our trip to paris

We spent a good chunk of last week in Paris. Paris, Idaho that is. There was no Eiffel Tower or crepes to buy off the street. But it just happened to be one of the best extended family trips we've had. Sometimes organizing and pulling off a trip for 25+ people can be tricky and stressful since everyone has such different ideas of how a vacation should be. It worked out so well this year and we are glad we got to spend some time with everyone! 

We spent a day at Bear Lake.

We all kind of like taking pictures. I get it from my Dad.

 

We were in charge of dinner one night so we had a Hawaiian Luau with leis, Hawaiian haystacks, Hawaiian names and music.

None of us went hungry all weekend. That's for sure. 

There was time for games, talking, a treasure hunt, a family testimony meeting after church, family photos and a trip to Garden City for raspberry shakes. 

The whole kingdom....until October. 

down on grandpa's farm

We spent a few days last weekend up in Idaho. While Brandon was working on Friday, I road-tripped up with Sarah, Hollie, Blake, and Evelyn. We laughed until we cried. Sure love those sisters of mine. First stop: to see baby Benson who was just a few weeks old. Then a pizza stop, drink stop, side-of-the-road potty stop for Blake and we made it back to Aberdeen for the King family reunion. 

Brandon came up later that night to camp at the boat dock with us. Besides reunion games, we spent Saturday with a 3-mile morning walk, visiting our favorite Wallace Drug, Grandpa's farm (for a little photo shoot) and hanging out with family. 

the last of oregon.

^gathering eggs at Uncle Glens' farm

^bakery stop in Manzanita. I'd love to go back to this cute town. 

more Oregon below...

our trip to oregon: the hikes!

One of our favorite parts of our vacation were all the beautiful hikes we went on. We kind of laugh at ourselves because we always think we are hikers, but we hardly do it. Well, in Oregon we changed that around and went on 3 hikes in 3 days. They were beautiful.

Drift Creek Falls: a hike through dense and lusciously green forest that ends at a suspension bridge and waterfall.

^Evelyn was quite the hiker. She kept saying "walk" and would have walked more if we had weeks to do the hike. 

Short Sand Beach : our favorite hike ever! Not to mention one of the most beautiful. Can't beat ending at the beach.

Multnomah Falls

Spectacular. I just don't know how else to describe it. We were in awe the minute we pulled up. We walked the .2 miles to the bridge and then decided to continue up another mile to the very tip top. I wasn't sure if Blake could make it, but we took each of the 11 switchbacks in 700 feet one at a time and eventually made it. I was so proud of him. Brandon was a superstar. He was carrying Evelyn in the backpack, but managed to carry Blake on a few of the switchbacks. We may have bribed Blake with cookies and promised to let him have root beer for dinner if he walked the entire way down. I'm glad he learned to do a hard thing.