Playing with the camera – again

I’ve been fortunate enough to have a new camera and have spent some time playing with it.  My favourite subjects are my girls of course.  Although I haven’t yet made the digital scrapbook page I’ve been challenged to do, I thought I’d share some of the great shots that I took.  So modest, I now – but it’s amazing what a good camera can do for your ego!

Oh, yeah, and I’ve made a card or two!

The digital camera is a great invention because it allows us to reminisce. Instantly.
Demetri Martin

Row, row, row your boat

My husband is such a typical male.  He dreams of one day owning a boat – you know the kind – big, with a powerful motor.  So his mom and dad bought one for him last summer.  Not the one of his dreams as they are normal middle class people, not millionaires.  It fits in a box and lives and under the bench seat in our trailer.  There is a handy manual pump to blow it up and the plastic oars came complete with oar locks.  You can see a shot of it in my earlier post  Taking a break!.

Pete spent a lot of his summers as a kid on the water whether at his parents’ cabin or at summer camp.  He lifeguarded for a time in his teens and taught swimming so he still loves to get out on the water or get wet.  Two families with us brought a kayak each and Pete took the opportunity to take the girls out for a little ride.  H oddly enough melted down, even though she’s been kayaking before, and wouldn’t get in.  The other two loved it.

The highlight of all our beach trips were the salamanders.  Cleawox Lake was teeming with them.

Being near the sand dunes presented us with a great chance to try something new to us.  I bought each of the girls a sand disk and they tried riding them into the water.  S had a few good runs up on the higher dunes at the beach.  Our last day at Honeyman, we went back to Woahink Lake but to a different beach area and the girls played in the sand without a care as to how cold it was with the wind blowing off the lake.  And they finished off the visit to the lake by sitting on their sand disks and eating Cheesies – what a mess!

A perpetual holiday is a good working definition of hell.

George Bernard Shaw

Dog days of summer

Summer is winding down, just a few short days until the girls are back in school – fortunately they are all excited about it.  We had a great time in Oregon not only camping but doing some tax-free back-to-school shopping.  New shoes, shorts, dresses with matching socks and brand new glow-in-the-dark pink skeleton pajamas.  The girls were given a set of the jammies a couple of Christmases ago, but as they just keep growing (should I stop feeding them to keep them little?) and have all made holes in the knees due to excessive wear, I bought each of them a new set.

Pete bought himself more cool graphic tees but I only bought a pair of shorts and a shirt.  I can shop for hours for stuff for the girls but absolutely despise shopping for me!  So our first night, spent in the WalMart parking lot at Wood Village was cheaper for us than the other families we were with – just groceries for us.

Our trip was with 4 other families so there were 9 grown-ups and 11 kids altogether – oh, yeah 3 dogs too!

 

 

 

The dogs all get along quite well although it took Echo a few times to clue in that she really shouldn’t eat Molly’s food unless she wants to see directly down Molly’s throat!  Cute but not so bright.

All the kids had an absolute blast whether it was playing at the beaches or looking at lighthouses.  Our girls developed a love for lighthouses last summer when we visited the Umpqua River lighthouse.  Our family visited 3 more this year.  The other families came with us to the Heceta Head lighthouse just outside of Florence.  As we were staying at the Jessie M. Honeyman State Park, it was fairly close.  That same day we had all headed to the Sea Lion Caves where we expected to be gagging from the stench.  I guess that fact that it was overcast, cool, windy and that the sea lions were all outside made for a surprisingly fresh air experience!

 

 

I’ll try to post more vacation photos in the next few days but now I really should start thinking about get my photos printed and my scrapping started!

 

” Books are lighthouses erected in the great sea of time”

Edwin P. Whipple

Taking a break!

We are off today to the Oregon dunes again.  Last year was a blast and hopefully this summer’s trip is just as great.  I’ll leave you with a few images from our previous trip.  Now to go load up the truck!!

 

Umpqua River Lighthouse

 

Beach at Honeyman

 

Miller boys jumping the dunes

 

A vacation frequently means that the family goes away for a rest,

accompanied by a mother who sees that the others get it.

Marcelene Cox

I’m back!!

Went away for a short holiday in the RV to Grayland State park in Washington.  Being right on the Pacific made for quite a few variations in the weather but we had a good time even on the foggy days.  The girls loved it and Katie finally learned to pedal her bike by herself – my back is eternally grateful!   

 

Crazy lady that I am, I let Sarah use the camera for a few minutes when Pete was first setting up the trailer…yup, she’s her mother’s daughter.  Silly self-portaits are a specialty of mine.

 The beach was amazingly beautiful but as the wind was fairly continuous, sweatshirts always had to be on hand.  Also, there is traffic on the beach.  Yes, trucks drive along it all day long and you can park there too.  We set up with 4 vehicles to act as a wind break.  Traffic means the kids can’t run to the shoreline alone for fear that a truck is coming along.  Some kids, maybe, but mine, nope!  Heather was great about looking both ways before crossing the beach but not so the other two.

 

 Westport was the closest town and although the economy seems to have hurt it a bit and many shops are closed, there was one spot we stopped by on more than one occasion –  the Go Kart track!  Pete took Sarah, who was quite upset that she is just an inch too short to ride alone, our friend Craig took Heather out and I had little Katie squealing with glee on my ride. 

 

 And, of course, we had our silly dog with us.  She had a blast chasing her ball into the surf even if it meant going face first into a wave.  Echo ended up sleeping almost as well as the girls did!

 

A vacation is like love –

anticipated with pleasure,

experienced with discomfort,

 and remembered with nostalgia. 

 ~Author Unknown