Our family vacation in pictures

What a great summer!! Luke has been so healthy lately, which has truly been a gift from God. It's hard to believe that summer is just about over, it flew by so quickly. We were extremely blessed to have a wonderful vacation, Luke did great except for the van ride, he doesn't like sitting in his car seat anymore, we are going to have to start thinking about ways to help him be more comfortable in the van.

This Tatoosh Island which is just off the tip of Washington

We went to Cape Flattery which is just about the most beautiful place on this planet, it is the farthest point NW that you can go on the Continental of the United States

Here is one of the humongous tree's on the trail leading out to Cape Flattery

We were blessed to have Gordy's sister Pam and her husband Hal join us for the first part of our vacation. Here they are on our way out to Cape Flattery.

Here's Luke sitting by Sequim Bay, it was so beautiful there.The kids down at Sequim Bay Campground

Here we are setting up camp at Ft. Flagler, the sunset was so beautiful

We were so blessed to wake up to beautiful weather on August 30th, the 6th anniversary of Luke's near drowning accident. We spent about 4 hours exploring Fort Flagler, all the kids and Gordy rode their bikes and Luke and I walked the entire time, I figure I walked over 3 miles that day. It was one of the easiest anniversary day's that we've had by far, Praise GOD!

Here's Lily taking a little break from her long bike ride.

Ft. Flagler is so much fun to visit and it is beautiful too, we had a great time going through the little museum there on the grounds.

We went up to Hurricane Ridge just outside of Port Angeles on Sunday, the weather really wasn't great that day, but every once awhile we would get a beautiful glimpse of the Olympic Mountain range, it is so glorious up there.

Amy blessed us by watching the kids one of the nights that we were staying at Seaside, Gordy and I went out to dinner at Mo's, which happens to be by the Tolovana Hotel one of the places that we stayed on our Honeymoon, 27 years ago. After dinner we went on a short walk during which time we saw the most beautiful sunset we've ever seen in our lives.

The sunset was so beautiful, I found myself with tears in my eyes as I stood in awe of God's amazing handiwork. I had a wonderful prayer and praise time on the beach that night.

A few days later we took the whole family out to lunch at Mo's right by the Haystack Rock in Cannon Beach.

After lunch we went down to the beach. The kids had the best time diverting this little creek into their very own pool, they spent hours of fun making this muddy little whole.Luke had a great time at the beach also, here he is enjoying the beach while eating his lunch.The tide was down so far we were able to walk out to Haystack Rock. By that time though it was getting cold, that is why Lily looks so funny in this picture.

Lily ended up hitching a ride on either mine or Gordy's shoulders the whole walk back to our car.

I realize this picture is blurry but it is the only picture I have of my yearly beach picture of my kids. My family is growing! We were so blessed to have Josh and Natalie come down and visit us for a few nights and then Daniel and Sarah came down for one night.

Here are a bunch of goofball kids pretending to be in jail, in one of the many bunkers at Ft. Stevens. We went exploring at the old bunkers in Ft. Stevens, with Yoli and her kids, they joined us while we were camping at Ft. Flagler. The older kids played hide and seek in the huge bunkers while Yoli and I took the little ones for a long walk around the grounds.

We also had Nicole and Lance join us for a few nights while we camped at Fort Stevens, here is a picture of all the kids minus Luke, who stayed back at the trailer with dad that day.

Our last day at Fort Stevens was rainy and cold so we took a trip down the Oregon Coast to the Tillamook cheese factory. We all had such a great time eating a delicious Ice Cream cone while watching the factory workers below us.
Here is Amy with her new Beau, Lance at the Tillamook Cheese Factory.
After we got back from the cheese factory we took one last walk to the beach to see the Peter Iredale, which is a ship that went a ground at Ft. Stevens Park many years ago.

The week after we got home from our vacation I took Natalie, Isaiah and Lance up for a 5 and 1/2 mile hike at Mt. Rainier. It was one of the most beautiful, awe inspiring, challenging hikes, I've ever taken.

Here is one of the many Reflection Lakes that we saw on our hike.

Here we are at the end of our hike. It was so hard, but so worth it!

I hope you enjoyed viewing our "slide show" of our vacation. Now we are back to real life, Luke has an appointment with his Gastronologist tomorrow afternoon, and he is back to having appointments with his OT again. I will not lie and say getting back to appointments was a easy thing for me it is not. I so enjoyed our break from appointments this summer and am thankful for God's gift of giving me that break.

I have some big news to share with y'all about exciting things coming up soon, but that will have to wait for the next posting as this one is already way to long!

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Sue