Seattle: Days 3, 4 & 5

Our friend, Jeff, had to work on Friday; unfortunately a big project at work got postponed and due the same weekend we were visiting.  The rest of us headed to Lake Wilderness for some swimming and playing in the sand.

We LOVED the soft, plush grass in Seattle; so much so that we all went out barefoot to play sports that night!

Playing soccer

Carter played some Frisbee :o)

In lieu of starting my Saturday morning with a 5 mile run, we ate some "legendary" doughnuts instead! 

Several of the doughnuts are named after famous characters or people.  In the box below, we had a Charlie Brown doughnut and an Oprah doughnut.  There was quite the selection to choose from!

The rest of the day was spent on Mount Rainier.  It is the tallest mountain in the contiguous United States from base to summit.  It was neat to see all the glaciers on the mountain.  Even though there hasn't been activity for a long time, I would be scared to live near a volcano!

Information center with Mt. Rainier in the background

We drove to Sunrise and did two hikes less than 3 miles, one before lunch and one after.  The trails were really dusty, but the sights were phenomenal, especially with the beautiful wild flowers in bloom.

Pregnant Mommas

Family pictures at the top of our first hike

Tahlia, Lily, Jeff, and Claire

They're pregnant with their first boy!

Caleb wanted to take a picture

After lunch, we headed on our second hike down to Sunrise Lake.

 Carter with his hiking stick 

 It was a very steep hike, especially the last quarter of the hike right down to the lake.  It made for a difficult climb on the way back up to the top!

At the lake

Beautiful scenery

Carter got pretty tired on both hikes and wanted to be carried for a lot of it.  He preferred me to carry him, but on this second hike, it was way too steep.  I was just trying to make it to the top myself!  Poor Matt had the difficult job of monitoring Carter's progress (carrying him on his shoulders for awhile and then making him walk for awhile).  Caleb and I went ahead of everyone else.  We didn't see a single mosquito in our stay in Seattle except for on this hike.  Anytime we stopped to rest, Caleb got swarmed by mosquitoes (he's got yummy blood).  So we kept pushing on and beat everyone else to the top.  We all got our exercise for the day from those two hikes!

Later that night we had Little Caesar's pizza and then roasted some marshmallows and made s'mores.  Isn't that awesome to be able to sit around a small fire in the summer?!?

The flight home was shorter by almost an hour than the flight to Seattle, so that made things a little easier for the kids.  We could only get 3 seats together on the way home, so Matt sat with the kids, and I got a middle seat to myself at the back of the plane.  Carter took a good nap, so that made things a little easier for Matt.  I took turns fighting for use of the arm rests with the two bigger gentleman that I sat between. :o)

Caleb is fascinated at airports with the planes taking off and landing.  Here he is watching while we waited to be called to load the plane.

What fun it was to spend time with good friends and to spend time as a family!  For some reason it was more difficult adjusting to the time difference once we got home.  Matt and I find ourselves staying up later because we're not tired, and the boys have been sleeping in every morning.  Carter slept till 9 am for two mornings in a row!  Matt and I are still getting up early though--him to go to work, and me to run before he goes to work.  We're all adjusting back slowly.