Day at the Beach

After Larkin's soccer game on Saturday we took off to the beach.  We rolled into Tilllamook around noon and had some lunch and ice-cream at the cheese factory.  Then headed down to Cape Kiwanda to see how the kids fared at climbing the dune.

We "raced" to the top and Larkin won.  Later she came up to me and said something to the effect of "Thank's Dad for letting me win, but I know Dad...I was going to die I was so tired"  

Noah and Joshua spent a lot of their time hunting jelly fish.

Joshua's prize jelly.  We "pickled" a few of these this morning in a little spice jar I had sitting around.  They look cool but we couldn't get air into them to make them float.  

The 2nd time we all went to the top of the dune I sat down and watched them play on the rope swing and thought that'd be a great picture.  "Hey kids," I said, "I'll be right back...well, better give me 15 minutes or so."  I talked Sarah into coming back up as I grabbed the camera.

Noah swinging off the edge of the world...

And Joshua...

And Sarah!

Arwen did it too but I only got video of that.

I was running down the hill at a thousand miles an hour when I looked off tho my left and here comes Noah zipping past me.  I speed up and fumble with the camera.  The end of the dune was approaching and I couldn't get enough distance between me and Noah to get the shot so I flipped it on and blindly pointed in his direction and took a few shots and got lucky.  

We did one last climb and run before heading home for the evening.  

It was a perfect day at the beach.

Zombie Apocalypse Run

Sarah and I ran in the Zombie Apocalypse Run yesterday evening.  It was full of helicopters out "hunting" for zombies, people in hazmat suits, and military out to keep survivors safe.  There were even 3 huge machines out showing off their impressive "punkin chunkin" skills.  It was awesome!

You could choose to be a Zombie or a Survivor.

We chose zombie.

All survivors had velcro flags around their waists and if they crossed the finish line with a flag they survived.

 It was a little over a 5k and the survivors got a 2 min head start.  It was a trail run and was gorgeous!  We went through the spooky woods, corn stalks and farms.

It was a lot of fun growling and having people scatter when you caught up to them.  I'd chase some of them down for a while till they tired out then go for their flags.

Both Sarah and I got a few kills under our belt and had a great time.  One of Sarah's kills fought back, got his flag from Sarah and ran off course into the fields.  (Sarah here--Aaron is being modest.  He got lots of kills and I almost had 2.  Aaron was one of the very first "zombies" in.  We went to Olive Garden after to re-fuel.  You should have seen the looks and heard the comments.  One old man was disgusted and had some choice words for Aaron.  It was great.)

First Day of School

Joshua was totally excited that he got a Mario backpack this year.

I can't remember ever being excited about school.

They have a new school location this year that they are all excited about.

Joshua and his backpack hook.

At his desk. 

Noah's still excited. 

 Arwen has an awesome underground tunnel to her dungeon classroom.

Which looks like a normal classroom once you get there.

Here's our 12 man Hood to Coast team.  We were team Mustache.  Each van has 6 runners and we all run 3 legs to cover the 199 miles from Mount Hood to the beach at Seaside.

Here's our Van the morning of HTC.

And again up on the mountain.

And again on the start line...just a few more minutes to go.  Sarah's getting nervous, so are the rest of us.

Sarah's first leg was a Very Hard due to the rapid 2000 foot elevation drop over 5.64 miles.  The scenery is beautify though.  She did great.  The 2nd leg is the worst because you just ran your heart out and then sit in a car and your muscles tighten up.  It's hard enough to walk let alone run your second leg.  Sarah's 2nd leg was through the middle of scary downtown Portland for 7.3 miles at night, she handed off the baton at about 10:00 PM.  I finished my leg that night at 1:30 in the morning.  When we were all done with the 2nd leg we drove to the next exchange point excited to maybe get an hour or two of sleep before we started up again on our 3rd leg.  I was falling asleep at the wheal and turned the driving over to Bethany, we only had a few more minutes to the exchange.  But there was traffic problems and it ended up taking an hour or so.  We spread out a tarp and got in our sleeping bags or just sprawled out in the car for a little sleep.  Somehow the few minutes we got were enough to feel a lot better when Sarah started our 3rd leg off.  The 3rd leg was pretty exciting because when you were done, you were DONE!      

We relaxed on the beach and waiting for the other van to finish their 3rd leg so we could all run over the finish line together.  The weather was perfect.

The whole team at the finish line.  Our total time was 28 hours 56 minuets.  That's an average of an 8:43 min/mile over 199 miles.  Pretty awesome.     

We started talking "next year" on the way home.

Belly Flop Master

Turns out Noah is an expert belly flopper.

Portland

We went into Portland on Saturday to pick up our Hood To Coast packet and spend the rest of the day playing around in the city.

The light rail was fun.  We parked at Washington Park and went into the city from the the tunnel.

Arwen's knee walker didn't show up in time.  It was waiting when we got home so I pushed here around in a little stroller all day.  She was a little embarrassed but got over it I think.  

We watched some aerial acrobatics for a bit, pretty impressive stuff. 

Watched some fun street performances and wandered around the Saturday Market.  We haven't been there in a long time and it's sure grown.  Lot's of fun stuff.  The kids wanted everything.

I wish I knew how to weld.

Played in some new water fountains. 

 Drying off in the sun.  She was also very tired and ready for a nap.  But was energized after a nap on dads sholder and a little sea lioning in the sun.

 Noah was sure posing for the camera.

Not sure what the fake angry face was for.

 We all had a great day but Noah must have loved it the most.

Smith Rock

I took Noah on a camping and rock climbing adventure this last weekend and he and I had a lot of fun. 

First we hiked around Camp Kilowan mapping out the 5 mile 2nd year hike for Sarah.

 Then next day we drove over to Smith Rock to do some climbing.

Noah was really good.  I want to see what he can do in climbing shoes instead of his clodhopper tennis shoes.

Though he's a great climber repelling afterwards is still his favorite part.  We clocked in at over 15 miles of hiking for the two days.  Noah was amazed that he hiked that far without complaining.

Cold Christmas in Denver

We got a taste of the cold we were in for in Denver on the drive.  We thought -11º F was pretty bad but we hit -17º F or so on the way home.

We took a stop at Shoshone Falls in Twin Falls and had fun looking at all the frozen waterfalls and trying to break holes in a little frozen lake.

We did a little tennis shoe ice skating on a big patch of  ice on one of the overlooks.  Only a few crashes.

All in all the drive was nice.  The kids had their endless supply of movies and Sarah and I had audio books.