TyChelAda: Central Oregon visit

We flew up to Portland for a week at the end of July with the family, it was great. We stayed one night at Deirdre and Mark's to go to Claire's baptism, and then off to Redmond where we rented a really nice house for the week.

Get ready, long post with lots of pictures!

Sleeping during his first plane ride. He did great. Ada unfortunately is really scared now during ascent and cried to sit on Daddy's lap. She was fine though the rest of the flight.

Aunt Deirdre reading to very attentive toddlers

Uncle Tim helping Ada find the best blackberries in the backyard.

When playing becomes a spectator sport...

Look! You think all four might be playing together nicely in this one?

Some of us decided to eat dinner outside on the deck

We realized part way through the meal it was the 5 of us (and a few babies sprinkled in for good measure)

Seth likes to be outside. I think Ty is distracting him to keep him calm before bed after a long day of travel.

On Sunday afternoon we drove to Redmond. Morfar drew the short straw and had to ride with Seth and me. Comfortable car (we rented a Toyota Highlander, pretty nice), but loud baby. Seth did not look like he did on the plane. About half way through, morfar had to sit in the back and try to keep Seth calm. It worked a little, and then we sand "Wheels on the Bus" about 45 times to get through the last hour of the drive. Ugh. I think it's worse for me because he is typically such a calm, happy baby.

Mormor and the attentive toddlers this time.

Nice racking, Seth! Ok, Claire, put down the cue ball!

Shopping for our meals. Seth started in the Moby but got restless, so since he has been sitting really well, he got his first time riding in a shopping cart!

Happy baby! He likes all holding and attention. We snuck this trip in just before stranger anxiety hits, I think. Ada had it super early, but Seth is still ok at almost 6 months.

Seth and Claire were together a lot. It was funny, just being a little older Claire is way better at grabbing so Seth could rarely hang onto any toys. Fortunately he didn't really care.

Whose toes are tastier?

Ada came downstairs and immediately said good morning to Seth

Auntie Monica's comfy arms know how to help a baby sleep

On Tuesday Deirdre and family and our family went to Smith Rock State Park.. Mormor, Morfar, and Tim went to Crater Lake. We've been and decided that 30 minutes in the car was enough to make Seth deal with, so Smith Rock it was. I had heard a lot about it, big climbers' destination in the northwest.

We drove up to the overlook first, and could see some of the trails. There is a trail that goes up the ridge that would be fun to do sometime without toddlers and babies

Family pic. Ada has loved riding on Daddy's shoulders lately. Oh and you can see the trail I was talking about in the background.

Kira and Ada doing some mini-climbing with big climbing in the background

Super cute picture of Kira climbing, too bad it's washed out.

Ada and Kira did great playing together. They were pretty independent a lot of the time too, which was nice.

We hiked down to the river and back. Not too far, but actually a decent elevation drop.

Little cave across the river, our final destination. They were only a little scared after Ty convinced them there was a cougar living in the cave...

Hi Claire!!

The girls did pretty well on the hike but couldn't quite make it back up the hill. Good job Dads! Ty had a pretty decent backpack and Ada, and Mark managed with Claire on his back and the heavier toddler on his shoulders. Good workout at least?

It got hot the last few days, so Popsicles were popular. A tad bit messy for these 2...

...so the hose came out for cleaning!

Cleaning up with the hose was even more fun naked. Note the proximity of the golf course in the background. Fortunately it was too hot to golf so it was an empty course by afternoon.

Claire in one of my favorites from Ada, Adidas tennis dress

Seth and Uncle Tim staying dry and cool on the shaded deck during hose wars.

Hands and knees! This was new during the trip, he can push up to hands and knees and rock a little. He can roll really well now and rotate so getting very close to mobile.

Ada and Kira in matching outfits from Great Uncle Ted and Aunt Marietta, they were really cute!

Holding hands, aww.

Tim and Monica played bocce ball one day, this is a great series of pics that Deirdre took of Ada in her cute Mickey mouse dress from Mara throwing a ball.

More reading and bedtime snuggling with Mormor and Morfar.

There was a mini golf course at the resort. Pretty tough one actually, more like real golf course holes shrunk down. I was going to skip it and stay with Seth, but Ty convinced me to go and bring him, which was great, I was glad I got to go. Poor Seth got passed around every 30 seconds but he did really well until about the last hole, but we made it! Timmy and Seth, the real golfers, won the game. I did terribly the first 9 holes but pretty awesome the 2nd nine...

On the last night we got a picture of all the kids (missing Josh!) and check it out, they are ALL looking up and smiling!

This was on the last morning when we were all packing up, boo. Morfar watched all 4 kids bouncing on the bed so we could clean up and get ready to leave.

Classy menu. I think it stayed mostly accurate.

So then, we drove up to Seattle. Kind of an epic drive, about 6 hours. And with Seth's love of the carseat it was pretty rough. Tim had driven Monica, Megan, and Timmy to the airport early in the morning, and then we picked him up on the way to Seattle. The main reason for renting a bigger car, pretty comfortable for 5 of us and lots of stuff. At least I think it was, I was driving so I was comfortable! Despite the crying, we made it with plenty of time to check into our hotel and make it to the Sounders game. Tim got us great front seats again, which was nice of course for viewing, and gave Ada a little bonus room to move around.

Warm-ups

Seth and Tim in their Sounders hats. (Technically it's Ada's but they shared it)

During the 5 minutes of sun that we got, Ada put on the hat.

It can get loud, so we went to the service desk and got earplugs. He didn't seem to mind them but I couldn't really keep them in.

The game was really around his bedtime...he didn't stay asleep but took a nice nap and did great the rest of the game.

After the game we walked back to the car. We parked about a mile away, so Ada was on Seth's shoulders (and Tim was awesome and carried Seth the whole way). After we had been walking a while, Ada started singing "We can't find our car, we can't find our car..." to the tune of the Farmer in the Dell. I guess she thought it had taken too long.

On Sunday we stayed in Seattle and visited Jen, Brian, and Everly in the morning. They are always great to visit and we're so glad we have been able to stay in touch between a few of their visits to San Diego and our trips up to Seattle.

Two awesome families, we miss you.

Then we were at Woodland park for quite a while, where Corinne, Peter, Eli, and Efraim met us for a picnic lunch and some playground time. I did too much talking with Corinne to get any pictures, unfortunately. After they left, Scott and Brynn walked up to meet us at the playground, and Michelle joined in a little later. We went over there for games, dinner, and bathtime. Of course great to see them as well!