Pearl's House

 A couple weeks ago I did a very brave thing. I packed the kids and the dog in the mazda (too bad the Land Rover isn't reliable enough to take on road trips, it has more than enough room for Bear dog and the kids...the compact 5 seat was well, compact. To paint a picture for you, Bear took the front seat and I had to barricade the space between his seat and the middle console or his head has been known to knock the gear shifter into neutral. no good. back to the story...) and we drove to Provo, UT to visit Pearl and Mona by way of Ontario, OR where Joe's parent's live. Bear was spending the week with his old buddy Rosco at Warren and Margaret's so Joe could join us for the following weekend in Provo by plane, and Bear wouldn't be left to fend for himself. Our overnight pop in at Warren and Margaret's was not long enough. Especially since I felt congested the night before, so I took some dayquil right before I went to bed... insomnia allllll night long. Regardless, I was determined to make it to Utah to celebrate my sister's brother in-law's wedding. We literally drove up 45min before the reception started in her in-law's backyard. Enough time to try and not look like we had not been traveling in the car for 2 days. The most amazing part of the trip was my kids were AWESOME car travelers. I was concerned about 8 and 9 hour days in the car with only the one-handed-backwards-reach to help with whatever they needed but they really did so well. Rosy didn't make a peep. Honestly.  If we thought it was cramped on the way there...Joe joined us on the weekend and we filled our 5 seater to capacity!

All the kids had a blast at the park.

 Rocky is 2months older than Ramona.

 Pearl is 4, and such a doll.

 This cute girl is always smiling.

 I thought these were the cutest pictures in their matchy matchy shirts until my mom said they looked like conjoined twins, now that is all I see when I look at it...

 Rocky's turn for a Grandpa's hat picture.

 I don't know if this is one of those things only parents think are so cute, just cause it's their kids. But Joe and I get a kick out of Rosy, every morning, and numerous times throughout the day she picks the blue chair and sits sideways just like this. I posted a while ago that she could occupy herself with these chairs going back and forth. Well the other day, she spend 45min still playing with these chairs. That just cracks me up. If it was Rocky at that age I would have been surprised if he spent 5 minutes on the chairs.

 Rosy in her new shoes looking cute!

Today an interesting series of events took place as I made dinner. Somehow, after going potty Rocky's pants didn't make it back on, and he let himself outside...

 Next time I went out there he had turned the water on and filled his rain boots...

 Then he put his feet in the boots, full of water, and tromped around...

 Lastly, he filled his rainboots with muck and mud and still tried to put them on... and his underwear ended up off and in the dirt. He is an interesting kid.

 Playing at the park today, Rosy was killin me with cuteness.

This is a terrible picture but it makes me laugh. We haven't gotten completely organized with our closet situation here, so Joe's unders are hanging out in a suitcase still. Rosy is magnetized to this suitcase and loves to get stuck in it. I couldn't get her to stay still long enough to get a good picture, but she was having the time of her life!

Labor Day

For Labor Day we drove out to the beach!  Since we're still so new to this area I forget that we are so close to the beach, it only took an hour and a half to get out there.  It's been in the 90's over here, but at the beach it was a frigid 60'.  We set up our tent and never took our sweatshirts off! Blue lips and purple toes we all still put our feet in the water.  There was a point where Rocky was dressed in sweats and his sweatshirt up to his knees in the Ocean.  That definitely defeats the purpose of wearing sweats. 

I couldn't get her to stop eating fistfulls of sand.  She would even sprawl out and put her face down in the sand to get a mouthful.  Unbelievable.

Rocky LOVED going in and out of this tunnel.

Rosy LOVED crawling all over the beach.  I followed her and we went all over the place.

I love this picture from Joe's perspective.

So that was our Labor Day, we also reminisced about past labor days, we spent last year at Joe's parents house while he started his first rotation for his last year of school.  Also of note, we missed the birth of Ian Nuckles, which was a big bummer.  The year before that, the Esplins, Nuckles, and Weatherspoons took a torturous hike in Oro Valley.  Waay too hot, and not enough water, but lots of good memories.  Everyone we passed just kept saying, it's only a little further....

This is a little bit of what Rosy girl has been up to.  She can entertain herself forever just going from the blue chair to the red chair and back.  She hasn't fallen yet.

More Oregon

My parents came into town a few weeks ago, and we had no shortage of fun.  Rocky is obsessed with trains right now, he LOVES seeing them, hearing them, playing with them... We actually rode one when mom and dad came down!

He was so excited when we pulled up.  I'll never forget how happy he looked when he inched up to this train and touched it with his finger!

 

We sat right up in the front, and the train whistle was SO LOUD.  Rocky never took his hands off his ears, although he still said he had fun.

They had a fun playground at the train station too.

We also visited the Tillamook Cheese factory after the train ride and got some free samples. Yummy!

We also picked A LOT of blue berries.  I think I mentioned my love for the berries out here in my previous post...

We skipped some rocks at the Willamette River, probably only 2 miles from our house.

This is my favorite picture right now. Rosy wearing my hat, sitting on my dad's lap, wearing his hat.  On the banks of the Willamette. 

These next pictures have a little story behind them.  When Rocky was little my dear friends of the Grow family sent Rocky these adorable red Converse shoes. I was so excited, they just seemed so 'Marlis Grow' to me.  She sent them when Rocky was about 2 months old.  He was only able to wear them for a month though because he grew so fast that first year!  I put them in their original box and packed them away, I just recently found them and put them on my girl, hopeful they still fit.  Guess what? Perfect fit and she's 8months old.  If that gives you a little idea of how much bigger Rocky was when he was Rosy's age... She is such a doll baby.  Thanks again for the red Marlis shoes, Marlis.

Joe had some time off from work this weekend, and we had a beautiful day in the mountains at the Santiam River.  It's rare when you get a day to do just about whatever you want, with no time constraints whatsoever.  That's what it fell like at the River.  We skipped rocks, swam, looked for fish and bugs and ate our fill of wild blackberries.  We would make an excellent mountain man family.  whatever that means.

No one was there to take my picture, but I just felt happy and wanted to document the moment!

Rocky didn't want to take any pictures, he was too busy being busy.  This kid is something else.  He's always been good at anything physical, but I realized yesterday he doesn't slow us down at all, even when he has rocks as big as he is to hike over.  He's such a fun kid to be around.

Our day did not end there.  Joe found a drive-in theatre not too far away so we packed all of our blankets and pillows in the land rover and went to watch the flick.  I remember going when I was a kid, poppin popcorn and packing drinks... It was fun to take the kiddos.  We got there in plenty of time to set up.

They advertised that they had the biggest screen in Oregon! (In the smallest town of Oregon...)

We Made It To Oregon!

Well we are officially residents of Oregon!  It already feels like a lifetime since we left Arizona, even if its only been 2 months.  While I miss so much more about AZ than I thought I would, there are definitely perks to living in Oregon.  For example, did you know black berries grow like a weed out here?  The streets are literally lined with wild blackberry bushes.  They are at every park, and along many sidewalks.  We live so close to a couple U-Pick blueberry and raspberry farms too.  I ate a blueberry that was no-joke, the size of a quarter! I didnt even know that was possible.  My parents came down last weekend to deliver the remanider of our stuff, and we went berry picking 3 times in one weekend!  That tells you how delicious they were.  We are living in a temporary 4-plex, and we are trying not to unpack anything we dont need.  Joe did most of his training in Portland during July so the kids and I stayed in a hotel for 2 weeks.(That's a story on it's own, one I dont wish to re-live...Let's just say, no car or stroller, Rosy and double ear infections, sick kids, no sleep...blah blah blah) So we really have only been here (in Albany at our 4-plex) for less than a month.  We were so used to living with so little since we left our 'stuff' behind at my parent's house that now that we have our boxes I still haven't unpacked much.  For example, we have one knife, and it's about 100 years old and it's still the only knife we have. I dont' know why I mention that, just that it makes me laugh when I find myself washing it 20 times a day.  The funny thing about living somewhere you know to be temporary is it's hard to ever feel organized.  No matter how hard I try I seem to still feel like a mess. 

 We did let Bear stay with Joe's parent's while we were making it work in a hotel.  This is the happy family at Multnoma falls on our way to visit the parents and drop off the dog.

Between study intervals (at this point in the summer Joe still had to take both of his Pharmacy tests- just ask him, BIG headache, he was convinced he had failed, but actually passed with flying colors) Joe and Rocky rode the lawn mower at his parent's house.

Rosy making cute baby messes at his parents house.

Look at that sass face!

So here we are, adjusting to life in Oregon.  For those of you who read that, it was a lot to read, but I have been MIA from blogging for a while!