It's time for a food fight!

Sorry if the title made you believe there would be photos of my family covered in a palatable mess - I stole the title from a great video about non-GMO foods!

Don't even get me started!

My family knows that I'm a bit of a freak when it comes to REAL FOOD and non-GMO's and they know when they bring it up that they are in for a ranting!  I could fill your inbox with articles and websites that would have you ranting too!

I'm far from perfect in my food choices but I really do try to choose well for my family (following the 80/20 rule) and am willing to pay a bit more for healthier alternatives.  GMO's frustrate me because they are one of those things that are really hard to avoid because they are in nearly every food imaginable (Food, Inc. is a great movie if you haven't seen it, watch it!) and there are no labeling requirements.   Wouldn't you like that to change - or at least require that GMO foods be labeled to reflect what they really are.  I am tired of the government controlling our foods and treating us like human guinea pigs.  It's time for a food fight!


IT'S TIME FOR A FOOD FIGHT from NO GMO on Vimeo.

{Exploring} Portland: Oregon Coast

Thursday we enjoyed a terrific play day at the Oregon Coast.
Made even better because we were able to convince Rich to play hooky from work and join us.

We began the day bright and early.
The drive to the coast can be as quick as 1 1/2 hour but we began our day in Newport, which is closer to 2 1/2 hours from our house.
Our only detour on our drive was to drive through Corvallis and enjoy a trip down (college) memory lane for Rich.

We reached Newport and spent our first two hours at the Oregon Coast Aquarium.
The kids enjoyed  getting to see seals, sea otters, alligators, jellyfish, octopus, shark, sting ray and a multitude of other marine life.

After the visit to the aquarium, we went to the Yaquina Bay State Park, where we had a picnic lunch, played in the sand, flew our kite and toured the Yaquina Bay Lighthouse.

We headed north on our adventure and stopped next at Depoe Bay.  The beach there was a rocky beach so we didn't spend time there other than to "ooh" and "aah" over the scenery.

Further north we stopped at Gleneden Beach and pulled out the sand toys and the kite again.  The kids found some sand hills that they climbed and explored and our time there went very quickly.  Gleneden had huge waves but the temperatures kept my kids out of the surf, which was probably just as well.

A trip to the coast wouldn't be complete without stopping at a candy store for salt water taffy.  We made that stop in Lincoln City (along with a quick stop at the outlet mall).

We hit Tillamook about the time that everyone's tummy was reminding us that it was time for dinner.  We enjoyed delicious fish and chips, as well as clam chowder at a fish house in Tillamook and then proceeded on.  We realized then that we were not going to make all the beach stops that we had hoped so we headed for the closest beach so that we could finish the day roasting marshmallows on the beach.

Our final stop was Cape Meares, just north of Oceanside.

As the sun began to go down, the wind picked up and the temperatures dropped so we were grateful for the jackets that we'd brought and the fire that we built.

We pulled out a s'more "bar" and tried a variety of s'more combinations.  I got the idea for the s'more bar here and ours included two flavors of marshmallows, graham crackers, chocolate chunk cookies, peanut butter chunk cookies, granola bars, hershey's milk chocolate, hershey's cookies 'n cream, peanut butter cups and (for dad) a york peppermint pattie.  Very fun!

We put out the fire just about the time that the sun finally set.  That was our cue and we headed home.

We've determined that our adventures of the day were just our "Southern Coast Exploration" and look forward to making another day of it soon to explore some of our favorite norther beaches.

Our 2nd Big Truck Event!

We've reached a landmark!
We have lived in Portland long enough to be enjoying activities for the second time around.
Last weekend I took J and T to the BIG TRUCK EVENT, which was one of the first outings that we took last year after moving here.
It was just as much fun this go around as it was last year - probably even more so for T this year.

Put pint sized kids inside full sized trucks and you have to know that dreams are coming true!

Girls Only!

One of K's goals for the summer was to have a pedicure with me.
One of my summer goals was to have an individual date with each of my children.
Last weekend K and I each marked off a goal after we went on a Girl Only outing to the nail spa.

Elder Dougall is alive and well

We are having a great experience receiving a letter each week from Tanner.
He is staying very busy and is very happy and his letters confirm both those facts.
I have attached links to his letters on my sidebar - feel free to read them or to drop him a line.
I know that mail is always welcome!

We found these four photos with Tanner in them posted on his mission's blog.
I had to download them to share.

{Visit} Utah: Bear Lake with the Binghams

Our second day at Bear Lake was spent with the Bingham family at their beautiful cabin.

Here is just a fun little walk down memory lane - the last time that we were at their cabin was ten years ago when it was nothing more than a cement slab...

We were grateful that we were finally able to enjoy the finished product - just sorry that it took ten years to get there.

The kids were in heaven riding the Bingham's ATV's for the afternoon.
Even J and T were driving the kid sized ATV and it was darling!

We wrapped up the day with a quick trip to the waterfront, eating pizza on the beach.

Thanks again Mel and Brian.
We value your friendship beyond words and we loved spending the day together.
Hope it's not another 10 years before we do it again!

{Visit} Utah: Bear Lake

We left Utah with two days left in our vacation.  

We headed up to the Idaho/Utah border to spend a couple of days at Bear Lake before we came home.

The first day was literally spent at Bear Lake - as in we were on the shores of the lake for the entire day.

Rich and I relaxed on the beach while the kids splashed in the water and dug in the sand.  

It was truly heaven!

{Visit} Utah: Kennecott Mine

Rich was born and raised in Oregon and yet I will often ask him about points of interest only to have him tell me that he has never visited them.  It seems that often you miss the tourist destinations of the very town that you live in.

Case in point:  I grew up in Utah and yet have never been to the Kennecott Copper Mine.
My mom suggested that we go to the Visitor Center and so we made a field trip of it and I'm really glad that we did.
The first thing we noted was the size of those dump trucks!  Look below - the two white trucks are normal size trucks and they are dwarfed by the dump truck driving by!

Here is a tire from one of those dump trucks...are you kidding me?

Yes, I became fascinated with the trucks and their tires.  

The tires cost $25,000/apiece.  

Each truck has six tires and they are replaced each year.

They have eighty trucks working the mine.

That's 480 tires a year at the cost of $12,000,000 just for tires!!!

Yes, I'm a nerd!

We watched a video about how the copper is mined and produced.
We then walked through the visitors center.

Lastly we stood on the edge of the open pit and just took it in!

{Visit} Utah: Human Bowling

When we visit Utah my brothers are always so kind to make time to come visit.
My younger brother and his wife came to my parents one afternoon and we enjoyed visiting while the kids enjoyed Diyah's massive slip & slide, which she turned into Human Bowling...
(the kids were the "balls" and they slid into jugs of water that served as the "pins")