Happy 21st Birthday, Zack

Today my oldest son turns 21! Wow! Where did the time go? He was only 9 days old when I turned 21.

We celebrated on Saturday by seeing Captain America 2 and going out to dinner. But we did gifts on Sunday afternoon...

He went with the little gift first.

A flask! William & Andrew decided it was the perfect gift for a 21 year old. A perfect gag gift... LOL

Obviously I was still thinking about camping because I suggested his brother’s get him some camping gear. Perfect! A lantern and a cooler set…

Our gift was a bit harder to see. His UTAH CWP class…

We love you and hope your 21st year is filled with joy and all that God has for you!

Happy Easter & Birthday

This year for Easter my dad made a new sign for church. We put it out, prayed and waited to see what would happen…

What happened??? People came! We had many new visitors on Easter Sunday. We had over 25 kids for our egg hunt! I was hoping to take pics but I was too busy running around getting everything together and organized. What a great problem to have! We are now praying for future ministry opportunities and the Gospel to do its work!

Once again the Easter cross was more beautiful than the year before! (But we always say that…) This year we were afraid there wouldn’t be any flowers with the early blooming season. We were wrong! We had so many, Kathy was able to fill the back of the cross, too!

It’s hard to believe this is our 10th Easter cross family picture!

After church we went home, grabbed our stuff and drove south to Portland to celebrate Easter and April birthdays: Zack, Greg & Stella.

There was an egg hunt for the little ones…

     

checking out their loot

Everyone wanted a chance to hold Baby Emily…

Everyone brought their helicopters for chopper wars. Thanks to Jonathon and Theresa, Zack was able to join in the fun!

the kids threw plastic eggs at the copters to try and hit them

 

Will to the rescue!

Stella had a mermaid beach cake and everyone else had pie…

  Happy Birthday and Happy Easter!

Spring Break 2014

All three boys had the same week off for Spring Break this year. So, I made a reservation at Ecola Creek Lodge for a couple of days. We love going to Cannon Beach, although I was a bit worried about going on Spring Break. It was busier than usual but I’m pretty sure the dismal forecast kept most people away. Thankfully, God blessed us with a mostly dry time and even some sunshine and blue skies! And, Chris got to join us for the last night there!

When we arrived, the room wasn’t ready yet. So, we hit the beach while it wasn’t raining in case it was the only opportunity we got…

Apparently we weren’t the only ones with that same thought…

The tide was REALLY low, so we also got to explore a whole lot more of the rock than usual!

After supper it still wasn’t raining, so Zack went running and Will and I did a bit of exploring the road past the lodge.

Zack ran into these guys on his run, just around the corner from where we were staying...

Will and I just ran into Hwy 101 on our walk… ;o)

But I did come back to the lights on at the lodge and I always like how inviting it looks in the dark.

The weather was still dry the next morning, so Zack and I went running (I went all the way to the Rock and back). We did a bit of exploring in town and then had lunch on the quiet side of the beach while Zack did some skim boarding.

See! No people! Perfect!

  

Everyone was on the other side of the river, just where I like them to be. ;o)

After lunch, the sun really came out and I walked to the quilt shop on the other side of town. It was just too pretty to be inside…

Everyone else thought so, too.

 

The lady at the quilt shop remembered me from earlier in the month when I came in after watching the guys surf in the storm. I guess we’re kind of infamous now???

Chris came in the evening and we had a delicious dinner at the Castaway. Then we went to the Rec Center for some carpet ball, battle tops and mini golf…

They got some new obstacles for the mini golf… some of them were harder for some of us. LOL

  Before heading out of town, we stopped for lunch at Mo’s. Since it was high tide, there wasn’t much beach left for walking on…

A bit of shopping in Seaside, a stop at Costco (man, they have delicious frozen yogurt!), and then we were home. I love truly relaxing vacations! Glad the boys were able to have a bit of a real Spring Break before hitting the books for their last quarter.