A Memorial Day weekend to forget

For the Memorial Day weekend, we went camping with our friends the Lewises. We went to Rainbow Falls which is near Chehalis. It poured all day Friday. The 2 daddies set up this great shelter to keep us dry (but not warm- it was like 10 feet away from the fire).

The shelter was great but a little too late. We were all soaked by the time it was up. Our camp ground turned into a giant mud pit and the kids were falling down constantly.

One set of muddy hands-

Two sets of muddy hands-

Four sets of muddy hands-

Rain water pooled up on the back side of the shelter. It didn't take the kids long to figure this out. As if they weren't wet enough! Taking a break from sloshing in the mud to eat dinner- Roasting marshmallows in the rain. You can see how wet the girls' pants are-

We woke up the next morning and it wasn't raining! Our campsite was still a giant mud pit but at least we were dry (well, maybe not dry but not as wet as the night before).

Helping out a friend-

These babies got very muddy. Sammi's even went for a swim in a puddle but the they kept the little girls entertained.

We walked to the "falls" on Saturday.

The kids played at the campground play toy on the walk back from the falls.

We headed home on Sunday. We pretty much woke up, ate breakfast, packed up and left. Here's Sammi playing hide and seek at Wendy's on our way home.

Some of the things to forget-

We didn't leave home until about noon on Friday even though Daddy told Josiah we would be leaving around 9:30. They got to the campground around 9 and had to wait in their truck until we got there. Right when we got there, the dogs got in a fight (exactly why we usually leave our dogs at home). Bailey was bit in the ear and bled a lot. Between the rain and mud (and without going into too many details, the bad chocolate milk the Lewis kids drank) we were running low on clothes by Friday night. The kids didn't seem to mind being wet but when Alexis started shivering and the mud was layers thick, we had no choice but to change them. Mommy woke on Saturday morning and her hair was still wet. Even though things were looking up on Saturday morning, things weren't great. The kids kept falling in the mud and Siah & Kaitlynn were still sick from the milk. Daddy invited a guy he knows (but never met face to face) to come hang out on Saturday. When the guy showed up Daddy thought he was some random guy walking around the campground and totally blew him off. That was embarrassing once he figured it all out! He chased the guy as he drove away and apologized but the guy wouldn't get out and stay- I wonder why!! Siah fell hands first into the fire. Thank God he was barley hurt- only a tiny scrape and a very small burn. It could have been so much worse. Even though it wasn't bad, it really scared everyone. It took both Mommies many, many days to clean up all our muddy clothes and muddy camp gear. No more blue tarp camping for us!

On Monday, Memorial Day, we went to Grandma & Papa Bob's house for a BBQ. We did what we love to do there...dress up in Ba's clothes and put on a show.

Meerkats

On Monday, Mommy checked the weather report and saw that it was the only day with sun in the forecast for the next 10 days so we decided to skip nap and head to the zoo to check out the new meerkat exhibit. The meerkats were very cute but way smaller than we expected. Right next to the meerkats is the komodo dragon exhibit. We had never stopped to look at these before. They are gigantic and Alexis thought they were pretty scary. Another animal that we had never seen before- the kookaburra. Sammi really liked the birds.

And always one of our favorites, the penguins.

Fishing

Last weekend, we went on our annual camping trip to Sun Lakes State Park with Papa Bob and his friends. We had fun hanging around camp, going for walks and bike rides but the highlight was definitely fishing! Saturday, we all went fishing on Papa's boat.

Here we are looking for the perfect spot to drop the poles-
Guess who was the first to catch a fish! Alexis with her pink Barbie pole! If you remember, she caught a fish out of the trout "pond" when we went to the pumpkin patch last year but this is her first real catch.

On our way home, we stopped in Easton to get lunch and fish some more. We took our lunch to the ponds there and did some fishing. The Barbie pole out-fished the others yet again.

Uncle Jeff, Sammi and Daddy-
Sammi took a couple turns with the pole-

Sammi's first catch (Daddy did most of the work though)-

Road Trip!!

Warning: This is a long one!

Alexis, Sammi, Mommy and Auntie Michelle headed out on a Road Trip a couple weeks ago. We made many stops along the way, but our goal was to make it as far south as Santa Clara, CA to see Mommy's college friends and meet Baby Jesse.

Day 1: We decided to cut over to the Oregon Coast to go to our favorite place- Cannon Beach. We got out and played on the beach for a while (after Mommy ran over/got stuck on a curb in town and wasted a bunch of time). It was windy, but overall a beautiful day at the beach. Next stop, the Tillamook Cheese factory. We watched them make cheese for a while and then had some delicious ice cream. After each bite, Alexis told us how delicious her ice cream was. After Tillamook, we cut back over to I-5. Some of our detours added many hours onto our drive time (we are convinced our GPS was determined to take us on some of the most windy roads it could find) but the extra hours were worth all of the cool stuff we got to see. We stopped for dinner in Eugene and saw some of Michelle's friends who go to college there and finally stopped for the night in Medford, OR.

A quick story...on the morning we left, Alexis had her first dentist appointment. She was so scared. She kicked, screamed, had to be pinned down, sent the basket of toys flying when the hygienist offered her a reward at the end...basically was a nightmare. The dentist did get a good look at her teeth after we got her pinned down and thankfully we don't have to go back for 6 months. Hopefully next time will be better!

Day 2: When we got on the road in the morning, we were surprised how close we were to the California border. When it was time for lunch, we found a nice spot on the shore of Lake Shasta, made some sandwiches and had a picnic. We arrived in Lincoln, CA (on the outskirts of Sacramento) in the late afternoon. We stayed at Mommy's friend Elise's house that night. We went on a long walk to a park when we got there- that really helped to stretch our legs!

Day 3: We got up and headed south to Santa Clara. Elise joined us for this leg of the trip. We met up with Mommy's friends at yummy Mondo Burrito and then walked around the SCU campus.
Mommy and Sammi by the roses-

Mommy's friend Janet lives really close to campus so we hung out at her house for a while and then went to In N Out for dinner. Alexis was really excited to give Baby Jesse a pair of Pooh socks that were in our sock drawer at home. She took him a couple of our baby toys too- she was so excited to share with him!

Sammi enjoying her burger-

Baby Jesse and Mary gave the girls Chinese ("princess" according to Lex) outfits. They LOVE them!!

After our long day in Santa Clara, we went back North to Elise's house to spend the night again.

Day 4: We took our time getting ready in the morning and Elise took us to another park near her house. We had a picnic and ran around a bit to get out some energy before hitting the road. In the afternoon, we started making our way to the Northern coast of California and spent the night in Arcata. We had to drive over 100 miles on a super windy road!

Day 5: We woke up on our last day of our trip just south of the Redwood Forest. We took a scenic drive through the huge trees and got out to explore a little.

After the huge trees we cut back to I-5 and headed home. It was such a great trip! We were able to see so many different things and spend time with so many of our friends. The girls were great in the car. Sammi had a hard time from about Salem, OR home which seemed like a really long time but really wasn't when considering how many hours we spent in the car. Next time, all the way to Disneyland!

Mommy wanted to get home sometime on Monday (we left on Thursday) so that Alexis could have all day Tuesday to get back into her normal routine before going to school on Wednesday. When we got to school, Alexis hung up her coat on a coat hook and tried to squeeze between the coat rack and another mom. The mom accidentally bumped Alexis into the corner of the coat rack. She instantly had a bump and her head started bruising. Her teacher had to go find the lady in charge of the preschool classes and we had to fill out an accident report. We struggled to get Alexis to put some ice on her head. After the accident, Alexis did not want to stay at school. So, Alexis didn't even end up going to school and we could have stayed one more day in California. Oh well, who could have known!

Happy Mother's Day!

The Monday before Mother's Day, we went to the Supermall for another of their momtopia events. This time the girls decorated flower pots and when we got home we planted a bulb in them. I think we did something wrong, though. They still aren't growing.
Alexis woke up on Mother's Day to find "Ba" sleeping in her bed with her. So exciting!! Michelle got back late the night before (or you could say really early Mom's Day morning) from studying in Barcelona for 4 months and ended up spending the night with us- there was some problems with her flights home and she ended up in Portland and then got dropped off in Federal Way. Anyway, it was an exciting way for Alexis to wake up.

We headed to Everett to have lunch with Grandma Jeannette and Auntie Darlene and the rest of the family. We really liked looking at the boats in the marina.

We love cousin Bonnie!

After lunch we went to see Great-Grandma "Pete" and Grandma Kris.