Fourth of July in Sunriver

We spent the Fourth of July weekend chilling out in the heat of Sunriver, OR. It was beautiful weather and our rental house had a nice deck where we inflated the kiddie pool that we brought, as well as the (old, slowly leaking) one that the property had there. The girls LOVED the pools, and it was a great way to beat the heat without paying $10 for adults ($7 for children four and over) at the expensive Sunriver pools each day.

My aunt and uncle have their own house in Sunriver, and the trip was planned because their son and his wife had their first baby last January. We had never meet Shai-Lee (pronounced to rhyme with Hayley - Shayley) and all of us fell in love with her - especially Lucia!

Alex got a nice long game of golf in, and my aunt and uncle tried to sell us on buying a house in Sunriver someday. Yeah... probably not unless we somehow become really rich - I wouldn't want to rent it out - people would tear it up and you would lose out on prime rental time if you took it during the holidays (i.e. the only times that we would have vacation from work as well!), and if you don't rent it, the costs are quite high. Plus, we like to keep our options open when it comes to vacation - there are lots of other places to go still, and if we had a house in Sunriver, I'd feel obligated to go there whenever we got a free weekend. Still, it is fun to dream, and we did enjoy the "private tour" my aunt and uncle gave us - Sunriver is a beautiful, if expensive, place to vacation!
Two side notes - Sunriver allows NO FIREWORKS WHATSOEVER - so we missed out on that fun tradition. Oh well, we've seen enough fireworks in our past year in China to last for a while, and our neighbors started setting off the ones they bought in Vancouver, WA several days before the 4th. And two - we went to mass at the Sunriver Catholic Church where the priest was from Cross International, a 501(c)(3) Catholic organization who spends 96.8% of its donations to help the poor in many needy countries around the world (including North Korea, I was amazed). Another worthwhile cause, there are obviously so many.

Anyway - on to the fun stuff! Here are some great pics to capture our weekend.



Here is Magdalena's adorable smile - loving the Kiddie Pool:

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Lucia just loved Shai-Lee, and insisted upon holding her (until she got bored and gave up):

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Shai-Lee had just learned to sit (6 months) and I love this pic of her:

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This is the only picture of me on the whole weekend - not the best self-portrait, but oh well!

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Thanks to Aunt Debbie, who also came on the trip, for the great gifts of books for the girls. They are all readers!

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Uncle Larry invented this awesome game of pulling the girls around their front yard with their sled. Since it was pretty tough pulling a 42-lb and a 30-lb, all the men took turns.

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Daddy takes a turn:

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And two cute ones during Apa's turn:

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Lucia even tried pulling Magdalena, though it was quite short-lived:

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We also played some beanbag toss games. Lucia kind of got it!

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Back to the pool before the baby left - Shai-Lee's first toe-dip in a kiddie pool!

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Here are the girls in the wading pool - they had this little game where they would run from the end of the deck to the pool, and usually Lucia would hold Magdalena's hands to help her in. Magdalena is so polite, saying "Thank you Cia!" each time! SO CUTE (and relatively quiet so you can listen when your kids are sleeping, as well as just 8 seconds)!