Day 16- Wilsonville
• At Natalia and Mike’s
• Went to lunch at Natalia’s restaurant
• Mike and Tal took us Thai dinner(honestly, best Thai I have had – I judge Thai by their Tom Kha Soup and it was amazing, and forget about their Duck Curry!)
• We took the Armada – popped in a Shark Tales movie for Rohan, Royce slept and the 4 of us tag teamed the haunted house! Best haunted house I have ever been to! Haunted house, forest and the dark. The scariest was Tal and I alone going through the forest! The creativity and acting is unparalleled. Or I just haven’t been to enough haunted houses. However a creepy girl rocking against a wall eerily singing, “…because the Bible tells me so.” And then a loud crack and some really scary thing in my face. AHHHHH! And we run and turn back and he’s still there- more loud pitched girly screams!
• We left at 11pm – Rohan still awake! At times we feel like it is child abuse, then remind selves we do not have to prescribe to society’s sleeping hours. He gets plenty of rest!
Day 17 – Wilsonville
• We went to the park across the street – played Rohan’s new Bocce set, Mike and Russell played baseball w/Ro, and on the playground
• Kids napped – we hung at house
• Went to Lee’s farm Pumpkin Patch – the real deal! Ok- not joking with the bests – but best Pumpkin Patch I have been to! It was the real deal. Hay rides, farm animals (not just a few chickens and goats brought in and fed $0.25 pellets until their stomachs explode) It had of course a jumpy house and a few rides, but a giant jump hump. It was like a 40’ long hump buried into the ground without walls that was the same material as a jumpy. It looked as if you would jump to outer space or slide down it – but it was rather controlled. Yet very fun for kids! We got a free hay ride because Mike helped fix the tractor. Rohan had a blast and we got some cute pics.
• We went to great BBQ joint – Dave’s BBQ. I went shopping at Old Navy catching big sales – and Tal had to come get me, but within 3 minutes she too was buying things
• Rohan and I carved his first pumpkin! He was so excited to pull out seeds. Which of course we roasted and ate. I carved Rohan in fun letters (per his request), he wrote in permanent marker all over it and we lit the candle – a sheer masterpiece.
Day 18 – Wilsonville
• Guys woke at 5am to go fishing – I kept getting txts that Russell was so cold – “brrrr. Wish I was home snuggling with u n the boys.” I would reply, “when u catch a fish it will warm ur soul.”An hour later, “still nothing, still cold.” Then at noonish – We get the big warming txt! They fished for salmon for 4 hours in the 40 degree windy weather. Nothing. They moved on to Sturgeon and when the captain asked if they want to set up for 1 or 2 they both sneeringly replied, “2!” Russell hooked one at 11:30 and with his bad back, couldn’t keep reeling, he passed the giant bent in half pole to Mike – who has lumbar disc problems. They passed the pole every 5 minutes. And every time Russell had a rest he peeled off his layers of clothing. By the time they reeled this river monster up (50 minutes) – he was in a T-shirt! Not so cold anymore, and this thing did warm his soul. Guys just listen to your wives It was a, ready for this? Are you sure?...450lb 8 ft long Sturgeon! They caught a 450lb fish!!! Unfortunately (depending on how you look at it) you cannot pull them up on the boat on Sundays and she was only about 25 yrs old – they live to 100! They are prehistoric creatures. Why have I never heard of them? I guess Beluga Caviar comes from Sturgeon in the Caspian Sea. Anyway – that catch of a lifetime was worth 4 hrs of freezing his tutkis off! Then they went and caught 16 Walleye in an hour and a half.
• Meanwhile – Tal the kids and I went back to The Lee’s Farm Pumpkin patch. I had tickets to use up and we met Kelly (Sheehan) Wehrung and her kids – I have not seen or heard from her since I was 18! It was sooo good to catch up.
• Rohan and Eli played and played and played – we then all ate pumpkin donughts, corn dogs, kettle corn and cider. Can you say Fall and Pumpkin Patch?
• The kids napped and Tal and I hung – waiting for the men to bring home their daily catch!
• Tal cooked us a great dinner
• Russell, Tal and I thoroughly enjoyed some fresh pumpkin farm fudge and donughts! It was pretty comical to hear the amount of groaning and savoring of these treats.
• They were sooo spent. I have never seen such a thing. Mike laid around and slept. Russell lounged – yet of course stayed up til 1 or 2 am.
Day 19- Wilsonville, Portland, Astoria, Aberdeen
• Pack, laundry
• Russell took Rohan to Mike’s shop to fix odds and ends on RV
• Left at 2:30
• Drove “The Arv” through Portland – yup cruising the city streets. We stopped and got a slice and brought it to a park across a charter school and ate and watched kids play. While dealing with Rohan having dumped his juice on the tempurpedic mattress pad and Russell being a hungry- grumpy bear- and trying to talk to Janel about her new baby and life
• We drove past Pioneer park – where our team visited in college and a giant flock of birds flew overhead- Hoyt ran and screamed like her life was about to end. We laughed. It was good to see that park again.
• We went to Astoria – a little coastal town – neat but eerie to us.
• Saw house ‘Goonies’ was filmed in. Very cool. It is inhabited.
• Went to the Astoria Column – a 164 step column to a 360 view of Astoria…at sunset. Pretty cool. Great pics.
• Went to Port George Brewery for a sampler and amazing cup of Tomato, bacon and blue cheese soup. Incredible brews! Rohan had a plethora of cool toys to play with there and we shared a table with some fellow upstate New Yorkers!
• Went to Astoria Brewery for another sampler and dinner. Gross brews.
• It was late and we didn’t have anywhere to stay in town and wanted to get up north so we drove to Aberdeen.
• Russell said he saw an elk (though he also at one point saw a large deer run into the forest and exclaimed, “what was that, a horse?” – funny. First of all – we were deep in the forest and the beast was on the side of the road, secondly, it has a white puff for a tail…no long 6’ whisking black tail
• I said, “I better see an elk on this trip”(meaning before our return home). Just then I looked up and what to my wonderful eyes should appear but a big giant field and 15 large grazing elk! Russell at midnight slams on the breaks as much as possible without sending our sleeping babies flying across the RV. We backed up, they were gone. Fast fellas.
• We listened to Joyce Meyer’s Overcoming Fear with Faith series.
• We had a giant plug in spotlight out looking for more elk to photo
• Nothing too impressive to park at, scary rather…so we camped at our first Wal-Mart. Apparently they advertise that they are free RV parking.
• We settled in just in time for the Wal-Mart parking lot cleaning machine. Lovely.
Day 20: Aberdeen – Cresent Lake – Olympic National Park- Heart O’ Hills Campground
Smiles and Trials:
• Woke at Wal-Mart to a very loud, big and long train.
• Royce woke every 1-2 hrs (though is back to going to sleep awake at times)- having a fit because his clothes were too bulky and constricting. That was fun, let alone him moving to horizontal positions. How on earth do people co-sleep? They love it! We’ve tried! We cannot.
• 1st shopping at Wal-Mart in over a year! – we got Rohan a sleeping bag and costume- he was super excited.
• Sat in front of Starbucks and Russell did some urgent work for 1.5 hours.
• Drove to Olympic National Park!
• Stopped at Cresent Lake
• Hiked Marymere Falls – great little hike. Cool bridges, rivers, trees, moss, and neat landscape, tunnel and of course the epic waterfall.
• Camped at Heart O’Hills – pretty primitive. But did have fire pit. We cooked dinner - some yummy meat but I screwed up the mac n cheese. How do you do that?
• Kids wouldn’t go to bed. Very frustrating. Found myself asking “What are you supposed to do when you are frustrated? I know our white trash way of dealing isn’t exactly “What Jesus would do”, “The Rhythm of Love” or what we want.
• Royce kept waking up…because he started a runny/stuffy nose NO wonder he can’t sleep! It’s always sad when a baby is sick. They don’t know what is going on, they only know they don’t feel well. We were all excited to get a good nights sleep with the first time we set up the pack n play. He lasted 1 hour. I figured if he is going to be up every hour needing a cuddle, butt pat or a nurse, it behooves me to just roll over rather than get my booty up outta bed and lean over to pat or nurse him (well, lean over to bring him into bed to nurse – I cannot just lean over a pack n play and nurse – my breasts aren’t that saggy.
• I have been slaving over spicy Maya Hot Cocoa from Chuao Chocolatier so I went out to enjoy some while Russell bolted in to get Royce (he thought he heard snapping in the woods).
• No sooner I spilled on myself and went inside too.
• When babies were settled – we broke out the telescope and looked at the moon. Romantic.
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