Oregon trip

We made a trip to Michelle's near Salem, Oregon on the 12th.  We decided to break up the trip a bit and throw in a little side trip to the coast.  It was made even more interesting because we ended up on a road we have never taken before from Sutherlin to Reedsport.  We have been on just about every other road to the coast and it was a lovely drive.





We saw fields of beautiful sunflowers in the valley, Mount Shasta with one of its odd cloud formations hanging off of it and my Aunt Millie and Uncle Marty.  We had a nice visit.































Our day on the coast was cloudy and rainy, we saw elk in a couple of spots on the way to Reedsport, we hit a break in the weather about the same time we found a bit of beach that was real easy to walk to and we enjoyed revisiting some favorite shops in Florence and Newport and had a shrimp cocktail on the pier.

We headed inland towards Corvallis where we stopped at Avery park to see the rose gardens, but they were mostly in a off cycle, there had been a warmish spell that had them peak a bit earlier than usual.  I still found a few nice specimen to get pictures of.

The kids had rescued/bought a six month old American Bulldog just the day before we arrived.  We were all happy that we had left Gracie with a friend for the week because that would had added to the poor giant pups confusion...us added to the mix was bad enough.  Bailey is 40 pounds and STRONG!  She has issues that they'll have to work on, but she is a sweet girl and very smart, so as long as she doesn't outsmart the two-leggeds she will be living with all will be good...hahaha.

Seth turned nine on the 14th and they had a bowling party the day after with a lot of friends and cousins.  We had a nice visit and on Tuesday we were headed for home with Seth for his summer fun with Gramma and Gramps.  We arranged to pick Ian up on the way so we have both boys until Tuesday.  Ian will then go to his Dad's for the summer and Seth will go back home on the 30th.

Michelle & Seth

The boys have had a blast tromping all over hill and dale here with the walkie talkies Grampa loaned them.  

They have had a few up close sightings of twin fawns and keep startling another single baby that it's Mom stashes behind some rocks across the street at the top of the hill the boys have been playing on.  The twins are very new and are only about the size of Gracie.  The twins and Mom came across the hill above the house last evening, when she saw us she stopped to make sure we weren't a danger and one of the fawns dropped to the ground into a ball and if we hadn't seen it and knew it was there we would have just assumed it was a large pinecone or pile of dirt, it just seemed to disappear.  Nature is so amazing.  It didn't move until Mom and sibling got a few yards away and then it decided it had better toddle on along.  The babes can barely reach the food spigots they are so small.

Seth enjoyed a hike with Larry yesterday morning and today Larry decided to drag the older one along for a short hike this morning.  He said the boys and Gracie seemed to think that going further than the parking lot was more effort than they wanted to put out.

Seth

I went to Auburn with a lady friend today for our monthly or so trek to the farmers market, various errands we both might have and then a lovely relaxing lunch.  We manage to go somewhere different for lunch and today was my first time at Awful Annie's.  It was very nice having lunch on the deck overlooking the historical old town and watching the tourists.  The dessert was the best and they are well known for it I guess; bread pudding with brandy sauce.  We shared it which was a good idea after our lunch.  Then we had a wander through the co-op art gallery and then back home.  

The boys, Gramps and Gracie were all doing their own thing when I got back.  Tonight is warm and still so we are enjoying a later night so the boys can view the stars and the full moon before our drastic weather change hits tomorrow.  We are supposed to cloud up and maybe see some rain Sunday through Wednesday.  

The week we were gone the garden had another explosion of bloom and I took a bunch of pictures, so look out for the flower pictures to hit tomorrow or the next day!