April 2015 Vacation

We took a four-day vacation up to Birch Bay with my parents and my brother and his kids who were on Spring Break. It was so much fun! Hannah rode up with the kids, me and my mom in my van and we took the scenic route via Chuckanut Drive (boy, did we have some good times being silly with that name!) and ran across a lovely park with a small falls.

After unpacking, we left the baby in the condo with my mom and headed down to the waterfront to enjoy the sunset. Later after everyone was in bed, the men (Dad, my brother Dave, Kevin and nephew Solomon) arrived - they came late because Solomon had baseball practice and Kevin wanted more time to get business paperwork done.

In the morning the kids were excited to see Daddy! :)

After a morning swim, the family split into two groups - one went hiking and the other went to the Canadian border (most for Abby because she really wanted to say she'd been to another country!).

One foot in each country!!!

This was a funny moment. I realized Abby wasn't standing next to me and looked around to see her walking the opposite direction. I called, "Where are you going, Abby?" She tossed her head over her shoulder and said flippantly, "To Canada!" Ha! Love that girl! :)

We spent some time reading all the various monuments (there were many!) and it was a great history lesson for Abby who is studying US History this year. Afterwards, we played at playground that sits right on the border with no fence in between so both countries can share the park. Very cool. :)

Swinging on American soil with Canadian houses in the background.

Back at the condo, my dad took a nap in a chair - a very typical sight for my dad. :)

The day warmed up more than expected, so we let the big kids play down at the bay waterfront during the late afternoon. This was a big highlight for them.

The tide came in quickly and the boys had a fun time trying to save their mote.

We barely made it down to the waterfront for the second night's sunset, but it was worth it.

The following day we drove in our two-car caravan to Hovander Homestead Park, which was extremely hard to find and we got lost and almost gave up before finally getting there! We were glad we kept at it. We first started with the nature hike that began with this cool lookout tower.

 

 

Ben was extremely concerned about the safety of this walk through the marsh (a mile or two long) since there were no handrails. He insisted on holding Kevin's hand and often called out to others to be careful if they got too close to the edge. Hard to believe that kid was a dare-devil toddler who climbed dining room tables and pianos when he could barely walk! Ha!

 Then we had a picnic lunch in front of the historic house that contained a museum, which was unfortunately closed.

The park has two different sections (really, two parks next to each other) so some of us walked and some drove to the other part. There we enjoyed the picturesque historical farm made into a family-friendly park, but were again bummed that the buildings were all closed until summer.

We enjoyed our final sunset back at the condo (what gorgeous weather we were blessed with!!!) and went on a little night walk (the kids and my mom and I).

Kevin and my dad watched football and the baby back at the condo. :)

After one last swim, we finished off the final night with root beer floats!

The vacation ended all too soon, with the men leaving early (this time they took Hannah, and Solomon rode back in my van). Packing up always takes waaaay longer than expected and we checked out exactly at the last possible moment (noon), which was hours behind what I was shooting for since I had many fun stops planned on our way home. :oP

Our first stop was at the Whatcom County Museums in Bellingham, which included the historical museum in the old City Hall, as well as the art museum and small children's museum for one price. I'm sure you can guess that we fell even farther behind schedule by attempting three museums (plus lunch). We had a really, really nice time though.

After going through the historical museum (the kids especially loved the display showing all kinds of old fashioned toys), we enjoyed our lunch out front overlooking the Bellingham Bay, where my dad often came in on the ferry from Alaska when he worked that one a few years back.

Then it was down the street to the art museum. That was a pretty quick stop with kids, but they do have a relatively decent amount of art appreciation from the art we've studied in homeschooling, and then to the children's museum which they, of course, could have played at forever, even though it was not nearly as state-of-the-art as ours here in Olympia.

We continued on and decided at the last minute to take a "quick" hop off the freeway to show the kids the tulip fields in Skagit Valley......bad idea. Very definitely regretted this one. We got stuck in horrendous traffic for over an hour (all because of the tulip festival!) on single-lane country roads, somewhat lost, with a baby crying, and way behind schedule with 2-3 hours of traveling left to go. We picked the wrong place to stop (it was unexpectedly expensive, the fields were very far away from the parking, etc), the kids were cranky and hungry for dinner, the baby was sick of traveling. Ugh. I have to admit I was a little irritated at this stop, but we tried our best to enjoy it - especially since we'd purchased tickets and already wasted so much time getting there!

The boys were being really silly, stuffing their faces in the tulips and pretending they smelled good.

The sun was too bright (no fields facing the opposite direction!!), the kids were tired and hungry (we were out of snacks by then), mommy was grumpy, but, by golly, I was going to get a picture with my kids next to the tulip field. Ha!

We had to drive at least another thirty minutes before we found a fast food place to stop at. We all got food in our tummies, Lizzy nursed and ate a good dinner of baby food, and we all felt much better. It was just about dark by time we left (with over two hours to go!), but several of the kids fell asleep....even in the midst of Lizzy crying all the way from Seattle to Olympia almost non-stop (one of the reasons I wanted to get home earlier, as she hates traveling in the dark!). Oh boy. It was a frustrating end to an otherwise very pleasant and fun-filled vacation. Perhaps it will be a start to more trips with family (and I will not try to fit in so many stops on our way home again!). :)