Maiden Voyage

Back in January, on the day Steve got back from one of his many trips to South Carolina, we bought a boat. We figured we didn't have enough to do with two kids, an old, fixer upper home and mole infested yard so why not? And then, let's not just buy a boat, but a sailboat that neither of us has ANY experience on. Oh wait, Steve's been on a teeny tiny sailboat like 3 times, and I've seen one, so we're totally pros.

Well, due to inclement weather (being that we live in the Pacific Northwest, this is a typical thing) and Steve traveling to South Carolina a few more times, we had not had a chance to take the boat out until... TODAY! And what a perfect day to go. We didn't sail, but we motored around and that was fun too! Cousins Brett and Kate and their daughter Trevi hitched along for the ride (and quite frankly did most of the work since I pretty much fed Adi) and we motored out to lunch and back all afternoon. Although the day started with a hiccup (the engine would not start), Steve kept his head about him and he and Brett got the engine problem worked out and we were on our way. Here we are, driving to the dock, boat in tow.

Putting the boat in the water!

The first attempt to launch was not successful. Turns out you have to untie ALL the ropes connecting the boat to the trailer before the boat can slip into the water. Details. Once everything was untied, everyone was loaded, and the engine started, we were on our way.

The truck looks soooooo tiny at this angle.

First stop in our boat, Tides for lunch.

Bri and Steve at the Tides dock.

Full view of the boat, Brett in the, wait for it, stern of the boat. See what I learned all in one day?!? Oh, there's more, he's on the port side of the boat. Boo yah!

First family picture in the boat.

Check out her chin. Before we even got on the boat, Bri tripped on the dock and scraped her chin and hands up. I was a little worried it may be a bad omen for our trip, but most of the day went well from there on. Oh, besides the fact that she almost fell down into the boat but miraculously Steve caught her by the ankle preventing her from falling 4' and landing on her head, but causing her to smack into the metal stairs. I hear it was a pretty awesome catch (I was up at the restaurant ordering lunch so did not see), good job babe! And then there was the fact that the engine just stopped after we left that harbor, not slowed down, stopped. After drifting for 5 minutes or so, Steve got it back up and running and we headed straight for the dock so as not to be stranded with 4 adults and 3 small children on the water. But besides all that, we had a pretty successful day.

And as you can plainly see, the girls were tuckered out after all the excitement on our new (to us) sailboat.