Take me out to the ballgame

    Well, I am another year older now. It was quite a bit more depressing this year than last for some reason. Now, it's pretty official that I am just going to get older and older. I know this isn't an earth shattering discovery, it just feels different all of a sudden. I really had no reason to be sad about it because I had a really good weekend.
 
     Sunday was my birthday and Chris made me scalloped potatoes with bacon wrapped chicken cordon blue. We also had salad and cheesecake. Yumm! It turned out really great! We had a relaxing day and got packed for our mini vacation to Seattle.

     That's right, we got to send the kiddos to Grandma's house for 2 days while we enjoyed ourselves in Seattle with some friends of ours who live in SLC. We had a really good time. The weather was perfect for sightseeing. We walked around the space needle, the glass museum, the waterfront, and ate tons of delicious food.

      We went to Ivar's for dinner and had seafood of course. Chris got the bounty of seafood which came complete with a bib, bucket, and tools. I had the salmon with halibut.

      After dinner we caught the Mariners vs. Orioles baseball game at Safeco field. It was my first time at a major league game. The stadium was pretty cool, and our seats were awesome. We even had two chances for a foul ball. Kara actually came away with one of them! The only bummer was the score. Apparently the Mariners are pretty terrible this year. They did manage a small rally in the 9th inning, but it was too little, too late. It was still fun to go see. I would do it again.

     The next day we checked out more along the waterfront, including the famous Pike's Market. We saw some flying fish, cheap flowers, and amazing bakeries. We stopped at the "gum wall", which as you could guess, is a giant wall in a creepy ally full of people's used gum. Interesting. The giant "wheel of Seattle" was fun to ride in. It had amazing views of the city and harbor.

     After that we headed up to the Science Center; which is a lot like OMSI. It was nice to wander around and look at interesting stuff there. They even had an exotic butterfly house. We walked through this super humid room with gorgeous butterflies everywhere! There were tons of them. It was pretty neato.

    The last thing we did was hit up Red Mill Burgers for some tasty grub and the best milkshake ever before heading back home in crazy traffic. We had a great trip, and can't wait to do it again! Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Phillips for taking care of our kids!

End of Summer and Beginning of Fall

The last couple weeks of summer were pretty crazy around here! We tried our best to live it up and enjoy the last few casual days of sunshine and no schedules.

I had the chance to take a fun little road trip out to Provo with my lil sister. It was tons of fun! We chatted the entire 12 hour drive and it went by surprisingly fast. We moved all her stuff in and then spent the rest of our time playing. We went to eat at Tucanos Brazilian Grill and spent a long day in the sun at Lagoon. I didn't get any pics, because toting the camera around would get in the way of my roller coaster fun. I love roller coasters! It was so much fun to do whatever I wanted (I didn't have my kids with me), and sleep, and eat whenever. It was great to enjoy the rides for myself and not just watch kiddos. I had a blast! I'm thinking ladies weekend at a 6 flags or something???? You know it would be awesome. Anyway, it was good times visiting my alma mater and remembering all the reasons why I am glad to be done with school. Hahaha...no more apartments with 4 loaves of bread, 4 jars of PB, and 4 gallons of milk. :) Thanks Kee! I had a great time!

  The week after I came home we decided to spend a day at Oak's Park with the reading program passes that the kids had. It was super crazy busy! We almost left early because the lines were getting pretty ridiculous. Plus Neil was having a really hard time. He wanted on every ride, but as soon as it would start he screamed bloody murder. He was not a fan. Even on rides where I was with him, he still cried. Eventually, I think lots of people left, because the lines all got much shorter. At that point it was fun again, and we all had a fun time. Well, except for Neil, who had a great nap in the stroller.

 Now, I guess it is back to a normal schedule and back to soccer and school. I really enjoyed sleeping in on most days. I think it was harder on me than on Claire to wake up this morning. We need to adjust a little. This year, both girls are playing soccer, and so far are having tons of fun. It has been fun to watch Grace interact with her team. This is her first soccer experience. I can't wait until the games start!
Claire went to her first day of second grade today. I can't believe how grown up she is getting. I can remember second grade pretty well and the friends that I made that year. She came home and said that she had a great day and can't wait to go back. I think she will have another great year!
Grace will be starting her second year of preschool next week. She is anxious for that. I am looking forward to it as well. I guess Neil and I will get more bonding time this year.

 

                                                 

Mountain Man Month

August is supposed to be Mountain Man Month around here. That's what Chris told me at the end of July. What does that mean? Well, I'm not exactly sure except for the part where he wants to do outdoorsy stuff every single day...
Last week he got to go backpacking out in the Wallowa's for the second time. He went with a couple of guys from work and they were only able to go for 3 days. They climbed to the peak of  Eagle Cap; which apparently is the 13th highest peak in Oregon. Woot! Woot! They enjoyed beautiful mountain scenery and swims in the lakes. Here are some of his pics:

I love my rugged mountain man!!

From Thailand, with Love

My little sister spent the summer in Thailand this year, which was pretty cool for her. We decided it would be fun to surprise her at the airport with lots of people and handmade signs welcoming her home. Finally the big day arrived. We all loaded up and got to the airport in time to snag a great place to wait. Here is the welcoming committee (besides me).

So we waited and waited. The time for her plane to get in came and went. We thought maybe she missed it, so we waited for several other planes to arrive. She wasn't on any of them. So, then we really started to worry. The airlines couldn't tell us where she was. We had no idea. Then I got on Facebook...and wrote something about my lost sister. She just happened to be sitting in the Seoul airport and logged on to see that. Turns out, we were a day early to pick her up. Lame sauce. Now we had to go home and come back the next day. At least I was able to leave Neil home the second time.

She brought the kids adorable Thai pants and little purses for the girls. They loved them! Thanks Auntie Kee!

A couple of days later we had a fun fire at my parent's house. Neil loved building the fire. He is definitely his father's son. We enjoyed making some s'mores and setting the grass on fire. We really did. It was crazy cool to see the little ember fall and immediately ignite the dry grass below it. We all just watched for a minute before extinguishing it with a pre-filled bucket of water.  Good times with the fam!

Seaside

A few weeks ago we took advantage of a clear, warm day at the coast. We headed to Seaside to enjoy some family time. Since we like bikes, we thought it would be fun to rent a Surrey and ride around for an hour. What we didn't count on was the fact that none of our 3 kids would be able to reach the pedals...meaning Chris and I got in a really great workout!! It was pretty exhausting. We turned in the bike about 10 minutes early because we just couldn't go any further.

Now we were all sweaty, but we hit the main drag anyway. We got elephant ears, ice cream, and made a visit to a gigantic candy shop. Then we hit the sand to enjoy our loot.

We played in the sand for quite some time and enjoyed the sun. The sand actually burned our feet without flip flops on. It was great weather. Hot enough for swimsuits. Eventually, we moved down closer to the surf and ran through the water. Neil loved it! When he finally started turning blue, we had to pick him up kicking and screaming and carry him all the way back to the van. He really liked the water. Love, love summer days in Oregon!

Campout 2012

Well, we all survived. Our 4 night camping trip on the Oregon coast was a success. We all had lots of fun! We had gorgeous weather the first 4 days. Lots of sunshine and blue skies. The beach was perfect with super soft sand and not too much wind. It really was about as good as it gets on the Oregon coast!
On Wednesday we packed up and headed out. Our van was super loaded down! We had our bike rack hooked up, which really saved a lot of space. It did make the back end pretty heavy though. We actually scraped our driveway when we pulled out. That was the only mishap we had. After getting camp ready and eating a yummy pasta dinner, we headed for sunset on the beach.  The kids also had a great time exploring the surrounding trees for "secret hideouts".
All Neil wanted to do was run down the middle of the road. This continued the entire time. He would just run and run and run. We ended up putting him on time outs in his car seat. It was great! He would totally relax as soon as we got him strapped in. Poor kid would scream his head off while we corralled him, but would just sit happily once he got in the van. Whatever works. 

On Thursday we took it easy. The girls went out on the boat with both Grandpa's and Aunt Bree to catch crabs. We went on lots and lots of bike rides. Neil loved to be pulled around the campground in the trailer. We saw deer all over the place which was fun. We were able to get really close to this one here. They must be acclimated to people. She wasn't easily scared off. Of course we also spent time on the beach. It was funny to see Neil react to being barefoot in the sand. At first he refused to walk in it. It took quite some time for him to warm up to the idea. He would crawl around with his feet up in the air. Eventually, he decided that it wasn't so bad. Chris got his fill of making lots and lots of fires.

  

Friday was probably the nicest day that we had. We spent the day on the beach making sand castles and playing around with the freezing cold water. Chris and I, along with his uncle Troy got to go crabbing with my dad. It was beautiful out on the bay! We saw seals and plenty of crab. It was both Chris and Troy's first time crabbing, so it was pretty fun! Once you grab the rope, you have to pull without letting up in order to keep all the crabs in the ring. It is a bit of a workout. They even made me do it a couple of times. It was pretty heavy! We were able to pull up quite a few crabs, unfortunately, most of them were either female or too small to keep. We got 5 keepers in all. We brought them back to camp to boil up. It was a perfect day!

  

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 On Saturday the weather was noticeably different. It was still dry, but the clouds had come in and it was cooler. We had plans to all jump in the ocean, so we waited until 2pm and all put our swim suits on anyway. We all went in! At least I went in to my knees...that counts right? Chris and the girls went all the way out, and said they had a blast. That water was freezing. So cold, that it made the bones in my feet hurt just to stand in it. Oh well, they seemed to have fun. We also buried all the kids in the sand. Besides having sand in all places, they really liked doing that. Nothing a warm shower wouldn't fix.

Chris and I went on a fun bike ride that day with his brother Calvin and his fiancé Jill. We rode up to the small town of Manzanita. It was pretty quaint and had all sorts of shops and bakeries. It was fun to walk around. It reminded me a lot of the seaside towns in Ireland.

It started to rain on us while we slept on Saturday night. It was so fun to hear the rain hitting our tarp through the night knowing that we were perfectly dry. I'm glad we were prepared for rain. Unfortunately, the rain continued the next day, so we woke up and had a pancake breakfast and then took down camp to head home. We of course stopped in Tillamook on the way back for some ice cream. It was a little hectic because Chris's brother and his wife delivered preterm twins late Saturday night, so everyone wanted to get back and go visit them in the hospital.
Considering everything, we all had a really good time camping! I can't wait to do it again. Hopefully next time Neil will be a little more cooperative.