More of the Oregonian Life

Some of you have been wondering what we're up to so I'll tell you- a whole lot. The weather is really beautiful right now so we've been trying to get out and see all we can. Plus we've already had visitors. It's been a whirlwind first few weeks here and I'm loving it.

Here's a recap on a few of our recent adventures:

Blackberry Picking

The blackberries are out and growing everywhere! We often go on walks at night and find patches we can pick. We've been eating them on cereal, with yogurt, or for dessert with milk and sugar. Delicious no matter how you eat them.

She loves them! Luckily I've found a good stain remover.

He's so great. I'm so happy to have him by my side for all of this.

Sunday Drives

We live in the greatest place. We're 20 minutes from metropolitan Portland and 10 minutes from the most beautiful countryside you've ever seen. One drive we love takes us past million-dollar homes built on rolling knolls and massive lots. There are farms, cows and horses, and sunflower fields. It is breathtaking.

Camping

For Ben, camping is a part of life. So we found a good excuse to camp when our ward held a campout the weekend after we arrived. We went to the Willamette (pronounced Will-AM-it) Mission State Park and had a great time getting to know other members in the ward. And of course it was beautiful. No surprise there.

 We camped near this pretty pond.

While we were driving to the campsite we kept seeing these fields full of tall plants.

We couldn't figure out what they were- probably because we had never seen them before in our lives. They're called Hops and they're used to make beer. They grow them all over in the area where we went.

 They look like mini pine cones.

They grow them in massive fields like this. 

Mark's Visit

And last but not least my brother Mark and his family came to visit us last week. We had so much fun. He has the greatest wife and kids and we crammed all ten of us into our 881 square foot apartment for two nights (with one bathroom mind you :) ). We went into Portland most days then headed for the coast on Friday. 

On Thursday Malinda and I took the kids to the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI). It was a great museum and the kids had a good time.

That night we went into the city and took the aerial tram. The view was beautiful, as you can see. We could even see Mount St. Helens from the top.

Our whole group

We then headed to a place called "Salt and Straw" for ice cream. It's original to Portland and has ice cream flavors like strawberry and black pepper, sea salt and caramel, olive oil, and honey and lavender. I went with chocolate, Ben was more daring and got the sea salt and caramel.

After ice cream we went down to Waterfront Park and walked along the river.

Friday we took the kids to the Zoo. This is the only picture I got. Lame. 

But can you see the lion in the background? Sort of cool, right?

Like I said, on Friday we headed for the coast. We didn't reserve a place to stay until Friday morning and got probably the last rental unit on the entire Oregon coast. It was a nice place... for being a double-wide :) Really, we stayed in a trailer near Tillamook, Oregon. And it was awesome. But we got a good laugh out of the fact that Mark reserved a double-wide for us to stay in.

Saturday we went to the Tillamook Cheese Factory. They had a fun tour and free samples. Mark and Malinda bought cheese so we went back to our double-wide (ha ha) and made grilled cheese sandwiches. Delicious.

Outside the factory.

 We made our child be the cow. We are great parents, aren't we?

Then we went to Oceanside to enjoy the beach. It was overcast but breathtaking all the same.

She fell asleep in the car and continued to sleep when we got to the beach. She seldom sleeps on my chest like this anymore. It is one of my favorite things about being a mom.

Cousin Jared and Nayeli 

Our awesome setup

Ben playing with Makayla and Emma in the 50 degree water.

 

 Love this one. These two are the best things that ever happened to me.