Fourth of July in Walla Walla

For the Fourth of July this year we went to Walla Walla with Kris and John to do some wine tasting.  These wine connoisseurs have never been before.  Can you believe it?  Me neither.  We rented the same house we stayed at for Randy's reunion and were able to take our dogs.  The house is within walking distance from downtown and is a perfect place for us to stay.

All packed up and ready to go!

Poor Trey has his tiny little spot within the carseat
and that's about it thanks to our carsick dog.

Amy had just taken her kids on a long road trip,
so she let me borrow some of her games and toys.

Here's Trey on the Etch-a-Sketch. 

Randy spent his formative years in Walla Walla, and his parents still have a lot of friends who live here.  We have been trying to get together with Missy and Kourt in Portland, but for some reason it was easier to get together in Walla Walla.  We went to Missy's parents' house for dinner, and it was perfect weather to sit outside and let the boys run around.

Walking back to the house from breakfast at the Maple Counter Cafe...one of my favorite spots in Walla Walla, and that's saying a lot considering all of the delicious wineries.

Trey chillaxin' in our first winery stop 

The main reason I wanted Amy's travel kit was to keep Trey busy at the wineries.  This play foam was a big hit and kept him occupied almost everywhere we went.

Wine tasting at Cougar Crest, probably our least favorite stop, but we felt obligated to go there since they had let Trey use their restroom on the way into town the day before for a bathroom emergency.

This may not look like a stage to you, but it did to Trey, and he put on quite a show. 

Magnetic faces! 

Basel Cellars

Pretty much anything you drink here will be good.

The view from Basel Cellars

We stopped at Gifford Hirlinger, one of our favorite wineries,
on the way back to the house.  

Trey was pretty pooped by this point,
but he enjoyed the shade and the swing for a short time. 

Dinner at home 

Everyone, well, almost everyone, resting up before fireworks 

I promised Trey he would see fireworks this year, and he did not let me forget my promise all day long.  We went out by the Walla Walla airport to see them shot off from the community college.  It was beautiful out here and the perfect place to get away from the crowds.  The only unfortunate part was that by 9:45pm the show still had not started and Trey was ready to go home.  Luckily, Randy's friend Jon and his wife had joined us, and they gave the grown ups a ride back to the house after the fireworks so I could take Trey home to bed.  Also, luckily, fireworks in Washington aren't illegal, so Trey saw plenty of "real" fireworks being shot off and doesn't realize he missed the big show.

Everyone staying occupied on their phones 

What do you do while waiting for fireworks?  

Have standing-on-one-foot contests, of course! 

After breakfast the next day, I took Trey to the park to burn off some energy before we started wine tasting again.  These pictures are cool to me because Trey has always been hesitant to climb on his own and go down slides, but he has turned a corner this summer and is being much more independent and "adventurous" on the playground, and I think it's awesome!

He went down this slide multiple times on his own! So proud! 

And when a boy has to pee, a boy has to pee. 

There are several tasting rooms clustered together downtown Walla Walla, so on Saturday afternoon we hit that area of town.  The plan was to go to a few tasting rooms, and then Randy would drive Trey home to nap.  It worked out perfectly...well, for all of us except Randy.  

 I'm telling you, this play foam stuff is genius.

 Spring Valley Vineyard

Saturday night John and Randy went on a little drive and came home with some great pictures.  The landscape in this part of the state is just stunning.

On Sunday it was too hot to keep the dogs in the cars while wine tasting and we had to check out of the house.  We decided to go to Woodward Canyon on the way out of town because John wanted to try their wine and we thought the dogs could handle one stop.  Luckily, there was a nice shaded area to hang out in, and we all agreed one winery was plenty on our way out of town.

Kris, John, and Porter 

Sadly, Porter is aging quickly and seems to be nearing the end of his life.

We were glad to have him join us on this trip and things went better than we thought, but it was hard on the ol' guy and I'm sure he was happy to get home.  

This is how Trey fell asleep on the way home. 

We came home with quite a loot of wine.

A few of our favorite new wines were Kerloo Cellars and Sweet Valley Wines.

It was a great wine tasting weekend and a really fun way to spend the Fourth of July!

First few weeks of summer

So I'm a little behind on my blogging...what's new?  I just find that when the day is over and Trey is in bed, the last thing I want to do is be on the computer.  I'd rather curl up with my book.

Here are some pics and stories from the first few weeks of summer.

Aunt Julie got Trey the perfect present for a super hero fanatic.  He wears these costumes all of the time; lately, he has even been wearing them in bed during story time.  I want to snap a picture, but I never have my phone with me during story time.  Shocking, I know.

Robin doing a show

Trey calls him "Robin Hood" and no matter how many times I try to correct him, he prefers Robin Hood.  The other day I even showed him a picture of Robin Hood on the computer, so now Robin's nickname is Robin Hood.  Whatever, I guess Mama has to deal with the inaccuracy (which for some reason bugs me).

Robin (Hood) at the park

Grady doesn't seem too sure about this...

I'm wanting to transition Trey to some early chapter books for read aloud time.  I went through my box of books from my childhood and found these.  According to the name on top of the box, they belonged to my first grade teacher, Mrs. Putnam, who must have been the ones to introduce them to me in the first grade.  I don't think Trey is ready for these yet, but they look beautiful sitting on his bookshelf.

Summer time means playdate time, and Trey and I have been having fun hanging out with friends I don't get to see much of during the school year.  Here he is with Garland (5) and Maclyn (3), Kathleen's boys, at the playground.

Our garden is not doing as well as I would expect at this point of the summer, but it's plugging along.  This shot was from 2-3 weeks ago, so it looks better now but still not very productive.

Trey got some birthday money for his birthday, so we took him to Toys R Us to choose a new toy.  Like I said when I captioned this on Instagram, one person's heaven is another person's hell.  It was hard for Trey to choose, but he came home with a new Bat Cave that he loves.

The last weekend of June is our favorite brew fest of the year which is the organic brewfest at Overlook Park in Portland.  Kathleen met us there as well as Julie and her family, and the rain held out which was great.  Trey was in a bit of a funk, so we didn't stay as long as we would have liked to, but we still had a good time.  He had the most fun at the playground, which was unfortunately outside the boundaries of the brew fest.

Hunkered down under the tent

Julie and her boys

Case apparently did not want his picture taken.

This day was a weird weather day because if you looked in one direction you could literally see the rain coming down in the distance, and if you looked in a different direction the sky was a beautiful blue.  This moment was exciting to us because Trey has JUST started going down slides on his own.  Yes, he's four.  I know.

At the end of June we went to Trey's BFF Camille's Frozen birthday party.  The kids painted Frozen ice art, had some Frozen games, and ate Frozen themed food (I figured out way too late that the cheese puffs were supposed to be Olaf's nose).  They also had a Frozen pinata and a beautiful Frozen cake.

The weather has been beautiful, and we've been enjoying a lot of outside time.  Some evenings Julie brings Case and Grady over to play.  Here they are in the whale pool (soon to be replaced by Randy's genius impulse buy) and the slip n'slide.

Case checking out the sprinklers

Yummy popsicles

Trey and Grady

Swimming at Camille's house

Girls' night out wit Kirsten, Amy, and Sam, three girlfriends from college.

I've been reading a lot this summer, but nothing in particular was that awesome except for the last book I just read.  I enjoyed the Husband's Secret by Liana Moriarty, but not as much as others have, and I thought an older book by Jojo Moyes called the Last Letter From Your Lover was okay.  I read everything by Lorrie Moore because a lot of the authors I like praise her work, but I never get that much out of it.  I just read her newest collection of short stories called Bark which I thought were okay but they keep making it on to various "great books" lists so I guess they're better than okay. Apparently, I don't appreciate her writing as much as I should.  I read the Ten Year Nap by Meg Wolitzer which was a novel about working moms, stay at home moms, having kids, blah blah blah and I found myself skimming parts.  Again, so-so.

I did really enjoy Delancey by Molly Wizenberg, and I read that book in a day.  I liked the book enough to not be able to put it down for a day, but I was bummed that it was such a fast read because I had really been looking forward to it.   I definitely want to take a trip to Seattle to go to her restaurant.

The book I just finished a few nights ago was called the Interestings, also by Meg Wolitzer.  I really loved that one and would recommend it to anyone.  Great characters, fun story lines, good dialogue...it was the kind of book I wanted to take in the car with me to read at stoplights.  I'm sad that it's over because I am still thinking about the characters.

I just picked up Midwives by Chris Bohjalian that is a pretty old book (a 1997 book that Oprah made popular), but I've been wanting to read it for years.  I'm hoping it's a fast read because I have several coming up in the holds list at the library that I am looking forward to.  Goldfinch is supposed to be a summer read for me, so that one better hurry up!  Any summer favorites of yours I should put on my list?