the four months.  President Jefferson had sent them on a mission in 1804 to discover "the west".  It took them two years. They traveled with an Native American woman and her French Canadian husband (and child!).  They crossed the Rocky Mountains and discovered the Columbia River gorge.  The group of 33 travelers lost only one man despite several encounters with Native Americans, but it turns out that already had experience with bartering from their exposure to ship captains from the coast.



This is what the fort looked like inside.  They had ample supplies of fresh water (there is a nearby river).  Sacajawea and her husband and child had their own quarters.  Meantime, about 10 miles down the road, three men set up a 24/7 system for producing salt which used five kettles to boil down the salt from the ocean.  They did this on the beach.

This is an example of the boats Lewis and Clark and their expeditionary group would have used.


From there, we ate lunch and returned home!