Lacamas Lake

Nate took two days off over the Fourth, so he could have a five day weekend.  We spent one of them with my family.  My parents, the kids, and I took a walk around Lacamas Lake while Nate ran (training for Hood to Coast.  I need to keep mentioning it so that his female teammates who read my blog are assured he is training for it :).

We really enjoyed the trail, though I was nervous one of us would be mowed down by a bicylist.  It was such a busy trail (and not wide),  and there were some bicyclists who went FLYING past.  So scary.  Judson now gets clear off of any walkways if anyone is coming.  Doesn't matter if it's as wide as a street and there's someone walking toward us.  He gets into the grass.  :)  Judson walked/ran over two miles and wanted to go further.  We were so proud of him!

Of course, there was plenty of pool time, too.  Cooper's not nearly as excited about cold water as her brother is (and has always been).

We took this before we realized how far he was going to make it.

 

On a little dock overlooking the lake.

Side note:  When we were camping, Nate was walking Judson over to the bathroom.  About thirty yards from our site was a post with an eight on it (Site #8).  Judson said, "Eight.  We've walked one mile!"

 

The Vancouver Compound

I have some very belated posts, regarding time spent with my family, to catch up on.  I didn't write about Father's Day, and then wanted to go back and do it before I posted about our next visit to Vancouver.  We've now had three trips up there since Father's Day, including "Roommate Family Day" two weeks ago, so it's high time to catch up!

First, Father's Day.  It wasn't overly warm, but my dad and Morgan had just purchased a huge pool that Judson couldn't wait to try out.  Macy tried to participate, but didn't last long in the cold water.  Not surprisingly, Judson didn't notice how cold it was.  :)  (Note: my mom was less than thrilled about the huge pool, but has changed her tune now that the grandkids and little friends love it so much.)

Anticipation is building... (it's too tall for them to get into by themselves.)

Not even half as full as it can get, but perfect for little people.  Behind Anna to the left is the carport connected to the house.  You can see part of the big shop on Morgan's property (overlapped by the carport).  The building on the right is the "quilting barn," where the previous owner and her friends quilted.  It's full of to-die-for cabinets and storage space.  Nate's trying to convince me to move my scrapbook stuff up there. :)

Some of us were quite cold!

Just before she got out, I think. :)

He sure does love playing with Uncle Morgan!

The Original Boyd Family and Descendents Take on the Zoo

We hadn't been to the zoo in months and finally scheduled a trip last week.  Anna and Nate were working, so it ended up being my parents, Morgan, Macy, and us.  Kind of funny.  We had a great time.  Macy and Judson are so cute together!  And she really loves "Coop Coop," too.

Why won't anyone look at the camera?!?!

One out of three.  Thanks, Coop.  But where did my baby go?!?!

A zoo trip isn't complete without a tractor ride.

In the bat "cave," of course.  :)

A bike ride

Nate's training for the Hood to Coast Relay at the end of August, so I decided to take the bike trailer out the other night while he ran.  (He often runs before he comes home from work.  We live in such a hilly area - with no shoulders on the road - that running from here isn't easy.  And biking with the trailer is impossible.)  We went out to Minto Brown Park, which we do once a summer.  Click here and here to see the past two years.  It's not like it's that hard to do or anything, but we rarely get out there.  I always think we'll do it more, but it just doesn't happen.

We didn't have a helmet for Cooper yet and they were out of the baby girl helmets.  (The baby boy one was just too ugly.)  So her helmet is a little big.  I figured she won't probably wear it many more times this summer and then it will still work for next year (and beyond).  My babies have big heads, so the helmet is too big, but not nearly as big as it would be on most ten month olds.  :)

It was her bedtime by the time we really got going, and she cried every time I stopped.  But overall she held up really well, especially considering the helmet was usually covering her eyes.  The experience could've been a lot worse.

As I was riding along, I heard a sweet little voice say, "Do you want to hold hands?"  Totally melted my heart, because it was a little out of character for our guy.  He's much more likely to use a drumstick on Cooper's head or douse her with the hose when I run inside to get him a granola bar.  Oh, yes.  Both of those things happened last week.  He obviously loves her, but he's a two year old boy and doesn't often show it.  :)  Anyway, as soon as I stopped to take a picture, he let go.  The last picture is a reenactment.  :)

And the rest of the camping pictures.

Okay, this was the most drawn-out series of blog posts ever.  Sorry.  Without further ado, here's the final day of our camping trip.

We decided that next year we'll camp for three nights.  It's just too much work to only have one full day.  Since Nate needed to be at work the next day, we decided to pay the day use fee, so we could pack up whenever we wanted.  It worked out really well, and is definitely something we'll do again.

After breakfast, we went on a hike along the McKenzie River.  Judson was tired and not cooperative for the first part of the walk, but eventually cheered up and then he and Madi were unstoppable.

During the big kids' naps (the little ones napped poorly the entire weekend), we packed up as much as we could while the guys hiked down to the reservoir.  Once they came back, JuliAnn and I left the babies with them and went to the reservoir.

Once Madi and Judson were awake, Jules and I entertained them with the bike trailer while the guys took down the tents and loaded the cars.  We were almost the only ones in the campground by then, and we enjoyed having the road to ourselves.

We headed for home at about seven o'clock and enjoyed pizza at Giovanni's in Mill City (kind of famous around here).  We had such a fun weekend, but it sure did feel good to get clean and sleep in our own beds!

They may or may not have been eating red licorice before noon.  :)

A frequent sight:  these two firstborns definitely know how to go at it! 

So pretty!