Photography Challenge October

Photography Challenge October

Week 40 Nature

Week 41 Dark & Moody

Week 42 Weather

Week 43 Spooky

I don't love Halloween, so I opted out of this one.

Misha's Car

Misha came out to her car aa couple weeks ago to find that the clutch was stuck to the floor. 

As in, it wasn’t moveable. Shoot. 

Chris thinks that it is one of two problems and both he and Misha are hoping it is the much less expensive fix. She needs to check the fluid level but hasn’t been able to do it until I this week since she is in school and then works most even until 6 pm when it is already dark.

She finally was able to get her car towed to a garage, though she is still waiting for it to be looked at. Takes a long time.

Linda's Visit

Chris' mom came for a quick visit. Chris purchased tickets to the Air Force game in Colorado Springs and he along with his mom, Kristen, and Misha spent the day in the Springs before the game started at 5 pm.

They picked up Misha from her apartment in Denver and stopped at the outlets in Castle Rock to exchange some things at the Columbia store.

Chris found a Groupon for a spooky tour of the Cave of the Winds. Nothing too frightening, but it helped pass the time as they spent the day together.

Grandma loves her souvenir "flattened" pennies.

The game was in an awesome venue. I wished that I could have been there for the flyover at the beginning of the game, but after that, it would have been a long fours hours to sit through. They were lucky to have such fantastic weather for the end of October. 

Chris bought Kristen a new "toque" (for all of my Canadian friends. Winter hat for the rest of you).

FYI, that sweatshirt that Kristen is wearing is mine (she would say, "used to be mine"). It is almost 30 years old.

And new shirts for the rest of them. Not sure when they will want to sport Air Force gear again, but they had a fantastic time and were home around 10:30 pm that evening.

Linda flew out with Chris on Sunday afternoon. He was headed to Austin for business meetings and Grandma returned to Houston.

A Bounty of Garden Tomatoes

I have a lot of tomatoes that I pulled off the vines before a freeze we had this past week. 

I didn’t get a chance to get to the ripe tomatoes before we left for Oregon, so here’s hoping they are mostly still good once I get home. 

I have started baking them with carrots, onions and basil to create a tomato sauce that also works as a soup. I little salt and pepper and delicious.

Oregon in Fall - Day 4

We missed seeing Nathan on Monday morning as he had to work. We got up and shared breakfast with Polly and her sister and nephew (Melisa and Major). I took a couple pictures around their property.

Before we left, Kristen and Polly sang together. Polly’s father had passed away recently and she will singing at his Celebration of Life ceremony this next weekend. She and Kristen sounded great together.

We drove over to the Portland temple so Kristen could see it. The last time she was there she was about 2 years old. Sadly, it was closed on Monday and visitors were not even allowed on the grounds. I did get a few pictures before we headed in the direction of the Columbia Gorge.

First stop, the Crown Point Vista House. I took pictures while Kristen and Chris explored inside.

From there, we continued up the Gorge to visit all of the waterfalls along the way.

The parking lot at Multnomah Falls was backed up. Good thing Chris new there was additional parking off the freeway. We drove a little ways further, stopped at another waterfall, and then parked.

Look at the huge leaf we found!

The snack shop was closed, so we had lunch in the lodge at the base of Multnomah Falls. Kind of fun. 

We hiked to the bridge at the Falls but the path beyond was closed—Kristen was not at all disappointed. 

We had a little time before we had to be to the airport, so we drove around Vancouver, WA to get gas, check out the newly rebuilt elementary school where Chris had previously attended, drove around the church and then stopped at his old house. 

The trees in the area were so brilliant and beautiful.

It was a short ten-minute drive to the airport. We passed through security quickly and had a little time before we boarded.

Oregon in Fall - Day 3

We woke Sunday morning to rain. It wasn’t a light mist either. It was coming down pretty earnestly and it was forecasted to last all day long at the coast.

After walking along the Old Growth Cedar Preserve boardwalk just a short distance from where we had been staying—in the rain—we drove inland toward Mt. Hood. Lucky thing for Kristen that her parents bought her a rain jacket! Didn't do much for her legs though!

And it certainly didn't help my hair at all!

The drive was a bit far to Mount Hood, but it was lovely. The trees at the coast had just barely started turning colors and were mostly and orange-yellow color. As we drove inland, the reds and oranges began to pop up more around us.

It took a couple of hours to drive to Mt. Hood, but we listened to General Conference at 1.5 speed. You can listen to a full session in much less time, though I don’t recommend trying to sing along at that speed.

Mt. Hood was covered in snow. We explored around the Timberline Lodge, Chris walked above it, and then we explored some of the back roads for some picture taking.

We had plans to meet up with some friends for dinner that we had met on the Couple’s Cruise we started going on about ten years ago. It was so good to see them and catch up.

Ben and Kimberly Aanderud and Polly and Nathan Doyel had just returned from two weeks in Italy and happily showed us some of their pictures. We played games, had dinner, and then sat and talked for awhile. (We were playing a called the Great Dalmoudi and Chris was the lesser peon in the game and had to wear a towel on his head).

Chris, Kristen, and I stayed the night at Doyel’s and enjoyed their hospitality. We want to get together again soon or go on a trip together. They are a lot of fun. Even Kristen had fun.

Happy Birthday to Chris

Chris celebrates his 46th birthday this year. 

Since we were traveling over the weekend, Kristen and I surprised him with gifts and cake before we left.

I think it is lucky for him to have the school Fall break over his birthday, because we are usually traveling and exploring a new location for his birthday. 

Chris is such an awesome guy, and I am beyond grateful that God brought us together. 

For all of the years and years that I prayed to find him, God got us together as soon as he could. 

Chris arrived home from his mission from the Philippines just before Christmas in 1996. 

He and I met at work at Utah Valley State College in February 1997. 

Because there is such an age difference for us, God did his best to answer my prayer as quickly as he could in order for Chris and I to begin dating. 

So often we wish we could get our answers sooner or in the way we would orchestrate it, but God always knows best and I am so grateful. Though I wouldn’t want to ever go back to those years of waiting, I am grateful for all that I learned and accomplished while waiting. 

And Chris was totally worth the wait.

Oregon in Fall - Day 2

Chris and I woke to a beautiful morning at the beach. The sun didn’t rise until well after 7 am. We set off for a walk. The weather was pretty temperate with minimal wind, and we were happy to see that there was no forecast for rain! Two days in a row.

Happy Birthday to Chris!

Chris texted the girls this picture as we walked along the beach.

Chris: This bitch is all sand and practically no wind

Chris: Ha!  Beach!  Beach!

Misha: Mooooom dads calling us a beeaachhh

Chris: Autocorrect strikes again 

I had been taking pictures and turned around to see him laughing. He quipped, "Look at your messages."

We had a good laugh.

Kristen called us after awhile asking where we were. We figured she would be sleeping late.

We drove through Tillamook, stopping at some food trucks for lunch, to reach the Cape Meares lighthouse, an Octopus tree, and to go on a short hike. We stopped at a few beaches a long the way.

We saved a visit to the Tillamook Cheese Factory for later in the day. Their newest cheese was a black pepper white cheddar. I thought it was fantastic. Kristen and Chris enjoyed some cups of ice cream after we toured the facility.

It was Saturday, and surprisingly, there wasn’t too much going on.

We thought we had scouted out a few places in Rockaway Beach for dinner, but as we returned, the one place we decided on closed at 6:30 pm! Who closes at 6:30 pm? That’s right smack in the middle of dinner time.

Our next option was a smokehouse with fish and chips. All of the BBQ was gone so we had to be happy with fish and chips. Not the best meal that we have ever had. Though their coleslaw was pretty tasty.

Oregon in Fall - Day 1

For my normal sleep-in day on Friday (that’s sleeping in until 6:30 am IF I am lucky), we were all up extra early in order to get to the airport for our 8 am flight to Portland.

I got up before my alarm went off at 4 am so that I could exercise and do makeup. I showered the night before so I didn’t have to get up even earlier.

Kristen, never one to go to bed early, only got a few hours of sleep. Pretty sure she will sleeping throughout the day today.

As we were driving to the airport, Kristen (who hasn’t been up this early in a long time, commented, “Shouldn’t the sun be up already?” Welcome to Fall.

We had to park at the Parking Spot, which adds an extra half hour to our time to get to their airport. That is significant when you have to leave the house so early in the morning. Chris noted that the Pikes Peak parking lot should be (cross your fingers) opening back up next month.

A quick stop at Chick-fil-A for breakfast before boarding.

Our flight was uneventful, except that one of Kristen's airpods fell out of her ear while she was sleeping. We had to wait until the entire plan was empty of people before we could do some real searching.

One of the flight attendants was fantastic at helping us. Did you know that if you start to play music on your phone and one of your airpods is lost, the airpod will start to "ding"? Thanks to her, we found Kristen's airpod a couple of rows behind where she had been sitting.

We were able to pick up our rental car and be on our way once we landed at PDX. I love that the car rental place is so close to the airport so that you don't have to take a shuttle to get there. We stopped first at a Columbia store. Kristen forgot to bring a rain jacket! To Portland of all places!

The trees were popping with beautiful reds and oranges all around the city. Sad to say, there were homeless people camping everywhere along the roadsides, in the medians, and next to the freeway. And they just dumped their garbage anywhere. Doesn't seem like optimal spots to me if you are going to set up a camp. 

We talked to some friends later in the weekend who live outside of Portland and who hope that the homeless problem doesn't spread to their community. They expressed the sentiment, "Don't Portland my Oregon."

We drove to the coast via Astoria as we had time and wanted to enjoy a beautiful drive. 

The last time we were in Portland, Kristen was pretty young. She doesn’t remember much of Seaside except, for some crazy reason, the Pig n’ Pancake. We snapped a few pictures and continued on to our rental at Rockaway Beach.

Chris had reserved a small beach house at place called the Blue Octopus on Rockaway Beach. The bonus was that the rental was just steps from the beach. We had a bit of a sea view from the house as well.

We unloaded our stuff from the rental car and took a quick walk along the beach. Kristen had hoped to find a sand dollar, but the beach was pretty clean.

We didn’t have much luck with finding places to eat in Rockaway; we drove to Garibaldi for dinner at Portside Bistro just a couple miles away. It was pretty good. Kristen ordered Fettuccine Alfredo and I am pretty sure her serving was big enough for four people.