We moved here six years ago for the peace. The tranquility. The relative isolation. Orcas Island is slow paced and visually stunning. Unadulterated natural beauty is what makes it so unique, unlike most of the rest of the world that is busy building and building. We’ve realized that Orcas isn’t …
The local Orcas Island Food Co-op offers some of the most interesting classes. Last year the boys and I went on a walk through Eastsound with botanist and cell biologist Ryan Drum to find local edible and medicinal herbs right in our midst. A few months later we learned to …
We moved to Orcas Island six years ago, and we visited the island for six summers before that. One of the first places we were familiar with was Howe Art, the residence and workplace we passed each day when we walked or drove up the road to the bed and …
I love that Orcas Island has a lot of second-hand options, and The Exchange really brings it home that nothing is worth paying retail prices. Dream up anything you need around the house, the garden, or the tool shed, and you just might find it on any given day at …
There are opportunities on little Orcas Island that are unlike anything we’ve experienced in other places. One of our family’s favorites is Young Eagles Day. Once a year in June, a bunch of island pilots with small planes volunteer their time to take kids 8-17 years old up in the …
You’ll notice some structures overgrown with ivy or eroding on the lapping shore near town. They are lime kilns. Our boys have had a sudden interest in them, so we’ve visited the three we know of a few times now. They reek of mystery and intrigue, but their past is …
My parents dragged me to the symphony every few months when I was growing up. I was bored out of my mind every second of it. The only thing that saved me was the thought of getting bubble gum ice cream at Swensen’s on the way home. I’d sit in …
The other day on the way to school at noon (I homeschool our younger one in the mornings), we noticed that the tide was at an extreme low. That means a trail called a tombolo emerges from the water that leads from the beach to a little island right off …
A-newting we have gone, A-newting we have gone Heigh-ho, the derry-o, A-newting we have gone.* Newts are abounding in ponds around our island this time of year. It’s a child’s fantasyland. And an adult’s! *The ASPCA and The American Humane Society declare that no newts were harmed in the following …
All kinds of opportunities come our way, living out here on these islands. We and a bunch of other families from Orcas Island signed up to board and ride a tall ship off Whidbey Island the other day. The enthusiastic, kid-friendly, knowledgeable crew showed us skills, explained navigation tools, taught …
Every April and November there is a one-day pop-up paint-your-own-pottery day called Clay Cafe set up in the high school art room. Anyone can come and choose a piece of pottery to buy and then paint with glaze. It’s a drop-by kind of thing but we love spending every minute …
The skies are finally opening up after a long winter of gray and rain – mindbendingly long this time – and we’re having our third day of blue, cloudless skies. When the sky is able to be cloudless is when I feel like Orcas has finally made the turn into …
We always walk into an adventure when we’re out exploring nature here on the island. A bike ride on our first sunny day in a long time led to a walk out on the Indian Island tombolo revealed by an ultra low afternoon tide. (Tombolo: a sand or gravel bar …
We – the boys and I – returned a few weeks ago from our 11-day adventure to Kenya – 3 days of it spent in planes, ferries, buses, airports, and cars. No complaints there, as it isn’t every day that you fly over Greenland or eat Stroopwafel cookies in the …
A compilation made by our 12-year-old…
Back in October, I had strep throat. I don’t usually go to the doctor unless a sickness gets to the point that I can’t handle it. My throat got unbearably painful, I went to the doctor, and came out so grateful for modern medicine and antibiotics. A few days later, …
Orcas Island abounds with unique events throughout the year. The Paper Airplane Contest held in the public school gym is nothing frilly. Simply a lot of kids with five sheets of paper each, forming planes for three contests – distance, time aloft, and accuracy. First-, second-, and third-place winners in …
For most of my life I have tried to eat healthily. Aside from living mostly off of leftover brownies and garlic bread as a river guide, I’ve typically enjoyed things like fruit and granola rather than ice cream and chocolate sauce. I’ve read food books, I’ve watched food documentaries, and …
Living on Orcas Island is the antithesis of living in Hollywood. We cherish our space. We love our peace and quiet. Our wardrobes reflect function over fashion. And anonymity is king for many. We haven’t had cable for years but I know how much my mom loves movies and watching …
Sometimes when we walk over to my mom’s house for a visit, she’s watching Highway Thru Hell on the Weather Channel. If you’ve never watched it, it’s a show documenting the rescues and tows of big rig crashes and wrecks that happen in thick snow and perilous ice on the …
We pass Karl Kruger on the road all the time, just as we do every other Orcas Islander. And just like every other Orcas Islander, Karl has quite a story. Last summer, Karl entered what’s called the Race to Alaska, or R2AK. Anyone can enter it as long as there …
I love that even though I may not feel the subtle changes in the air or in my body, the natural world is moving right along in its cycle of rebirth. Gray clouds loom, snow has recently fallen, and I’m still wearing my down jacket in the house all day …
Though some people travel to the tropics during their kids’ one-week mid-winter break from school to escape the four-months-and-counting of gloomy weather here, I often feel that our kids have this week off for nothing. We have no such plans. They may as well be in school if it’s going …
Yesterday it snowed. It was a beautiful, quiet, heavenly sight watching the flakes slowly flutter to the ground all afternoon and into the evening. I went for a longer-than-normal walk this morning, taking in all the sights and capturing pictures of all my familiar walking places now donned in white. …
Today we awakened to a clear, endless blue sky. The sun was out all day, so we were too. We haven’t had that much solar exposure for months on Orcas, so we don’t take even an hour of it for granted. We don’t get a lot of snow here either, …
If I were the superstitious type, I might see this past week’s happenings as omens. My husband has recounted the last several nights as he was sitting in bed. One jerked with a quick, jarring earthquake – a little 3.1 whose epicenter was 10 miles away. Another night the lights …
Wow. Like heaven opening after a prolonged pause in purgatory, our one day of sun was glorious.
As an average kid growing up in a hot, concrete suburb of Dallas, Texas, National Geographic was a revelatory introduction to the world that was somewhere out there. I’d browse through the magazine each time it appeared on our coffee table and by far the most engaging photos were of …
If the upholstery in our car gets wet, it’s no problem; it will dry in April My bath towel before a shower is often only a little less wet than it was after the previous night’s shower Golf umbrellas (which are huge) enable my daily walk to continue; at least …
Dan and Katie have been on my mind since creating this site because they are intentional about every single lifestyle choice they make. I respect them for that. As I sit cozy inside my heated house writing this, I’m alternating between watching a National Geographic documentary called Before the Flood. …
Did you know that? We didn’t until we lived here. Because we have wall heaters, we don’t have to heat our house with wood. Our neighbor down the way only has a fireplace, so they start burning wood in October. We don’t have a wood stove sitting out in the …
Well, here we are folks. It’s late January and we have one more month of gloom, if not more. We haven’t seen much sun for quite some time now. Our faces are pasty white, we’re lacking in Vitamin D, and some of us have dark circles under our eyes. My …
I always refer to Orcas Island as Little House on the Prairie in modern times. Not only are we surrounded by nature and genuine friendliness, we also have landmarks along the road that are testaments to honesty. In the summer especially, you’ll pass roadside duck and chicken egg stands, gorgeous …
Summer beauty here is big and loud. Winter beauty here is often small and subtle, and usually in the palettes of grays, browns, and dark greens. Look closely enough and you’ll see a spark of orange. If you walk, as with any place, you often see what would normally be …
The Orcas Center is often our lifeline to the rest of the world when the gloom takes over and we begin to feel isolated. As the performing arts hub, it’s a place where creativity never stops. Especially in the winter. Plays, performances, art shows, lectures, films, dance and aerial silks …
I noticed a contest published in the paper near the end of summer. Orcas Power and Light Co-op (OPALCO, as we call it) wanted ideas of what to name the underwater cable they were installing. The person who submitted the winning name would get a free day trip to go …
This is one of my favorite memories that my husband just happened to capture from our bedroom window last year in February. He made a mini-movie out of it unbeknownst to us. Our little boy and I went out to sled and just couldn’t stop. We flew down the hill …
The Orcas Island Film Festival has been in full swing now for several years. This past summer we decided to attend a showing of Ai Wei Wei‘s documentary about refugees around the world called Human Flow. It was 2 hours and 20 minutes of sweeping scenes of desperation, loss, and hopelessness. …
I remember passing it on a telephone pole – a flyer that said, “Make thousands of dollars this summer, travel across the country, and have lots of fun.” I was in my second year of college and I’ve always been up for an adventure, so this got my curiosity going. …
I don’t post things for any other reason than for the pure enjoyment of photographing something beautiful and writing about it. I just had to get that out of the way before bragging about this island business. It all came about because I walked into Girl Meets Dirt a few …
When we moved here, I realized that Orcas Island is a place where a person’s talents and skills can blossom and flourish. Often, if you’re good at something and people hear about you, you will have gobs of opportunities to shine. Our community is incredibly supportive. We islanders have watched …
I love the winter season here on Orcas Island because everything changes – not just externally, but especially internally. Life goes from constant outdoor gardening and athleticism in the sunny summer to indoor creative proliferation and exponential educational explosiveness in the brisk, perma-gray winter. Our younger son has listened continuously …
It’s Christmas Eve and we’ve just left a wonderful dinner at our friends’ house. It’s an hour before a beautiful candlelight service at our church and I’m sitting on my cold bathroom floor in front of the wall heater. Our kids have asked me repeatedly if I’d get the pickle …
As we near the end of the year, I am reminded of my worst parenting experience. Two years ago on December 29th, after hearing that the road going up to our highest point on the island – Mt Constitution – was closed due to snow, I decided to take the …
Here on Orcas Island we have several school choices, plus the option of homeschooling. Our family has done a random mix of things, based on what seemed best for each year. Our older son and I were sitting at the kitchen table learning about the Presidents a couple years ago …
We Orcas Islanders know how to celebrate. And we never go hungry either. Last Saturday I put a list of six events for us to go to in my pocket. That was just one day’s events. So far in the last three weeks, we have been to the Holiday Artisan …
He can’t eat. He can’t sleep. Sometimes he can’t think about anything else. He daydreams about all the time he wants to spend with her and all the things they’ll do together – the fantasies they’ll dream up, the worlds they’ll traverse. We go on a family walk together but …
Yesterday morning I dropped the kids off at school at 8 AM, drove to the ferry landing to sit the required half-hour in line, crossed the ocean for an hour and a half – with a stop for more travelers on Shaw Island – then drove another 45 minutes from …
One of the unique things about living on Orcas Island is that the power can go out unexpectedly. It happens a few times each year, which is why we all have back-up wood and dozens of candles for light. When it happens, it’s an immediate halt to whatever we may …
Time slows down the minute you get in line to wait for the ferry to the island Natural beauty surrounds you wherever you are Long, winding roads through the forest lead to beautiful harbors and docks The community genuinely cares about each other All your errands can be done within …
Moving from Santa Barbara, California, to the San Juan Islands off the northern coast of Washington State gave us one of the biggest changes we coastal Californians had ever experienced – seasons! While summer here is sunny, stunningly beautiful, and very external, fall and winter bring a very palpable internal …
Step out of your door and you will see and hear animals everywhere you go here on Orcas Island. Deer amble through your front yard. Quail peck through your neighbor’s grass. Eagles soar above (with a call more appropriate for geriatric chickadees), and crows and ravens caw and glurb to each …
I couldn’t let another year go by without capturing one of our island’s festivities that sets it apart from everything else in mainland USA. Down the forested, aptly-named Haven Road sits the Oddfellows Hall, overhanging the ocean and glittering inside with year-round fairy lights and huge paper lanterns. Every year …
“It’s ridiculous how much I love my life,” Maura Lynn says, as she’s picking colorful pumpkins and squashes from their vines and piling them into a wheelbarrow. Our younger son and I had chosen this particular fall-y-feeling morning to take her up on her offer to visit the farm where …
