Last August after our last trip to the coast we ended up re-booking the house we stayed out on the south side of Lincoln City near the Siletz Bay for part of Brandon’s spring break. We really liked the layout of the house and it came with a hot tub and was built in 2012 so everything was fairly new and updated. The house was recently on VRBO so it was not super expensive either which was nice. Anyways, last August we ended up going for three nights and Grammy and Papa came for two nights. This time we ended up booking the house Saturday of Spring break through Tuesday. I had plans to have Brandon off the entire week of Spring break and not taking him to the YMCA. I pieced together my mom watching him on Wednesday and Thursday and then me watching him Friday.
We left for the coast after the kids got out of school on Friday at around 3:00 PM. We stopped off at our winery at Sokol Blosser and picked up our Spring wine collection shipment and enjoyed a little wine on our way to the coast. Then we headed to the coast and got there at around 5:30 PM. We unloaded the car and played around the house and then headed out to dinner at our favorite place, Rusty Truck Brewing. We love the food at Rusty Truck but the service has always been questionable. The restaurant underwent a nice remodel and got more waiters. The service and food was excellent this time. The kids had fun coloring and Sean and I enjoyed a pint. Then we headed home and went in the hot tub and went to bed.
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| Brandon out in front of Rusty Truck Brewery |
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| Dinner out! |
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| Drawing at the restaurant |
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| Brandon, our little drawer |
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| Enjoying a pint with my honey |
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| Olivia and Mommy selfie |
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| That face.... |
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| Olivia gave Rusty Truck brewery two thumbs up! |
The weather was supposed to be rainy the entire time we were there. We woke up to sunshine though which was awesome! We got up and made a big breakfast and then got dressed and ready to go down to the beach. We had heard about little glass rocks hidden around the beach during Spring break and decided to go to the nearby public beach on the South side near the Christmas shop to try to find them. We did not find any but had a blast playing on the beach. Brandon especially loves the ocean and could spend all day at the beach chasing the waves and poking around looking for rocks and shells. Olivia had a lot of fun but does get cold sooner than Brandon does and then wants to go. After we played at the beach we headed to the Christmas Shop (this large famous Christmas ornament shop in Lincoln City) and I let each child pick out an ornament for Christmas this year. Olivia picked out an adorable rainbow and Brandon got another pickle (since I broke ours accidentally putting it away). We then went shopping and got the rest of stuff we ended for the week at Safeway and then to Olivia’s delight we headed to the Candy store (her favorite!) where the kids got to pick out a few pieces of candy and Mommy got to get her favorite Swedish Fish. We also picked up some fresh seafood (clams and large jumbo shrimp) as Sean was going to make a yummy seafood dinner. We then headed back to the beach house and ate lunch and went in the hot tub with our candy!
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| Beautiful and quiet Oregon coast |
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| Sean walking |
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| Playing in the sand |
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| Playing in the sand |
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| Brandon looking for the glass balls |
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| Brandon almost 6.5 years old |
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| Playing in the sand |
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| Love this one of Brandon |
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| Brandon loves the ocean |
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| Hot tub and candy fun! |
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| Olivia is in heaven |
After we ate lunch we decided to go back out to the beach since the weather was still relatively nice with no rain. It was supposed to rain all the next day so we wanted to get in as much of the beach today as we could. We went to the South beach just south of Lincoln City on the way to Depoe Bay (only about 10 minutes from the beach house. We really like this beach because it is not very crowded and has really soft sand. The kids had a blast chasing the waves and playing tag with the waves. We headed back to the house and the Ducks were playing in the Elite 8 in the NCAA basketball tournament. We got back to the beach house right when the game was starting. The Ducks were playing really well in the first half and controlling the game. It was awesome to see as they were playing a number one seeded team Kansas team. Sean began making our Seafood dinner. He made a yummy broth for the clams and then cooked the shrimp up. We ate a very yummy Seafood dinner at half time. Then we watched the Ducks continue to play well and watched Kansas surge back but the Ducks hold them off to win by 14 in the end. The lady Ducks played in the Sweet 16 earlier in the day and upset their opponent (they were the 12th seed and beat a 4th seed) and made it into the Elite 8. It was an awesome day for Oregon basketball all around!
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| Playing on the beach with Daddy |
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| Running towards the ocean |
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| Chasing waves |
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| Running away from the waves |
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| Ninja Brandon |
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| Racing against the waves |
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| Olivia having so much fun |
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| Sweet Olivia 3 years 9 months |
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| Ninja moves as the sun goes down |
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| Beautiful clouds |
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| Some happy Ducks on a Duck win! |
The next morning we woke up to it raining hard outside. It was cold and windy too. The kids had fun hanging out at the house. Sean and Brandon were playing Mine craft together on the Xbox and Olivia was having fun playing with her toys. I was working hard all weekend on our family Shutterfly memory book for last year, 2016. I like to do one memory book now a year and I have decided to make the memory book a bit longer than in the year’s past. The kids enjoyed some popsicles in the hot tub. Then we had lunch and headed to the outlets to go shopping. The kids were not in the shopping mood but we were able to get to some shops and I was able to get a few things at the Ann Taylor Loft and Sean was able to get a really nice North Face winter jacket for 60% off. We got back to the house and hung out some more and made shrimp tacos for dinner with the left over shrimp from yesterday. The kids headed to bed early after playing hard all day and I got to continue working on my 2016 book.
On Monday, we woke up to much nicer weather. The storm had passed it seemed. We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast at home and the kids had fun in the hot tub again. We then got ready for the day and decided to go into Newport (rather than doing the Oregon Coast Aquarium) and spend most of the day at the Yakima Bay Lighthouse just outside of Newport and at Agate Beach. It had been quite a while since I had been to the lighthouse. We got there and it was quite windy and cold. The views up at the lighthouse were awesome and we walked around. We could not do a lighthouse tour as Olivia was not tall enough to go into the lighthouse and it was super booked up as it was Spring Break. After we checked out the lighthouse, we went into the museum they had set up that was really neat that was about the lighthouse. They had these really old fashioned games they used to play in the 1800s there that the kids had fun playing with. I enjoyed learning about the old lighthouse that has been around for over 120 years.
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| The kids and Sean outside by the lighthouse |
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| Newport Yakima Bay lighthouse |
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| Lighthouse views |
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| Olivia and I by the lighthouse |
After we finished at the lighthouse we decided to go down to Agate Beach in Newport that was close by. The kids were hoping to find some agates. I loved and remembered Agate Beach very well from my childhood as we often times went to Newport since it was the closest beach to Corvallis. While we did not find any agates, we did enjoy a fairly secluded and non-busy beach filled with soft sand and had fun chasing waves again. We had so much fun that the kids did not want to leave. They found some really cool hiking sticks too. We left the beach and although it was late afternoon we were all hungry so decided to have an early dinner at Rogue Brewery in downtown Newport. I loved going into downtown Newport as it looked exactly the way it did 30 years ago during my childhood. Rogue Brewery was super fun and had awesome food. It was fun tasting their beer and we got some beer flights. We went to our favorite candy shop in Newport and got some more candy after dinner and then headed back to the beach house. Olivia fell asleep in the car for 15 minutes and woke up refreshed and we played in the hot tub for a good hour before getting the kids to bed. I then spent the rest of the evening doing laundry and packing and I finished my Shutterfly memory book.
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| Playing in the waves at Agate Beach |
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| Hiking over to Agate Beach |
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| Brandon and Olivia running from the waves |
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| So much fun! |
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| Look what I found mom! |
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| She loves to run |
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| Beer flight at Rogue Brewery |
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| Enjoying candy on the way back to the beach house |
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| A quick snooze! |
The next morning we had to pack up and be out of the house by 11:00 AM. Olivia spent most of the morning savoring her last time in the beach house’s hot tub. We were going to eat breakfast at the Wildflower Café one of our favorite breakfast stops in Lincoln City and our way out of town but they had just stopped serving breakfast so we ended up going to Pig N Pancake and got breakfast there on our way out of town. Then we had to get back home and unpack and do laundry and get ready for the week. It was a very fun trip with just our family and nice to get a way and be on vacation.
