Nutria

Our library has a wonderful expansive outdoor area (technically I think it's part of the business park) and we go there often. Sometimes we feed the ducks, sometimes we take a long walk, and sometimes we take Buster along to give him some social time since there are always plenty of dogs to visit with. There are quite a few ponds and bridges, and there's a little area with rushing water where we like to have "boat" races (putting sticks in at the top and seeing how far they go). The boys have come up with names for a couple of these areas. The wooded area is the Misko Forest, one of the bridges is Lasken Bridge, another bridge is the Bridge of the Aleano Wizard and there's a wizard that lives under it. We go on many adventures here.

Since there was some sun on Monday, we took a break from our errands that afternoon and spent an hour just walking and exploring around this area. Like I said, there are lots of ducks and sometimes we spot a few nutria. The nutria were out and about yesterday and as we walked by two of them, Aiden says in an exasperated tone, "I'm allergic to nutria. Looks like I'm going to have to hire a contractor to keep them away from me whenever we come here now". At that moment, we were walking past a gentleman who looked extremely confused as to what he just overheard. I don't blame him. Aiden seems to be under the impression that he's allergic to rodents and has been insisting that this is true for well over a year now. Also, I'm not sure why he thinks it's necessary to "hire a contractor" to keep the nutria away when the nutria are perfectly content to ignore him. And, what a strange thing to hire a contractor to do. I don't think we'll ever quite understand how Aiden's brain works!

Spring Break Part 3

After dropping the boys off, we got on the road to head to Lincoln City for our weekend away. We had been looking forward to having a relaxing weekend to ourselves for almost six weeks and it was going to be amazing to celebrate 7 years of marriage.

We hadn't stayed with this particular hotel before and we had chosen one of their beach houses (Nantucket Inn) that had been converted into five individual condo-like rooms. We were very excited to stay in the "romantic penthouse" and when we arrived, we found this waiting for us.

 Rose petals on our bed!

 An amazing two person jacuzzi.

 And a fabulous view with just a few steps down to the beach.

The weather was supposed to be awful the entire weekend, but after being sick all week, we were perfectly content to storm watch while curled up in bed in front of the fireplace. That evening, we had the very last reservation of the night at the Blackfish Cafe for our anniversary dinner. They set us up in a somewhat secluded corner and we had a beautiful, quiet meal. Unfortunately my appetite had not yet fully returned after the flu, so I was unable to really enjoy my delicious dinner and managed to eat just half of it. But we both agreed that we enjoyed the experience thoroughly and plan to go back, hopefully with a very willing appetite!

After settling in for the evening, we listened to a huge storm rage the entire night, which made sleeping a little difficult but the sound of the rain was still very relaxing. The next morning, there was a surprise break in the weather.

After a walk on the beach, we decided to explore a bit for the afternoon while the weather was calm. My research during the week had shown that there was a cemetery in town with an amazing view. Before you think that we were being morbid by wandering around the cemetery for fun, it was actually a common thing for us to do when we lived in Philadelphia. Of course, the cemeteries there are gorgeously ornate and crazy old and full of historical people like Ben Franklin.

As we wandered, we discovered some storm damage from the night before.

The dates in the cemetery in Lincoln City aren't super old, but it's always interesting to find the oldest one. The graves that really stood out to me though were for one family. There were the graves for the parents, and then three others. One for their 6 month old daughter, who passed in 1928. Another for their 8 year old son, who passed the following year. And then another for their baby boy (no age), who passed the same year as the 8 year old. They lost all three children within two years. The father passed in 1969 and there was no date of passing for the mother, but her birth date was listed as 1902. A quick internet search revealed that she passed in 2001. It's the finds like this that make you wonder what the story is. Why they would lose all three of their children like that so close together.

Despite the slightly depressing yet interesting find, the view was breath taking.

After the cemetery, we went to Depoe Bay to wander around. We poked around in a rare book store, but after deciding that we could not spend $400 on a very old copy of one of Shakespeare's plays, we moved on to finding pirate stuff for the boys. The weather was starting to go downhill again and as soon as John and I left a store to go back to our car, the downpour began. We got from the store to our car within 30 seconds and we still ended up looking like this:

 You can see the mass of raindrops pouring down our faces if you enlarge the photo.

While we were literally soaked completely through all of our clothes, we decided to go for an early dinner at Rogue Brewery. I yet again couldn't finish my dinner, although I was doing much better in terms of what I could eat. We still had a great time and Rogue is a fun place to eat, especially since you get to walk through the beer production facilities to get the the restaurant. It's pretty amazing.

We made it back to our hotel before the next storm front pounced down upon Lincoln City. We spent the entire evening curled up in bed in front of the fire, listening to the rain, and watching TV. So relaxing.

We had a great weekend and it was fun to really not do much of anything, but we enjoyed our little afternoon adventure. Here's to year 8 of being married to a great guy!

Spring Break Part 2

After our snow day, I had to spend all day Friday preparing for my midterm the next day, so we didn't get any playtime in. We had plans for fun family stuff after my midterm, but when I got home, I discovered that John had come down the flu. The weekend was shot. 

On Monday, John came home halfway through the day because he still didn't feel well. I spent the day cleaning with the kids so we could prepare for starting our super cool spring break stuff on Tuesday (the boys had destroyed their room and had to clean it before we could do anything). Life had other plans. I woke up Tuesday morning sick as could be. I haven't had a stomach bug like that since Norovirus. Ugh. I spent the next two days curled up on the couch, effectively wasting away our spring break. I felt so bad for the boys. They never ended up getting it (thank goodness!) and since John and I were due to go away for our anniversary on Friday, we decided to spend Friday morning with the boys at OMSI to see the new limited engagement Lego exhibit. Every single family in the Portland area had the same idea. It was PACKED. The line to get tickets for admission was out the door and down the sidewalk, but thankfully our membership got us around the line and we got right in!

While it was busy, it was so worth it. The Lego exhibit is amazing. Aiden (our Lego boy) was in absolute awe.

Wow.

There's a portion of the exhibit set aside for playing with Legos, along with a Duplo section for smaller kids. Obviously, we spent quite a bit of our time just playing with Legos.

Germ central, anyone?

After making their own creations, we headed out so we could get Buster to the vet and the boys to John's parents house. It was nice to spend a few hours doing something fun, finally, even if the entire place was packed.

Next, we celebrate our anniversary.

Spring Break Part 1

Spring break started a little early here (good thing too, but we'll get to that later). Aiden's last day of school before spring break was going to be Thursday, but on Wednesday evening, the snow began to fall. Yes, you read that correctly: spring break and snow. Oregon has been extremely confused weather-wise this year.

While we were pretty sure it was going to stop snowing and melt, it decided to keep snowing and stuck around. We went to bed wondering if there would be any school at all.

I got up and checked the school district website to see that there was a 2 hour delay, which automatically cancels morning kindergarten. Spring break began with a snow day! We all slept in a bit, let the older school kids have their snow fun, and then we headed outside later in the morning after everyone else had gone on to school.

 They had obviously been busy!

Aiden was pretty darn happy about this snow thing, if you can't tell!

Even though the snow level was dwindling, the boys tried their best to make a little snowman.

 Leaf arms and Aiden's snow hat!

And then it was crushed. What can I say? I have boys.

After getting thoroughly chilled through, we headed inside for hot chocolate and watched the snow melt off for the rest of the afternoon.

Next up, why the rest of spring break was ruined.