summer lovin'

And more maternity leave adventures! (Despite the post title, both of these things technically took place while it was still Spring.)

Swimming! Lucy loves it. And Nana got her a new life jacket that doesn't go around your neck, so now she likes to wear it all the time and uses it to "swim" in the deeper water where she can't touch. And the water slide! The Portland Parks department really has their stuff together.

Hiking and picnicking at Powell Butte Park. This is a 600-acre park on the outskirts of Portland surrounding a cinder cone. The park is covered with tall trees that make great shade; at first we had a bit of trouble finding a place that wasn't too cold to put down our picnic blanket. (We were planning a picnic at the top, but some of us were too hungry to wait by the time we got there.) After the picnic we thought we'd just hike up a bit of the way until Lu got tired, but some people on the way down mentioned horses at the top, and that plus mud-stomping along the way (she said she was doing it for the next people, so they wouldn't have to step in the mud) kept her energy up all the way to the top.

At the top is a meadow full of wildflowers ("more flowers than I ever dreamed of") where you can supposedly see three mountains at once; unfortunately that part is under construction right now so our lovely hike through the woods ended at the top with huge construction vehicles marching by. We had to stop to feed Oscar, and there at the top we heard his first gurgled laugh. Hooray! Lucy then started making faces to try to make him laugh again, while he looked on adoringly.

The sun was hot up at the top, and Lucy was by turns brave and frightened of the loud truck noises, and since the hike ran into naptime she was beginning to melt down by the time we turned around to go back down.

Luckily down is much faster than up, and we met some horses on the way that we had been looking for at the top, which gave Lucy a much-needed second wind.

what celebrity do YOU look like?

gone fishin'

Is there something about the nice weather that makes me want to end my post titles in apostrophes? When summer is beautiful, who can be bothered to finish a gerund?

We continued our stretch of weekday summer adventures with boat fishing at Hagg Lake. Oscar managed his first stretch in a lifejacket and on a boat well, the same way he handle most things. Nana was a champ; as usual, doling out grandma love and snuggles with a lap and two arms.

The water was cold enough to make you take a few seconds to catch her breath, and though Lucy initiated the jumping in, when she did it herself she wasn't a fan. Titi, though, who generally avoids cold water in the bathtub, was having a ball.

There was a dearth of fish and therefore also a dearth of fish pictures, but Shaggy found an abandoned rope swing so the day and the sun were fully used.

We also still managed a minor fish fry with the yellow perch we caught. The adults were judicious, making sure there was enough to go around, but when Lucy came to the table she immediately grabbed a handful of the cornmeal crusted bites for her plate, she definitely has radar for the best food on the table.

We are going to have to get that girl a fishing pole.

lulu and ox

beach trip

A couple weeks ago it finally hit me that I'm going to have to actually go back to work soon, and our babymoon as a family of four with no obligations is about to end. And that we should really be using our weekday free time to do fun things that get crowded on the weekends.

And thus began a series of adventures!

This was the first one, a day trip to Oswald West State Park near Cannon Beach. Even though I've lived in Oregon all my life we only discovered this place last Spring and since then we've been wanting to take Lucy.

To get to the beach you park in a lot off the freeway then hike the rest of the way in, about half a mile on a wooded trail that follows a river. Just getting there is completely beautiful, with the sound of birds and the trees big enough to hide out in their roots and pretend to be a bear, and then all of a sudden there is the ocean, sprawled out below you.

Lucy ran so fast across the sand she practically levitated, and she asked me to give my camera to Daddy (back with Oscar on a blanket) so I could get my hands dirty building a sand castle with her.

After awhile we walked down the beach to explore the caves and tidepools and waterfall lining the far end of the cove. She wouls run, then stop and say, "Wait! I saw something!" Then retrace her footprints about ten feet until she found the shell or feather that had caught her eye. Then she would pick it up and say: "A shell! This shell is my favorite! I'm going to keep it forever!" She would hold on to that treasure until she found the next one a few steps later, when the shell was tossed aside in favor of a feather she would keep forever, which in turn was unceremoniously replaced a few seconds later in favor of a bigger feather.

And everything was abandoned by the time we got to the freezing wading pools and a rocky wall she could climb.

I brought her a change of clothes, anticipating the full body onslaught of beach: wet sand on clothes and hair, dress soaked at the hem and pants soaked throughout. Unfortunately, the change of clothes was in the car so we turned my red hooded sweatshirt into a nice warm toddler dress and all was right with the world.

At Tillamook Cheese Factory on the way home Lucy enjoyed every last drop of ice cream then threw her cone away.