My Heart Belongs in Pacific City

I love the beach. Any beach. But I REALLY love the Oregon Coast. It's where my life source is. My family has been vacationing there since I was little and I always felt like there couldn't be a happier place. I still remember how it felt to return to the ocean if we hadn't been able to visit for a few years. We'd be in the car winding down that road surrounded by the color GREEN and then finally the greenery would part enough for us to briefly get a peek of that blue-gray ocean and the excitement was unreal! I'd impatiently wait for us to find our beach house and get settled enough that we could go down to the water. Then we'd run down that sand dune at full speed and I'd yell "I'M FREEEEEE!" and we'd run straight into the icy waves and it all just felt like this is what life was all about. Whew. Can you feel my love for the ocean?? I'll calm down now.

While dating Matt, I found out that he too frequented the Oregon Coast as a kid. This just added to the nostalgia of it all (were Matt and I ever on the coast at the same time as kids???) and it was an obvious choice for our honeymoon destination. It's been almost three years and this summer we got to go back! This time with our playful daughter :) It's so cool to come full circle and bring our kids to a place that Matt and I loved to go as kids.

Carly is a water baby through and through. We definitely hit a couple of cold-windy-rainy days but Carly trudged right on into those waves whether it was freezing or not (and whether anyone was there to hold her hand or not!) When she wasn't in the water, she was building (or rather knocking down) sandcastles with her little shovel. She was in heaven. Just like her momma :)

Look at that face. Pure joy.

More pictures on my Mom's blog

There's No Buddy Like a Brother

It's my brother's birthday. He's somewhere in the Baltic, so he might as well be on Mars. And I miss him. Let me show you why. Here's just a few of the many Braeden-isms :

 

 "Sometimes during a test, I will tap out the answers in Morse code. I figure I'm doing my part."

"So I was sleeping in Math today. Somebody wet-willied me. For extra credit."

  
"If I was allergic to classy, my whole life would be a sneeze."

"Lady Gaga was not born this way. If she was, the doctor would have said, PUT HER BACK IN!"

"Ke$ha looks like, if you touched her, she'd be sticky."

After working concessions during my high school's basketball games all day, I came home smelling like popcorn and hot dogs. On the way to the shower, Braeden encouraged me to skip it because he promised it would make me more attractive for the school dance that night.

I found this to do list in his room one day:
Write letter
Driver's license
Topple South American government
Build giant slingshot 
Fling enemies into sun

"This Thanksgiving I am thankful for the privilege of spending my childhood with you, Chelsea. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness," but most importantly, it was by far the best sixteen years of my life. Thanks for everything. Keep in touch. Love you, Chels."

Braeden is away from his family for 2 years so the people of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Belarus can spend an eternity with theirs. I'm so proud of him. But let's be honest; I'm counting down the days until I can see his face again!
 

Saying goodbye for 2 years, but not forever!

Happy Birthday "little" brother! Love, Chels

Coming Soon to Own on Videocassette

Some of you heard about our recent purchase of a VCR and several VHS tapes. Here are my thoughts on the subject:

1. I love movies.  Love them.  And so does my husband! When we have the time, we love ending our day with unwinding and watching a movie together.  So of course we aspire to someday owning a massive beautiful collection of great movies.  The classics, ya know?

2. Which leads me to my next point.  First of all, I am all for new technology and moving forward and all that.  But am I the only one who thinks maybe we're racing to develop all this new tech a little too fast?  So fast, that it's almost impossible to gather said movie collection before the format changes? 

Seriously.

3.  DVDs and Blu-ray....expensive.  Ridiculously so.  You can go to the store and buy a newly released movie for around $20 right?  We bought 22 movies on VHS for less than that. 22. You know why? Nobody wants their tapes anymore! "Blu-ray has crystal clear sound! Look at that picture! It's so real!"  You know what guys? Two minutes into our VHS version of the Lion King, I didn't notice.  Honestly.  And don't get me started on how nostalgic I felt pressing "stop" and "rewind" at the end of the film.

So what am I getting at? Am I insisting you all visit your local thrift store and empty their shelves of great movies on tape like we did? Not exactly. I mean, then there wouldn't be any left... :)  But we did double our movie collection for very little cost.  And we do feel very smart about it.  So smart, I just needed to share.