Mother's Day Weekend was a flurry of family and fun for us. We spent most of the weekend with the Newton side of the family at a cabin we rented near Mt. Hood, and had dinner with the Joy family on Sunday night en route back to Seattle. Here is a brief breakdown of the weekend...
Saturday:
Two hikes, three dogs, FIVE servings of dessert (no, that is not a typo, crazy I know...), and eight and a half kids/grandkids (see pics of Jessie below) celebrating Mama Newton. That pretty much sums up the day. We went on two hikes because the first one, a trail around Mirror Lake, was still completely covered in snow, and to be honest quite miserable. I wish I could tell you that we were smart enough to turn around and find another hike 5 minutes into the trail, but for some reason we decided to persevere and endure it. Needless to say, the hike resulted in a lost dog (Jeb was eventually found), seven pairs of soaking wet feet, and one very unhappy four year old boy. Jessie, Luke, Joe, and I decided to go for a second round of hiking (after Round 3 of dessert, a decadent dipped cone from Dairy Queen) this time on dry land. We hiked the Castle Canyon trail, scrambling our way to the tops of rocky spires and cool lookout points. It was a pretty sweet hike, and we were glad to return to the cabin with dry feet and all 3 dogs in tow.
My beautiful sis-in-law Jessie, complete with bun in oven
Lukie not feeling the sunshine-snow-sans sunglasses combo
Sporting my sweet hiking outfit and squinty eyes (not because I am Chinese, because I have no shades and it was BRIGHT)
3 of the awesomest dogs I know (yeah, I said awesomest)
Why is it so fun to take pics of preggos?!
Jonas, immediately regretting the fact that we forgot our sunglasses
"We are kind of like the Donner party out here"... very comforting words Jessie (BTW- that is Mirror Lake in the background of the photo. Don't see it? Maybe that's because it's COVERED in snow)
A group of hikers we ran into, with snowshoes... they might be slightly smarter than us
G.O. and Tre, happy that the hike is OVER
The Mama of Honor
Tre and I found these flowers on our "photo shoot" walk... I have no idea what they are called, but I love them- they look like little hearts!
Please don't hate me for posting this one Jessie, I just love that belly!
My cute lil' niece, Sinah
Luke carefully inching his way to check out the beautiful view
Hiking is SO much better on dry land
Sunday:
After making a nice Mother's Day breakfast, we headed off to Ski Bowl for customer appreciation day. It was the last day of the season and lift tickets were FREE for everyone. The weather was super warm and sunny, which made for poor skiing conditions, but who cares when it doesn't cost a dime?! Actually, I was grateful for the warm weather because Joe, who was in charge of packing the ski equipment, forgot our gloves, goggles, and snowpants. Thus, we sported sweatpants and t-shirts (we keep it classy) and scrounged some extra goggles and gloves from Jessie and the Neal family. We only skiied for a few hours (by 1 pm the conditions were downright dreadful), but it was a fun way to spend 1/2 a day, the price was right, and I continued to work on my skiing capabilities- black diamonds the whole day, go me!
The hub and brother-in-law making their way to the top
About to take the plunge
Looking classy in our sweatpants
Mt. Hood is kinda purty
These were my options: Black Diamonds or Double Black Diamonds... I might've fallen countless times, but I am pretty darn proud of how far I've come in one year!
