Stillaguamish Flooding

Wow, what a day. We were completely cut off from everywhere for quite a while so we went out and took videos and pictures of the flooding from our side. Then last night, I came within inches of hitting a deer, or a forest rat as Uncle D calls them, as I was taking my daughter to basketball practice. It jumped up from a ditch, over a snow burm, and onto the highway right in front of my car.

I can't believe how much it has rained over the last 3 days, and we still have over a foot of snow! I uploaded one of our videos of the flooding to YouTube (Anmlucas), but will upload the others later. It just takes too long from our house. Do NOT make fun of my spanish video if you choose to watch the river video. Soy una principiante. Don't judge.

Anyway, here are some flood pictures:

This is the traffic light that is usually a half a mile from where the river goes under the highway.

Here is a closer look at the river going over the highway - those are NOT our kids. Darrington may have been cut off from everywhere else, but the kids still went to school with a 2 hour delay.

This is a side road near Trafton - some people we knew arrived as we were leaving and had a boat meeting them to get back to their house.

The old railroad bridge between Trafton and Oso was taking a beating by the Stilly. The river was all the way up to the top of both bridges' pilons.

And finally, the favorite fishing spot - the river about 2 miles from our house was moving faster and fuller than I have ever seen it!

Some good news - I saw pink in the sky this morning and the peaks of Whitehorse Mountain and Mt. Higgins trying to part the clouds. That means sunshine today! YAY!

New Plans, New Year

I am so looking forward to 2009, since 2008 has ended with many trials. I'm still getting stuck in my driveway, every morning and every night, there's still about 2 feet of snow on the ground and 6 feet on the side of the driveway and cul de sac, and my Geology class was cancelled due to a record breaking winter in the Cascades. And so in 2009, I begin my journey into the design portion of my degree.

I've replaced the Geology class with a freshman level Engineering Technology class that meets twice a week, y continuo Espanol tambien. Geology, which is actually the only class I need for my Associates transfer degree, will have to wait until Spring. Instead, I will be playing with CAD and CATIA, and getting a pre-req for my minor at WWU out of the way. It's all good.

My kids are coming home from their dad's tonight, and we plan to bring in the New Year with some Rock Band, Mario Kart and some poker lessons. I remember playing for pennies with my Godparents when I was much younger than my youngest, so we've dug the poker set out of the closet (along with some bottle rockets :) and plan to play some rounds into the New Year.

Remember to put some money in your pocket, and good luck to all in 2009!