The Parentals visit the Northwest

This last week, my parents finally made the long trek to the Pacific Northwest. While they were here, we made the most of it and tried to tire them out. Success!

On Saturday, we visited Pike's Place market (tasted about 4 million types of jams), stopped by the REI headquarters to look at bikes and sample camping food, ate some ice cream and topped the day off with a little stand up paddle boarding.
There was a funny moment at the beginning where the boys got in the lake and Dad went one way and Dana went...the other way. They eventually found each other. When they came back, Dad was quite dry. Dana had jumped in (he says on purpose...sure) a few times so he was nice and wet.


Sunday we attended a nice ward in Renton and then took a long cut up to the Ballard Locks and Botanical Gardens. The locks keep salt water from the ocean from crossing into Lake Washington so boats that want to enter or leave have to go through a sort of Panama Canal experience. It was actually pretty cool. Here's a whole collection of boats:

And this is a bridge being raised for a really cool looking sail boat.

Sunday night, Dana and I headed back to Yakima (and those job things we can't seem to get rid of) while Mom and Dad continued their holiday down the Oregon coast. No photos but it seems they camped a lot, hiked a lot (mostly straight uphill if you ask Mom) and went on a dune buggy over the sand banks.

Thursday they made their way over to Yakima and then the fun really started! Friday Dana had to work (boo) but we made the best of it by going blueberry, apple, and pear picking. Then, since Dad had to, um, nap (yay?), Mom and I spent 3 hours at JoAnn fabrics driving the cutting ladies up the wall. It's fun to be a girl.

Saturday was a separate but equal day (I really like those). So the boys got up early and hiked up a mountain while the girls went shopping and ate gyros. Separate. But equal. I wasn't on the hike, but Dana said it was fun. It was only supposed to be 8 miles round trip to Rachel Lake, but then they wanted to go a mile up to the overlook and then there was that issue with parking 2 miles away from the trail head so...8 plus 2 plus 4 equals 14 equals two exhausted husbands. They even turned down the offer of a ride from some nice old couple. :) Ahh, boys.

Sunday we went to church and walked around the neighborhoods and generally just vegged with books.

Labor Day was the last day with Mom and Dad and since they'd come all the way to Washington, Dad thought it would be criminal to not do one last hike up Mt. Rainier. We went to the Ohanapecosh campground and did the Silver Lake Trail. Dad was pretty excited and true to form he climbed on every rock. Now we know where the grandkids get it.

We ate lunch on the rocks
And enjoyed the beauty of the waterfalls

After the falls, we headed further up to the Grove of the Patriarchs which includes a fun little suspension bridge. They suggest only 1 person at a time but the Kitchens don't follow no rules. Boo yeah!

Mt. Rainier in the distance. We talked Mom and Dad into stopping even though we were in a race against time--namely, 200 other Southwest passengers trying to check in at 2:05pm.
We finished off the weekend with a BBQ with Dana's parents and Matt. It was such an amazing week and we were sorry to see them go. Thanks for coming! Remember to tip your tour guides:)