Sunday, October 27, 2013

20th Anniversary Trip - Part 4

If you haven't seen my earlier posts, they are here:  20th Anniversary Trip - Part 1, 20th Anniversary Trip - Part 2 and 20th Anniversary Trip - Part 3

Thursday morning we got something quick to eat and headed across on the Kancamagus Highway, through the White Mountains.  As we were driving, it was so pretty and David was wondering if it was possible for the leaves to have brightened up overnight.





Every chance he got, Tanner wanted to "drive".  He would get quite upset when we took him away from it:)

In the distance we thought we saw Mt. Washington.  We listened to the local White Mountains news station and it said that there was 90 mile visibility from Mt. Washington.  We decided to drive up the auto road.  Just another scenic picture on the way there.

At the top of Mount Washington.

Even though it was beautiful, it was still very cold and windy.  You can see here how the flags are flying straight out.
 





After leaving Mount Washington, we drove into Maine.  David wanted to go to L.L. Bean.  On the way there we realized he no longer had a phone:(  Most likely left it on the ground in the parking lot at the bottom of Mt. Washington.  I'm still not sure what we went to L.L. Bean for.  We walked around and looked at things.  I thought it was rather boring since I didn't have an extra $1000 cash to buy a couple things with.

Finally we were on our way to Tim and Leona's (my sister).  We got there around 9:00 I think.  It was lovely to finally see them!!

On Friday, Leona and I went shopping.  David roamed around on his own, with his first stop being the Verizon store!!

Friday night we went to David's nephew's house - Bob & Holly Saari's.  His two nieces, Andrea and Michele, also came over there.  We got to meet Bob and Holly's girls (David's great nieces) and their boyfriends, too.  We had a great visit there.  Bob was quite proud to introduce David as "my uncle who's younger than me" and Tanner as "and that's my first cousin" to his daughters and their boyfriends:)

Me, David, Tanner, Andrea, Holly, Michele and Bob

David stopped to take a few pictures Saturday morning when he went for coffee.  I think I like these the best!  I love all of the reflection ones.









Saturday afternoon we went over to Juha and Katie's.  Merle, Jubal, Jairus, Jobe and Samantha (I think!!!)

Saturday night we went out to dinner and shopping with Tim and Leona.  We had to stock up on Fluff for the kids and a GF bread mix that David really likes.

Sunday after church, Tim and Leona made some delicious chicken fajitas.  Then Jake & Carrie and their kids and Christine came over to visit.  Cousin Tom came, too.


Jenae, Shandi, Laylah, Aidan, Rhianne and Brock

 Zoey, Carrie, Jake and Addison

Sunday night after church we went to Jeff and Aili's to visit.  Ethan and Courtney were there, too.

Monday was our day to spend at Boone and Anne's.  I think all of their kids showed up sometime throughout the day except for Stacey.  As always, wonderful food and visiting there:)  As a bonus, we went home with some of Boone's delicious maple syrup!!

David with his sister, Anne.

I found a text from Julia after we left Boone and Anne's.  She was wondering if we'd be at Leona's.  I said we'd be there and she said if we weren't too tired she'd come.  I told her I'm sure we'll be up late no matter what, so she came over with Laila.

I hadn't gotten any pictures of Tim yet, so I took one of these two "birthday buddies".  David's nine years older.

I ended up sewing a couple baby blankets I'd worked on cutting out for Leona.  We'll hopefully see soon which one she gets to use . . . boy or girl!!!

Tuesday morning I was busy packing.  Then I remembered we still hadn't gotten any pictures of David and I together on our 20th anniversary trip!!




Me with my sister, Leona.

 Kenzey and Cyrus with Uncle David.

Kenzey, Cyrus and Aidan.

We stopped for maple sugar candy and maple cream on our way to Manchester and then went to David's sister Mary's house for a couple hours to visit before we had to fly out.

David with his oldest sister, Mary.

Tanner on our flight home.

We got to bring the carseat on for our flight from Chicago to Portland.  That was nice!

And we got home safe and sound after a wonderful time away!  And the house and kids were all still there:)

20th Anniversary Trip - Part 3

If you haven't already seen them, here are 20th Anniversary Trip - Part 1 and Part 2.

We really wanted to go up Mount Washington on the Cog Railway.  Unfortunately, it was in the clouds on Wednesday, and there were pretty high winds.  Five years ago we drove up there when there was about zero visibility and we decided it wasn't worth wasting our money ($64 each!!) on if we couldn't see anything.  We drove up to the visitor center anyways, just to see what there was to see.  On our drive from North Conway to the Cog Railway, we saw lots of pretty scenery.






Watching a train take off up the mountain.

Tanner getting a ride with Daddy.

The other train heading out.

We were waiting for David so I decided to take a picture of Tanner in front of their display.  The only way I could get him to kinda look at me was when a man walked up.  Tanner's eyes followed the guy all the way and I snapped the picture when he walked behind me:)

When we left, we were getting rather hungry.  They do lack in food in this area if you're looking for something fast.  Even more difficult if you're looking for gluten free!!  We decided to drive all the way to Littleton for food.  We were pleased to find a Subway but, alas, no gluten free buns.  Just ended up going to a grocery store and grabbing a few things.  Rather boring!!

On our way again, headed to see The Flume.  This tree was quite popular among all the leaf peepers!!  It was right in front of The Flume visitor center.  Everyone I saw with a camera stopped to take a picture!



Round trip to walk to see the Flume and the trail back was 2.4 miles.  It was another pretty day and Daddy carried Tanner in the front pack.

Covered bridge along the way.

Somewhere I read that every year they have to rebuild some of these walking pathways because they get covered in ice and wrecked in the winter!


 Looking up on our walk.



I thought these trees looked pretty neat, with the roots growing all over the rocks.


A bunch more scenery from our walk.


 


Tanner was happy to be out of the front pack and free again!  Daddy didn't think he quite knew how to walk after carrying/wearing him for so long!!  He felt so light without the pack he said it was weird to walk.



Having fun in the leaves before he had to get buckled into his carseat again!

From here we found a little motel to stay in for the night.  And since I put soooo many pictures on this post, I'd better start another:)

20th Anniversary Trip - Part 4