Things that have become all too familiar....

Please, join our vacation, immerse yourself in the phrases we speak fluently.....
'I need to go potty'....spoken by Luke

'I don't need to go potty'...spoken by Laurel when we are visiting the only restroom within a 120 mile radius, although I have come to believe she has an iron bladder. That girl can hold it for at least 6 hours.

''What's our final destination?'....asked by the boys while looking over our shoulders at the GPS and picking up the technological lingo of the device.

'Is that really the time we'll be at the final destination?'...asked by the boys continuously as they watch the time on the GPS

'Are we at our final destinantion?'...asked by the boys who have suddenly abandoned their interest in the GPS

'What do you want to eat, a cheeseburger or chicken?'....asked by Bill or I as we visit the 25th Wendy's drive thru.

'Can I have a nack (snack)'....asked by Luke starting at 9:23 am on the dot (every day) and every other minute until I get tired of telling him no and I give him one.

'Wow Dad, that gas was expensive'....no brainer

'Stop poking, touching, looking at, talking to, listening to, interrupting, bugging, laughing at, being nice to (since they seem to take issue with anyone being tooo nice...weirdos), your brother, and occassionally your sister'......said WAY TOO MANY TIMES to count to the boys by us

'Yes, we're eating at IKEA again'....we ate there oh, about 6 times in one week

'SSSSSHHHHHHH, Luke and Laurel are asleep'...

'Yes, we are stopping at another outlet mall, no I don't know if they have KB toy store, no, you can't buy anything...'

'No honey, this mountain is not Mount Saint Helen's'....said to Laurel after she asked MANY times as we drove back to our condo last week if we were driving to Mt St Helen's again.

I'm sure I'll remember some more of the things I just can't wait to say again....but maybe later, and don't ask me how long, cuz' I don't know!!! Aren't vacations supposed to be fun? I keep telling myself yes.....but in all seriousness, we are having a nice time and seeing lots of neat places. We were talking in the car today how we've passed through a number of state capitols this trip.....Salt Lake City, Boise, Olympia, Salem...and we should pass through Sacramento on the way home.

This is our friend Janet and I...posing for a smile!

The jet boat excursion we took was a bunch of fun...cold, windy and wet kind of fun!! It was freezing that day but the kids had fun (as did Bill and I) as you can see....gotta love the colored ponchos! The tour took us to the base of the Willamette Falls and past some really neat floating houses. Think big house floating on huge round logs....how did they even think of that idea?

It was Fleet Week in Portland and there were a bunch of military ships coming in to the harbor, so this picture is looking down towards a Canadian ship pulling in and being welcomed by a fire boat...pretty cool.

The Willamette Falls are in the background of these 3 pictures.

Water and kids, or at least our kids, go hand in hand...who cares that it's blowing 20 miles an hour and wet spray in your hair now makes it feel like it's 20 degrees...it's water, so who cares!! I have to say though, that my hands would not function well enough to help undo the life vests when we were done :-) But the kids seemed fine, so we invested in a little child labor-the nice thing about the kids this age, they WANT to push Luke and Laurel in their strollers (whether L and L agree or not), so Eric got the uphill job of pushing Laurel, as Luke was unavailable since I had to RUN him up the ramps to the bathroom after he uttered his famous 'I need to go potty'......

Well, blogger is freezing up so I'll have to include that picture tomorrow...incentive to come back!! We are in Newport now, we can hear the punding of the surf since our condo faces the beach-the very COLD beach! More to come later-good night-