My grandparent's celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary. We took the opportunity to celebrate with them and the ENTIRE rest of their posterity. This included there 3 kids, their 16 grand kids, their 17 great-grand kids and all the spouses. We had a total of 51 people and everyone made it! We traveled to Portland, Oregon from New York, Alaska and everywhere in between. It was an adventure for sure but one that was worth all the effort! I am so thankful to my grandparents for helping us get there!!
The first leg of the journey was a 7:00 am flight (meaning we left our house at 5:30 am). The kids were SO excited to fly on a plane. We got lucky both flights to get the "extra" seat for Luke so we could strap him in his car seat. The worst part of the flight was when the DVD player died after only 15 minutes of Wiggles for Luke.
After seeing an product online I asked Dan to come up with something similar. All it took was a simple metal chain connected to the LATCH belts on the car seat to strap him to a carry-on bag and Voila! A stroller. Luke loved it and it made airport travel a little easier.
We arrived at my Aunt and Uncle's house and promptly found snakes to entertain kids of all ages.
The next adventure was The Lake which is actually on my aunt and uncle's "Property". That Property also includes a Dairy Farm, a Pig Farm, a Mansion (literally) in the process of being built. The Lake has a small campground, a zip line, a bike launch, paddle boats, water trampoline, and canoes.
We celebrated my Dan's birthday with homemade cookie/ice cream sandwiches.
We took individual family pictures, bigger family pictures, one of the entire 51, some with grand kids and some with great-grand kids. Here are just a couple from my camera. The photographer got the good ones.
That is Dane hidden in the branches of a cherry tree. He's picking the cherries and dropping them down to one of the cousins.
The most important event was the dinner to celebrate. Tutu and Lodie spoke a little. We shared memories and laughs. It was all done in a tent outside due to the huge group and the inclement weather. Tutu gave each of the granddaughters a gold necklace charm and Lodie gave each of the grandsons a key chain with their initials.
Another highlight for my kids was the indoor pool at the hotel. It made bedtime a little easier...the older kids would swim while the younger kids fell asleep. Sleeping my 4 kids in in one room with me was a little tricky. Late nights and early mornings were the norm there. Thankfully both hotels we stayed at had free continental breakfasts so that those who were awake early had a place to go while the others slept.
One of my favorite parts of the trip was on my birthday. I have been to Portland 4 times and this was the first time I had actually seen any of Portland. I usually spend the whole time with my family in Gresham. Anyway, Dan found the perfect way to see a little of everything. It is called the 4T Tour. We started in Washington Park with a 4.5 mile hike through gorgeous scenery. It was pretty hard but we all made it!
Trail:
We ended the hike at OHSU and took an aerial tram down to the city.
Tram:
Then we hopped on the trolley to ride into downtown. Here we got off and walked around to the different food carts for dinner.
Trolley:
And we ended with a trainride back to Washington Park.
Train:
To celebrate my birthday we picked up my favorite...an icecream cake from Cold Stone and took it to Tutu and Lodie's house to share. Yum!!
The last night we were there we camped at The Lake. It went better than expected. Luke didn't sleep great and ended up inside my sleeping bag with me the last couple hours but he made up for it by taking an almost 4 hour nap in the tent later. The weather was great the last two days and we enjoyed spending the whole time at the lake.
The night we camped was Fourth of July. They set of fireworks over the lake. It didn't really feel like my favorite holiday but we did have a fun time!
Funny boys playing "Harry Potter" with their sparklers.
And of course the final leg of the trip was a 9:00 p.m. flight home. After a couple melt downs all the kids fell asleep. Which was nice for the end of the flight but made getting off really tricky. We had 4 carry-on bags, 4 backpacks and 4 sleeping kids. It was really hard to wake up Brice. We relied on the flight crew to help us get everything off. Thankfully we had acquire a cheap stroller for our hike that we could put sleeping Mackenzie into. It was a very memorable trip!
