A Fabulous Time

So, as you probably know, Bret and I went on a trip just the two of us this past week. It was really good and it was nice to get away from it all for a bit. The first night we were gone I really missed the girls and was filled with guilt for leaving them. It took a couple of days to get over it and then I really enjoyed myself. By the time Bret and I got to Lake Shasta, we were done. We missed the girls a lot and they were missing us a lot too. Alaina would ask for us to come home and "take care of her" in her prayers. So we ended up not going to Tahoe and coming home two days early. We were gone for 8 days and we went to three places. Here is a nice little summary of the trip with pictures!

This is us on the road!

This is our camp site at Crater Lake. It was nice and spacious. We didn't have neighbors the whole time!

Do you see the highest part of this mountain? Yeah we hiked up there. It was hard. 6.8 miles there and back. Felt good to finish it though. That day we hiked/biked a total of 16 miles.

The was a sign on one of our bike rides. We set the timer and took a picture.

Crater Lake. Its beautiful because its so unique. And the water is so clear and blue, its so pretty.

This picture is one I took on another hike up to a fire watchtower. Its my favorite picture I took of Crater Lake.

After we left Crater Lake we stopped by the Oregon Caves, which were really cool. I don't have any pictures on here though. After Oregon Caves we went to the Redwoods. Oh my its so pretty. I love it there. I think it was the highlight of our trip. This is our little campsite there. It was a hike in tent site, so it was nice and secluded.

This tree is on a hike off the scenic route. Its called Big Tree. I don't know why though, seems weird.

This is a cut redwood tree, almost as tall as Bret who is 6 ft 2 in. I liked how you can see all the rings.

If you can't tell what that is, its an Elk. A really big one. Its not a great picture but at least its there. His name is Mr. Elk E. Elk.

This is a big tree that probably got hit by lightening. Pretty cool looking.

These are the only falls in the Redwoods. The Trillium Falls. We saw three more huge elk on the hike there, they looked a little more ready to fight than Elk E. Elk, so we didn't take any pictures.

Of coarse the Redwoods are right next to the ocean, so we went for a couple of nice little walks. I love the beach and the water (just as long as I'm not in the water).

We drove through a tree. Very exciting.

We went to a place called Trees of Wonder which had a big Paul Bunyan and Babe in the front, I mean big. They had a gondola ride up to the top of the mountain looking down on the tops of the huge Redwood trees. It was beautiful...and scary.

In the Redwoods campground we made friends with lots of Banana slugs. At first I was completely appalled by them, but then I saw one murdered by birds and I liked them from then on. This one's name is Ganeo. (Bret likes to name all the animals we see.)

More ocean, pretty pretty ocean.

Bailey Cove campground at Shasta Lake. Kinda ugly when coming from the Redwoods. Lots of noisy birds and tiny lizards (the one that hung around the most we named Lego.) We were the only ones there until the last day. It was nice except for the scary bathrooms and.....the fact that Shasta Lake was barely there. We camped in Bailey Cove, but you could go four wheeling on the bottom instead of swim. It was about 100 feet low.

We were excited to see the sky though, never saw it in the Redwoods. My favorite thing that we did at Shasta Lake was go on a bike ride around Bailey Cove, which should have been filled with water. It was a fun, challenging bike ride that I would do 1000 times if I could.

First sunset we saw too.

So here you can see what I mean about no water. We had to walk down to the boat on a road that is normally not there. This is the boat we took to see Shasta Caverns. It was nice to get out on the water, at least the water that was left.

Heres a place it didnt look so low. It probably is very pretty when its full. Its pretty when its not!

Heres the entrance into Shasta Caverns. Caves are one of my favorite things, so thats why we went to two on our trip. These caves are the prettiest I've ever seen. You'll see why.

Some neat looking growths on the ceiling of the caves.

This is why they are beautiful! They are sparkly:) You know how I feel about sparkly things.

This is the guy who discovered the caves. That stands for 1878. I think its cool he put his name.

After the caves we went to see the Sundial Bridge in Redding. It is pretty neat. We also walked around the Arboretum in the rain. The bridge is made with glass, so theres the glass...with our dirty nasty shoes.

This about when we decided to come home. I don't regret coming home. It was nice to see Alaina get so excited and clench to me like she never wants me to leave ever again. Braelyn just wanted Bret. Whatever, its not like I create her or survived a c-section for her or breast fed her or take care of her everyday and slowly become deaf because of her or anything. She could have Bret, I wasn't bitter:)

It was great; good Mom therapy. I appreciate my children more and can handle another year or two of yelling and tantrums now.

Thanks to Mom and Dad, Nolan and Susan and Jena and Jeff and Emily for watching them. I could never thank you enough or repay the gratitude I have for letting us go on this trip. You guys are awesome.