Vacation Fun and Photos

I know there is nothing worse than sitting through your neighbor's "home movies." But trust me, this will be fun!

Alice and I left last Saturday, the 9th for the Pacific Northwest. Our first stop was in Portland, OR then a short drive to Albany, OR where my sister lives. We spent some time there and were even fortunate to have my niece Angie and her kids Bryson and Lindsay come down for a visit. It was a great time. Plus, I had not seen my nephew Michael in over ten years so that was a special treat. We had great laughs, terrific food, and a nice time catching up with family.

Then it was off to the Tri-Cities, WA. My mom had come out to OR so the three of us drove back along the Columbia River gorge through the Dalles and were treated to several groups of sail borders and kite borders along the river. It was something to see. We even caught a quick glimpes of about seven Big Horn Sheep - I didn't know we had any in that area. Then, when we stopped for a break, Alice thought the deer in the front yard of a person's house looked very life like. That was because it was!

The following week we caught up with Heather and the grand sons who had flown in from England to spend some time with their other grandparents. We rented a hotel rooom so we could use the pool and the boys loved it. Well - we all loved it!

Elam and Silas had taken swimming lessons in Dallas before going over to the UK. Unfortunately, there has not been much of an opportunity to keep the skills up. So the pool was a real treat for them. Naturally, Elam just walked right in and began swimming. Silas, followed his big brother and when I turned around he was thrashing in the water. I asked Heather if that was normal and she said "NO!!!" So I jumped in a pulled him up. It took a while for him to warm up to the water again, but Heather did a good job of making him "get back on the horse." And, as you will see from the pictures posted below, he did fine.

After our visit with Heather and the boys, we had a chance to spend some time with my younger sister Debbie, her husband Russ, and my niece Joanna, her husband Rich, and thier young son Brenden. We had some wonderful meals and good conversation.

When things had cleared out, Alice and I (Alice mostly) did some garden work for mom and then cleaned up around the house. I took on the task of eliminating the hornets from around the back fence area. And then we did some painting on the exterior of the fence before we headed out.

We drove up to Spokane, Wa to catch our flight home. Had a nice dinner with Debbie and Mom before they headed back. Then it was lights out for an early flight back on Sunday the 17th.

It was a wonderful time and something that we'll share more of down the road. But we hope you enjoy the pictures below. There are three slide shows so we hope you get a chuckle every now and then.

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A very SPECIAL THANK YOU to Jon and Paula, our good friends who so graciously watched Eli for us while we were gone. It was so nice to know that he was in good and loving hands. They are very special people and we are so thankful to have their friendship.

God Bless