Washington-Oregon trip! (part 1)

We were able to take off for two weeks, tagging along on my sister in law's vacation. Sadly we left Damon behind to work while the girls and I played. 

Our trip started with us all, including Damon, driving to Joe & Susan's to celebrate Michelle's pregnancy with a baby shower.

  

We also had a family get together to say goodbye to Grason and Michelle as they moved away to Arizona. Indie had a great time playing with cousins and being with Papa Joe and Grandma Soozie. 

She might have loved the Kitty most of all though.  She adores animals. 

And all of the wide open spaces were a hit. Can't wait til we have a real home and backyard for my teenies. 

Stellie just chilled. She's such a good baby.  

I love this little leprechaun. 

Bath time. Sink style. (Stink style)

We went and visited Damon's Grandpa Hadfield's graveside.  Indie slept in the car the whole time. 

We had our last family dinner (Indie devours corn, her favorite) and said goodbye to Damon. He then drove back to Pocatello. 

The girls and I spent the night at Joe and Susan's and met up with Cara in the afternoon to head out to Washington. The drive was great.  Estelle was sad to be put back into her car seat after each stop, but was an easy travel buddy. Indie did amazing until the last 30 mins, where she had a meltdown, pooped herself, and fell asleep. (She hasn't pooped herself since before she was potty trained, poor thing was so distraught!) 

AUNT JAN'S HOUSE

Aunt Janet had a huge bouncy house set up in her basement. The girls were in love! So much fun!

Indie LOVED Uncle Ken. She would go up to him every morning and lay her head in his lap, or give him high fives. She'd pass toys to him to play with.  I love this picture of them. They just loved each other. 

Janet is such a creative fun person, her home was gorgeously landscaped and was such a perfect kid play place. 

Isla and Indie loved these inner tubes. They were walking all around in them. Little feet making trouble. 

PLAYHOUSE 

There was such a fun play house in Jan's backyard, with a slide that went from the deck down to the play house.

She couldn't open the door by herself, her face tells it all

With Isla, the dog, and Indie's powers combined, they made it in!

They loved to play teacher together with the big chalkboard. 

CARA'S BIRTHDAY DAY

We had all the birthday's to celebrate while we were there. Cara's on the 3rd, Ave's on the 5th and Indie's on the 12th.  For Cara's birthday we went on Portland's Arial tam. It was a bit of fiasco to get there and get parked. But we did it!

Then we went off to Spaghetti factory for Cara's b-day dinner. 

There was a beautiful short walk by the restaurant, along the river. 

RIVER

Another day we took the kids to the river that seemed a lot like a beach.  It was so incredibly windy, Indie was asleep in the car for half the time.  I had to wake her up, to be sure she wouldn't be sad and sleep through the whole thing. 

She and the sand had a rough relationship.  It was love at first sight. 

They loved hard and fought hard.  At their best, Indie and the sand were blissful and inseparable. 

At their worst Indie and the sand were too inseparable and Indie couldn't handle the sand in her eyes and mouth. 

The good times... 

...and the bad

She tried her luck in the water.

That was a bit of a flop. 

 Poor thing. So cold too.  She might have had better luck just staying asleep in the car. But she did have a lot of fun. 

 You know what they say. It's better to have loved and lost then to not have loved at all. 

Maybe one day, she'll reconcile with the sand...

and the water...

THE ZOO

This was not the magical event that I had envisioned. Indie and Isla were both not super into it, and melty downy.  Which is too bad, because we went there for them. It was super hot though. So I'll give them a pass. 

They both wanted their picture taken here. 

This was easily the favorite spot. Should have just saved money and gone to the park.

PAPA DAVID!

We met up with my Dad and Laura at the Zoo and left with them for the weekend. 

Stellie and Papa David, she's 4 months old on the dot here. 

She found this yoga mat and wanted to try out all the poses. 

We spent Friday-Sunday afternoon with my Dad. So we had one full day together, and boy did we fill it. Our first stop was to ride the train along the coast. 

There was a park by the train that Indie adored. She played while we waited for our ride. 

Beautiful Stellie, post blow out. The stinker. 

No matter how hard I tried Indie would not sit next to us by the coast view. She told me she liked the other side, watching all the cars. Really!?

 

Estelle was so relaxed and happy on the train. It moved her just as we would if we were rocking her to sleep.  She loved watching the passing lights and color. 

After the train we went to Tillmook Cheese Factory and sampled cheese and had ice cream.  The whole time waiting in line for ice cream all Indie wanted was to ride in this little car. (Road rage much?)

The ice cream was a bit of a disaster.  It was super melty, she couldn't keep up with it.  Her ice cream fell seconds after we bought it. (Which received an audible gasp from the people around us. 'awwwww')  Then we finally got Indie and the ice cream outside and that was a bust.  Indie didn't like how sticky her hands were from the drippy ice cream, she dropped it a few more times. Random people kept watching her and giving her napkins.  

Then we went to the beach. It was a perfect day.

Indie was obsessed with picking up every rock and burying it.  I have no idea how long she would have buried the rocks if I hadn't cut her off.  

We said goodbye to Grandma Laura and Papa David and went back to Aunt Janet's house and the Stewart clan for another week. To be continued!