Trip to the Olympic Pennisula- part 1

Late, last night we arrived home safely after a fabulous weekend on the Olympic Peninsula. We had such a great time exploring the wilderness and spending time as a family. A few weeks ago, Rob asked me what I wanted for my birthday and mother's day and I told him I wanted to just go away somewhere as a family for a few days. When we first moved to Seattle, Rob's sisters Kim and Kris came out to visit us and we made a quick drive up to Hurricane Ridge on our way home from Victoria BC, but we didn't have enough time to get a real hike in plus there was still tons of snow everywhere. After living in Seattle for four years, we still had not hiked in the Olympic National Park rain forest! So, that's where we decided to go for the weekend. We stayed the first night at the Lake Quinault lodge. The lodge is almost 100 years old and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. There is this amazing grand room, with a gigantic fireplace and leather chairs

and the view from the lodge of Lake Quinault is breathtaking. I've decided that staying at this lodge every few years in going to be a family tradition.


We took a 2 mile hike Friday morning in the lake Quinault area and Jasper tried out his new hiking shoes. He did such a good time and hiked at least a mile on his own.




We found a rushing creek,


some licorice fern fiddle heads,


trillium,


and a couple of potty breaks




Friday afternoon, we headed towards Forks where we had rented a cabin for the next two nights with Jim's cabin rentals. We LOVED Jim's cabin rental #3 for the following reasons- we love a good deal (you can't beat $70 a night for a cabin of your own) and we don't mind staying in a single-wide "cabin" (especially if it's brand, spankin' new). This accommodation worked out perfectly for us because there was a separate room where we could put the boys down and the living room had a futon that we could sleep on. It was tucked away in the woods and the Rialto beach was only 10 minute drive away. We spent the evening at the beach, but didn't stay long since it was freezing! Rialto beach was spectacular (Rob said it was the most amazing place he thinks he's ever been) with the HUGE haystacks off the coast and a pebbly beach.

We tried to hide behind some of the huge pieces of drift wood to shield ourselves from the wind, but we still got really cold.

Family Photos

We had family pictures taken this past Saturday by our friend Tysha Carter. She has started her own photography business Little Red Wagon Photography and she is amazing! Rob and I are very pleased with the way the photos turned out. Miraculously, Tysha was able to take some shots with the entire Egbert clan looking and smiling at the camera. Rob and I hadn't really thought through how difficult this task of photographing our boys was going to be until we were in the car on the way to the shoot. We realized that Jasper hadn't eaten a good breakfast and was a bit antsy and needing to run around, Gid was falling asleep and due for his morning nap, and neither Rob or I had taken time to eat breakfast ourselves... I thought it would be impossible to get both Gid and Jasper simultaneously happy, but Tysha did it. Thank you so much Tysha! You'll be seeing us again in a year or so for sure!

Here's just a few of the photos (I'll put some more up in a week or so):
http://littleredwagonphotography.blogspot.com/

Our garden

We are p-patchers. We love our garden. It's our special thing we do together as a family. I love having this place where we go together and get all dirty and do some hard physical labor and work together as a team. This is our fourth season at Picardo p-patch. I feel like we are really getting the hang of things this season. When we started, our plot had some wonderful perennials that we inherited- asparagus, a lavender bush, a rosemary bush, sage, oregano, and thyme. We have contributed our own perennials too- autumn gold berries from my Grandpa Bob, raspberries, rhubarb, purple fingerling potatoes, and dahlias. Each year has been a new learning experience for us. I remember we grew a lot of lettuce and spinach our first year (a super easy, no fail, no brainer for Seattle), our second year we planted tons of tomatoes and basil (a super adventurous, somewhat risky endeavour for Seattle), and the third year we tried artichokes and brussel sprouts (the artichokes nearly took over our plot). Each year we've grown peas and carrots too. This year we have planted (from seed) swiss chard, spinach, carrots, peas, and lettuce. Our new adventure this year is strawberries and pumpkins! We planted the strawberry starts last week and they look fantastic. We are going to grow our own pumpkins to carve and eat. We will plant the seeds this week and the next. We are going to try two varieties- a sweet pumpkin and a white pumpkin. Fun, huh?

The best part of gardening this spring has been Jasper. He loves our garden. He asks to go to it every single day, I kid you not. And, honestly, he is really helpful. We've worked really hard to teach him where to dig and where not to step. He helps pull weeds and waters all the tiny, baby plants very carefully. He and I went last Friday and he did all the watering for me. It was great. Peter, Paul and Mary sing a song called "the garden song" and we listen to each each time before we go and Jasper and I dance around the living room and get ourselves pumped up to go.

Here are some pics of our garden:

Jasper watering the baby lettuce plants


Rhubarb


from top to bottom- autumn gold berries from Grandpa Bob, potato trench, peas, carrots, and asparagus popping up in the middle


Strawberries and oregano


Jasper at work