photo shoot

So, perhaps I exaggerated a bit, because apparently the photo shoot wasn't a total disaster. Despite the kicking, screaming, and general crabbiness, the photographer managed to get a fair amount of good pictures of little Miss Sadie Rain.



He captured quite a range of expressions, I think...


Funny that this one ended up being one of our favorites; it was taken right after she flung herself down on the floor, full-on tantrum style:


And this one couldn't be more fitting for our sweet little thumbsucker:


All in all, a good snapshot of Sadie at 18 months...

somewhere in eastern washington...

... in a time long, long ago...

road trip, the fifth and final installment

It's been too long. I need to conclude this drawn-out saga before we embark on our next road trip---which just happens to be this Friday---and get buried under an even bigger pile of pictures and stories.

So where were we? The 4th of July, Missoula-style. Let me just say it didn't disappoint. There were meat smokers and wine pulleys, jello shots and monkeyballs, but oddly enough no fireworks. No matter. We had an epic time getting rowdy in Kevin's backyard:






The next day, we packed up our stuff at a comfortable hour and hit the road westward...in Butterball. We were feeling lucky, I guess, especially with Ken & Shawn at our backs. So we set out for Oregon, planning to camp at the best available spot before dark. We found a sparse and surprisingly unpopulated campsite on the banks of the Columbia River, a mere 4 hours from home. We were in the clear! The next day, seemingly invincible to a breakdown, we even found time to visit Stonehenge and a Columbia Valley winery:




Did you know there was an actual-size replica of Stonehenge in Washington, built to the exacting specifications of the original? Yeah, neither did we.

All in all, it was quite a trip---eight days of cavorting and caravaning around the northwest with a great group of peeps. I could have lasted eight more. We were in no hurry to get home, despite the fact that our engine could bust up into a churning mess of metal at any moment. But it never did. Butterball made Bend, albeit noisily. As of this writing, she's in the shop for a rebuild and that four figures worth of work I declined in Montana. Oh well, she earned it.

Next up? The Fuckaroos 5.5 crew (PAWS UP!!) reunites in Joseph, OR this Friday for Labor Day weekend. I'm pretty sure Joseph's not ready for this...

jah, mon

Reggae baby gots da dub beat:

road trip, part 4

I realize I left you all hanging, loyal readers. My apologies. But we obviously made it back from Montana, right? The question is: how?

Volkswagens may be a headache from time to time, but damn if they're not persistent. After our whirlwind tour of Glacier, we decided there was nothing to do but drive. We had AAA. We had a car full of friends following us. We had determination and all the time in the world to slowly coax Butterball back to Missoula. And she didn't let us down. That is, until we got the news from the VW mechanic that the problem was not a valve, or something in the drive train, but rather a head or a rod deep, deep within the engine compartment. Meaning: drop the engine. Disassemble. Rebuild. And 5 days and $1500 later, we could return to Bend.

Needless to say, this didn't fit our vacation plans nicely. The mechanic suggested we rent a car and have Butterball towed back to Oregon on a flatbed, so we could deal with the issue on home turf. That didn't sound ideal either. We decided to deliberate the issue over the weekend and enjoy the Fourth of July instead.

Missoula is a great town in that it has an outdoorsy, quaint, small-town feel without the pretentiousness of Boulder or Bend. It's all blue collars, cowboys, and hippies (oh---and Kevin, too). On Thursday, we hit the riverside park for the weekly food & music fest:

... and rode the historic carousel:


... and abandoned shopping carts:

... and even managed to check out the local bars that night while Reid & Ken babysat:


Quite a day, considering we had just left Glacier at 10:00 that morning.

Coming in the next installment: the Chillable flows in abundance on the Fourth!

south sister

For the past two years, Sibila and I have talked about organizing a girls' South Sister climb. South Sister is one of a group of three volcanoes (the Three Sisters, appropriately) just 20 miles west of Bend. At 10,358', it's the third highest peak in Oregon and, though considered dormant, has recently shown "swelling" in the past few years which geologists speculate is caused by seismic activity at its core. So, we figured we'd better climb it before it erupts, right?

When the opportunity finally presented itself last weekend, our group consisted of merely three: myself, Sibila, and Leah. The weather forecast looked good, and we hit the trail at 6:30 am, planning to summit well before noon. What we encountered at the top could only be described as nasty: windy, cold, and sleeting, with visibility of about 20 yards. This video was taken at the saddle, approximately one hour from the summit. And it just got nastier from there...

Needless to say, we didn't enjoy 360 views or a picnic lunch in the sun once we arrived. Still, it was well worth the effort and felt good to push my physical limits again...it's been 8 years since my last Colorado 14'er. Anyway, here we are at the summit crater, which given the weather may as well have been a frozen lake somewhere in Antarctica:

Had it been a clear day, we would have seen this, instead:

Oh well. Maybe we'll get a view when we climb Middle Sister NEXT summer...

my advice to new parents

DO NOT, under any circumstances, take an 18-month-old for a "professional" portrait session.

Unless, of course, you would like to wrestle a tantruming toddler for 45 minutes, hoping to get them to stand still for two seconds, three wardrobe changes, and one---just one, please---smile. Yeah, it was THAT fun.

In retrospect, 6 months would have been the ideal age for a photo shoot: they can sit up unassisted, perhaps crawl and roll around a bit but are by no means mobile, and are easily amused by rattles and squeaky toys. Ahh, the good old days!