Going Coastal

We hit up the coast of Oregon, yet again. It was a lovely time of relaxing, eating, coffee drinking, waterfall hiking, rock throwing and generally just playing. Bing and I had a weekend away in Portland while Grammie Marcia and Grandpa Barney watched the yahoos, with only one, almost trip to the hospital :) Maddox pretended to have pain somewhere, and wouldn't stop crying until grandpa was half way to the hospital, pistol!


I have a whole bunch of these that look awesome when viewed quickly but, I'll spare you the repetition...

He even started going down this backwards. I'm sure I will be well acquainted with the E.R.

Youngs River Falls

Fuzzy-wuzzy caterpillar

Trying to hit the big, spawning salmon

Jetty likes to dance, we call this his "pimp hand"

Oh what mischief they will cause together!

One of many coffee dates at Coffee Girl

Maddox claimed all boats as "his boat" and we made many special trips to one in particular

Sometimes he refuses to nap and then he passes out at dinner, I caught this right before he tipped and then I caught him :)

Grandpa Barney indulging Maddox in boat watching

Jetty had some sort of reaction and his eyes were super puffy and red, he healed right up though

Our date to the arcade, Maddox looks an awful lot like me in this :)

After the arcade, we had ice cream for dinner and kicked at seagulls on the beach

And then, we saw a shark exhibit. After the first shark eating pic, Maddox insisted on taking one with ALL of the sharks, and then an Elvis painting on the way to the car. Funny kid.

Jetty slept through most of the adventures, so he has fewer action shots

Jennifer and Julian joined us for "Iron Chef Goes Coastal", which is a benefit for the local chapter of United Way. There are a ton of fabulous restaurants in the Astoria/Seaside/Cannon Beach area and they get together and compete for titles, there is a silent auction and tons of food for sampling. We had a nice time out sans kids (except for Julian), eating and chatting and bidding on silly things. I came home with a few dozen light bulbs and two big bags of Boy Scout Caramel Corn... Bing is still cursing me :)



Under pressure


Trying to catch us crab for dinner, turns out, dinner came from the store that night :)

Saying goodbye to one of his boats

Trying to scare the poo out of Jetty before we loaded him into the car :)

The only picture I have of our time at Auntie Sis' new house. We had some fun visitors while we were there. Love you Bob and Teresa!

We look forward to coming back soon! I just hope we get to see more people next time. We missed out on Auntie Piper, cousins and all of Bing's grade-school buddies. There sure is a lot to fit in to 2 weeks!

Travelers

Bing had a meeting in Rapid City with a very wealthy oil man, a client of his, so the whole family went to enjoy the many sights and attractions in the area. I had no idea that there were so many fun and interesting things to do there and it is only 5 hours away! On our list of things to do:
*Mount Rushmore
*Reptile Gardens
*Art Alley
*Water Park
We skipped the water park for lack of time and nap-time conflict but it looked really awesome, the other attractions were quite fun and the boys were content in the hotel pool/hot tub. Bing's work partner and his family came and Maddox claimed the youngest girl, Kody, as is best friend, literally... he called her his best friend. Not sure where he even learned the term but it was stinking cute to hear.




Mount Rushmore was unexptectedly cold





The reptile gardens were really warm, muggy, and disgustingly stinky. Bing and I both thought we might throw up from the smell.
A domed building, kept at the right temperature for several hundred reptiles combined with the things they eat and expel = horrid smell. It was still really neat to see, and Maddox ran from one tank to the next, excited to see what could be in the next one. He loved the crocodiles and repeatedly called them caca-doodoos.

This is Maniac, he is HUGE, 15 feet 7 inches!

At the end, they did a live, snake show. They brought out a cobra in a plexiglass box and it struck several times at the box, Maddox thought it was HILARIOUS and busted out into a contagious giggle each time. He was thrilled to pet the albino Burmese python, so much so we were the last to leave.



Art Alley is an entire block of alleyway that is covered in extensive graffiti work, mostly tasteful and very vibrant.



The boys love to wrestle and play together which is really a blast to watch. They are going to be such great friends :) Maddox talks to his baby sister and every so often will give her kisses. Jetty, we are teaching him "nice", "gentle", and "soft" in preparation for a new baby. Otherwise, his default is hair pulling, scratching and slapping the face... awesome.

Sweetest boys ever

We headed to Bozeman for Halloween, trick-or-treating, a little cousin time and, a head start on our trip to the coast. We had a delicious meal with the Schuylers and then headed out for some doorbell ringing with Super-Sawyer-lightning bolt, Spiderman, Spiderman, a duck and a Soldier.




Maddox insisted on entering every house as soon as the door was ajar despite many attempts at explaining the proper etiquette.


You can see here, Maddox is standing NEXT to the candy lady, facing the camera :)

All was well, until the third time that Maddox ate it and smacked his face on the cement. He got a little skinned on his upper lip and squealed like a stuck pig.

You can see the owie on his sweet little face.

I got him calmed and he desperately wanted to know where his candy bucket was and to rejoin his cousins. Reese and I headed inside with the littler guys and the dads took the boys for more trick-or-treating. Upon their returning I learned that Maddox had fallen several more times, the last time breaking the bucket... the dads didn't realize what had happened and so he left a trail of candy behind him as it fell out the bottom. Bing recovered a small handful and Maddox was perfectly happy eating all of it, not realizing all that he had lost. I, however, couldn't help but cry for my sweet knight. I continued to replay the falling and candy dropping over and over in my head until about 4 am, and would melt into sobs, I was a big mess. He didn't even realize that he was bleeding until mid-morning when I pulled out a mirror to explain why it hurt every time he scratched at his owie. What was supposed to be a fun night with his cousins hoarding candy and sorting the loot turned out much less glorious than I had in mind, but Maddox didn't even notice. When I asked him today if he had fun last night, did he trick-or-treat with his cousins, did he get lots of candy and eat it all.... the answer was a happy yes on all accounts. He is so tender and sweet, I just melt for this kid. I suppose I could take lessons from him on having a positive outlook.

Jetty had fun too, his monster mittens made it impossible for him to hold a bucket but he stood with the best of them, waiting patiently for the candy to be dispensed.


little stinker

After eating all of his candy, we put the boys into jammies and headed out for Astoria. We rolled into town at about 9:30 this morning, napped and recovered from a really long night of driving. Whew.