Oregon at it's finest

Last Wednesday afternoon my parents suburban was packed to the gills and we (meaning my parents, Emily, and all of our posse) headed for Junction City, Oregon. Why? Only to visit some of the coolest people in the world - Mark and Katie "whatchu talking about" Willis! What we thought was going to be a 12 hr. drive turned into 14, which is quite gruelling at 4am and you want to sleep so very badly. (Seriously, Oregon, what's with your 55 mph speed limits when it's flat and mostly straight and there is NOTHING AROUND?) But we made it and it was well worth it.
First things first, we put the kids right to work at Katie's store, Luxe. Plug: you should go there if you are in Eugene, such a great place! Jaxon now wants a job there.

The next day we went to some waterfalls, but as soon as we opened the car doors to start our hike, it started raining. Welcome to Oregon, right? So we waited it out by playing cards for a while in the back of the Suburban (crazy fun). And then decided that we might as well just go and see those waterfalls. I think the rain only added to it all, we had so much fun!




The next day was beach day and we thought that we lucked out because it was sunny and hey, no rain! We hiked up to a lighthouse first, picking blackberries all the way.


Next stop was to find a free beach to play on and have our picnic. By the time we found our "free" beach, which we had to pay to park, some major fog rolled in. Awesome. Couldn't even see the waves. But we hunkered down and played anyway. Jaxon and Sammi had a blast searching for buried pirate treasure that Mark was secretly stashing away for them. Jaxon was only slightly concerned when he started eating one of the pirates cookies, which looked strangly like the cookies that Katie made... Riley became a seagull whisperer and made them dive and catch crumbs of bread mid-air. He had tons of them around him, I swore up and down that if any one of them pooped on any part of me, he would be in some major trouble. But we all escaped unscathed.




Then we decided that we were going to find that water and play in it, fog or no fog. About forever later we found it. Jaxon soaked up being at the beach for the first time, quite literally. Sammi just laughed and laughed at Katie helped her scoop up water from the waves in a bowl. We all got a little wet, but Jaxon and Sammi got the brundt of it all, and they loved it!




The rest of the time was filled up with playing all sorts of games, laughing our heads off, taking walks, and eating fantastic food. All in all it was a fantastic trip, rain and fog and all. Made some awesome memories and I'm itching to go back. Mark and Katie, you guys are the best! Thanks for showing us such a good time - we owe you one!