Back to School

It is time to go back to school!  Liam and Kate started first grade at Boeckman 

and Jacob and Claire went to 7th grade for their second year at Meridian Creek middle school.

Torin went to his second year of pre-school at Valley Christian

With the little bit of extra time, that meant that Jared and Dani could continue their weekly temple attendance.

We love our kids enthusiasm for learning - in all its forms!

 

More Summertime Fun

Jacob bribed Liam to eat a spiraled zucchini, and if he could eat it, he would earn $1. Dani had gone to answer the door, and while she was there, the zucchini and ALL of Liam's dinner came back up! Dani was NOT impressed with Jared encouraging such behavior, but it is now family lore. And Liam did not get the $1.

Summer concerts in the Korean War Memorial Park were our favorite. We enjoy biking there and eating a picnic dinner, listening to some music, dancing, and biking back.

Dani and Jared enjoy going biking on the Springwater Corridor and stopping by the Springwater Cart Park for some dinner. Sometimes, we go on a weekend evening or on a Saturday morning.

Jared and Ryan enjoy taking bike rides around Wilsonville. It is beautiful country and the roads aren't too busy.

 One day, we were on a bike ride west of Wilsonville going up Ladd Hill and happened upon Jim running the opposite direction!

Wilsonville has lots of events in town center, and it is fun to see friends whenever we go.

Dani and Jessica took the kids out to Canby to play in the the Molalla River on a beautiful summer day. Summers in Oregon are the best!!!

The Stafford Ward Picnic was a lot of fun.

The kids joined a pie eating contest - really, just whip cream on crushed oreos.

Kate Jeffries put on a concert in the back yard of the Lowes. It was a beautiful scenery, and Kate did wonderfully!

A summer weekend date on paddle boards on the Willamette with Dani - this is basically Jared's dream coming true!

 

Clayton and Wyatt come to visit

Clayton and Wyatt came to visit for a few days, so we took them to see sights of Portland. One of the highlights was the Beacon Rock hike.

It is not too long of a hike, about 1.8 miles round trip, but it is pretty much straight up! It leads to an incredible view of the Columbia River Gorge.

It was such a beautiful day (as are pretty much all Portland summer days, of course). The view was spectacular!

The stairs going up and down are always fun to take pictures on!

We went to the Bonneville fish hatchery next to the Columbia River. It wasn't the high season for it, but it was fun to see the different ponds of fish as they were growing.

 

Breckin comes to visit - and we went from mountains to the ocean!

Grandma Vicki has a tradition of bringing grandchildren to visit us, and this year was Breckin's turn, so we filled our days with activities.

One day we went to Mount Hood's adventure park.

We did the alpine slides, climbed rock walls, tried a Jacob's ladder (unsuccessfully), went summer tubing, and lots of other fun activities.

One of the coolest things that we did was "ride the rails" near the Oregon coast. After a pretty windy drive (with carsick people!), we arrived and got set up on our rail car bikes.

We got to wear super bright colored vests.

Jared partnered with Claire, Dani partnered with Torin, Breckin and Liam were a team, and Jacob went with Grandma.

It was genuinely a lot of fun riding through the woods on railroad tracks.

We would stop at any crossing so the guide could stand by the road as a crossing guard. It was kind of funny. Then, once we got to our destination, we picked up our bikes, turned around, and went back.

We crossed a bridge on the way there and back. It really was a cool activity!!!

Afterwards, we went to the beach at Rockaway.

The kids braved the cold, cold water (and goaded Jared in eventually).

Not content with rail riding as exercise, Jared and Dani took a jog on the beach.

Dani had all sorts of hot mom vibes going on that day!

We built sand castles, played Kubb, flew a kite, and had an amazing day on the Oregon Coast.

What a great way to show off the beautiful country we live in (even though everywhere we went was met with "Wyoming is better!")

On the way home, we took a stop by the Tillamook factory to get some ice cream!

It is special that we have a family that loves to get together and that Vicki helps to continue and build relationships among the cousins.