Easter Fun

This year we spent Easter in Vancouver... just Shad, me, and the kids:) It was a little lonely, but all in all it was a great time. Bonnie sported some bunny ears (thanks grandma Cindy and Grandpa Tony) and Preston got to put together a really cool replica of the Flying Dutchman from Pirates of the Caribbean. The neighbors had a garage sale on Saturday and this "little" gem was given to Preston for only a dollar! Might be the best buy we have ever made:)


This was the turkey breast that we had for dinner:) It was my first one so Shad thought it would be a good idea to capture the moment, and I'm secretly glad he did! Everyone liked it even Bons who ate it faster than we could put it on the plate.

Bonnie loves to steal the last few drops from Preston's juice cups. Every time he lays one down she makes a b-line for it and won't let it go until the last drop is gone. I caught him handing it to her this morning after he was finished... such a good big brother:)

Hiking Trip

This past weekend we went hiking near Multnomah Falls which is just East of Portland. Not a cloud in the sky and almost 70 degrees we decided to hike a little farther than what we had planned, but man was it worth it:)

This was at the top of our drive there is a really cool view point that you can look out at the Columbia River Gorge.




The start of our hike... I would like to point out that my AMAZING husband is carrying both packs. At the start there was only one child in the packs, but as you will see the hike proved just a little to hard for the P-Man:). Good thing dad is a stud!

Lesson number one: Tie your shoes BEFORE you put the baby in the pack... makes it A LOT easier:)

Preston was all ready for the hike. When we first started out it was chilly because it was still early, but at the end we all had our jackets off and it was pretty hot:)


This was the second set of waterfalls we came to. When we decided on a hiking trail we had no idea that this was waiting for us on the trail, such a cool find:)

You can't really see them but this is Shad and the kids in the cave area behind the waterfall. The picture gives you an idea of how big the area was behind the waterfall:)


Preston REALLY like the cave. I think his exact words were "this is the coolest thing in the world". That is his new thing every time something is exciting or really fun it is the coolest thing in the world:)This is how Shad got to hike about half the way up and all the way down. It was funny because there were quite a few people that we past and almost all of them would say something about the size of his load. This became really fun because at one point Preston said "Wow everyone is calling Dad a load" haha the things kids say:)


When we hit the spot that we decided we were going to turn around there were some hikers talking about triple falls. Anyways to make a long story short we decided to continue up the mountain to find this "amazing" triple falls. There were many times that I wanted to give up (it was a really hard hike) but we kept pressing on and to our surprise we finally hit triple falls. Needless to say it was worth all the pain cause it was spectacular:)








On the way down both kids fell asleep and it was such a peaceful hike down. Poor Shad was DONE when we got to the bottom (I wouldn't have made it even a quarter of the way if I had to carry that "LOAD" haha) but he humored me and took me to the outlet malls that were a few miles away:) Such a great day!!!!!

Peacock Lane

In Dec. this year we spent the first part home and the second part in Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado. We decided to start some traditions since Preston is finally old enough to understand the meaning of Christmas.... TO GET PRESENTS!!!!!!! Our first tradition was to go look at Christmas lights, so I googled some of the best places in Portland to see Christmas lights and at the top of the list was Peacock Lane. Most of the pictures didn't turn out but here is one that did.


Bonnie was all bundled up and asleep. We decided to walk even though it was raining and pretty cold... but the traffic was RIDICULOUS!


Preston had a lot of fun too until the end when he started to get really cold.
This is just a random picture of Preston in all of Shad's gear for work. KIEWIT SAFE!!!
Bonnie has started to eat solid food and was getting her first teeth so she was loving this carrot... and Preston:)




She also loves to eat other things, like her toes:)

We had a great Christmas this year, but don't have many pictures to show for it. Shad accidentally erased the pictures when he was playing with the camera, but we will forgive him this time:)