Holy cow, we’re done.
I went into this summer knowing it was going to be insane, it didn’t disappoint.
It was crazy.
But most of all it was really fun and a great adventure.
I started the whole thing off by shipping my beloved husband off to an overseas research project for which he was gone an entire month.
No big deal, I signed my kids up for Vacation Bible School and put my feet up.
Except for in the evenings when I needed to run. I was training to run the last 6 miles of the Vancouver Marathon with my sister, Rachel. So my amazing friend Cassie came over every other day the whole time Jeremiah was gone, so that I could run.
After a couple weeks of Jeremiah being gone, I loaded up our Excursion, attempted to clean the house a little, loaded up the kiddos and headed out for Washington. Praise the Lord my mom decided at the last minute to fly down and meet me so I would have someone to help me. So on the way out of town I grabbed her from the airport and we made our way north.
Once we got there, I unloaded the truck. Relaxed for a couple days, went horse back riding. Then Linus (my oldest) and I hopped in my dad’s toyota and drove down to Vancouver, WA for the big race.
That evening over steaks (chicken for me) my brother-in-law, Matt, and I came up with the concept for the Luscious Lemon Cheesecake. Matt went to the store and got the supplies and we made a cheesecake. We figured we would need something to celebrate with the next day.
The next morning, Rachel got up early and had a good healthy breakfast (I am assuming she did anyway, I was still asleep) and Matt took her to the marathon and sent her off. We decided to do it that way so the kids could all just play the whole time rather than trying to corral 5 kids for several hours, one of whom is 18 months and then of course Sam, you can read about Sam here.
Once Rachel reached the 17 mile marker she was supposed to call and then I would drive over to the 20 miles marker and meet her. She was shooting for 10 minute miles the whole way, but she had a knee injury and we weren’t sure how things were going to go. But she called right on pace and I headed out.
I parked right after the 20 mile marker and decided, rather than stand there waiting, I would just start walking the course backwards. I figured if she was struggling then she would appreciate seeing me a little early.
I finally found her right before I got to the 19 mile marker and her knee was hurting.
Apparently she had been fine until she got to 15 miles and then it started bothering her a lot. She did have motrin with her but it was only taking the edge off.
We did a walk a minute, run as far as you can routine, pretty much the rest of the way. But I told her she was going to run across the finish, she could drop down dead after, but she was going to run across the finish if I had to pull her. She was to exhausted to talk so she made me just jabber away the whole time, which is not something I am particularly good at but I did my best.
And she DID in fact run across the finish line and without me pulling on her 🙂
After crossing the finish line!
Rachel and her husband, Matt.
After that we went back to Matt and Rachel’s house and ate pizza and cheesecake!
That same evening I drove back up to my parent’s house.
Somewhere in there I had my sister, Lissa, give me a perm. I know it’s not the 80’s anymore, but I always wanted one and I thought, Oh what the heck. She’s at cosmetology school so I was hoping for the best. I love it! Now people think Juliette gets her curly hair from me 😉
The next big event was Jeremiah coming ‘home’ which he did that next wednesday. It was so nice to have my other half back!
Then the next saturday was my sister-in-law’s wedding which went beautifully:
Two days after the wedding we hooked up my parent’s tent trailer to the excursion and took off for Yellowstone. We decided to stop off at Jeremiah’s brother’s house in central Washington to spend one night with them. I somehow managed to get my wonderful brother-in-law to marry one of my best friends a few years ago so it’s always nice to get to spend some time with them. Andrea was nearly due with her second boy and it turned out especially nice that she happened to go into labor the next morning, while we were still there!
I was extremely excited to be there to witness Levi John coming into the world. Handsome little guy!
So we ended up spending an extra night at Jonathan and Andrea’s and then headed out for Jeremiah’s grandma’s house for one night and then to Yellowstone.
We spent three nights there, and got to see all the awesome wonders of the park. Old Faithful was spectacular and the paint pots were fascinating.
After that extravaganza, we headed home.
We were there for one week.
In that space of time I managed to make a 3-tiered wedding cake for our friend’s wedding. I had never done anything like that before but I feel pretty happy about how it turned out:
The day after the wedding I started packing again.
Then I left the next day for Washington again, this time I did the drive without any help.
It went surprisingly well.
We still made the 23 hour drive in two days, well sort of. We could have easily made it in two but I decided I wanted to stay the night with Jonathan and Andrea again so technically it was three days I guess.
The next morning I headed over to the west side (of Washington) and we were nearly there, going over Tiger Summit and the truck broke down (pulling the tent trailer, might I remind you). I pulled over and called my dad since I figured he could come rescue me with his truck and he had me talk to his mechanic. Between the two of us we discovered that the truck was leaking oil and had run dry. Fortunately, being the daughter of a former mechanic, I had packed two gallons of oil. So I dumped that in and was back in business. I pulled over and had a a shop take a quick look at it and top off the oil to get me back. Praise the Lord it started back up and got us back to mom’s. I was very happy to not have to buy a new engine for it!
The same day I went grocery shopping for the supplies to make 250 cupcakes for my other sister-in-law’s wedding which was the next saturday. My brother’s wife, Amanda and I made all the cupcakes together in my mom’s kitchen and we had a blast.
In the middle of all the cupcake baking, my sister, Kirsten and her husband, Sam had their first baby, Gideon Daniel:
I went with my mom to the birthing center and we just barely missed the birth in the middle of the night. It was quite thrilling to be able to be part of two births this summer!
Jeremiah pretty much flew up for the day of Natalie’s wedding and that was it. Her day turned out just as gorgeous as Liz’s:
Once the wedding was over I had to sit around and wait for my truck to get fixed. So my parents decided to throw me a birthday party since I was there.
I made my cake:
Dad smoked salmon and ribs and mom did everything else. You know all the important stuff like clean the house, make the salad and scalloped potatoes, provide drinks and make sure everyone has a generally good time.
Everyone was able to make it to say goodbye and wish me a happy birthday, which was nice considering I don’t plan on going back for quite some time. It was a very successful party.
The next day I kidnapped my mother-in-law, loaded up the kids and headed home for the final time.
5770 miles later (plus more for the trip to Vancouver and Yellowstone but I don’t feel like trying to figure that out) I am home, with my family and it feels good.
Home, sweet home, as they say.
- Huckleberry Plum Pie - January 1, 2017
- Fresh Mango Sorbet - July 17, 2016
- Steak Caesar Salad - June 8, 2016
