Weekend update: Dentists, eagles and salmon

This weekend was a busy one for Nora!

Saturday morning was Nora's first visit to the dentist. She sat on the chair while Mommy got her teeth cleaned, then took her turn. She did a great job at sitting still for the hygenists, and thought that the suction tool was the coolest thing ever. She even managed to score a helium smiley-face balloon!

Then, on Sunday, it was back to the mountains. We drove up Highway 9 to Rockport, a prime eagle-watching area along the Skagit river. Rockport is in the center of the North Cascades range and has some incredible scenery. This weekend was the first time in several weeks that the weather has been sunny, and the view of the mountains was spectacular.

The time from the end of December to the beginning of February is when the salmon swim upriver to spawn and die. This makes it prime feeding time for the bald eagles. We were not disappointed...with the help of one of the eagle watching guides we were easily able to spot a bald eagle roosting on one side of the river, and a Great Blue Heron on the other.

We drove a few miles further up the road and toured a salmon hatchery which has been operating in the area since the late 1940s. It was amazing to see the hundreds of thousands of baby salmon swimming in the tanks. We learned that this year would have been the best year in decades for the salmon population, but the flooding in the area over the past couple of months has wiped out a lot of the eggs that would normally be hatching now.

Tomorrow it's back to the new daycare for week 2. Nora's behavior has been great (no more biting!!) and she seems to be having a lot of fun. After seeing the difference between this new daycare and her old one, I think we definitely made the right decision. Now I just have to find a better way to get to work in the morning!