On Wednesday of our vacation in the Northwest we left rainy Seattle and drove 2 1/2 hours through rainy Washington to Oregon, where the rain finally started to let up.

We arrived at my brother Josh’s house.

They made a special wall of photos in our guest room just for us!

We had so much fun and great memories during our few days with my brother Josh and his wife Hannah and their kids. They were so kind and hospitable and helped us enjoy every day. Hannah even provided a whole bowl of pretzels for Wes.

It was great to have cousin time. My kids don’t see their kids often, and since they are close in ages it was nice for them to play together.

Wes playing Angry Birds on the tablet was quite the event.

On Thursday morning Hannah and I took the kids (all 7) for a neighborhood walk.

Logan and Ethan would often run ahead, and Wes would run ahead with them. But the difference between them is Logan and Ethan would eventually stop and Wes wouldn’t.

It was cute to watch Carissa with her twin cousins. They are close in age. I think she especially enjoyed playing with Charlotte.

We decided to spend the day at the rose garden in Portland and then the zoo. It was a little chilly and wet, but still perfect for being outside. Carissa is usually camera shy but I made a deal with her that she could take pictures of me smelling the roses if I could take pictures of her. The result? Way more pictures than usual of both of us.

Silly faces in the Shakespeare Shrine.

Wes got bored fast in the rose garden so John walked him down to the nearby playground. It was a fantastic Oregon playground in the middle of huge shady trees.

Then it was off to the zoo for lunch! John and I and the kids were so hungry in Oregon because our body clocks were an hour faster and we usually ate lunch and dinner later than we were used to. We learned after the first day that we had to eat a big breakfast to make through till lunch. We ate a lot at the zoo!

We had a fun day. Finished up with a round of Uno.