Cannon Beach + Haystack Rock

Hey you guuuyysss!

The last couple weeks have been a little chaotic around my house as we adjust to having a new roommate as well as school starting back up again. I'm still trying to figure out a good sleeping plan that works with the family but also allows me get enough sleep. I've been a little on edge trying to balance working at night four nights a weeks while still being present with the family. Such a juggling act!

I've been working now for about a month and it's going as good as the night shift can. It goes without say that I was relieved and excited to hear Perry had Labor Day off work because typically that would mean more sleep for me! Instead of sleeping the day away though, I brought up the idea to him about potentially spending the day at the beach. I later asked HD what he wanted to do on his day off school and he thought going to the ocean would be fun. Just like that a trip to the beach was planned for day when temperatures were supposed to reach 100* at home and a pleasant 80* on the beach.

On our first to the coast we went to Astoria and then wandered south a little to Fort Stevens State Park. Loved it! So peaceful! This time we drove southwest to Cannon Beach. Such a cute little town! I wish I had the whole day to wander the town and peek into all the little shops. In case you didn't know though, Cannon Beach is known for its landmark, Haystack Rock. Who recognizes Haystack Rock from one of my favorite movies, "The Goonies"? Hey you guuuyyyysss!

*These pictures were take by HD. He missed the entire back drop in the first set he took. In the second set, he really got into his photographer roll by waving his hand in the direction he wanted us to move. Go this way! No no too far, go back this way! Come closer! *thumbs up* It was really hard to keep my composure while watching his adorableness.*

 

We strolled the beach for a while and enjoyed watching the kids chase the waves. I imagine the beach is usually pretty busy in the summer, but extra busy this time with it being Labor Day. It was almost high tide when we left beach in search of food. Turns out we had strolled nearly a mile...

After much wandering, we stumbled upon a quaint little cafe to stuff our faces called the Season Cafe. They mostly served cold deli sandwiches and hot panini sandwiches but we all left full. I even stepped out of my normal "Ham + Cheese Sandwich" routine and opted for a BLT instead, since I hadn't had one in so so long. Yumm!

Immmediately when we finished up, we raced over to Bruce's Candy Kitchen to pick up some taffy before heading home. While we were there we were able to watch them spin the taffy on their machine. Fresh taffy is my favorite! I may have picked up a large bag of taffy to bring home... The boys also picked out a bag of PopRocks to eat.

I had napped for about half an hour or so on the way to the coast so by the time we were ready to leave around 2pm, I was exhausted. I stayed awake as long as possible but inevitably fell in and out of sleep on the trip home. You know how restful sleeping in a car is...

Aside from my exhaustion, it was nice to be able to get away for an afternoon and just enjoy ourselves. I do have to admit I was slightly irritated that I thought I left my phone at home. I brought my Canon Rebel but some things are easier to do with my phone, like take a video. Luckily I had something to capture our day. HD found my phone as we piled out of the car when we got home. Go figure. It probably fell of my lap during my morning snooze.

Camping at Grandma's House

On Friday, while Perry was working from home, I asked if we could set the tent up in the backyard for the boys to sleep in that night. We hadn't been camping yet this year, and I thought this would be fun for them. He responded with a, "why don't we just go somewhere to camp?" After a busy few weeks, I thought this would be the last thing he wanted to do. We hadn't discussed where we'd camp, but agreed to go somewhere. At dinner with Grandma that evening, she told us how she was planning on going to Whitefish to unload a grill for the house, without any help, so we volunteered to meet her there to help, and then go camping after. 

We scrambled around Friday evening and Saturday morning to get everything packed up. It *barely* fit! After a long drive to Whitefish with a lot of traffic, we met up with Grandma and had lunch at MacKenzie River Pizza before we went out to the house. Although the house had a ton of mosquitoes, the kids enjoyed running around for a few minutes. Charlotte enjoyed running/scooting/rolling down the hill off the deck. SO cute to watch! I would say she's walking 50% of the time now!

Before we left Whitefish, we stopped at Whitefish Lake to meet up with a mutual friend of mine and Perry. Unfortunately they were out on a paddle boat when we arrived which caused us to miss out on seeing them. (I'm hoping to take the kids back up there this week to see them again though!) We finally made it out of Whitefish around 4:00 and planned on camping somewhere in the Swan Lake area, about  2 hours away...and once we started exploring the area, we found every spot was taken. At that point we decide to just camp out at Placid Lake outside of Seeley...when we arrived there, we discovered every spot was taken there too.... So we camped in Grandma's backyard by the river. Basically we spent a total of about 6 hours in the car thorough the entire day, and ended up camping 50 miles from home...

 Camping at Grandma's had a couple big perks though! For one, we were able to use the tractor to haul everything back and forth. For two, it had a bathroom. Enough said. 

Before Perry and I could even get our stuff down by the fire pit, the boys were already playing in the river. Hunter was crawdad hunting and thought he found one. 

 Charlotte was a trooper the entire trip. She hardly fussed at all. She napped for a total of maybe 2 hours throughout the day. And missed out on her morning and afternoon snack. 

 The boys were awesome too! They also missed out on an afternoon snack and kept their attitudes in check throughout the day even though dinner didn't happen until close to 8:00p. 

 After a little arguing, we finally had the tent set up. Perry hates reading the directions...

 Once the boys finished eating, I told them I had a surprise for them - Glow-in-the-dark bubbles. Except they either didn't work, or it wasn't dark enough. I bought glow sticks and dump the insides into the bubbles, and the container was glowing, but the bubbles didn't. 

 Luckily I brought other glow sticks to play with. 

 Like these glasses. Hard to keep on, but fun in the dark!

 Charlotte had her fun with the glow-in-the-dark stuff too!

 JP probably had the most fun though!

 We all crawled into bed around 10:30 and despite the few rocks we were laying on, we all fell asleep fairly quickly. Charlotte woke up around 1:15 and cried for a while. She was probably out of sorts being outside in the dark. After about fifteen minutes of bawling, she finally calmed down, and slept with me. She did the air sucking thing that people do after they stop crying for about half an hour. Does that have a name? 

Just as she was sound asleep, it started sprinkling...Before I knew it, we were in the middle of a down pour with flash lighting and LOUD thunder. It woke Perry up (which is hard to do) and even though two of us were talking in our normal voices, it was still hard to hear each other. Charlotte and Hunter slept through it all. JP woke up at the end of the thunderstorm. He came over to me and told me he was scared, and asked to snuggled with me. Before I could even get a word out, he was snuggled up on my pillow, asleep. Once Perry and I were done laughing about it, I woke him back up to go get his sleeping bag and bring it over next to me. After he was laying there for a while, I asked him how he was doing. "Not good mom!" He then scooted to the bottom of his sleeping bag and plugged his ears for a while... I was just glad JP and Hunter didn't wake up during the storm and need to go to the bathroom! Perry left the tent for a while so he could watch the storm, and there was no way I was about to leave the tent, let alone my sleeping bag!

 I did get to wake up to this cutie though! Actually, it was the sounds of her and Hunter giggling, as he had crawled into the pack-n-play to play with her before we everyone else woke up. 

By the time we left the cabin, we had a lot of tire people! And I'm the only one who hasn't napped yet! Not fair!

Family Sunday: Golfing at Beaver Creek

Okay...so maybe it wasn't a Sunday, but it still counts for our weekly family day! For the weekend of July 11 & 12th, the ENTIRE family made a visit to the Dome Home. Initially our big family get together was because there was supposed to be a golf tournament on the 12th, but it was cancelled. Since we all planned on going anyways, we all came with our clubs anyways. 

Perry has been acting as the interim district manager right now while the new guy moves over from Chicago. Our trip to the Hi-Line was planned for the weekend after his first week with his "new" job. He made his first store visits to the Bozeman and Billings stores and then made the loop to the round house. It worked out perfect since he's been in Washington for the last few weeks. Anyways, Kile, Chris & Casey made the long 8+ hour drive, Kim brought her boyfriend Julian, and Robin all met up in Hingham for a short weekend of fun. 

 Once we had the babysitter settled in, we headed out the golf course in Havre. The weather was GREAT! Although the "real" tournament was cancelled, my dad rounded up quite a few other people and we had a mini tournament. I think in total there was about 20 of us - we made up a solid half of them!

 I've never done it before, but we played a best ball scramble. I think that's what you call it... But everyone teed off and then we took the best ball, then everyone hit their ball from that spot and took the best ball...and so on. I wasn't much help...

 We played girls vs boys. My dad was SO excited to hang out with "his boys"!

 I was the lucky one to share a cart with Kimmy, who was mostly referred to as Wie (the famous golfer). If there was a "Wie" pun, it was used, the entire day. "Wie need to golf better!" "You're going the wrong way. Oh, Saw-wie!" And let me just tell you about our carts! Ours had super speed. You were either stopped or going super fast. No in between. Plenty of times we passed Robin up in her extra slow cart. Kile and Mom's cart was "normal" except for you had to shut it off when you weren't moving because it would sit there and idle. 

 Isn't this momma-to-be adorable? Couple more months and I'll have another nephew!

 Sisters!

 The girls ended up losing, by 2? strokes, even though we had a pretty big handicap. I guess we have to do the dishes on the holidays... I'm glad Thanksgiving is with the Dustin's this year! Or so I think anyways... 

 Even though we lost, we still did pretty good! 

 After golf everyone met up at the Hingham park for a barbecue. Although I attempted to prevent it, Perry passed out for a while. He had a little too much fun :) 

 And so did Julian with my camera...

 Check out this big kid too! He was walking every where! I can't believe he's going to be a big brother!

Once we got back from town, Perry and I watched the sunset over the Sweet Grass mountains. When we were lighting off fireworks, I made a comment about the Super Moon to the boys. Apparently neither Perry or Julian have seen it this big, and red before. What a treat for them!

A Glance at our Weekend in Philipsburg

For the long weekend, we took a trip to Georgetown Lake with Grandma Betty, and family friends Scott and Barbara. 

 The house we stayed in had a gorgeous view of lake from the back deck!

 After spending the morning mining for sapphires, we spent Saturday evening relaxing around the campfire.

 You can't have a campfire without hot dogs!

 When I was working on our gallery wall in our room, I realized Perry and I have *very few* photos together, so I'm trying to be more diligent in giving the camera to someone else. How cute are we?!

 But I love this picture of Grandma and Hunter a little more!

Is that really JP in a green chair? Who would have thought...

After a wonderful night playing dominoes (and winning if I may add), we all hit the hay exhausted. Sunday morning we went back to Gem Mountain before heading into Philipsburg for lunch and a stroll around downtown. 

If you've heard anything about Philipsburg, you know that they have an *amazing* candy shop called 'The Sweet Palace.' Go to this place!

 

 The wall are lined with candy. I was drawn into the sucker sticks, or whatever you call them.

 There are buckets and buckets of candy!

 

 SO much to choose from!

 Fortunately for JP, he just had to find the green ones... Unfortunately for Hunter, he didn't eat breakfast OR lunch so he missed out on the opportunity to pick out candy. What a bummer!

Green candy...Yumm!

Tell us where you're from: Rudyard?! Who did I know that I just missed?! 

 I just love all the old building this little town has. Completely in love!

 Most of the group - minus Scott and Charlotte

We had lunch at Doe Brothers and it was delicious! They have the best chicken tenders and fries! After our stroll around town, we stopped back in for ice cream. 

 After checking out of the house we rented, we drove through Philipsburg one more time so Hunter and JP could play at the elementary school park. Is this not just an awesome looking school?

 It reminded me of Dragon's Hallow in Missoula.

 Except this one had a jail!

 These boys wore themselves out, Perry included!

 I, however, discovered this amazing chair swing. So relaxing! 

 Check out this stud. I am in love with his new glasses. 

Charlotte was a little angel during the whole trip, even though her naps were few and short.