Friends and Family Tour - next stop: Olympia and then back to Ephrata

Signs of a successful camping trip....

And then, my sister texted this, overhearing my nieces:
"Conversations from the back seat....
Hannah: Only really strong people have tattoos. That's why Auntie Lisa has tattoos.
Halle: I know, she poked me really soft one time and it hurted."  Ha!

From a wonderful family gathering to seeing one of my dearest friends and her family!  Molly, Heidi, and Tristan Merritt-Petersen!  Love these people and have the incredible privilege of having a friend in Molly who has been in my heart and life since we were in 7th grade!  Only missing Andrea Neal on this one!

We had great times hiking the "treacherous" Deer Trail down to the water, seeing beautiful Mt. Rainier at sunset, great stair sprints and a playground workout that left a hamstring mark for days....  Good times with good people.

Back over the mountains to Ephrata for a great week at home.  Beautiful early morning bike rides with Dad to an incredible oasis in this desert, down at Rocky Ford Creek, seeing pelicans and mink.  Got in a wonderful road bike ride on the peaceful back farm roads in Sheep Canyon, riding through old memories (fields behind Molly's house, remembering snowmobile excursions, racing our parents' vehicles to "skip the dips" in the roads over the canals, showing Mike my high school, babysitting on back country dirt roads, the old drama stage where Andrea and I were Kili and Fili "at your service" in The Hobbit, and on and on...).  Another great mountain bike ride on Beezley with Andrew.  It was so cool to share those rides with Dad and Andrew and to see them sharing that together, to see our Dad getting into something we all love, and being able to do that with him.  It was great being back in the saddle again.

Yummy Mexican food, great paleo cooking by Mom, front yard kiddie pool water fights with Taya and Aura... all good times that one would expect at HOME!

And then to be able to do CrossFit with Leah, Karyn (Hooyer) Becker and Mike at CrossFit Sagebrush?  Wow!  A CrossFit gym in Ephrata.  Doing CrossFit alongside my sister-in-law and a former classmate!  Who would have thought???

VERY cool experiences in a small home town!