Two big events this month were participating in a "family friendly" protest to support racial equality, in which the kids, Mom, Dad and Andrea all joined in a bike ride with about a 1000 other families. Fiona had a blast riding in the bike and looking all around at the people riding with us and joining her brother and sister in the bunch bike. An interesting and difficult time for all of us.
We also went backpacking as a family for the first time! A 3.5 mile hike in and then two nights in the woods in Opal creek. Fiona, again, was an absolute trooper - having a blast in the backpack on Mom's back and then crawling around camp and the tent. She slept, all things considered, fairly well in the tent and the loved eating all the exiting camp food! It was a gorgeous weekend with only a little rain and we all really enjoyed the time together as a family and outside in the woods.
Sunny days and play house!!!
What! Mom lets up use whip cream and food coloring.....this somehow seems like a trap....
Snuggle buddies, look how big Fiona is getting!
85% sure that had is not going to protect him from the corner of the desk, just waiting to smack him on the head.
A doctor / scientist / nurse in a mask...how very 2020
A big event of the month was the kids and Andrea putting on a "Casa de Cook" dinner. Complete with a menu, serving staff, a multi-course meal and many decorations. They took a HUGE amount of pride in creating it. Mom and Dad LOVED the romantic dinner out.
Too many kids in a bed!
The best part of helping mom bake is sneak peaks....may be the primary motivation.
Definitely the primary motivation....
Sunny day science experiments with eye protection!!
Bunch bike decorations for Elliot's 5th birthday!!!
Out on a big birthday ride for the big birthday girl! We had a roving 5th birthday party for Elliot. With physical distancing still in effect, a group gathering wasn't really in the cards. Even with that, we were able to decorate the bunch bike and visit friends around the neighborhood for a special birthday hello!
Big birthday!!!!! It's hard when social distancing is the new rule...but everyone was flexible and we had a blast riding around and saying hi to friends (from a safe distance). Certainly not the same, but Elliot was a trooper and we had a special day.
Mac's sourdough is marginally less terrible....
We rented a sprinter van (oh my do we want to buy one) and drove out to some private land in southern Washington state (a bit north of Mt. St. Helens...near Morton) for a weekend of camping and wilderness adventuring. We pulled into the fields and set up camp.
The views were great and the solitude really nice after all the chaos at work.
Double decker bunk beds made the sleeping reasonable - Dad, Mom and Fiona on the bottom bunk and the two big kids on the top. It was actually pretty spacious, all things considered.
Camping beby!
Wilderness river yoga!
Totally going to work guys....
A great family of adventure kids!
It's Oregon...it rains, don't tell anyone he has an umbrella....very un-Oregonian.
So this happened, on a slippery trail run - Crystal fell and got a monster bruise on her leg. Really a hematoma (right leg, mid-shin) and probably developed some mild compartment syndrome in that leg. In standard doctor fashion....we didn't do anything about it. She seems ok in retrospect...shrug
Silver falls state park on a family adventure!
Sometimes bed time is tough.
Growing up big!
Family BLM protest in the midst of the 2020 protests - felt it was important for the kids to go, understand what was going on and be part of it. Masks and all.
The bunch bike birthdays continue! Wes is 3 and we were out in the neighborhood again, taking in the sights and saying hi to friends along the way!
Who loves orange wrapping paper!!!!
and orange cakes!
Naked adventures!!!!
This baby girls is just amazing! These are the Opal creek picture, our first family backpacking trip as a family of 5! Lots of food, lots of snacks, lots of warm clothes - but totally doable!
Great campsite right by the creek in a beautiful part of the forest!
and a multi-person hammock for the win, the kids loved to snuggle and to swing, best hiking toy ever!
Dad was tired...
There is a LOT of stuff to carry and both Crystal and Mac were very weighted down. Hopefully as the kids get bigger they can take more and more stuff on their own backs.
siblings!!!!
parent adventure on the shoulders of Mt. Hood!
Up at a lake along the side of Mt. Hood (Timothy Lake) - really great views and a cool campsite! Plenty of space to play in the lake and get a great long weekend in!
Seems like a lot of kids on that paddle board....
The prelude to paddleboard yoga is paddleboard napping!!
A happy little guy in the woods!
DIG! DIG ! DIG! What good is a beach if you cant DIG!!!!
More camping and hiking! You can see the hammock making its presence known - good for relaxing and for snuggling.
Fiona is such a great little camper!
In July we rented a house outside of Yakima and took a trip out to the sunshine!! Social distancing was still in effect, but we had access to the pool and, in the heat, what more could you really want? That unicorn, however, met an untimely demise when someone (dad) jumped on it in the pool and it popped!!!
Sun, wine (!), snuggles and swimming....a great weekend in Yakima.
Top 10 Fiona photo of all time
Artist in the making!
Two artists in the making!!
A trio of siblings checking out the elephants at the zoo, we just love to watch them all together.
Let me out of the tent!!!!!!
Dad is 100% NOT having a heart attack back there...its just a lot of stuff to carry and he is getting old / out of shape. This was the start of an AMAZING trip to the Wallowas and Wallowa Lake State Park. We kicked off the trip by backpacking as a family in some really beautiful wilderness.
Ringed by the Wallowa mountains, we were in an Alipine meadow with great views and weather. The kids were troopers and just had a blast!
so much so that their clothes fell off at a lunch spot (oh my......) jk....they were swimming in a stream.
Hiking and treats! What a great combination.
Nice face Elliot....
Happy hiking crew!
Dad might die.....
After the backpacking segment, we were car camping at Wallowa state park and rented a pontoon boat to doodle around on the lake. The boat was slow and easy to drive and Weston LOVED it!!!! He could not get enough of spinning the wheel and laughed for HOURS about how much fun he had.
The lake had little floating docks in the middle you could tie up at and use a lunch / swimming platforms.
The water was glacially clear and beautiful, a nice relief from the sun.
Post swim snuggles!
Cool dude!
We were able to get tickets to visit a goat farm. The best part was you got to pet and hold the baby goats. The kids (human) were initially kind of shy, by the kids (goat) were just too cute not to be friends with.
ABC graduation! On to kindergarten!
Sunflower festival, who knew flowers grew so big?
Fiona didn't!
And shave ice!!!!!!!
OMG!!!!!!!
Dad was unfortunately at work :(
With the change of the school year, Weston started at ABC! He took Elliot's spot and continued the Cook family presence at ABC. He was SO VERY EXCITED!!!!!
Sometimes we sleep.
Elliot started in Kindergarten in what may have been the strangest start to the school year in a while. With COVID raging through the country, kindergarten was all virtual. We set up a "pod" with 5 other families and then hired a teacher (a woman recently graduated from a teaching masters program) to help facilitate. We rotated between the 5 families on a weekly basis in order to help give the kids some amount of normalcy is a very abnormal year.
There was a lot of bamboo in the backyard that had to be cut down. You an see the air quality is TERRIBLE! There were some big forest fires just outside Portland, so close that people who worked at our hospitals had to evacuate.
The whole city smelled of smoke, was an eery red and air quality was abysmal for about a week. The destruction was significant in some of the exurbs of Portland.
Wes likes ABC - A LOT!
Baby celebrating life, at sunset...a still life.
'
and to cap it all off, RBG died. Ugh. 2020 is miserable. Pandemic, fires, political chaos, protests. We are holding it together as a family and looking towards a brighter future. Trying to survive and stay sane. The kids are healthy, happy, strong and caring. They are great friends to each other and fun adventure buddies. We count our blessings every day. More to come!
