The Great Northwest

This was the sight out of the office windows yesterday afternoon. The clouds above Mt. Rainier were incredible.
Luckily someone was prepared and had their camera phone handy to grab this shot. Thanks Stacey!

Going to the Chapel......

It wasn't exactly a chapel, but the outcome was just the same: Terri Stafford and Jay Stein are now

Mr & Mrs Stein

After being together for almost 18 years, these two decided to make it official on Friday evening. It was a very pretty and private ceremony at their home. Terri's best friend for 22 years (me!) and Jay's long time friend Don from Oregon were the witnesses. Tim and Don's wife Angela were also there. Jay's first friend in Washington and long time co-worker Doug performed the ceremony and his wife Rainey took the photos. It was a very intimate group of close friends to share this special moment. Following the ceremony was the cake cutting and champagne toasts. The toasts that Terri and Jay gave to each other were so touching that there wasn't a dry eye in the room. Then it was off to dinner at a Japanese steak house. Yummy!

Congratulations Terri & Jay. I wish you many more years of happiness together! Love you both!

Thanksgiving 08

As we do on most Thanksgivings, we headed up to Sequim to have dinner at my cousin Karen's house. She has the perfect Holiday house up on the hill overlooking the Dungeness Spit. The kids are in the backyard showcasing the amazing view.

While the adults are chatting downstairs and getting dinner ready, the kids are upstairs challenging their spelling skills with a game of scrabble.

Bye Bye Braces!

This week we had a major milestone in Kaitlyn's life.....she got her braces off! Kaitlyn started going to the orthodontist when she was 9 years old - that was 7 years ago! She had several phases of treatment, with the actual braces being put on in the spring of her 7th grade year. It is now fall of her Junior year and she is finally brace-free!
Her teeth are beautiful and her pretty little smile is no longer filled with metal!

Our Beautiful Rose.....all grown up

Senior Photos 08

Homecoming Photos.....

From Kaitlyn's camera throughout the evening. Kaitlyn's date was Charlie, the same young man that escorted her last year.

Homecoming Preview

It's that time of year again. Here's what my beautiful baby looks like on her way to her Junior year Homecoming.......

Today Is Your Birthday!

No its not, today is MY birthday. I am now the ripe old age of 41! Wow, only 9 years to 50, as Tim so lovingly reminds me.

My special day started off at work at 7:20 a.m. I had some nice (alcoholic) presents from my coworkers, a dinner gift card, a coffee gift card, and a plant, not to mention a nummy chocolate birthday cake. It's a good thing I had a piece as my "breakfast of champions" this morning, cuz that was the only birthday cake I had today! Later this morning I headed to our Olympia office where I worked until 7:30 tonight.
I finally made it home about 8:30 tonight, after a brief stop at the UPS distribution site in Fife. Kaitlyn is at her Dad's house and Tim was just sitting on the couch watching sports and playing on his computer. If you didn't have a calendar that proved it, you wouldn't know it was my birthday in my house!
My exciting day ends catching up on my personal email (I had 36 unread messages....whoops!) and now quickly blogging before I head off to bed.
Lucky me gets to go to work in Olympia again tomorrow morning. I am so very special!
The only good news to share is that on Sunday, Tim and I are getting on a plane and going to Reno for a few days. "Why Reno and not Vegas?" is the question I'm getting asked a lot lately. Two main reasons: Reno is CHEAP and I need to relax. There isn't anything relaxing about Vegas, but Reno is really laid back. I need to unwind, hang out, drink lots of free cold adult beverages, and let my mind not think about work. I wonder how that is going to go when my blackberry is my cell phone now. I'll have to practice the art of ignoring it!
Thank you to everyone who called me, emailed me, or sent me a card for my birthday. I really do appreciate your remembering my special day!
Good night!

What a day!

Unless you live in a vacuum, then you've probably heard that in a deal put together over the weekend (in less than 48 hours), Bank of America bought Merrill Lynch for $50 Billion (that's billion with a "b") in an all-stock transaction.

I was resting peacefully yesterday afternoon when my phone rang about 4:00 in the afternoon. When your Director calls you at home on a Sunday afternoon (and your stock was in the tank on Friday) you know something is up. I was informed that our Board was meeting in New York to approve a sale to B of A. I immediatly turned on the computer and CNBC to absorb all of the information that I could get my hands on.

This morning I was at the office at 4:45 a.m. ready for an analyst call at 5:00 a.m. Gotta love the Eastern to Pacific time zone issues! The day then followed with the phones ringing off the hook, a global employee town hall teleconference, a local office, and lots of questions from clients and employees. After almost 12 hours at work, I called it quits at 4:34 this afternoon and headed home.

So far we are pretty positive about the deal and what it means for our division of Merrill. The wealth management piece is what B of A was after. Our model and infrastructure will hopefully stay in tact. Only time will tell.....

Out & About

Yesterday Tim and I enjoyed the beautiful sunny day out in the Puget Sound.
We launched the boat in Tacoma at Point Defiance. Tim was very impressed with the launch. It was well worth his $13 launch fee.
We then headed over to Redondo to meet up with Tim's friends, Kenny & Don, who were fishing in that area. It gave Tim a chance to show off his boat to his buddies.
We then headed for Gig Harbor, where we docked up at the Tides Tavern for some lunch on the deck overlooking the water.
After lunch, we boated under the narrows bridge, back over to Ruston Way, and then back to the launch. It was a beautiful day on the Sound. Very peaceful and scenic.
(Silly me forgot the camera, so this photo was taken with Tim's cell phone. Not bad!)

My New Kitchen Floor (finally!)

After months and months, its finally finished - my new kitchen floor. We decided to replace the kitchen floor early this spring. We picked out a marble laminate that was installed in late March. It looked pretty, but was impossible to clean. After several conversations with the flooring store, visits from the product manufacturer, and lots of debating, it was decided we would rip out that laminate and put down something else. Tim and I decided to bite the bullet (like we should have to begin with) and buy the italian tiles. It is so pretty and durable. This floor will outlast our lives in this house and will probably still be standing and looking beautiful for years and years. I couldn't be happier with my floor, but now its on to paint and other fun projects! :)

a Whale of a Tale

Tim "the birthday boy" Babbitt (seen below in his new Captain's hat) got his wish and we boated to the San Juan Islands on his birthday for a few days. We just got back late this evening.
The weather was incredible! We spent Monday night in Friday Harbor and Tuesday night in Roche Harbor. The photo is our boat docked up in Roche Harbor - it looks so tiny between the two bigger boats/yachts on either side of us. You have to look closely but we're there. 27 feet is nothing compared to the sizes of yachts that are in these marinas. The price tags of these babies are unfathomable.
The sunset photo is last night's sunset over the marina in Roche Harbor. It was an incredible sight!
Speaking of incredible sights - today was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen - a pod of Orcas swimming in front of our boat. In fact two were so close they swam under the bow of our boat and came up for air about 50 feet behind us. It was amazing and honestly, a little scary. I was so afraid they were going to hit the boat or tip us over and we'd be done. The water was pretty rough where we spotted them and we were rocking pretty good that one little hit with a whale-tail or bump from underneath would have sent us in for an unscheduled and mighty chilly swim in the Puget Sound. I can't even describe what it is like to see whales popping up all around you for about 5 minutes. Crazy Cool!
We met some really nice people on our journey. Talk about a small world! On Monday afternoon we were entering Friday Harbor on our way to our moorage slip for the night and we pass my cousins Karen & David in their brand new boat. They were about 10 slips down the same dock from us. It was so fun to see each others new "toys". We had dinner together for Tim's birthday - some great fish & chips!
We even had left over fish in sandwiches the next afternoon before we headed out to go our separate ways (after Tim and David did a little mechanic work on their boat). We headed to Roche Harbor and they were headed to Sucia Island for a few days. I love Karen dearly and it was so fun to see her in this setting and spend some one-on-one time chatting! I hope we run into them again when we are out in the water. Maybe next time we'll even plan it!
All-in-all it was a good trip. I survived sleeping, eating and showering on the boat. It wasn't as bad as I anticipated. This boat is so much smoother in the water than our Sea Ray. We hit a rough patch of water yesterday. I told Tim that if we had been in the Sea Ray I would have been on the floor crying. On the Monterey, I just sat there, holding on, but not freaking out.
Tomorrow is "clean the boat day". The salt water reaks havoc on the poor thing. She's covered in salt and will get a good scrubbing so she's bright and shiny the next time we go out.

Is it a date?

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then generally it is a duck, right? Isn't that what our mamas always taught us?

I think Kaitlyn had a date, but she denies it. Oh the joys of a 16 year old daughter!!

Let's see....
Coffee at Starbucks - check
Movie - check
Bowling - check
All in the same day with the same boy. That sounds remarkably like a date. But what do I know, I'm just a Mom!

Just for reference - Rose is "chaperoning" the bowling event this evening. She's doing the "big sister snoop" for me. Gotta love it!

I just met this boy tonight, although I've seen him a few times dropping Kaitlyn off places. She met him at work and I'm not using his name on purpose...just in case! He seems very nice and Kaitlyn is a pretty good judge of character. Since I don't know what 16 year old girls think is "cute" anymore, I'll just go with Rose's endorsement that he's pretty cute.

Kaitlyn is truly loving the freedom of having a drivers license. She's been running around all day meeting her friends and doing as she pleases. She is very good about calling or texting me to check-in and let me know where she is and that she's gotten to her destination safely. How long will this last? Who knows, but I'm enjoying her compliance while she's willing to put up with the over-protective mother-thing.

~ a 98 !!! ~

That was Kaitlyn's score on her driving test today. She is an official licensed driver as of about 2:00 this afternoon.

We had to drive to Centralia today for her test. All of the test locations in the Tacoma/Seattle area were booked into the middle of August. Since Kaitlyn is a working-girl now, she needs transportation to work and the bus was just unacceptable. Being the loving mother that I am, I took the day off and road with her to Centralia. Luckily it wasn't a wasted trip, since she passed her test. She did the best parallel parking job that I've seen. I personally suck at it! I couldn't see the rest of her test, but she was back in 10 minutes with a smile on her face and a passing grade in her hand.

She's driving herself to Target tomorrow morning at 8:00.

Boating 101

Boating lesson #1:
Do not drink beer when you are driving a boat right in front of the police vessel!!

As it turns out, that isn't what the nice police officers were pulling Tim over for last night. They saw we had expired tabs on the boat and didn't see our temporary tag in the window until they came up along side. Tim skates by again!

Last night we "entertained" our friends Lisa & Per Bakken and John & Celeste Morrison aboard the Instant Gratification 2. We boated through Lake Washington chatting, admiring all the beautiful houses, and enjoying some nice snacks and beverages. I had a really bad day at work and it was so nice to relax and kick back with friends out on the water. We hope to have them back out with us again soon and maybe this time with the kids for a little inner-tubing or wakeboarding.

After taking them back to the dock, Tim and I headed over to Anderson Bay near Seward Park where we anchored and spent our very first night on the boat. It was interesting for "land-lover Kris" to say the least. We are planning to spend a few days at the beginning of August up in the San Juan Islands. Now I have a better idea of what to expect and what to pack (like earplugs for that annoying water splashing sound all night!).
I am happy to report that our water issues seem to have been resolved. Tim is so handy! The bathroom worked really well and we didn't have any water in the galley. Yay!

All photos courtesy of Per Bakken. Thank you for bringing the camera!

Kaitlyn Got A Job!

Katie Sue got her very first job. She is a cashier at Target. This past weekend was her orientation and first day on the job. She was terrified, but made it through her shift without any serious issues, aside from the fact that she got a boo-boo on her finger from a hanger.

Good As New - Sorta

We got the boat back on Friday. Supposedly everything was fixed. It passed Tim's initial check of everything so back out in the water we went. Saturday we took all the kids out for the day on the water for their first excursion in the Instant Gratification 2. Rose's favorite part was the bathroom.
About 3/4 of the way through the day the carpet in the galley area was suspiciously wet again. Darn it! Once again, we soaked up the water with our towels. When we got home, Tim found the problem. The dealer fixed the cold water valve on the bathroom sink, but now the hot water valve was dripping. This time he is taking things into his own hands and going to fix it himself. That way he's confident it will be done the right way and we won't have any more water issues.
We are hoping to take friends out this weekend for a sunset cruise and we are headed to the San Juans on August 4th for a few days.

~ The Instant Gratification 2 ~

It's huge!
Tim is 6 feet tall and he is dwarfed by this boat!
Her maiden voyage was yesterday and it did not go as smoothly as hoped.
After picking her up at the dealer yesterday morning we headed straight to the lake. The launch include Kris making a graceful (not!) fall on the dock which included a scraped shin, splinters in her hands and bruises on her chest. Good thing no one had a camera!
Kris (yes, this says KRIS) drove her off the trailer and into the water while Tim parked the truck and trailer. I have never been so scared in all my life. This thing does not maneuver like the 20 foot Sea Ray! I managed to go back to the dock, pick up Tim without any issues and we were off. The first hour and a half went smoothly. Then I went down into the galley area and stepped into about an inch of water. Oops! This is not good. I panicked, of course jumping to the conclusion we were taking on water and going to sink. Tim called the dealer and they said it was probably just from when they pressure washed the boat. This made no logical sense to me because if this were the case the water would have been there the whole time and not just showed up. Tim bailed out the water using a water bottle he cut down to size and we mopped up the carpet with all the towels we had on board. Unfortunately, when I went to use the bathroom, the one main reason I said "yes" to this boat - no more peeing in the lake - we didn't have any water. Bummer. The guys at the dealer assured us they filled the water tank. We discovered the problem when we got home last night. There is a broken water line that leads to the sink in the bathroom. When we pressurized the water tank so we could use the water, it sprayed, all 20 gallons, out into some odd area of the hull of the boat. Nice! So, when the dealership opens again on Tuesday morning, they are getting the Instant Gratification 2 back for some much needed repairs. We are hoping we will have it back in the water next weekend with the kids.
Today we are cleaning it. I hate cleaning other people's dirt! But as all of you know, I am so nit-picky that unless I clean it myself, I won't be happy. Shortly we are off to the boating supply store to stock up.
As you may recall when we bought the SeaRay 3 years ago, I mentioned that all a boat is, is a hole in the water you throw money into. Well, our hole in the water just got bigger and there's a lot more money we have to throw into it now!

Goodbye Instant Gratification!

Tomorrow morning we are saying goodbye to the Instant Gratification.

So Sad!

She has been a wonderful recreational toy for the past 3 summers. All of the kids learned to wakeboard and even I was able to get up long enough to get it on video.

Tomorrow she gets traded in for the Instant Gratification 2!

Tim is a spoiled boy and finally got his wish to get a cabin cruiser that he can "boat camp" in. We bought a Monterey 250C. It's a 2006, but in really good condition. It sleeps 4 and has a "real" bathroom, kitchenette, and TV with DVD.

It will be truly interesting tomorrow afternoon when we put it in the water for the first time and I try to handle a 27 foot boat off the launch. Someone should truly have a camera to capture the hilarity!

Watch the blog for IG2 updates & photos after this weekend.

Sweet 16 !!!

It happened....my little baby girl turned 16!

Today was Kaitlyn's 16th Birthday. The morning started as all birthdays do, with her "beside the bed present". A tradition my mom started when my sister and I were little. There was always a small gift sitting beside our beds when we woke up on our birthday mornings.

She then opened her gifts from Tim and I. We then headed to get mother-daughter manicures. Then Kaitlyn had her hair cut at Gene Juarez and we did a little shopping (shocker!).

Her birthday celebration rounded out with dinner at Red Robin with 3 of her closest friends - the "new" fabulous foursome - M.A.R.K. - Mackenna, Amy, Rochelle & Kaitlyn. She opened some rather interesting presents too. Rochelle and Mackenna then came back to our house for ice cream sundaes and a sleepover. I highly doubt there will be much sleeping happening!

~Blog-worthy News~

Today Kaitlyn passed her written driver's license test (on the very first try!).
Yeah Kaitlyn! Just 2 short weeks from today and she turns 16.


Relay Wrap-Up News
Tonight at the 2008 Relay For Life of Tacoma Wrap-Up event, Team Merrill Lynch received 6 awards:

Overall Top Individual Fundraiser - Joan Lougheed
Top Online Individual Fundraiser - Joan Lougheed
2nd Place - Individual Youth Fundraiser - Kaitlyn Lewis
2nd Place - Corporate Team
2nd Place - Online Fundraising Team
2nd Place - Per Capita Fundraising Team

I am very proud to be part of a team that cares so much about the community, our employees, and takes up the fight against cancer.
I am even more proud of my daughter, Kaitlyn, who has "relayed" for the last 5 years. In each of 4 of those last 5 years, she has personally raised over $1000 in the fight against cancer, and in the last 2 years, she has been recognized as the 2nd place youth fundraiser for the entire Tacoma event. This year she raised $1680.
She relays, in her own words, because:
"No one deserves to suffer through cancer. Those of us that don’t have cancer need to help those that do. Cancer has become such a common occurrence, and we don’t know what the future holds for us and the people we love."

Prom

The same weekend that Tim, Kaitlyn and I were Relaying.....Rose was doing something important too.....like attending the Prom! She went to West Seattle High's Junior/Senior Prom with a new "friend" Alex.
According to Rose, boyfriends are too much work so she's just enjoying hanging out with her friends. We'll see how long that lasts.
Alex is the tallest boy in the photo and Rose would be the "la petite" blond.

Relay For Life

Relay For Life of Tacoma has come to another successful end. The Team from Merrill Lynch spent 24 hours walking the track to raise money for cancer research, patient programs and education.

This year the team raised over $23,000. Little Miss Kaitlyn raised $1645 at last count all by herself for this great cause.

Friday night at the event there were over 100 Merrill Lynch employees, family and friends there for opening ceremonies. It was an incredible site to see this sea of yellow on the track as we proudly wore our Running With The Bulls team tee-shirts, which have the names of our family and friends that are cancer survivors and the names of those we've lost to this dreaded disease listed on the back.

I was able to catch up with some old friends at Relay, Chris and Dani. We haven't seen each other much since Christmas and it was nice to be able to hang for a few minutes and catch up. We are hoping to get together for breakfast again here soon, which will be a welcome reason to get up early (which is NOT my favorite thing!).

Thank you to everyone that supported this year's event. You can and did make a difference in the lives of so many with your generous support!

KTs KAR

Kaitlyn is the proud owner of a 1999 Nissan Altima which she named Veronica. We drove to West Seattle today to bring her to her new home in Puyallup.

Too bad Kaitlyn still has 5 weeks and 3 days before she turns 16 and can drive it by herself!

In the meantime, it looks really cute parked in front of our house!

Our New York Experience

Tim and Kaitlyn arrived on Wednesday late afternoon to join me in New York City, where I had been since Sunday on a Merrill business trip. We stayed in Mid-Town Manhattan at the Sheraton Hotel & Towers. I've stayed in much nicer hotel rooms in my many travels, which was disappointing considering what we were paying for the room, but the location was central to everything!

It rained most of the day on Thursday, but that didn't detour our plans. We took a double-decker bus tour, complete with our rain ponchos. We saw the Village, SoHo, the Financial District, the south Seaport, and more.

Friday the sun came out and we took a harbor tour out to see the Statue of Liberty. Then we headed to China Town and did some secretive handbag shopping. It was quite the experience. A little woman stopped us on the street and asked me if I wanted a Coach or Gucci, I said yes and she asked us to follow her. Somehow along the way we lost Tim. Kaitlyn and I were led into the back of a little store front, into a storage room, up a secret staircase and into a secret room full of handbags. A little freaky, but funny just the same. I got a great deal on a red Gucci purse. We bought a Juicy Couture bag for Rose, but she didn't like it so we bought her a Coach on 5th Avenue the next day. Kaitlyn also bought 2 Dolce & Gabana knock-offs during our purse shopping spree. They were great deals!

Later that night we walked through Central Park a little and then had dinner at the Brooklyn Diner (the finer diner according to their sign) and sat a few tables away from Bradley Whitford, an actor from the West Wing or Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, depending on your generation.

Saturday Tim headed to Yankee Stadium to see the Yankees beat the Seattle Mariners. We bought him tickets online from StubHub.com from a computer at the Apple store on 5th Avenue. We can be creative in a pinch. The game started 30 minutes after we bought the tickets, so we threw Tim on the Subway and sent him to the Bronyx. It worked out well because he found his way and was in his seat by the middle of the 1st inning. Kaitlyn and I spent the day shopping on Madison and 5th Avenue and then went to a Broadway play that night, after a quick stop at the wax museum, where she hung with her famous friends for a bit.

We flew home Sunday afternoon and spent today doing laundry and running errands. The most important errand we ran today was picking up Kaitlyn's car. I'll post that next.

Tim and Kaitlyn's first night in NY.

Central Park

The NY Stock Exchange. It was heavily guarded with policemen carrying assault rifles and really cute, but I'm sure deadly, German Shepherds.

Our famous dinner companion, Bradley Whitford at the Brooklyn Diner about 2 blocks from Central Park.

Kaitlyn and her play bill from Grease on Broadway. She got to pick any play/musical that she wanted to see when we were in New York. She picked Grease because we watched the reality show on NBC last spring where they were selecting the new Danny and Sandy to star on Broadway. We watched every week and our favorite duo, Max & Laura, won the contest and were still playing those roles when we were in NY.

One of the most recognizable buildings in the world, the Empire State Building. We actually went up to the 86th floor observatory on Friday night. The view was incredible, but the long lines and the hike of the last 6 flights of stairs were killers.

Mother and Daughter in Times Square.

Kaitlyn's Famous Friends