Pacific Northwest Vakay Day 2

Day 2: We knew we were in Oregon when we saw these.

TREES!! Everywhere! As we were driving through the forest I couldn't help but think, what if one of these fell down right now? I decided to quit thinking about that! So I changed directions and began singing Ke$ha's "Timber". Looking back, that was probably not the best idea either. Nevertheless, we made it! We started our national park tour on day 2 of our road trip with Crater Lake National Park. 

It was beautiful! The water was so blue.

We decided to go for a hike up Garfield Peak so we could get another view of the lake.

 As we were hiking, we got a good view of the Phantom Ship.

It's really just an island popping up, but it does kind of look like a ship, don't ya think?

 As we were hiking, we discovered something unbelievably crazy to us Arizonans-snow, in July! I hadn't seen snow all winter except for the couple days I was home around Christmas. 

Then we got to hike through the snow. Little did we know hiking through the snow would become a regular occurrence on this summer road trip. 

 We hiked to 8054 feet and made it to the top!

Look who else made it.......................

OLAF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We hung out at the top for several minutes, 

snapped some pictures, 

and took a step back to really revel in the beauty that is America. 

To head back down, we had to use the same path we used to get up which meant hiking back over the more snow. Basically, this is how we got down. It was kind of a mix between sledding and surfing. And it was a little bit cold! 

Then we checked out the rest of the park which included a pretty spectacular waterfall, 

and more incredible views. 

Then we took a hike down to the bottom.  

It was amazing!

That completed our journey at Crater Lake so we headed north. We were able to cross off another state-Washington!!

Normally I don't mention the hotels we stay in, but I had to share this one. It was the most adorable place ever! 

We stayed in this little tiny Washington town that was built around the hotel. 

It was so cute-inside and out! 

Day 2 was one amazing day. Cannot wait to share day 3 with all of you. If you can believe it-each day gets better! Stay tuned!! :)

Pacific Northwest Vakay Day 1

Well friends, here it is-today I start my journey of telling you our amazing road trip story. It was incredible. I think I should keep my thesaurus close by because I need multiple synonyms for words like: beautiful, amazing, and fun. But I am not going to do that so feel free to insert your own synonyms when you reach those frequently used words!

Day zero: I call this day zero because this was an extra day not totally planned into our trip. I came back from my amazing trip home, made some snacks, packed my bags and we hit the road. 

We got a pretty early start and were able to stay the night in California between LA and San Francisco. 

Day one: I must say, we did not get off to the best start. We had some extra time and thought we should go for breakfast at Denny's to get a good start to our road trip. We were seated almost immediately. We ordered our drinks and food as soon as we could. After about 40 minutes of waiting, we were getting a little antsy. We knew we had some extra time since we started out so early the day before. We finally found someone, not our waitress, that we could ask to check on our food. No answer...Fifteen minutes later we had mustered up the courage to tell the manager we were leaving. After a few minutes we found him and told him we had to leave. We had not been in a time crunch but were now indeed in a time crunch since we had waited over an hour to get our food. Good news-I got my orange juice for free!! We still are not sure if they had even started making our food or if it had been sitting under heat lamps for 30+ minutes. Also, maybe our waitress decided to quit after she took our order?? Not sure, but I did see a huge bug roaming around during our wait so it was probably best we did not eat there. Instead we drove through Burger King and still had to wait about 20 minutes to get our food. It was not our greatest start, but you know when they say things can only go up from here-it was true. We got to Napa 

and headed to our first winery-Silverado Vineyards. 

How gorgeous is this view?!? It was so beautiful!!!

I would definitely recommend this vineyard. It was very relaxed, but the servers were very helpful!

Then we headed to the Beringer vineyard. It is the oldest continuously operating vineyard in the Napa valley.

Since it was the 4th of July Matt thought I needed to show my patriotism. This is what we found-

Then we took a tour of the vineyard. Where we learned some very interesting facts, 

saw some really cool things, 

and were taught the appropriate way to sample wine.

Following the tour we took our own tour around the property. 

It was so beautiful!

Then we headed north. One cool thing about a road trip is you never know what you are going to see. A nice surprise, we got to see Mount Shasta. It seemed so tall standing on its own.

Sorry, the pictures are really blurry-we were driving.

That night we made it to Oregon and were able to cross off a new state for us on day one! Hope you enjoyed my first look-back onto our trip. Stay tuned for more :) 

For Day 2 click HERE.

For Day 3 click HERE.

For Day 4 click HERE.

For Day 5 click HERE.

For Day 6 click HERE.

For Day 7 click HERE.

For Day 8 click HERE.

For Day 9 click HERE.

Home Sweet Home

Again it has been too long since I have updated everyone on what has been going on. Summer has been crazy! As you know we just went on the road trip of our lives. I plan to post one day of the trip each day from here on out. The key word in the sentence was PLAN. But before we did that, I took a vacation of my own. 

Since I have finished school forever I thought it was FINALLY time I took a trip home. It was so great to see so many friends and family! The time flew by as it always does every time I am home, but I am very thankful for the time I got to spend there. Here is the synopsis of my trip!

My flight was one interesting experience. They were late boarding our plane. They had us all go stand outside and wait. 

After about 10 minutes they opened the emergency exit in the back and all of us in the back of the plane got to board that way. Everyone else got the normal treatment. We also got to exit the plane in the same manner. It was very interesting but did save us some time.

While at home, I spent a few hours studying but found some time for fun. My parents finished their fire pit so we enjoyed some s'mores on the most beautiful evening ever. 

Summer nights were not like this when I lived in Nebraska. It was absolutely gorgeous!

We spent a few hours taking a girls' day and saw The Fault in Our Stars. I thought it was good, but oh so sad. 

I also was there for the fair but before the festivities could start the work had to be done. Jadyn and Atlee spent many frantic hours slaving away in the kitchen to finish their fair entries. I just helped taste test!

I also got to see some other things that I don't get to experience in Arizona-WEATHER!!! 

We had a nice storm roll in; I thought I better capture it. 

We are entering monsoon season in AZ but I'm not sure if we will see clouds like this.

Saturday we got to go test drive vehicles to raise money for the school. Naturally, I chose the most conservative one there...

We had a good time. Not quite like the Tesla test drive I took earlier this year, but I had much more freedom to drive where I wanted.

Atlee also had her softball tournaments while I was home so I got to sneak in a game!

Then the Sunday activities were underway and we were in full swing fair mode. We did the Fun Run Sunday morning. It was a major family affair!

Sunday night we headed to the park. We watched the band perform. They were missing many members, but they still sounded very good! I am sure this is mostly due to their amazing teacher! ;)



They also did the crowning of Miss Bertrand. Jadyn was one of the contestants, and since I missed her at prom it was so nice to see her in her prom dress.







Isn't she the cutest!?!!! :)

Tuesday was the parade. I had not been to the parade since I graduated from high school. I couldn't even tell you the last time I got to watch the parade and not participate. It was a nice change.



One of the events I was most excited about coming home for was the rodeo. I attended both nights and had lots of fun! A couple of my friends, Angela and Alyssa, joined me on Tuesday night. It was a very exciting rodeo. It was the most entries they had ever had.

I also got to enjoy a couple quick trips to the lake. They were not long enough, but it was nice to get there for a few minutes. 

It was so great seeing so many friends I hadn't seen in such a long time. And enjoying some sweet treats with some of my favorite people!