Labor Day Weekend

On Saturday of Labor Day weekend, I took pictures of this crazy fun family:

And afterwards we headed out to the cabin they were staying at on Whatcom Lake.  We had such a fun evening hanging out and trying new things.

Ha ha Eric got pushed in the lake after the final pictures.  ;)

Raymond was a great driver, giving the boys rides in the kayak and boat.  Sam was the gas station.

Can you find Bryan?  We were sure he had decided to paddle off into the sunset.

He did finally make it back...

We always enjoy spending time with the Kennedy's!
Thanks for a fun evening.

Blessings

Bryan's Birthday

For Bryan's birthday this year, we headed up to Canada to discover a couple parks, get away from home for the day and spend some quality time as a family.  The first park I wanted to check out was completely closed for some big event so we drove around until we found a different one. 

Burnaby Lake Park

This park was more of a preserve and so big it was easy to forget we were still in the middle of the city.  It was mostly marshes and whatnot, not really up Bryan's alley, but the boys enjoyed exploring for a little while.

Seeing how crazy they could make the walk way rock.

After that we headed up to what turned out to be our favorite park of the day.

Burnaby Mountain Park

We want to go back there some day soon and do more exploring.  We ran out of time and it hit the uppers 80's so my northwest family was not enjoying the heat so much.  While we were there we saw no less then six wedding parties either getting married or on the mountain to take their wedding pictures.  The park is gorgeous with a rose garden, beautiful views of the inlet, forested areas and some totem poles.  Brandon liked the rope pyramid the best.

That's it for today, folks.  Time to shut down Photoshop Elements for the evening.

Blessings on your week.

Precious Moments: A Fun Sequence

I'm sorting and editing lots of pictures today.  It was the perfect day for it.

Anyway, I came across a fun sequence to share today.  More of our snowy week pictures soon.

See the big grin on that precious face?  I have one little boy who absolutely LOVES to play in the snow.  My other little boy gave me a wonderful excuse to need to go back inside.  ;)

Blessings

Sunday--Birthday Surprise Finale

As I said in the last post, we decided to take the scenic route home.  We took 109 up to Moclipse, drove the Moclipse Highway up to 101, 101 to Port Townsend, the ferry across to Oak Harbor, and finally, 20 to I-5 and home. 

It was raining when we left Ocean Shores and rained off and on the whole day.  There's no other way to explain the weather other than to say it was a very moody weather day.

The tree grew in this direction. 

 We drove the Mocipse Highway (a highway Bryan has driven on that Don has not--very hard to do!) up to Quinalt Lake. 

There are five trees (all different species) that are the largest in the world and a couple that are co-champs, found in this area.  We visited the Spruce one, but since it was raining we decided to skip the others and do that with the boys some other time.

I couldn't get a picture without getting rain on my lens.  It was a bit frustrating.

Bryan's 6'4" to give you an idea!

 The fall colors were spectacular along 101!

Our final ocean stop on 101 was Ruby Beach.  From there the road veered inland.

The stone to Bryan's right kinda looks like a man watching the ocean with his arms crossed.

In Port Townsend we had about 45 minutes to watch the sea gulls and read while we waited for the ferry.

There was a rainbow with the full spectrum of colors hanging above Bellingham as we got off I-5.  It was a beautiful way to end the trip.

Blessings on the rest of your week.

October 29, 2011

My birthday was one of the most relaxing days I've had in a very long time.  We spent the morning walking on the beach, driving around the little spit of land Ocean Shores is on, going out to the rock barrier and going flicky window shopping in all the fun little souvenir stores.  After lunch on the beach we spent four straight hours sleeping and reading and didn't feel a bit guilty.  It was just the type of day we needed.  My only requirement for the day was that we watch the sunset on the beach and because the day had been so beautifully blue and sunny, the sunset was spectacular.

We spent the evening swimming and sitting in the spa--again, a relaxing treat. 

A morning stroll on the beach.

The rock barrier.  The waves crashing were so powerful and never the same. 

Sharky's--a fun souvenir store.

 We had a picnic lunch on the beach.  The starlings were fascinating to watch.  It started as a group of maybe a hundred and over the course of the hour we were there it continued to grow and grow and more groups joined together into one. 

The "lighthouse" on top of our hotel.  Unfortunately they wouldn't let us out on the walkway and the windows were filthy so my pictures didn't turn out so well from there. 

Nothings tall enough for my husband.  It's pretty funny to watch sometimes but I feel
sorry for him at the same time.

A fun picture through the telescope.

 Down to the beach to watch the sunset. 

I love how the "wispy" waves show up in the glow of the sun.

Doesn't that just look like the perfect location to completely lose yourself in thought for a while and be
 mesmerized by the waves?

 After we got back from supper Bryan called me outside to see this site.  We had seen a few clam digging couples going out to the beach earlier while we were watching the sunset and they were all putting headlamps on.  We thought that was rather strange, but apparently clam digging is best done at night.  The entire length of beach that we could see was covered in lights, and as you can see from the streaming lights in the bottom left of the picture, more were driving out there by the minute.

We had been planning to get up on time and head straight home, but Bumpa and Grandma called that evening and said they were doing fine and we should enjoy seeing more.  So, we decided to get up early and take the scenic route home, following Highway 101 up the coast and around the Olympic Rain Forest.  Guess what?  It rained all day in the rain forest... ;)