OREGON TRIP - The drive

Oregon was very green and pretty to drive through. Brooklyn was surprisingly good throughout the whole thing. She slept, played with her dolls ate snacks and even got to watch a new movie. She thououghly enjoyed Veggie Tales. Mark and I listened to the book "The Host" on CD and it was long enough to last both there and back and we liked the book but hated the readers voice. :)

Parks along the way.

Kids are so much happier when you let thenm out to run! Brooklyn is getting so big and daring and hardly needs help at the playground anymore. She's only been to a playground a couple of times and only starting this year. She's growing up too fast but keeps getting cuter and more fun.

Pretty Views

The view fromt he back portch of our condo. We turned the furnature to look out the windows and could have just sat and watched the wild waves all day.

Look! Are those whales?! Probably not. I was so excited to go stay at Depoe Bay the "Whale Watching Capitol" but it ended up being so stomy there were no boats going out on tours because the waves were too dangerous. Normally you wouldn't even need to go out on a boat to see the whales. The people at eh condo's said there were 5 whales right up in the bay by the condos Saterday, the day before we got there and the Friday before that the whale watching centers cencus for the day was 40 whale sightings including grey whales and orca whales. However, we got there Sunday when the storm came in and it stayed all week. Bummer.

I love these two!

Thanks again for coming mom and dad!

Family photo courtesy of the camera timer.

Harbor Seals

We found some cute seals "sun bathing," though it was not very sunny, on some rocks in a little harbor. They were very fun to watch. Mark and I go down to them first and my mom followed a few minutes after. Now, kite flying is a big activity along the coast because it's quite windy, and there are specialty kite stores and such. So my mom bought a kite and was constantly looking for oppertunities to fly it, so here she comes walking down the path to the harbor, flying the kite, and the seals all got big eyed and started to dart into the water. She quickly took it down but they were very suspicious of us after that. What's funny about that also it my mom had just been told a few minutes earlier, by the lighthouse, that she couldn't fly it there because it would scare the birds. A couple days later the kite broke off it's string because it was so windy and landed on the roof of the condo. She was sad.

Oregon Coast Aquarium

We loved the aquarium. Some of our favorites were seeing the cute sea otters swimming in their pond being fed shrimp for dinner. They are very animated. The seals in their tank. Some of them were enormous. And the circular shark/fish tank with the walkway in between so you are surrounded by the water. Very cool. Brooklyn was afraid of the sharks, which I thought was a learned trait but apparently not. I also loved seeing the halibut. I had no idea they were such weird fish! They're borm normal but them start swimming sideways and one eye migrates over close to they other one. They're actually pretty ugly. Sorry fish. Brooklyn learned how to say "ocean" and "fishie" on this trip. I'm not sure anyone else could underswtand her, but mommy can!

Yaquina Bay Lighthouse

There's just something about lighthouses, isn't there? It wasn't anything grand but very pretty to see. Mark and I also climbed the 93 vertical stairs to the top, saw the light and panoramic views and had shakey knees by the time we made it back to the bottom. Love it!