Portland, Oregon

Last week I had the opportunity to spend 4 days with my mom and grandparents on a getaway to Portland, Oregon.

My mom was there for work and my grandpa has a sister who lives there.  My mom thought it would be a great opportunity for my grandpa to visit his 93 year old sister.  I got to go along as a chaperon for my grandparents. : )

I was sad that I left my camera at home so all of these are taken with my phone.  They turned out well enough!  But I realized that I didn't take one picture of any of us on the trip.  Oh well.

Portland is such a beautiful city.  It is so green and most of the streets are lined with trees!  Love it!

One of the finds near our hotel was this cute cupcake place.  My mother and I are obsessed with cupcakes! I won't tell you how many trips or how many cupcakes we bought.  We did go for the mini ones over the regular size, so that isn't so bad, right?! ; )

This particular week was "Fleet Week," when the sailors come in from sea.  It was pretty cool.  We actually got to see the bridges go up and the see the ships sail in.

We rode a tram that goes up over the freeway and up a hill.  At the top is OHSU (Oregon Health and Science University.) At the top there were several hospitals along with an amazing view!

Here we are going up the tram ride towards the hospitals.  There were some pretty amazing houses below us!

And here is the view from the top.  It was a pretty cool site to see.  And I think that Salt Lake needs a tram to take you to University and Primary Children's hospitals!

Our last stop was to Voodoo Doughnuts.  I saw them on a Food Network special and so we had to give it a try!

And this sign just made me laugh!  There are some pretty strange characters around the city .  After spending lots of time downtown, I got the feeling that Portland prides itself on being a little weird!

So I had a great time.  We didn't have a rental car so we just stayed in the city.  It would have been fun to drive to the coast or the Portland Temple or Multnomah Falls.  I won't lie, being away with no children to tote around was kind of nice!  I got to do my favorite thing, shop.  And being able to do it on my own time table was fabulous!  However, four days later, I was happy to see my family!

One of the highlights for me was being with my grandparents.  Seeing my grandpa with his 93 year old sister, who is, by the way, sharp as tack!  You wouldn't believe that she is that old.  But, listening to them share stories of their youth and good old days was wonderful!  I love them so much and I was thankful I could spend some quality time with them.

So, now I am home and back in the swing of laundry, dishes, meals, diapers, whining, fighting, laughter and busy times!  It was a nice little break! : )

School's Out For Summer!

We survived our first week of summer vacation!  Yay! 

Last week, my friend inspired me to head to the mountains for a little hike!  Now that school is out, we have a lot of time on our hands and the kids are constantly asking to do something.  So what was more perfect than going up the canyon?

I found this particular hike from Pinterest.  It was a short, and I mean short, little hike. I think it took us about four minutes to get to the destination!

 We drove up to Little Cottonwood Canyon and hiked up to this cool waterfall.  It wasn't very big and there wasn't a lot of water.

But there were lots of rocks to climb!  And the waterfall was pretty cool because it just runs off a giant slab of granite.

The water was pretty cold, but a couple of them dared to get in and touch the waterfall.

Love this face!

Then we took a break for a little snack.  Perfect spot for a snack!

I absolutely love the mountains.  They are one of the places I love most!

After the waterfall, the kids wanted to do some more exploring.

We drove back down to the bottom of the canyon and played at the Temple Quarry. Again, lots of rocks to climb on!

We had such a fun time!

The next day, Carson and Kate asked if we could go hiking again.  Hopefully we can do some more hiking this summer and enjoy the beauty of the mountains!