The Slow Season on Orcas…

The Slow season on Orcas is anything but!

When you live in a tourist town, you get used to visitors, and sometimes relish in the breaks from them. The summer months are always jam packed, and you generally expect things to die down in October. The days will get short, and dark, and hibernation mode sets in. Not this year! We have had sunny days, snow, visitors, holidays, and raging waterfalls. Never a dull moment!

 

We were lucky enough to have nice, sunny weather last a bit longer than normal this year, and we definitely took advantage of it! We went to the beach, had a lovely dinner at Orcasong Farm, and played outside while we could (without puffy coats). Eleanor even learned how to play….I am not a fan of the name…corn hole. Ugh. Can’t it be called something else?!

In a matter of two weeks we filled our tiny cabin with visitors from Chicago, Texas, and of course Washington. We meandered the property, painted and carved pumpkins, explored, and enjoyed maybe too many Montucky Cold Snacks. We took them out to Camp Orkila (in the wind and the rain) and had a blast at their Fall Festival and Haunted Hay Ride. We totally forgot to wait for the hay ride, but the kids had enough fun, so we got away with it. Plus, it was cold!

 

Pictures from the Fall Festival (minus the Haunted Hay Ride)…

We were also lucky to house the Whiskey Shivers from Austin, Texas. The most fun, talented, child-tolerant guys on the planet. If you ever have a chance to see them perform, do it! You will not regret it!! While I (surprisingly) don’t have pictures of it, we BBQ’d around the fire pit, wandered bare foot through the field, and managed to NOT drive in to town for Karaoke 🙂

It was a wonderful reunion of some of our favorite people that we just do not see enough of. We are always happy to host, guys!

Then…Halloween! My husband and I have always LOVED Halloween. We have crates and crates of costumes, and it seems that our daughter has inherited the gene. This year we let her pick out our “theme” and she chose Trolls! She was Princess Poppy (of course), and we were Bergens. She even talked Nana and Grandpa in to playing along!

After all of the extended sunshine, visitors, and family dress-up came the SNOW! Yes. Snow. In November. On Orcas. It was awesome! Eleanor learned about snowballs (and got me right in the eye), and learned you can eat snow. Only white snow, of course. It did not last long, and we are still eagerly awaiting its return. For an island that “rarely gets snow,” two years in a row is pretty amazing!!

We then had a whirlwind with Thanksgiving off-island, Willy Wonka at the Orcas Center, a dance recital (the littles were Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer), more off-island trips, more visitors….phew! Busy times.

Then…Christmas!

In all honesty, I was never big on Christmas…then I had a kid. As soon as she was born, it was over. I love the decorations, I love the presents, decorating cookies! Everything is new to her and it is just too much fun to see her light up over it. She wrote letters to Santa, learned Christmas songs, and of course saw Santa.

Again.

And Again. (she REALLY likes that dress…)

We topped it off with Christmas with family at West Beach Resort. We ended up without a traditional Christmas Tree, but ended up with probably one of the coolest trees of all time. Eleanor decorated it, and placed the bulbs in very precise locations. I topped it off with a super sweet Barbie from 1989 that I received for my birthday. It was perfect.

So, that’s it. The “slow-season” on Orcas!