Mazama--A REAL vacation

The official "End of Deployment Leave Period" finally came to pass this last week and we hit the road. We travelled about three and a half hours on the cascade loop to a little hamlet called Mazama, and we had ourselves our first *REAL* vacation. It was unhurried--so unhurried that most of the time we didn't know what time it was. We hiked our little legs off. We revelled in the yellow beauty of fall in the Methow Valley. We travelled up really, really scary washboard-ridden dirt roads in our Goobermobile for no other reason than to find a beautiful viewpoint (much to Val's protest). We had an unfortunate run-in with one of the highly over-abundant suicidal deer in the area. We sipped hot cider and enjoyed being together as a family, doing fun things and forgetting about housework and Andy's shop.

It. Was. Fantastic.

I know there are more photos here than anyone could possibly want to see, and I'm posting them all mostly for myself... But if you happen to scroll all the way through, enjoy! We sure did. (P.S. There are some photos of Carolyn taking swimming lessons after this gargantuant post. Check those out too!)




















































He has what it takes

Swimming Lessons

Carolyn and I have been doing Mommy and me swimming lessons. We're having a ball--especially Carolyn who, it turns out, is quite the little fish.

And Abbie? She is our little cheer leader. When she is awake.

Autumn Adventures

We finally found a day where our colds, the weather, and Andy's work schedule allowed us to go stomp around in the pumpkin patch. We had a ball.









Of course we couldn't resist the corn maze. Let me tell you--with a toddler and an infant to distract you it's easy to get disoriented amongst all that corn. We got our moneys worth trying to find our way out!