The Autumn Leaves

Fall is here!

What are you looking forward to doing most this autumn?

The Roses

We have three rose bushes in our backyard. When they bloom, I have fun taking all sorts of pictures of them. They look so pretty!

This summer I made several bouquets to set on the tables when we had friends over for dinner in the backyard. I used roses as the main flowers, along with lavender, hostas, violets, maple leaves, and some little white flowers that I don't know the name of.

Red roses would have to be my favorite.



What's your favorite flower?

Ohanapecosh // Camping 2012

This years camping trip was at Mt. Rainier again, just a the Ohanapecosh campground instead. Only one family went with us and we booked sites right next to each other. The sites were next to a creek, which was lots of fun to play in. We would also set our chairs in the water and sit and enjoy the creek.



Our first dinner was hot dogs roasted over the fire. They taste much better fire roasted! Plus they were fun to cook!



Since we were just at Mt. Rainier last year, we didn't go to Paradise or go to view the mountain. We stayed at our campground the whole trip. There is a hiking trail that starts and ends in the campground and takes you up to the falls.





Emmalyn and Alina who had fun exploring the creeks along the trail.



And here it is folks, Silver Falls!




Daniel's Junior Ranger patch. He was the only one who did the Junior Ranger Program, since all of us girls had done it in 2006.




My perfectly toasted marshmallow. Roasting marshmallows is one of my favorite things to do camping.



Daniel caught this frog, which stayed in his hands just long enough for me to get one picture. Then he jumped out of his hands.




On our last day we walked around the campsite looking for a place to walk down to the river. We found this neat area with lots of rocks to sit on and just enjoyed the river for a while.




And that was our trip! We all had a great time and we were sad to leave. Us kids all had fun playing card games, going on walks in the dark of night, talking about cave deer, and chatting around the campfire. I had a wonderful time.

What was your favorite place you visited this summer?

A Blueberry Pickin' Mornin'

Tuesday morning we were up bright and eairly to go blueberry picking with two other families. It was something that I had never done before, but it was quite fun.

I don't care for the taste of blueberries myself, but I had a wonderful time picking them. The bushes are fairly tall, making them easy to pick off. 

It wasn't long before we reached our goals. My family ended up with just over 8lbs of berries.

Adventures in Oregon {2012 Edition}

For those who have followed my blog the last couple years, you know that my family usually visits family in Oregon about once a year. Since I've grown up going to visit Aunt Carol and Uncle Terry, they're house is like a second home to me and my family. I've shared some pictures from our trips in 2010 and 2011, which you can check out if your interested.

This year, we decided to go on the 4th of July. We left bright and earily on the 4th, around 5:30AM to be exact, so we had a lot of the day to relax. Most of us were tired by the time it got dark, partiularly myself, so we didn't say up to watch the fireworks. However, as the sun was setting, we had some fun with sparklers and some smoke bombs.



One of Daniel's favorite things to do while we're at Aunt Carol's is to catch lizards.



Recently Tiana and Alina made their own bows and arrows out of PVC pipe and brought them with us, since there's no shortage of space at Aunt Carol's.



Uncle Terry.





The weather was warm when we got there and just kept getting hotter by the day. On our last day there, it reached 90°F and I was melting! I don't do to well in the heat, so I was happy when after walking around town all afternoon, we found a water fountain at the shopping center that Tiana, Daniel, and I got wet it. It didn't take long before I was soaked, head to toe!





Cactus look pretty cool.





Some bright green grass under the shade of a giant tree on that 90°F day.



After grabbing some frappuccinos in Starbucks in town, we went to this really neat candy shop that we had never been to before. They had the movie Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory playing in the back and had lots of fun and unique items and candies.




Tiana bought this Star Wars: Episode IV tin poster at the candy shop. She's a huge Star Wars fanatic.

Daisies at the Park

After all the rain lately, we've finally been getting some warm weather. Yesterday was sunny and warm, so we spontaneously decided to go have a picnic at the park. The grass was filled with thousands of little daises, one of my favorite flowers to take photos of.

Tiana made a daisy chain necklace, bracelet, and ankle bracelet.

There were small patches of sun peaking through the trees, lighting up the daisies. They looked to pretty!