It was such a short visit down to see my mom. We left at 12:30 on Friday afternoon and headed to Oregon. Normally, this drive would take me approx 4 hours or so, give or take a few for potty breaks. Well, thanks to the stimulus package, there is road construction in just about every big city from B.C. to Portland! I also heard a rumor about how the D.O.T. was widening the freeway for the winter Olympics next year to ease congestion. ?????
We finally arrive at 7:00 pm! That's right folks. A 4+ hour drive that took us 6 1/2. Nice. My grandparents had also driven up from Phoenix and it was nice to have us all together. We hung out at the house on Friday night.
Lil' C got a call from my mom's neighbors, Niko and Aja, asking if he would like to go dirt biking with them Sat morn. I gave the all clear so we were in bed at a reasonable time so this could happen for him. He borrowed some gear from Niko, and of course I had to take some pics since I would not be there to see him on the bike.
Doodle, Grammie and I got ready to go and met the grandparents at Costco. Then we headed out to lunch at Shari's. Did you know that Mon-Fri from 4-9:00pm kids eat free there? All you have to do is buy them a drink of some kind. Well over the weekend it was kids eat free for some kind of special deal so we ate there. Doodle and I liked it, everyone else was so-so about the food and service.
We had to head back to the house to get Lil' C from his dirt biking adventures. Mom and the grandparents were back at their hotel. We had just picked Lil' C up when we get a call from mom. Does Aja want to some swimming at the hotel? Of course!!! We head there for some pool time, and we do cake to celebrate Lil' C, Doodle, Grandpa P's and my birthday, all which took place in the last 60 days.
(now with a pic of Grandma smiling)
Sunday morning we go back to the grandparents hotel and bid them goodbye. They were driving back to Phoenix and we wanted to see them one last time. Then, the rest of us head for a little shopping slice of heaven. Want to know where???? GOODWILL. I love to bargain shop! You can find the most amazing treasures there! We went with the express purpose of looking for school clothes. I am on a pretty tight budget so I need to be quite frugal with my shopping. Plus, Goodwill in Oregon is tax free, and my mom belongs to Club Goodwill so we get an additional 10% off all purchases. Found a ton of things for Doodle and only a few for Lil' C. More pics on that later!
After 2 Goodwill stores we head back to the house to refuel. The kids eat and head out to play with Niko and Aja while mom and I go through some things in the garage she wants me to take home. I got some great under the bed storage containers, a cool toilet paper container for the bathroom and a chair that used to be at my desk when I was little.
We finally get around to present time! We had: mom's birthday, Christmas and Mother's Day presents; Lil' C's birthday present, Doodle's birthday present and mine!
We finally head out around 6:00. Of course we had to hit the Carl's Jr on the way out! Recently, like 9 months ago, they put one in our town about 3 miles away. HOWEVER, the place is always so packed it is not worth the wait!
Heading home, we had a chance to reflect on our visit. We had a great time and even though it was a super short 48 hours, it was worth every minute.
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