Are You Sick of Hearing About Camping Yet??

If you aren't, please read on. If you are, rest assured that this is probably my last adventure for the season. My doctor told me at my appt this week that they won't let me go past 39 weeks with my blood clotting thing, which leaves only 3 weekends to get ready for this baby's arrival, one of which will be filled with all the festivities of my brother coming home from his mission.

So on that note, we headed to the hills for a final adventure. This time we hit up Leavenworth, a cute little Bavarian Village just on the other side of the Cascade Mountains.

It is quite a popular little tourist town, but it is also surrounded by an overwhelming amount of outdoor adventure and doesn't take long to get away from the crowds. Aaron has decided it is his new favorite place in Washington. Here we are overlooking the valley.

This is a view from the same spot, but in the direction of our campsite. We camped in icicle canyon, about 20 minutes outside of town. A lot of people go there for backpacking and rock climbing, but we just liked it because it was beautiful and peaceful (not to mention the largest campsites we have ever seen!)

We headed up to Fish Lake the next day for some rowboat action. Not the nicest ride we have been on, but at $5/hr rental, I suppose you can't complain. And I really couldn't complain because Aaron wouldn't let me row; I just got to sit back, relax, and watch the birds and the fish.

Then we headed down to Lake Wenatchee State Park ready to play in the water, but it was too cold and windy for us to even stand being on their beach. So Aaron took Adelyn horseback riding instead. She LOVES horses and had a great time, except for having to wear the giant bicycle helmet.

We had a great weekend and look forward to going back again and rafting that Wenatchee River!

More Fun Firsts

Our first campout with Adelyn went so well that we decided to give round 2 a try just two weeks later at the next sign of good weather. We moved from just camping to giving her a tryout on solo hiking (not being carried).

There were quite a few times that she wanted to give up and ride on someone's shoulders, but we found little games to play along the way. Her two favorite distractions were finding the perfect fallen log to pose on for the camera, and racing Daddy. She is quite the competitive one, let me tell you...at one point she even ran right in front of him and cut him off so he wouldn't pass her!

A couple more weekends after that we were blessed with our first nephew, Ryder Grayson Bertels. He came about three weeks early, so I hope this little baby of ours follows suit! Here he is with his proud little mama.


And of course we had to get a cousin shot! Adelyn wasn't quite sure at first what to do with such a small baby.

While we were in Bellingham, the sun came out and Jake was taking Jadyn for a ride on the jet ski. I was quite surprised that Aaron felt Adelyn would be too sad watching Jadyn go and decided to take her out too. Personally I worried 2.5 was a little young for a first jet ski ride, but they made it back safe and sound, with Adelyn chanting to go faster.


Inspired by even more sunny weather...yes we do live for the summer here in the Pacific Northwest, we decided to head out to Tillicum Village on Blake Island. Aaron has been wanting to do this for a long time, so that was our Father's Day present.

For those who aren't around here, it is an Indian village boasting of its authentic Salmon bake buffet and native dancing and storytelling. For those who ARE around here and who haven't been, you aren't missing out. Maybe our expectations were too high, maybe we waiting too long to go, but we thought it was just OK.



Perhaps the most entertaining part of the day was Adelyn's reaction to the steamed clam appetizer that we were greeted with upon arrival. I was surprised that she wanted to try one and not surprised to realize that it didn't quite make it all the way down. I looked and realized she had it sitting in her cheek like a chipmunk for about 15 minutes! Can you see it in there?!

And the final first that we have for our show and tell today was Adelyn's first visit to Mt. Rainier. Saturday was such a perfect day that while we were out running errands, Aaron got the urge to head to the hills. Those are the kinds of urges that I don't fight one bit, so we packed up a quick picnic and headed up.

As I mentioned it was a gorgeous day...a Saturday on a holiday weekend at that, so we weren't the only ones with this brilliant idea. It was so crowded that the parking lot at Paradise was full. So we just scoped out the campgrounds for future reference, ate our picnic, and hopped on the trail to Carter Falls.

We made the mistake of showing Adelyn the backpack, and after that she wasn't really into the idea of hiking herself. Chasing chipmunks was the only way we could get her down. It was much hotter and steeper than we expected....poor Aaron! And yes, Adelyn dressed herself that day...ode to PINK!!

That's about all we have for now. Hopefully you feel adequately caught up on our recent lives. I even threw in a couple of pictures of my growing belly for those of you who get excited about that sort of thing.

Only six weeks to go!!!!!