Just some fun shots from around the house, to give you an idea of what everyday life is like at our little beach home!

This one is taken during a very low tide, so we are looking upwards from an unusual perspective at our fun little beach house. The neighboring houses are considerably more grandiose than ours (helps valuation, but hurts taxes!). Our neighbors are pleasant folks we do appreciate! Click here or on the picture for a high-resolution (2MB) large size picture.

We recently painted the kitchen and dining room walls and ceilings.

Again, the repainting job. We really liked the "custard" color. Notice the "old" light fixture, a ceiling fan / light combination.

Now, see the new chandelier, it's much nicer. Also there's a cat up where she's not supposed to be! You can see the Christmas-decorated table.

Here's an overview picture, this one from a boat out on Commencement Bay. Green arrow indicates our house.

Here is Sara gardening, adding in a large and impressive new flower-bed. Sara has worked very hard all this summer planting and nuturing dozens of lovely flowers and shrubs. Now that we have more flowers, we see many more birds scooting around the yard, than before.

Sara swimming in Commencement Bay! It's warmer than you think--some days a layer of warmer Puyallup river water lies on top of the colder seawater. It helped that this day was in the mid-80's. In the background is the PAA-91, a derelict 180-foot Russian vessel that has been moored illegally there for about two months.

Dave's Mom and Dad enjoying the easterly view from the deck and all the ship traffic. This was taken last summer, notice the low-grade deck railing material! More recent pictures show the new improved replacement.

Daisy and a friend enjoying a swim on our gravelly beach. We are in the head of a subtle but definite crescent-shaped "bay" so our beach gravel is finer-grained than at the points.

Sara's namesake is our first yacht! So far it is powered only by oars. Dave has rowed across Commencement Bay a couple times--it takes about 45 minutes per one way crossing.

This picture shows the tide out about as far as it ever gets, this is a "minus 3-1/2 foot tide." At high tide the water laps at the base of our bulkhead--during storms waves can actually break over the bulkhead, perhaps global warming could worsen this situation! The small sailboat is called the "Sissy." The buoy just above the ladder is ours.

In the fall through late spring, large numbers of California Sea Lions rest on the barges & bouys about a half-mile from our house. They are quite noisy with a lot of barking & growling to improve their social standing, but we kind of like the sounds.

Friends! From left, Lester with Daisy behind his legs, Dave, Dave "E," Pat, Victoria Schauer held by Veronica, Kevin, Nick, Joseph and Mary Schauer.