Last Days of Summer

Well, since it legitimately feels like fall, a bit of rain here and there and a crispness outside, even when it's 80 degrees; combined with the fact that the sounds of college football now fill the air (including one unmentionable game today) I thought I'd fill you all in on our last days of summer, before it's too late.

So, to begin with, around August 15th we hiked a trail to a mountain meadow that was pretty amazing. It was a fairly easy hike and the meadow was just flat out gorgeous. But, it was real wet. Like muddy and swampy. Apparently, too early or too late or there had been some rain or whatever. But, of course, Nickel loved it. Not so much her hose-bath outside later, however.









So then the next week I went to Cannon Beach with a bunch of ladies from church. Cannon is gorgeous, and apparently when you go out while it's low tide you see tons and tons and tons of these:



Isn't that amazing!?! I don't think I've ever seen a real starfish outside of the aquarium. They were everywhere...almost to the point of gross, actually. And smelly. Plus, bugs. But seriously, amazing. Sharon actually even picked one up. Uhhhh...





Then we saw one of these, which has like 18 legs and was just crazy. Plus, there were all sorts of caves and things we could walk through, so all of it was just incredible.



Then, as soon as I got home from the coast Daniel and I headed out for our first for real hike-in camping trip.



We have the equipment for it and have planned on it for a long time, but have just never done it. So we headed out for a hike in the gorge, that really we didn't know much about. But apparently it had some streams/rivers, so we could get some fresh water. Well...several, several miles later we were getting pretty despondent. The entire thing was uphill and we had on those packs and there was no water. But don't worry, we made it. Five miles, and eventually we found a "seasonal" stream that is very literally seasonal and had just enough water to put in our nalgene with a filter. Plus, it was very close to dark by the time we got there. But we made a fire just in time and set up our stove, and let me tell you, Daniel is much better at picking out freeze dried meals than I am. Last time I did they were questionable, but this time he got us some actually really good pasta, mac and cheese and granola with strawberries. Yum.



The views were awesome, and we spent much more time with them on the way back down the next morning. Through the trees you could see the river and the state of Washington and we were super high. Plus, could see Mt. Adams and got to just sit and stare at it. And of course, Nickel loved it.





So then last weekend we headed out to a lake at the foot of Mt. Hood to do a bit more luxurious camping. Timothy Lake is a pretty popular camping spot to people out here, and there are some good reasons for that, we found out. Our campsite was right across a trail from the lake, which we were able to take our kayaks out on and just stare at the mountain. It was stinking amazing. Amazing.





There was a super easy hike that took us around the lake and from it there was this unreal view of the lake and Mt. Hood.



Plus, we relaxed and played cards and cooked awesome meals, including s'mores, hotdogs, and these unreal sugar and cinnamon "donuts." And did I mention we went out of the lake in our kayaks and just sat there?!







Nickel didn't like this one so much. I mean, she liked it. But she had to be leashed up the entire time, and then there was the incident of us trying to teach her how to swim. We thought it would be interesting since we had the kayaks and could go out while keeping her on the leash. Plus, it helped that she really wanted to chase the ducks.





SO...she swam!!! She hated it. Like was miserable, freaked out and panicked. But she tried it one more time when she saw some more ducks, and she'll be better next time, don't worry.



And in addition to ducks, Nickel really took to hunting bees, which was really interesting. I think she maybe actually swallowed like 4 or 5, and she didn't appear to get stung. Daniel, however, was not so lucky. But good news! Daniel's not allergic to bees! They did hurt him, however.



So those were our summer trips! And fall's upon us, which means amazing weather, pumpkins and the scent of cinnamon, two very important birthdays, the start of school-year youth group and a new house!!!! Hooray!

the rents

So almost two weeks ago the Monroes came to visit. (That's where we'll start...there's more to post about before that but we had to find a place to start, right...?)


Daniel and I picked Debbie and Ron up at the airport Thursday night and we drove out to Mount Hood to a g o r g e o u s condo. Matt and Kim met up with us Friday night and we spent the long weekend snowboarding and skiing, staring at the snow and hanging out...here are some pretty amazing pictures—if they look antique-y it's because they were taken with disposable camera on the mountain. The first one is me (if you can't tell) and the second is Daniel's dad. And if you look the background, right there where the clouds are, you can't tell because it's white, but that's the peak of mount hood...


On Sunday daniel and i went back to town to go to church/youth group, and Matt, Kim, Debbie and Ron stayed at the mountain and went snowshoeing...and it looks so pretty...


So here's the mystery of the weekend...and I know I'm not going to be able to explain it well enough, but it's totally worth it anyhow. So we were playing board games Friday night and Daniel and I had brought a plastic bag full of Skipbo cards. Trust me. The entire deck was there. We play with them often. Keep them in one place. Got the bag out to pack it and would have noticed if there were cards missing. And Friday evening Daniel got all the games out of the very securely-packed backpack and and put them on the table. Definitely didn't notice anything weird about the cards. When we went to play games and decide which game to play, I held up the bag of cards and everyone looked at me and I even commented about the stack of cards and I swear. The entire deck was there. Okay, so Saturday afternoon we were sitting around and glanced over at the table to see the skipbo cards...with 3/4 of the deck missing (!!!) So 3/4 of a large deck of cards. Bag sealed. We looked everywhere. Under the couch, all in the couch cushins, all over the (by the way spacious and mostly-empty) living room, throughout our room, the backpack, the other bags...everywhere. e v e r y w h e r e. no cards. 3/4 of an entire deck of cards...just dissapeared. that would be weird, but i promise, it would be weirder if you were there. if you had looked seriously everywhere and not found any missing cards. and if you honestly played skipbo almost every night of the week...WELL, that's not all. So Sunday afternoon daniel realized that he had not taken the key to the condo off his keyring. we were already back in town and the rest of the group had not checked out yet, so he called his parents and explained the situation. The next day Debbie and Ron showed up at our apartment and, before we went to lunch, Debbie handed me the address to the condo to mail them back the key. So that I wouldn't forget, I (in this exact order, and remember...our apartment is small. Not much room for error—literally) took the address from her and put it on the coffee table, walked 10 steps to the hooks by the door where we keep our keys, got daniel's keys and removed said condo key. Walked back to the coffee table, put the key down, turned around and leaned over the couch to my desk located a foot behind our couch, got an envelope, pen and piece of paper. Sat down on the couch, wrote a short note explaining, copied the address onto the envelope, as well as our return address, folded the piece of paper and tucked teh key inside. Put the piece of paper and key into the envelope and sealed the envelope. Leaned back over the couch, got out the stamps and put one on the envelope. Debbie and Ron practically stood there and watched me (it wasn't weird or anything...we were talking). By that time it was time to go and I picked up the envelope to take it to our outgoing mail. As I walked, I held the envelope in my hand and tilted it back and forth letting the key fall from side to side. It fell side to side. I remember the weight. I remember the key inside the envelope. Inside the envelope. Last Thursday we got a call from the condo. The got the envelope. Sealed. No holes. Letter inside. and yet. no key. seriously, no key. how is this even possible?!?! things dissapear at this condo place. dissapear. (this. this is how exciting our life is...)

Ummmm so the monroes were here for like three more days but we didn't take any more pictures. We did have tons of fun and such a good time just hanging out and being together. but alas no more pictures. but hey this is a post, right :)

eventful weekend

well, if we've been quiet here, it's because we were preparing for what happened sunday night...but more about that soon.

let's start with friday. fall colors. fall temperatures (highs in the 60s, eek). we started with a cupcake in the park while nickel ran in circles around us like a crazydog.

saturday morning we headed to the hood river county fruit loop. the "cereal" daniel likes to call it (fruit loop...) essentially it's just like a 36 or so mile stretch of road at the base of mt. hood. the valley has extremely fertile soil, and so tons of fruit trees and bushes and the like grow there and so it's become an attraction of sorts—berries of all types early in the summer, cherries in late summer, and apples and pears all fall!

the views of the mountain were gorgeous. it's by far the closest we've ever been to it and while not much snow remains on parts of it that we can see usually, i'm pretty sure that huge chunk of snow right there is actually the year-round glacier on the mountain, which is pretty stinkin cool.

and we got plenty of apples (just for a pie and eating this time...don't worry, we did the apple butter and sauce last year and still have some leftover, so we'll wait on that until next year) and a couple of delicious pears.


and look what else we saw!!!! farm animals!!!


and alpacas!!! these things are amazing. they're like a sheep/llama mix. and apparently these alpaca farmers make a ton of money doing this, so we're considering it for retirement in 70 or so years...

we ate some oregon bbq and were home in plenty of time for a victorious football game

and then sunday.

our first youth group event!!!

so yes. our first ever CRCC youth group event sunday night. it went SO WELL. we had 50+ high school and middle schoolers, which is huge!!! the excitement was super high, the place packed and daniel wore a blue leisure suit. we did donut olympics (which at this point i need to apologize to all NGHS students and former students. we miss you guys!)

we've heard great feedback since, and since i'm a third party and think you all should know...everyone has been really, really impressed by daniel and how it all went. so yay! huge success...now we just have to keep momentum up and excitement high and keep kids interested. but we're REALLY, really excited, really encouraged not only by everything that's happening, but by everyone here, and really can't believe it went so well. did i mention it went well?

okay, we're off to a high school volleyball game (we're now experts on high school volleyball, by the way, in case anyone's interested...)

ps. you can see more of these pictures, as always, at our flickr page