Brother, Brother

Our summer of visiting and visitors continued last week when big, bad brother/uncle Greg (that sounds like some weird polygamy term but I PROMISE you, I don't mean it that way) came 'round the mountain.We dragged him hither and yon (including to five fun-filled mornings at the pool for swimming lessons - wahoo!) during his week o' fun in the summer-personality-challeneged city of Seattle (where we had temperature swings from the low 50s to the high 70s). We had chilly trips to the beach and warm afternoon bike rides (those go something like this: Molly pedals ahead and waits for us. Jack rides two feet and then wants to get off and we carry his bike. Molly runs back because we're slow -- note that she does ride back, she drops her bike in an inconvenient spot and hoofs it back. Jack stops and smells every-mother-loving flower in the path. It's amazing...ly slow). We made him pick blueberries again. We celebrated his birthday (and gave a shout out to Nana and my great Aunt Tid on the same-day birthdays. All the rabble-rousers apparently are born on the same day). But most of all, we just had a great time and it was especially nice to have company while John enjoyed the east coast last week. My kids are officially tuckered out and need a to go to bed at 4pm for the next month. For a final hurrah last weekend, we got the heck out of dodge and went to the mountains, where it was (thankfully) gorgeous. The little people and I did a small-person-sized hike on Saturday while Greg did an adult-sized hike with some of his friends. We camped, enjoyed some delicious food, did another beautiful hike on Sunday morning, splashed in some very chilly but crystal clear water, and caked on at least three feet of dirt on hands, feet, and faces. We all smelled ni-ice on Sunday morning, let me tell you. Besides our body odor and streaked dirt faces, poor Molly also came home with so, so many bug bites on her face that she looks destined for the leper colony (and a friend asked me if she had chicken pox. Ouch). Poor thing. I got one bite, Jack got three, and she got 4000. Still, she doesn't care so boo to you cold July days and welcome sunny, summer camp days. We like to show off that yellow orb to our guests.

Singing angels moment with the sunlight streaming through the trees... also a hallelujah moment after a rather harrowing drive to the trail head. Hello super steep drop off on from the road; I wanted to throw up nearly the entire way up. I dislike narrow roads with no shoulders very, very, very much.

Botanists/Professional Slowpokes in training. Yes, yes, the journey is important but so is making it out of the woods before the bears come and eat us.

Hiking outfit 2012: baseball shirt, tiered skirt, non-ankle socks, and worn sneakers. Awesomeness. 

The dirt/chocolate mustache only got worse from here. 

See, that destination was worth it. Pretty lake.

Some more angels singing...

Kicking it old school at the campsite (thank you for the camping tables for Christmas. They came in very handy in our rogue camping spot).

Literally.

Sunday hike with the big man. And no harrowing drives. That's Molly and the Uncle waaaay up there. It was cute. 

And there is my water inspector. All the water. All the muddy water. All the puddles. All that ran through my head with each acknowledgment of the H2O was "Hey look kids, there's Big Ben and there's Parliament". It happened that many times. 

It all got hugged out in the end, though.

And, we've arrived at the ice fields and caves. It was pretty magnificent. It was pretty cold. 

It was binky time.

My for-scale model.

We gave ourselves a thumbs up during a refueling stop.

Our final activity: rearranging nature's river bed. 

A final ponder.

Somewhere Over The Rainbow

Well, you may be surprised to hear this but seven million people seem to have the right idea when they go to Hawaii each year. It's not just hype, people, it really is incredible. We had a really, really wonderful vacation with good weather, lots of sand (and red, streaking dirt), beautiful water, and great company. We adventured a bit, we beached a lot, Molly came back ten pounds heavier from the water weight she absorbed, Jack made a lot of train tracks in the sand, John finally learned to order pina coladas with no shame, my parents got transported (happily they say) back to the time when you don't get to go to the bathroom on your own and there are more crayons at the table than menus, and I just enjoyed (nearly) every minute. I will spare you all further gushing, because no one really wants to hear that, and you can just pretend that we hated it. All of it. Even the colorful fishies that we got to snorkel with. And that one eel (though even she was pretty).

We started our adventure on Oahu. It was very nice and I'm glad we got to Pearl Harbor and the north shore (and because we all watch too much tv, we checked out various LOST locations since we were swinging through). The weather wasn't great on our north shore day but coming from previously gloomy Seattle, it seemed like the brightest and warmest weather ever. 

Oh, but then we got to Kauai... and well, there are really no words. It's a beautiful slice of heaven and I loved it. We all loved it. The water, the sun, the hiking (that we mostly watched other people get to do), the waves, the waterfalls. And those wonderful fishies. It was stunning.

Jack's train track maker

This girl did more snorkeling than John (mostly because he didn't do any). She has officially become a better underwater swimmer than dog paddler. It's rad to watch her tackle waves. Wait'll she gets another gander at New England water later this summer, though. We may see more land lubbing then. 

This little man is the most intent sand sculptor... and has only a passing interest in the water. Mostly, his interest seems to be when I'm not there. When Grammy and Grampy take him to the beach, apparently he won't come out of the waves. When dad takes him in the water, it's all cool. With me? It's the sand or bust. 

This is the smattering I had time for tonight... my parents have most of the pictures and I'm sure there are a few on our phones. But, we're back, we're here, and our summer is off to a glorious start...

Batter Up

We are beginning our summer travel soon and to kick it off right, we dragged some east coasters out to join us...


Grammy and Grampy join the baseball (food) and train fanatics on the light rail on our way to the Mariners/Sox game -- the trip in is half the fun of the whole experience.




Watching Big Papi give a live interview before the game. We didn't get to see his 400th home run but we did get to see him drive in the winning run, the kids got to run the bases after the game and the rest of us left with only mild indigestion. A success!