Adrenaline, Part 2

Courtney and Michael brought their nephews over to play and swim. Dan and I had church cleaning duty. My mom and Dimitrios were coming in the evening. Nick was racing at the track again today and Dan met him at the track at noon. 

Dan has The Enduro tonight -- a six hour race in a Porsche in which he had two one-hour driving shifts, racing against 39 other cars.

The kids all wanted to go to the track to watch Dan's first drive but that meant eating an early dinner so we could be on the road by 6:30. And I still had grocery shopping to do. I had a casserole in the oven and the minute my mom and Dimitrios walked in the door, I asked if Dimitrios could saute zucchini, squash and mushrooms and make the cucumber and tomato salad. And if my mom could come to the store with me. Dimitrios is a fantastic cook and is always happy to pitch in and help. It's never comfortable asking for help, but he was happy to do it and of course everything was delicious! Thanks, D!

I hadn't planned on making the one hour trek to the track and watching the race originally, but with everyone going together, it sounded like a lot more fun! The minute we got out of the car, I was happy we were there. The loud shout of race car engines speeding by grabbed your throat and practically pulled you onto the track and into the frenetic energy.  We caught 30 minutes of Dan's race, frantically figuring out what black Porsche was his. Nick texted us from home -- they were 711.

We were able to track down Dan's trailer where they could rest between drives.

He was exhilerated and exhausted, but we were excited we could say hi. 

He'd been nervous about driving in the dark, racing for an hour and the potential rain that was forecasted.

The wind really picked up while we were there and got progressively worse.

We headed home for Nielsen's and bed. (Just two more days until Chris!)

Meanwhile Dan raced in a violent rainstorm and the team ended up in 4th place, out of nine in their car category. He was thinking of backing away from racing before this, but now he just might be considering going all in!

Adrenaline, Part 1

Courtney and Michael's flight was delayed hours and hours on Thursday, so instead of me picking them up at the airport at 9:00 p.m, they didn't make it home until 3:00 a.m. Friday. And both had to start work at 7:00 a.m. But they were up and at 'em anyway, thanks to adrenaline.

On Thursday I couldn't sleep because of a sore throat and therefore suffocating being unable to swallow. Spent a long night on the couch in the bunkhouse living room in Pagosa. Wrapped up in Courtney's comfy college blanket and it wasn't actually too bad. Sleeping that is. My throat was miserable and got progressively worse over the rest of the day. I originally blamed it on being poisoned by our very unfortunate well placement and resultant salty water (think 50% salt content... is that more than the ocean?)

My sore throat didn't improve by Friday and headache and body aches followed, so I scheduled a Covid test, just in case. It would be astonishing if I actually had Covid (given I had it already AND I'm vaccinated), but with Chris coming home and him not being vaccinated, I wanted to be sure. (Just three more days!)

Friday morning I gave Michael an air hug, but couldn't resist hugging Courtney for real. Tried to keep my distance, but realized I'd been right close to her while looking at her computer. Thankfully my Covid test came back negative (no surprise), so I've only been spreading the common cold and not contributing to the rapid spread of the Delta variant and worsening this never-ending pandemic.

I know I should lock myself in my room to slow the spread (of the common cold) and would have loved to crawl into bed for a few hours, but its so fun having comings and goings of all the kids (almost all the kids) that adrenaline has me hopped up!

Those Were the Days

 

And cashing in arcade tickets after Every. Single. Birthday Party.

And choosing one treat at 7-11.

Finishing Touches

Our cute little bunk house.

Walk through with Mike (our builder) to discuss progress and plans for the main house.

We love how Mike takes Barnes Vanze' plans and adds extra details to create

so much Wow factor.

He asked if he could re-design the powder room adding some details to make it special.

Yes, Please!

More beautiful lines.

And wildflowers on my walk.

Third trip to Walmart today. But just a few things. 

And, we're done, for now.

We've been working from morning to midnight the last three days.

We did take a minute to drive down to the river. 

But this has really been a work trip. But it's been so fun!

Memories

Whew! Sleeping on the floor in the loft was fun but also not comfortable! 

Glad we did though because, MEMORIES!

At 1:00 a.m. I was trying to figure out why Dan was up with the lights on downstairs.

Turns out he was sure a mouse was in the garbage.

Eventually we both put on shoes and walked by the light of the moon across the yard 

to the dumpster so we could throw it far away, outside the house where the mouse couldn't escape and get us and away from the porch where raccoons could potentially rip it open and spread it all over.

It's possible it was actually stuffed plastic expanding in the bag making noise. 

But the memory of the mouse in the middle of the night is much better.

Furniture arrived and we had a busy day, plus another trip to Walmart and Ace Hardware.

The most difficult part of setting up was getting everything out of all the boxes and plastic.

Oh, and setting up the dryer.

View from the shower. Should we just move here?!

Loft trundle beds

Bedding and nightstands will be switched around a bit still.

And we have paper blinds for now. But it's all so so good!

Once we got everything set up, we made another trip to Target 

(Wow! I typed that accidentally. How I wish there were a Target there!) Not Target. Walmart.

A very picked over Walmart, then decided to eat in town for dinner.

Another late night, but we got to sleep in a bed!

The Bunkhouse!

 Had to capture the light at the end of the tunnel coming from Chris' room.
He's almost home!!

Dan and I arrived in Pagosa just before noon and spent the next five hours in town at 
Walmart, Ace Hardware and the grocery store buying one of everything.

Mike met us at the house to give the grand tour. I was hoping he would. 

He's worked so hard to make it beautiful and being together for the initial walk through

was a metaphorical passing the torch.

The bunkhouse is so cute! We love it! My pictures don't do it justice.
After he left, we got to work unpacking our purchases and organizing before the movers come tomorrow.
It was tricky to figure out how to make dinner in just one pot, but I figured it out.
Nothing like dinner on a card table and camp chairs and sleeping on the floor in Walmart sleeping bags to break in a new house!

The views!

Trek to Zion

I felt good about how singing time went today.

I was a lot less nervous and had another fun poster for the kids to see.

The pioneers "magically" pushed their way from Illinois to Utah every time they sang well on a new song.

(Thanks to heavy duty magnets, it worked great.)

I'm not artistic, so I was pretty proud of how this poster turned out.

I wanted to tell the story about Dan's ancestor who was a pioneer from Utah to Canada and when asked if her six week trek was so so hard replied, "No! We had fun!"

So it was extra special when EC spent the day with us and wanted to come to Primary with me.

I asked her to tell the story and she captivated the kids!

When the chorister, you really have to embrace holidays.

Braids

 Nick got home this morning from AFY (Adventure for Youth).

Said he had a good time. I said it looked like he'd met some girls.

A huge rainstorm happened on Thursday

(why do I always miss the good rainstorms) 

and put so much water on the pool the cover gave way.

It sure looks prettier having the tile visible though.

Dan flipped pancakes at the ward Pioneer Day breakfast

I worked on Primary singing time all afternoon.

In the evening we went to a John Denver songs concert at Deer Valley with the Watts.

Goodbye Oregon!

 Finished our stay at Salishan Lodge and Spa by shopping at the golf club to use up our room credit. 

We thought we were saving $ by not booking through Inspirato and going directly through the hotel which offered a $100/day room credit. Thought we were booking the same "bay-view" room.
Instead we looked at dead grass and a pine tree with the comment from our front desk newcomer that "most of the rooms don't actually look at the bay." 

I don't think that was true, BUT, we were out so much, it didn't matter too much.
Who am I kidding, a view ALWAYS matters. But we didn't let it bother us.

And unfortunately, the ropes course and the spa were all booked because we didn't plan ahead, so we didn't have anything to use our room credit on except a few meals and clothes at the golf club.
Lesson learned. But Dan's new golf shirts look great!

Made a final stop at an antique shop/used book store/rocks & minerals shop.

Took home an original Hardy Boys. 

Our nephew, JD is riding his bike from Oregon to Virginia for the next two months.

He arrived on Tuesday so Thursday we kept our eyes open for him whenever we were on the road.

Found out he was still about an hour north of us, but, he was taking the same highway out of town that we were! He shared his location this morning so we could track how close we were to him,

and suddenly, there he was!

We stopped on the side of the busy highway to say hello, give him a hug and hear about his first two days.

He's doing great! After our short visit, we had to say goodbye.

It's been a great trip!

Starfish

We literally slept in until 9:30 then laid around for another two hours. 

And it was heavenly.

Hike to Cascade Head Trail through rainforest then a mountain meadow.

(I wondered why "mountain meadow" had such a familiar ring to it when I used the expression last blog, but just now I realized where it's from. So... yea, history. #iykyk)

Luckily we packed snacks in the car because we needed to get to Yaquina Lighthouse again for low tide to see the tide pools. I was excited,  but I didn't realize Dan was REALLY excited.

He'd never seen any before and was super hoping to see a starfish.

Seals.

Dinner by the beach and sadly we didn't get a picture, but imagine eating seafood on your last evening of vacation on a grassy hill overlooking deep blue water, families in sweatshirts playing in the sand, flying kites, children running from waves and couples walking hand in hand along the beach. 

All while 90 mph winds blow your mac 'n cheese sauce off your fork and onto your leg 

every time you try to take a bite.

But we finished with a quick trip down this amazing slide in the park across the street.

Yay for whoever built this for the kids!