Home Again

We made it home after a lovely drive along the Columbia Gorge on Friday. It is a long trip when you’re coming all the way from the coast to Spokane, about nine hours, but we broke it up with several stops and so it didn’t seem quite so long.  We had breakfast at Pig N Pancake in Lincoln City before we began the long trek homeward. In talking with Teresa and Dayle at lunch the day before, we found out that they also enjoy breakfast there. Dennis loves the taco omelette. Since we had been good and eating our breakfast in our room every morning, we decided to treat ourselves to breakfast on the way home.

After a couple of hours we hit Portland traffic. Even though it was late morning, it was still bumper to bumper and took a very long time to get from the west side of town to the east side. Much of it was sitting at a complete standstill on the interstate.  It was a reminder to me once again that I don’t want to live in a big city like this.  Please excuse the bugs on the windshield. There wasn’t much I could do about it at that point.

We made a quick stop in an antique store in Troutdale where I bought a jade plant that I had seen the week before. I haven’t had very good luck with jade plants, but I’m going to try again. I will take a picture of it for my next post and show you this sweet little plant that I have since re-potted.

Then it was onto Multnomah Falls which many of you are very familiar with from Teresa’s posts. We were lucky enough to snag a parking spot this time. We have been here dozens of times, but I never get tired of seeing the falls.  Who is that person that needs to lose a lot of weight? I detest pictures of myself.

The falls were roaring from all of the snowmelt. Absolutely stunning.

Then, as the truckers say it was the “pedal to the metal” until we reached Washington state and the Tri-Cities where we stopped at 4:00 for a very late lunch, early dinner.  It was just a quick hamburger, but it sure did taste good.

Our view as we reach the outskirts of Spokane. My, that was a wonderful site to see.

While we were gone my flowering pear tree bloomed. I was so afraid I would miss it, as it is so pretty.

Just gorgeous.

On Saturday many of my family in Nebraska and Iowa, including Mandy and Piper, participated in the “Heroes Walk” in honor of my nephew Brian.

My sweet Piper walked all of the way.

Girl cousins!  Chaela, Becky and Mandy.

My brother Lynn, sister-in-law Val and niece and nephew Doug and Maureen. This is Brian‘s mom and dad and brother and sister. Notice the sign they’re holding it’s different than the one in the above pictures

They even sent me my own shirt to wear while they were all walking on Saturday. It has Brian’s firefighters shield number on the front and on one sleeve is my sister Melanie’s husband Mike’s name and our cousin Alan’s name on the other sleeve. They were both liver donor recipients while Brian was an organ donor.

I am so very proud of all of them for taking this opportunity to bring donor information to the public.

Saturday afternoon Dennis and I went to the lake and took the covers off of ours and Larry and Nita‘s trailers. We put the slides out and opened up a few things. Yesterday afternoon we went back and took some food, cleaning supplies and toiletries out and made the bed. We also cleaned up four overflowing garbage cans full of just pinecones from our spots. We didn’t even touch the pine needles! There will be a lot of cleanup this spring. We’re hoping to go up and spend the night on Friday. 

Larry just had knee replacement surgery a week and a half ago and so he will be unable to do a lot of the work this spring. Poor Dennis is getting the lions share of manual labor.

Of course my back did not cooperate and I was down with spasms most of the night Saturday night. To say this is getting old is an understatement.  There are so many people with so many more serious issues, that I try not to let it get me down too much.

Wishing you all a wonderful week. I’ve woke up to blue sky and the birds singing this morning, but it’s only 38°F out. It’s amazing how much blue skies can lift your spirits isn’t it?

“You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for You created all things, and by Your will they were created and have their being.”  Revelation 4:11

Blessings,

Betsy