A Whirlwind Washington Adventure

We were lucky to get a short trip in up to visit with my Husband's Sister up in Seattle for a day and then we headed east to visit a charming mountain town where we stayed in a cozy A-frame cabin for the night. It was a very hot trip in the mountains, like crazy hot. Made me wish we stayed a little bit longer to soak up the Puget Sound.

My husband used to travel constantly with work and one such work trip led him to the small mountain town of Leavenworth, Washington. The entire town is themed like a Bavarian village. He really enjoyed it there and wanted to share it with us someday. Since we were going up to Seattle anyway we decided this would be a good time to check it out, especially since we are moving away from the Pacific Northwest in a few short weeks and this might be our last chance for a while.

My little merman.

                                                   Perfect day on the Puget Sound.

 This is one of the prettiest drives I have been on and for once I was not driving!

 Can you spot the little blue A-frame hiding in the trees? I think I have found my dream home.

 It was in the 90s when we got to the cabin so we decided to visit the creek on the lower part of the property. The water was crystal clear and ice cold a perfect little oasis. We were even visited by three goats who came running down the hill on the opposite side of the creek. They were very happy to play in the water too.

The Three Billy Goats Gruff.

 Solomon enjoying the loft in the cabin. One guess where he chose to sleep.

Leavenworth,Washington.

 So much detail in this cute little town. I loved all the murals and detailed woodwork on all the shops.

                   Solomon melting in his jeans. I figured it would be cool in the mountains so I packed pants and long sleeve shirts. I couldn't have been more wrong.

 There was a statue of three goats outside this building, the kids thought that was great after our random meeting with the goats at the creek.

Before our very hot, and very long drive back to Portland we stopped and visited some cute farm friends.....well most of them were cute......

A trip to Seattle

We took a little  family weekend trip up to Seattle this past weekend. It has been a long time since I had been out of Portland, or done anything at all really so it was a nice change of pace.

Our trips are usually out and away from any city because I am not much of a city person, my soul craves the quiet and peace of nature and Oregon has so many beautiful places to chose from. Not to mention spending time in any city is expensive, especially with a family of five.I thought Portland was big but compared to Seattle it feels very small. 

That being said we had a great time.

One benefit of Ben traveling constantly with work is that he earns rewards points towards free hotel rooms and it doesn't take long at all before he racks up enough points for a free room. So we stayed for free all weekend.The hotel we stayed at was just three blocks from the Space Needle and we had a great view of it from our room. The kids had fun watching the elevator go up and down while lying in bed. We found out that the Pacific Science Center accepted Portland OMSI membership so we also all got into the Science Center for free! What a thrifty trip it was!

That's how we roll.

We also got to spend some time with Ben's sister which was fun.

To be Continued.....

Tulip Festing...

(Photo by Solomon)

                                        This is what I get when I ask Sollie to take a picture with me.

Photo by Ben

We took a trip out to the Tulip Festival in Woodburn,Oregon. It was our first time going, but since I am a sucker for road trips and taking pictures I couldn't believe we haven't gone before. I told Ben, "Can you believe we haven't been here before? This seems like the kind of thing I would make us do every year." I have avoided it in the past because of stories from other families that it was one giant mud pit. Well to be honest, we do go the the Dahlia Festival in Canby almost every year..kinda the same thing. The one thing that kind of irritated me from a photographers perspective was that they let people walk in between the rows so it was impossible to get a photo of just the flowers without crowds of people walking through. But I love watching people so it was fun. I don't think I have ever seen so many different cultures of people all in one place, there were people .....and tulips of every color and shape so much diversity so many different languages!
I am glad we waited for a dry weekend, it was crowded, but no mud!
I think we will just have to go back again next year. I might have to make this for Nalah to wear to it.  Like I need an excuse to knit that.