Darrell & Sharyn

Darrell just recently had his Spring Break, so we took off the day after his final and headed down to Anderson Valley to see his family. His Dad, Stepmom, Sister and Brother-in-Law hadn’t seen Edward since he was 4 months old, so we figured it was about time to head down there again to visit. It was a nice vacation and we spent a lot of time just wandering around and seeing people while spending time as a family without the distraction of our regular routine.

Around Grandad and Grandma Peggy’s:

My Nemesis for the week – Wisteria. My allergies were just all over the place and of course, it was almost everywhere. Benedryl didn’t work completely so I was pretty tired most of the time. Hopefully next time I will remember that I need to take something a little bit stronger.

Edward’s favorite friend on the trip – Lexi the dog:

Edward got to see some chickens for the first time. He wanted to spend time with them. Grandad and Grandma Peggy took him to feed them and to gather the eggs every day. He finally wanted to hang out in the run with the chickens and tried to feed them the grass they had access to. It was pretty cute. 🙂

Montgomery Woods State Natural Reserve:

Views of the Valley: On the left is the view from the road on the way to Montgomery Woods from Ukiah. On the right is the view from over my Sister- and Brother-in-Law’s yurt in the valley.

Big River Beach – We thought it would be fun to take Edward to the actual ocean (since we only take him to the sound up here) so he could play in the sand and we could watch the sunset together. However, Edward had other plans and only wanted to head to the water. It made for a very frustrating time since he pitched a fit whenever we tried to stop him from running straight into the water. But, even with the frustration, we got some cool photos and he seemed to have fun most of the time. After we got him back to the car and cleaned up, we went up to Mendocino and wandered around the town. It was the first time we were back in Mendocino since we got married – almost 6 years now.

PennyRoyal Farm Tour – We got to see the baby goats at the local Goat Cheese farm. It was a wonderful tour and Edward was able to get into the cages with the baby goats (and a lamb) who were about a week old. There were also some who were just born the morning we were there. Now all he talks about is baby goats and that they say “mey” (his pronunciation is pretty dang cute). He also picked some wildflowers from around the area.

Park fun – Low Gap park in Ukiah and Greenwaters Park in Oakridge, OR(a rest stop on the way home):

Pheasant Rock Property – A pit stop on our way home. Uncle Kenny was down at the property, so we decided to stop by and say “hi”. Edward loved that he was able to wander around without a whole bunch of supervision. He also found a couple toys to play with:

Darrell had a conference in Washington DC so we all went with him and saw the sights while he was busy. Luckily for me, my cousin lives nearby, so her and her little girl came into downtown and we hung out together for the week. It was a lot of fun.

Wednesday, we walked the National Mall and saw some of the Monuments.

Thursday, we went to the National Zoo and wandered around there for the day.

 Just look at those little teeth!

Friday, we just hung out in the Hotel room. We were going to go swimming, but it didn’t pan out. Saturday, Darrell and I went to the Air & Space Museum and then met up with Joni & Chris for dinner. We had Hard Rock Cafe for lunch before the museum and Edward LOVED their twisted Mac & Cheese. Hopefully he keeps up with this love of almost all foods. (He still turns away from some foods if they aren’t what he wants. IE: We are trying to give him a pouch of food and he wants pieces of ours, or we are trying to spoon feed him and he wants to eat on his own.)

Darrell ended up taking a week off after the conference and we went up to Connecticut to visit with a bunch of Darrell’s family. Later in the week, we headed down to NYC and hung out for about 36 hours there. It was really cold, so we didn’t wander around too much, but we did go up the Empire State Building.

Edward enjoyed his plane rides and trip through the airport. We bought a little strap that allowed us to attach his carseat to a rolling carry-on and then we just wheeled him around the airport. He loved it and we really enjoyed having somewhere to put him down when we needed to. The plane rides he loved sitting and staring out the window. On our way back, he just wanted to stare out the window when we were landing and after parking at the gate. We had to practically tear him away from the window just to get off. We were the last ones off the plane because he was so entranced with what was going on outside.

We enjoyed our whole trip and were really glad that we did the trip. Some day we will go back and visit again. Hopefully it won’t be so cold, so we will be able to get out and see more of the sights.