It is hard to believe that is it almost September.  We have had a very cool summer, with very few days in the 90's!  This does not make for many good pool days, but it does make for many great hiking days.  I am busy getting us ready to kick off the new school year next week.  We are starting with a unit on Charlotte's Web.  E is sooo excited.  Today she finished up her Olympic Lapbook.  Here are photos of the completed book.

This summer we had a birthday, visited waterfalls, took hikes through lava fields, went to the ocean, went to a hot air balloon festival, had a blast at the county fair, went camping and took a long, scary drive to a beautiful viewpoint (8,000 feet).  Below are the pictures of our summer fun!

June 2008

Vacation 2008

Zoo

We spent a day at the zoo at the end of our trip.  The zoo is 3 hours from our house, so it is not a usual trip.  We had a great time!  They had a special exhibit on Dinosaurs that was a huge hit with the girls.  They even had a chance to dig for bones.

Our Drive Home

We had a beautiful drive home through the Columbia River Gorge.  We even had a great view of Mount St. Helens on our way out of Taco Bell! 

July 2008

July was a busy monty for us.  We went to a 4th of July Parade and watch fireworks that night.  We decided to get out and do some hiking, our first hike was Tumalo Falls.  What a beautiful hike.   Our next adventure was to Lava Cast Forest.  This is a mile long paved trail through lava fields.  When the volcano erupted thousanads of years ago it left "casts" of the trees that were there.  They are long hollow tubes and holes in the ground.  It was pretty cool.   Not long after we spent the day at the lake.  The girls had so much fun playing in the sand and the water.  Also in July we went to Summer Fest and to the Saving Grace Kids Fair!