Family Vacation Recap

O.K. I am finally starting to get back into life. After a 10 day vacation I am trying to catch up on everything that was put on hold. The hardest part has been to get motivated to do anything. I am still in the vacation mode. Unfortunately the kids want to keep on going. I am trying to keep them happy and still get my stuff done.

Here is a little recap of our vacation.

On Saturday, July 12th, we packed up and waited for Ashley to return from Girl's Camp. She got home about 11:30am. As soon as she got home we had her take a well needed shower while Randy and I unpacked all her stuff and did a load of laundry. We left about 2:00pm. We drove to Farmington, Utah. We stayed at Randy's sister's for the night. We thought we would try and go to church before leaving for Oregon, so we woke up early enough to get ready for a 9:00 church meeting. After we were all ready and in the car, Randy walked to the other side of the car and noticed we had a flat tire. So we all went back into the house while Randy had our tire fixed. His poor sister had to put up with us for another couple of hours and was late for her church meetings. Thanks Kim, for EVERYTHING!!

I had a great idea of taking a picture at each state welcome sign. Well, the signs for Arizona and Utah were not easy to stop at. We were able to stop at Idaho and then Oregon had road work with the lane blocked off right next to the sign and Washington doesn't even have a welcome sign. So, this is all we got. Jared was asleep in the car, so he didn't make it into the picture.


After staying Sunday night in Baker City, Oregon at Randy's cousins house, we left for Pendleton, Oregon. This is where Randy grew up. As we drove into town, they had a Pendleton sign, so we had the kids get out for a picture. Jared once again is missing. He really did come on our vacation.

Randy gave us a tour of Pendleton. Travis' favorite was the Little League baseball fields, where Randy used to play. Ashley and Courtney enjoyed the tour at the woolen mills. After driving around town, we went and got a snack and went to see Wall-E. A major highlight for the kids. We then went and stayed at Randy's aunt and uncle's house for the next two nights. It was great to get to know them.

After leaving Pendleton, we drove to Seattle, Washington via Portland, Oregon. It added several hours to our drive, but it was a very pretty drive and we got to stop and see Multnomah Falls.

After we got to Seattle, we got checked into our hotel and got the kids settled in. Randy and I then went and did a session at the Seattle temple. It was very nice. The steeple was covered in scaffolding so they could refurbish Moroni, so none of our pictures turned out very well. On Thursday, we spent most of the day at this beach, Tibbetts Beach. The kids had a great time and loved being out of the car.

On Friday, we met up with Randy's sister and her family at Pikes Place Market in Seattle. Seeing all the fresh fish, flowers and fruit was amazing. If we lived close by, I would be a frequent shopper there. Especially for there fresh flowers. They were beautiful!!

From there we went to the Space Needle. Here are all the kids "climbing" the base of the Space Needle.

Here we are at the top of the Space Needle.

The big highlight was going to a Seattle Mariners game. When we bought our tickets for left field I told them that I needed wheelchair accessible sitting. When we arrived at Safeco Field, and were going to our seats, the person in the elevator said that I wouldn't be able to get to those seats in the wheelchair. I would have to go down two flights of stairs (10 stairs each). He then told us to wait at these other seats and he would check with his supervisor and if it was o.k. we would sit there for the game. We told him we were meeting four other people. He said we could have them come and join us. We got to enjoy the game from some GREAT seats. We originally paid $15/ticket. I looked up where we sat and they were anywhere from $46-$54/ticket. And to top it off, the game was great too. The Mariners won 8-2. There was a Grand Slam home run that was pretty exciting. And it was bobble head night. So we got 6 Felix Hernandez bobble heads. Just what we always wanted. I was able to give one away, so now we only have to figure out where to put the kids. Unfortunately they are pretty excited to have them.

We left Seattle and went up to Bellingham on Saturday morning. Randy's mom gave us a tour around Bellingham. We were able to see where Randy lived when he was little and the farm where his mom grew up. After the tour, we went to the park for the reunion. It was a reunion for his mom's family. Her three sisters were able to be there but her brother was not able to get there. It was great to meet everyone.

On Sunday we left Bellingham and drove to Twin Falls, Idaho. Monday morning we woke up early so we could go to the Twin Falls temple open house. It was a beautiful temple. What great timing to be driving through during the open house time. We then stopped in Salt Lake to watch the Joseph Smith movie. What a great movie. I love Joseph Smith and this movie really strenghtened my testimony and deepened my love for him and all that he did to restore the gospel. What a great way to end our vacation.

O.K. At the beginning I said that this was a little recap of our vacation, but it ended up being very long. Sorry, I just got carried away, and thought this would be a great way to help journal our trip.