The best family vacation we've had so far

Last week we were able to spend a week in the Pacific Northwest visiting my mom's side of the family. I loved showing Kendrick and the kids a part of the country that they had never seen before. Everything went according to plan and honestly, the whole trip was perfection. From the moment we started the 14 hour drive to my Aunt Jennie's house, to the moment we piled in the car at 5:00 am in Portland to start our journey back home-everything went smoothly. I don't know what I was expecting as far as the long drives go. I guess I thought there would be a lot of, "Are we there yet?" and "he touched me!" and "I'm bored!" Overall there were maybe 3 or 4 "Are we there yets?" and that was only when we were getting close to our first destination. But there was not one single fight between the kids while we were in the car. In fact, every time we were in the car we had a very pleasant experience. I kept waiting for some sort of disaster or temper tantrum to occur, but there wasn't one.

I made each of the kids a road trip bag before we left and I think that was the biggest life saver of all. I bought 4 different colored tote bags at the dollar store and filled each of them with:
a NEW (that was the key-everything had to be "new" so it would stay a novelty for at least 10 hours) Melissa and Doug reusable sticker book, silly putty, a matchbox car, math flashcards, sunglasses, tissues, a smurf figure, gum, mints, their favorite flavor of Mike and Ike's, a wooden travel game, a clipboard with paper on it, markers, crayons, a workbook, a pencil, a package of fake mustaches, and a word search book. It also helped that we rented a nice mini van so we wouldn't put the miles on our old clunker. We were hooked up with a Town and Country that had all the bells and whistles and I probably could have lived out of that van for another month and been happy. It was so nice and luxurious inside. We kept ourselves entertained by rocking out to hip hop music, wearing disguises and stopping for frequent photo ops.

My friend, Jenn asked if this picture was my way of "announcing" something. Rest assured, it is not. I was just too lazy to make him take off his brother's shirt.

We arrived at my Aunt Jennie's house in Bellevue, Washington on Saturday evening and we stayed with her until Tuesday afternoon. While we were in her neck of the woods we went to church with her, tried horse vaulting for the first time, explored downtown Seattle, hiked Snoqualmie Falls, and took a land/sea tour on a WWII duck boat.

Snoqualmie Falls

Seattle

The day we took the duck tour was considered a warm day in Seattle. We were all freezing. This guy is obviously a Seattle native because in my mind, there was no other reason to be half naked in 70 degree cloudy weather. 

While at Pike's Place we ran into some Mormon missionaries! The missionary next to Kendrick is from Provo!

Horse Vaulting

Goodbye pictures with dear Aunt Jennie

On Tuesday afternoon we drove to the coast to stay a night on the beach before heading over to Portland. Our hotel was in Seaside, but we had to stop in Astoria so that Kendrick could get his picture taken in front of the Goonie's house. I am not a fan of that show. But Kendrick loves it and hopes to make fans out of our kids as well, so we made sure to get plenty of pictures in front of the Goondocks, in front of the Astoria town sign and in front of the Goonie's tourist sign. Astoria is a cute little town but it was almost creepy to me how small it felt. While their view is unbeatable, I could never live there.

Astoria

Seaside

This was the hotel we stayed in. It was just steps from the beach and from our window we could see the ocean. It was heaven and I want to go back next year and stay there for an entire week.

On Wednesday we spent the entire day on the beach before we made a quick stop at Bruce's candy kitchen in Cannon Beach so that I could get my salt water taffy fix and Easton could spend some of his hard earned vacation money on bubblegum, and then we were off to Portland to stay with my Aunt Lisa.

On Thursday the first and only order of business was seeing how quickly we could get our butts over to Voodoo Donuts so that I could fulfill a month's long dream of tasting their famous Voodoo doll donut. As far as jelly filled donuts go, it wasn't my favorite. But their Portland Cream was divine and I could probably eat a dozen of their plain glazed by myself. Okay, no "probably" about it. I definitely could and would- if given the non judgemental opportunity. After the donut shop we spent a LONG time at the toy store so that the kids could spend their hard earned vacation money on things they could probably buy at home, but that are way more fun to say you bought on vacation...

Tay bought a new "baby Zoey" (stuffed chocolate lab) to replace the one she lost in Disneyland 3 years ago.
Jackson bought (and promptly lost) a light saber building kit.
Myles bought binoculars.
Easton bought a police helmet, handcuffs and a sheriff's badge.
Kendrick bought a hacky sack and a Portland shirt and bought me a Portland sweatshirt that I haven't taken off since. I'm wearing it now in fact.

Voodoo Donuts

We waited 30 minutes just to get inside the donut shop! 

Toy Store

On Friday we "had" to try Little Big Burger. My PNW family is pretty crazy about those tiny little patties on a brioche bun served alongside french fries made in truffle oil. I have to say, the veggie burger I ordered was nothing to write home about, but the french fries were divine! After our bellies were full, we headed over to The Rose Gardens and to see the view from Piddock Mansion. Then we went to see the house that I grew up visiting during my summer vacations as a child. I cried like a baby when my grandparents sold this house and moved to a condo in downtown Portland. If I could, I would buy this house back in a heart beat (yes, I knocked on the door and asked permission before traipsing around their property). After all of that we headed over to my grandparent's condo to watch an old movie and eat some homemade nachos. One of the things I adore about my grandma is her love of nachos. My grandparent's condo is a fun place to hang out. It has some amazing views of the city and they have it filled with custom framed paintings and old photographs on just about every wall. It is quite possibly the most serene and spiritual home I've ever stepped foot in.

Little Big Burger

My cousins, Patrick and Robert joined us for some Little Big Burger.

Click this picture! I love what the bottle says.

The Rose Gardens

This is Shakespeare's garden. When I was younger I wanted to be married here. Easton overheard that and decided that he wanted to marry Kendrick and I. He orchestrated the whole thing. He told us where to stand and what to do and when to kiss and then he laughed his hiney off when we finally did kiss.

Piddock Mansion

My Grandparent's old house

Nacho/Movie night at the Condo

Kendrick and my grandpa.

My cute kids and my cute grandparents. I am so grateful my kids know their great grandparents.

On Saturday we chilled. A lot. It was delightful for the kids but slightly painful for me. I like to be go go go when I am on vacation in a place I don't visit often. Because in my mind, I can always chill at home. But I think it was nice for Kendrick and the kids to have some down time the day before we all piled back into the car for a 12 hour drive. That night we ordered some of my cousin, Patrick's favorite pizza from Pizza Schmizza and visited with the family, then we took one last walk to the park. 

Robert, Patrick, Uncle Lee, Aunt Lisa, Nate

While at the park that night Kendrick and I snapped this picture. I don't know why, but I think it is one of my favorite pictures of us-even if it is fuzzy...

The drive home was LONG. For some reason it felt a lot longer than the 14 hour drive we had taken to get to Washington the week before. I cried for pretty much the entire drive along the Columbia River. We were all overly tired and sad to be leaving and bloated from a week of eating food we don't normally eat. Even with all of that though, the drive was surprisingly pleasant. We came home to hot, dry weather, nearly dead grass and two very happy puppies. Once we returned the rental car and started unpacking, reality sunk in that the vacation was over. It was honestly one of the best vacations we've ever taken as a family. It was so nice to share a place I love with them. The kids were pretty well behaved the whole trip, it was heaven to spend all day/every day with Kendrick and the Washington/Oregon weather was perfect. I am so grateful to all the extended family who let us stay with them, entertained us, fed us and offered us suggestions of things to do. It was a nice visit and I am so happy that we were able to start the summer off with such a great vacation!!