Reno Trip

Our good friends recently moved to Reno and we went down to visit them over a long weekend in January. The best part was just hanging out and catching up but we did get to experience a little of what the city has to offer.

We visited the plantarium and watched a cool show.

Then we visited the most famous Circus Circus. The kids loved playing the games and watching the circus acts. We even ate at the buffet there and actually it was really good. The asian noodle station was amazing. The kids deemed it the best restraunt they have ever been to!

We also went to a HUGE store called Sheels. It is a sporting goods store and has a ferris wheel inside. We went for a ride, played in the playland, looked at the fish and visted all the wax presidents. It was cool! They even had a bunch of animals (stuffed) just like at a museum.

August Memories

We had a very busy and fun August. We started the month off with a visit from my parents. They stayed for a week and we loved every minute of it. We went to Crater Lake, camped and even took the boat tour around the lake. It was awesome. We visited Lava Lands and the Lava Tube Cave (aka bat cave). We biked around the Old Mill in one of those fun surrys. We hiked to Tumalo Falls and enjoyed playing in by the river. It was a great visit and the kids can't wait til they come back for a visit. It is hard when grandparents live so far away.

The following week we took a trip down to Utah. We stayed with Ryan's brother's for part of the time then with my brother for the rest of the time. The kids had a great time hanging out with cousins and seeing family. We made our annual trip to the "Ranch". We had fun riding 4 wheelers, shooting guns and learning how to shoot with a bow and arrow. The kids love the ranch and talk about it all year. We also went to Cowabunga Bay (a water park), the dinosaur museum, and spent lots of time just hanging out with the family.

We had about a week to get ourselves together before Ryan's sister, Korbie and her best friend came out to visit. We took them to see the sites of Bend and had great visit. It has been so fun to spend the last part of the summer with family that we rarely get to see.

July Fun

In July we took a fun vacation to visit some places in Oregon we have never been. We drove south and camped at Diamond Lake. Then we headed over to Roseburg and went to the Wildlife Safari. We also drove a scenic byway that has 20+ waterfalls. We stopped at some really spectacular ones and would love to go back and see more. Some are right off the road but others you have to hike in to see. Next we headed to Sunset Bay Beach. It was awesome. There was no wind and pretty good weather. The kids just love the coast. We drove home through Eugene and stopped at Chuck E Cheese. This was my kids first time to Chuck E Cheese and they had a blast. We don't have one in Bend so it was a special treat.

At the end of July we attended the Deshcutes County Fair. We love the fair and go every year. This year we bought each of our kids 10 ride tickets. They couldn't get enough. Ellie even went on the adult rides. It was a great time!

We also had a geat time at the Primary Water Olympics and the 4th of July.

Rocket Ship in Portland

We started off spring break by going up to Portland for a couple of days. What an adventure. We left early on Friday morning so we could be at the zoo by noon. To get anywhere out of Bend you have to drive some pretty winding roads and we discovered both Ellie and Maxwell get carsick (just like their mom). So about and hour into the drive I gave the kids a small dose of motion sickness medicine which seemed to help. However, by the time we got into the zoo, they were all so tired and completely out of it. Max was too tired to get out of the wagon and didn't care to look at anything, Ellie was walking around like a zombie and couldn't of cared less about the animals and Caden was just mad and didn't want to be looked at or talked to. We didn't stay at the zoo that long, which was disappointing. The kids all fell asleep the instant we got in the car, so Ryan and I just drove around for a couple of hours so the kids could nap. They woke up feeling much better so we headed over to the mall to eat at the Cheesecake Factory. Then we went swimming at the hotel pool and tried to get the kids to sleep (always a challenge in a hotel room). They finally dozed off around 10.

We were all sleeping soundly until we heard a knock on the door at 6:15 a.m. We were annoyed that someone was disturbing us but when we opened it there was the police asking if we were missing a child. They had Maxwell with them. Apparently Max left the room around 4 a.m and was riding the elevator (aka rocket ship) up and down and pressing the bell. An older women found him on the 3rd floor and took him down to the front desk. Maxwell doesn't know his last name so they tried calling all the rooms that have children registered to find out who he belonged to. Our phone never rang 1) because we had it unplugged since the kids play with it and 2) we didn't have the kids registered b/c when I booked online and entered the kids I got an error saying exceeds maximum occupancy. The front desk didn't know what to do so they called the police. The police took Max to the parking lot to identify our car, then they ran our plates to find out who we were. Max was just hanging out at the front desk having a great time for an hour and a half while they were trying to get a hold of us. When the police returned him to us they ran Ryan's D.L. and came in to check out our room and make sure we were okay. What kind of parents don't know their kid is missing in a hotel in the middle of the night??? I was so embarrassed and scared even though I knew he was safe. Lets just say we learned our lesson and put the ironing board and luggage in front of the door so he couldn't escape the next night.

None of us went back to sleep after that so we just got up and got ready for OMSI. We got there early and it wasn't crowded at all. It was our first time there and we all LOVED it! We spent several hours there enjoying all the hands on exhibits. Even Max did well, despite not sleeping the night before. And for all my local friends, we bought a season pass to Sunriver Nature Center for $30 and you can use it to get into OMSI for free! It is like having a season pass to OMSI for a quarter of the price. You can also use it at other science centers throughout Oregon and the U.S.

We also got in some shopping, more swimming and yummy food while we were in Portland. On the way home we stopped at A.C. Gilbert's Discovery Village in Salem. Also got in for free with our Sunriver Nature center pass! I wasn't expecting much but it was really fun. The kids loved it. I would definitely recommend stopping there if you have younger kids.

After a rough start we ended up having a good time. Although, I'm not in a hurry to stay in a hotel again with the kids anytime soon.