Hunting rocks in south central Oregon

Central Hotel was a fantastic place to stay and I highly recommend it to anyone who might be considering a visit to this area.

Because you have to stand near this kind of pic when you see it, right?

On our way to the Sunstone Public Collection Area. Note: It is way the heck out there.

A together selfie (is that a thing?) after some successful "mining".  Note: Almost all the rocks we got were laying on the ground and completely visible.

Blue Basin hike.

At the Painted Hills

Prineville Reservoir State Park - an unplanned but entirely lovely evening at the park with a water view!

Hen's Oregon Sunstones haul

Aurora borealis! In Portland! OHMYGAH!

My iPhone shot of the aurora from the bridge without a tripod.

 

Toppling trees

Lost Lake / Shavuot / 2017

Summer 2018, week ten - pictorial

Much post-production work to be done

The Oregon Garden - Silverton, OR

Artist installation

Hobbit-like hideaway hole in the Children's Garden

Geometric plants

Wandering

Frank Lloyd Wright's Gordon House

Lunch at PDX Sliders

Hall of Mosses invaded by LEGO minifigures and a boy

Introducing Bob Stewie Stuart Silverson, salamander extraordinaire

The salamander, the myth, the legend. 

"There's an emergency." "Is it a medical emergency?" "Sort of."
Note: There was no emergency, sort of or otherwise.
Children have been advised what constitutes an emergency for future reference.

Miss Amels with Stewie

Monsieur Hen with Stuart

Silverson's not scared of two yutes.

Going home

Children: "We won't forget you Bob Stuart."

Just before sunrise

Sometimes you have to pull the car over and snap a photo because the colors are beautiful. This morning was one of those times.

Camp

Two questions I got to ask Hen when I picked him up from camp today:

1. Did you start a fire?
2. Did you use a knife to whittle wood?

Trackers is an awesome camp. Not only is one of their locations super convenient for us - we're able to bike Hen there every morning and bike home when the day is done - they also do a fantastic job of catching children's imaginations through their innovative and educational programs. The kids spend the majority of their day outside regardless of weather, which can be less than stellar in the early days of summer. The kids are taught actual skills. For example, Hen is learning how to use a bow and arrow in his Stealth, Archery, and Wilderness Survival camp. And, yes, he's learning how to build a fire. (Pssst…he's playing with fire, but in a safe environment. This is part of the awesomeness of the camp.) He likes to point out the plants he's learned about whilst traipsing through the forest. He went last year for the magic camp, and I fully expect he'll return for many more summers in the future.

Snowpocalypse crafting!

I have to admit something here on the blog that's a little embarrassing. I'm hanging my head in shame as I type this. Okay, here goes…

We don't own a sled. 

I know. I know. How can this be? We live near a mountain and have a six-year old boy. Having a lad and no sled is just this side of neglectful, really. We can't possibly expect him to grow up to be a fully functioning member of society WITHOUT A FRICKIN' SLED!

Our glaring lack in parental responsibility was made all the clearer when our next door neighbor dropped by to ask if she could borrow ours. That look, the one she gave me when I informed her that our household was minus a sled, I don't know if I'll ever be able to live that down.

But hey, I still had an internet connection and, by God, there had to be others who found themselves in similar situations. What if I could remedy this with old-fashioned cardboard crafting? Perhaps there would be instructions online? My search commenced and less than a second after typing "how to make your own sled youtube," I had my answer.

A quick check confirmed we had the necessary supplies - cardboard, garbage bag (or in our case a sturdy LEGO plastic bag with Yoda on it. Yeah, YODA, people.), and packing tape.

This is what we crafted for sledding…

This is what it looked like on the trial run by the condo-building-house. If it looks as if Hen isn't moving real fast it's because he's actually not moving at all.

Here's the sled in action…
SnowpocalypseSledding from Christie Glynn on Vimeo.

And since this is a crafting post, I'll include a picture of the cardboard igloo fort we made yesterday.

Introducing Hyles lineata

I submitted a request to have someone confirm the type of moth Hen found while in the Mexico and they finally got back to me. What's more, they track this info on their site so Hen's picture holding dear Hyles lineata is now a part of their database. Lepidoptera are awesome.

We're back!

5 nights, 6 days of camping

≈585 miles of road traveled

2 restaurant breakfasts

2 nights with campfires and s'mores

1 lake visited, 3 beaches visited, 1 river visited

4 campsites

1 flat tire

2 3-scoop samplers at the Tillamook Cheese Factory

no melatonin ingested

plethora of echinoderms discovered

countless hours exploring nature

many pictures taken

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

For those who wish to view it on Flickr, click here.

Holiday weekend happenings

We have no problem inviting ourselves over if you have a place in Mt. Hood as Robert and Lynn found out this past Labor Day weekend. We had brunch on the patio, followed by a trip to the pool for Hen, a walk down to the river, and dinner back at the cabin. We constructed rock towers, gathered dinosaur bones (also known as broken tree branches), and enjoyed a particularly tasty chocolate cake. It was a most excellent way to spend the day.

Camping at Lost Lake

We went, we saw, we camped. Lost Lake is even more gorgeous when the fog lifts and you can see the mountain. Our nature adventures continued this trip with the 3.2 mile hike taking nearly five hours to complete. We spent less time playing in the water, and more time playing with a dead crawdad Hen found. There was no crazy, been dead for far too long smell so I figured this was okay. The campgrounds are spacious and private with great flat areas for pitching tents. You can rent rowboats and kayaks and paddle boats. The General Store is stocked with the largest marshmallows I have ever seen. We saw newts again. And chipmunks, water skippers, and crawdads both dead and alive. The live crawdad we saw in the morning. Hen was awake by 6:30a.m. and we were down by the water by 8:30a.m. I enjoyed the view while Hen searched for newts and I saw him dip his hand down and pull something up. It was clear from the way it, well, moved that this crawdad was alive. And this became clear to Hen as soon as the very alive crawdad grabbed a handful in his hair with his front claw. Hen put that sucker down fast. We will definitely be going back again before summer is over. Of course, there were pictures...

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

Click here to view the pics on Flickr.