What Dylan will see when he opens his gift on Christmas morning.

He doesn't know it yet, but we are going to Disney World!

Doesn't Dylan look cute pretending to be Santa? I am so excited for the holidays. The two of us are going to see the Nutcracker at the Pacific Northwest Ballet on Christmas Eve.

My friends at JayRay are taking Dylan's picture and super-imposing it into a photo of Disney World. I'm stuffing the photo into a giant box with tissue paper and wrapping it up. Christmas morning will be like the old, post-Super Bowl commercials.

"Now that you've won the Super Bowl XVI, where are you going?"

"I'm going to Disney World!"


Life is good!

Tacoma Art Place

My son Dyaln is really inspired by his volunteer work. I think everyone is inspired by Tacoma Art Place. The idea came from art co-ops we visited in Mali, West Africa.

It's a gift to Tacoma!

Pop culture gets Seattle and Tacoma kids to save 11 percent more

Ok, more organizations should think outside the box like these credit unions. They're inspiring teen savings by actually staying outside of the classroom. Instead they send in a former regulator who uses her old-skool stories about her pink Mohawk and straight talk about compounding interest to motivate savings and improve financial literacy. The crazy best part is that their research is proving that Credit University in high school classrooms succeeds where others fail. Yes, research shows that just in time education sent into schools by most banks is not working.

I think this is pretty cool because:

• Washington high schools failed national financial literacy test for four years.
• Seven credit unions created Credit University to address the problem.
• Testing of 6,500 participants showed an 11 percent increase in teen savings.
• Credit University measured improvement while other programs show no impact.
• Credit University is receiving national accolades for improving teen savings.
• Tacoma and Seattle schools ahead of the curve and have visionary teachers.

Its a cooperative project of seven local not-for-profit credit unions: Qualstar, Group Health, Sound, Watermark, America’s, Seattle Metropolitan and Verity.

We Love The Fair and Our Krusty Pups!