The birthday celebration

We had two parties for Reese this year, one with her friends and one down in Corvallis with family.
Her friend one was after school on her actual birthday and we had it at a popular park in the area, Pirate Park.
I picked up Penny from daycare (it also happened to be Lark's first day back at work after sabbatical) and her and Reese were too cute together. They were talking about their schools and birthdays and it was so sweet.

Reese loves taking on the big sister role with Penny

 Ryan brought Cooper, Randi and the girls came, and then Reese's friend from preschool last year. The kids ran around and played, we had bubbles, streamers, tattoos, hats, and a piñata.

Cooper helping blow out the candles

Penny has the most hilarious mannerisims

 I think she had a great time. For her birthday dinner she wanted Papa's Pizza and her and Bria played so hard there. Heather and Tracy joined and us adults were able to eat pizza and drink beer while the kids ran around, it was pretty fabulous.

The family party was at Grammy's house and it was perfect. The weather was amazing and Grammy's backyard is like a fairytale. The girls spend hours outside playing and exploring, it's wonderful.

I love these two together

Love Jaidyn's photobomb in this!

Jaidyn and Kailey...I remember back when they were turning 5 and 7, oh my word time goes so fast!

Sibling pic!

Fun with Shopkins

Aunt Heather got to love on Zoey :)

And just like that, my baby is 5

Routines are my jam

Special Occasions has been in business for 30 years and Kyle is growing it at a rapid rate. He is growing it so well that it was time for a bigger warehouse. Moving a 30 year old business is not easy and we were happy to lend a hand and hopefully be able to help ease his work load a teeny bit.

I picked up some shelves from Ikea for him and loaded up our car :)

 We spent a majority of a Saturday doing landscaping and shoveling gravel. Sunday I put the shelves together and they did more landscaping.

Family affair!

 After a hard days work we needed margaritas and some food!

 It's pretty worth it to come down and help because A) we are close enough to be able to, and B) the cousins get good quality fun in.

This girl, she's incredible

 The building looks amazing and since this picture they've done even more.

 Proud of them!

School has been going well and we have settled into a routine. Our mornings consist of getting dressed, breakfast, making lunch for Bria, and doing hair. Both girls know the routine, I definitely have to give them reminders to keep them on task but for the most part they do great.

She was so excited to wear her cowgirl boots :)

She wanted me to take a picture before school, I was more than happy too!

The tough part is timing the drop offs, the girls start time is almost identical (8:20 and 8:30 am), but I can drop Bria off at 8:05 am (earliest I am able to) and then drive to Reese's school and be there by 8:15 am, she starts at 8:20 am. So we have to leave our house by 7:55 am or it's all screwed up. Fortunately we have been able to do that so far.
Reese gets out at 11:40 am and her and I usually go run an errand or two, come home for lunch, she has quiet time and I try and get more work done. Then we leave to get Bria at 2:50 pm, she gets out at 3:05 pm. I let the girls play on the playground for awhile to get some energy out and then we head home for snacks, tv time, homework, dinner, play, finally bedtime.
I thrive on routine so I am loving this.

But that's not all...

One last hoorah with our friends for the summer...Beach trip! Lark's friend was kind enough to lend us her beach house in Manzanita. Amanda and the boys joined as well and it made for such a fun trip.

Hope these girls know how much I love them!

 The weather wasn't amazing, but it didn't rain and wasn't overly windy, that's about as good as it gets for the Oregon coast!

 As soon as we got there we walked down to the beach...

Must stop to get a picture first :)

These two...hilarious-ness ensues!

 The older kids didn't let the chilly temperature dampen their style, they raced right in the ocean, clothes and all.

Crazy child!

These two smarty pants stayed nice and dry and enjoyed the sand

 After our kids were thoroughly freezing and their lips were turning purple, we raced home for warm baths and then back out for ice cream before dinner because we are the best moms ever :)

Penny also got some in her mouth haha!

 Once back home we had dinner, then into pj's and set the kiddos up with a movie and popcorn. Finally we put them to bed and then the mamas had their slumber party...

Wine was also involved, obviously.
We stayed up way too late talking and laughing and it was such a wonderful way to end our adventurous summer.
Grateful for friends and memories.

Hood to Coast 2016

 Hood to Coast...the Mother of all relays. It is epic and I was lucky enough to do it for the second year in a row on Lark's team, Go Fight Winn! in honor of her friend Teddy who kicked cancers ass!
It is the most fun you will ever have...in a van, with 5 other people, for nearly 30 hours straight.
Seriously.
Each team has 12 people, 2 vans (6 in each van) and you relay from Mt. Hood to the beach. Each runner has 3 legs they run and you don't stop until you cross the finish line. It's exhausting, amazing, inspirational, and just an incredible experience. One I can't put into words, but trust me when I say you need to add this to your bucket list!

The race started off on a Friday and it was brutally hot. So hot that people were passing out all over the place and being taken away in ambulances.
Alright, so maybe I'm not doing the best job of selling it, but it gets better.
So, it's 100 degrees out and most of our legs don't have shade. We decide as a team to take it super slow, and encourage each runner to walk when we needed. If possible, we meet the runner half way to give them more water.
On my run, all the houses I passed had their sprinklers on and turned toward the street for us which was incredible and saved me for sure. There were even people sitting out front with water to give us. Bless these peoples hearts, I think it saved quite a few people.
I'm happy to report we all stayed vertical and no one passed out. Dusty ensured his success by wearing as little as possible. Although, even in cold temperatures he doesn't like to run with clothes...

 Yep, those are literally his shorts. Not a diaper, but shorts. And yes, he got many looks haha! He's such a good sport about it, we all gave him such a hard time but he knows we love him.
Although my first run in the heat was brutal, my second was at midnight and it was nice and cool.

 After that I was able to try and sleep while my van continued their second runs. My stomach always aches and burns after my first two runs, I think it's my bodies way of telling me to take a chill. But after laying down for awhile it goes away. Once my whole van was done we parked and slept for a good 2 hours. Yep, 2 hours of sleep and then we were ready to go again and finish our last leg and run into the beach!

Paul handing off to Amanda for her last leg!

 This exchange had hot dogs and oh my word we were thrilled. Will (Lark's awesome brother) and I devoured our hot dogs with a delicious Coors Light, and as soon as Paul was done with his last leg we handed him his long awaited cheeseburger.

So happy for cheeseburger time!

 So, Amanda was off and the last person in our van to run was Dusty. He got to run our team to the finish line which is exciting...but not when the rest of your van is done and enjoying their beer while you have to prep for your next run...

Best photo. And yes, this was staged :)

Libby and I celebrating!

 Eventually Dusty ran in and they actually have you wait on the side so your whole entire team can gather and cross together. It was incredible and such an amazing accomplishment.
The fabulous part is that we are supported by Nike (most of the team works at Nike) so we got to get into their section at the beach with free food and drinks.

Team Go Fight Winn!

 We were all tired and sore but still able to celebrate our amazing accomplishment.

Hopefully we get picked from the lottery again and invited back next year because I absolutely love it!!!