Oregon

Sadly, our 3 day stay in Oregon is almost completely undocumented. We stayed with Lakin's grandma in Cave Junction, Oregon. Her parents and her brother with his family were also there. Basically we crashed the tail end of their family reunion. 

The very hospitable Rigbys/Hays

We went to a cool pizza place for dinner the first night we got there. We also got to witness Lakin's grandpa chasing after some deer with a slingshot to "discourage them from eating my garden."

The next day we loaded up and went rafting on the rogue river! Apparently Lakin grew up on a raft, so her whole family is pro level. Claire got left with her great-grandma, but the rest of the kids went with us, Robb, Lakin, Lakin's parents, and Lakin's brother and his 2 year old. There was also a local girl that tagged along in her kayak. The kayak was far less stable than the sturdy rafts, and she got flipped pretty bad a number of times. At one point, I hopped into the other raft to help watch the surplus of kids when Lakin's brother went to help bail the kayak. Elliot was quite upset by his abandonment (even though he was with Aaron). He laughed giddily for a good while when I came back. We also taught him how to do a count from sesame street type laugh. 

This is the river we were on, but we had two rafts and those bags of stuff were replaced with small children. 

We went through some mild rapids. In the big rafts, they translated into mellow bumps with some good splashes. It was fun for both the kids and the adults. 

We stopped at a cliff jumping spot. There was a tall rock and a bunch of smaller rocks mixed with sand. Elliot tripped and landed face first in the sand. We thought he was going to cry, but instead he stayed sprawled in the sand and started playing with it. This kid and dirt... it is his greatest love. The jumping rock was about 12 feet tall. Elliot flipped out when either Aaron or I jumped off the rock into the water because he couldn't see the landing from his sport on shore. He was convinced he was becoming an orphan every time. He was perfectly fine with anyone else jumping. I guess he felt Robb was pretty expendable.

The river had spectacular views, and the weather was great. Only mild sunburns were attained. Afterwards we stopped at DQ for ice cream, which totally hit the spot. Elliot danced after each bite of the Oreo Blizzard we fed him. 

Throwing leaves in the driveway while we were packing up to leave.