The fading vestiges of summer

The leaves have begun to turn and school has started and it has snowed in our tundra town so I thought I'd turn my attention once again to reminisce on the lovely days of summer. And I must say that once summer finally came to this area, it was delightful. Never too hot, perfect summer evenings just right for bike rides along the river, and even a day or two at the pool. Occasionally we got a little fancy:


And sometimes we tried to be fierce:


But generally speaking we just kept our summer mild....except for the occasional rock session when we really rocked the house:


So with the final vestiges of summer quickly fading it seems only appropriate that mention the other momentous events of the summer.

Girls Camp - Without the fabulous assistance of Gramma Sarah, there would have been no way for me to have had the pleasure of spending five day, sans shower and bed and flushing toilets, with the fantastic girls and YW leaders in our ward. The kids probably had a much better week with Gramma than they ever would have had with me because they made a huge list of things to do and except for the zoo they did everything on the list which included among other things a trip to ToysR'Us, multiple trips to the craft store, lunches at McDonalds, getting lost and getting found.


Our Athay family reunion on the Oregon Coast - Now this was a fabulous adventure near the end of summer. We decided that it would not really be much longer for us to drive to the coast than to fly to Portland and drive down to the reunion in Florence and since this would likely save us some cash we found ourselves driving across the vast expanse of relative emptiness comprising, let's be honest, most of Idaho and eastern and middle and really most of Oregon until you reach the coast. With a few stops along the way and two exhausting days of driving we made it to Florence. The following picture is one of many stops. This was a shot at one of our state's significant landmarks, which we felt we really should see in case we never make it back to Twin Falls. Of course, we didn't really want to pay the entrance fee to the park to actually get up close and personal with Shoshone Falls for just a brief view and picture so we viewed it from a distance. The falls are, more or less, behind Mitchell's head. Perhaps we'll go back for a picnic one day........


We stayed in Bend our first night out. It was a nice place but we moved on early the next morning closely following the directions on our GPS unit and soon we were on tiny mountain roads that very nearly turned to gravel trails winding through a lunar landscape unlike any we've really seen before. This was Mckenzie summit in Willamette National Forest and the site of an ancient lava flow.

Needless to say, I don't think the GPS took into account the small size or rigorous nature of the roads we traversed but eventually we made it to the Florence and what a great time awaited us there when we met up with Gramma Sarah, Grandpa Ron, the Athay siblings and all the cousins. We rode trains...
and drove go-karts...



We rode dune buggies on the massive Florence dunes...


And what a roller coaster ride that was.....particularly for Luke who spent over half an hour with his hands in the air, even when we weren't cruising down the dunes. And Grandpa Ron really did find himself questioning if he wanted to claim this grandkid...


But that was only the first morning. We spent the afternoon at Haceda Head lighthouse and playing in the ocean....







And what family reunion is complete without a princess party? Thanks to Lauren the little girls, well not the babies, but the rest of the little girls, ok Nina isn't such a little girl so the girls, had a princess party wearing Lauren's prom/dance dresses and becoming very very fancy.




But alas our camera didn't seem to take too many pictures beyond the family photo shots.....


Suffice it to say that we did have a few more undocumented, or unphotographed rather, adventures when we visited the sand dunes again to try our hand at sandboarding and sandsledding. It was "AWESOME" except for the wind that rivaled anything we have in Idaho. So we ended with sand covering us and being consumed by us but it was pretty fun and Mitchell has decided that he absolutely must try snowboarding now! But the days events couldn't possibly outshine the evening. No, we held the first annual Athay Olympics and of course the utra competitive "Flaming Tigers" (really? that was their name?) or Davis family took the prize. But after bidding a fond farewell to those we love so much our little family headed back home with several stops but by a definitely shorter route which took us up the coast.