theres a party in the usa.

disclaimer: the title of this post has absolutely nothing to do with the content of it, i just had no name for it. awesome.

location: seattle washington

miles driven: a little over 5,000

pictures taken: 4,000

states visited: 3

countries visited: 2- soon to be 3 (including the US of course)

nights slept in a hotel:2

nights slept in a car: whos counting? :)

nights slept in a camp ground: 1

other: whos counting that either?

these are our current road trip statistics. we have been thoroughly enjoying our time the past few months. we have both been able to see so many things that we have always wanted to see and i discovered that my dream of living in oregon was right on the button. it is beautiful and now that ive actually been there i am more determined to live there.

life is going by quickly. its amazing that you can be the busiest you've been in your life or you can be the laziest you've been in your life and no matter what, time rushes by. this coming week means the end of our semester of fun. after we spend some time here in seattle and head up to canada for a day or two (just to say we went from mexico to canada) then we will start our journey home.

im excited to see family, sleep in a real bed, and eat something other than peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and soup. im not excited to stop being so care free, stop seeing amazing things and spending all day everyday with the most wonderful person in the world-sam.

things have changed a bit, and we are no longer heading to dc for the summer. instead sam will be selling in salt lake. im feeling a little bitter-sweet about this. i was so excited to head back east again and live with my beautiful cousin addie and with an amazing friend jaylyn, but it will be so wonderful to be so close to home and be able to do all of the awesome family summer things that we have missed out on for 2 years! we will gain memories that will always be treasured!

life changes really quickly. ive learned that more than ever in the past week. im learning that i cant take small things for granted and that i need to be living my life for my Savior. i guess just a few things im currently beginning to understand....

with those things said here is what we have been up to.

northern california was beautiful. seriously amazing. i LOVED the rolling green hills. it made me feel like i was in ireland and that i should be running through the fields with sheep and picking flowers. a little weird? but still amazing!
calla lilies are everywhere! these are my favorite flowers so i was in heaven!
its true... HAPPY COWS DO COME FROM CALIFORNIA! i will never doubt again!
see dont you just want to be little bo peep here?
we have been able to see so many lighthouses along our way too. all of them are so beautiful to me. like i said i would kill to live in one.
we had to get a highway 1 road sign in.
to be honest, i just think this picture of sam is so incredibly cute. this trip has made me realize that i might just be the luckiest girl ever. i know all of us women think that, so you just keep thinking that about yours and ill just keep thinking that about mine! :)

i guess we arent a very educated couple.. we thought you could find pearls in muscles too, so we gathered a bunch... after opening a few we realized we were wrong. sorry PETA!
just another beautiful place.
this is on top of one of the light houses


sam is a sweet talker. he talked this lady into letting us up in the light house for free... he says it was just out of the kindness of her heart, but im telling you hes sweet!
sam is also a ninja
this is how we cook most of our meals. we bought a small backpacking stove and it has worked perfectly. this morning sam was cooking eggs.
we went to the drive thru tree in the redwoods. this wasnt it...
this was.
our car was too big to fit so we just posed in front of it like we could
paul bunyan
a coast guard museum that was actually pretty cool.
the hughes house. supposedly its the oldest home in oregon, but after going to a few more towns with homes older... ive determined they are lying. none the less its beautiful
another lighthouse.

for church last sunday we had to drive inland to find a meeting house. the night before we were driving through the ridiculously cute small town and came across and antique shop. the owner was so nice and so incredible. we became fast friends with her and ronald mcdonald.
i just love the moss you find EVERYWHERE!
we pretended like we went to the sea lion caves. but we didnt. we had seen sea lions already and didnt want to fork out the cash. so we put sailor hats on instead.
lots of cool bridges everywhere.
and lighthouses.

and wood. that is ANOTHER thing i loved about oregon. there is wood washed up on shore EVERYWHERE. really cool if you ask me.
of course we had to stop and get some squeeky cheese. it was/is delish.


sea side/ft. stevens/astoria- that stretch. have probably been my favorite places. so quaint and inviting and beautiful. i love it there. i think it calls for a family vacation... or a friend one. anybody interested?
in fort stevens there is a cool old ship wreck. we enjoyed climbing and this is where the nice "local" left us a sand dollar. again so awesome.


my heel click into the sun!
eewwwwe....


this bridge crosses the columbia river. washington and oregon are divided by it.
here is portland. such a cool city with a unique flare. i loved it! so many thrift stores and junk yards and antique stores. this city calls for a girls week! again anyone interested?

at the japanese gardens. again we didnt actually go inside just look at all the beauty surrounding it.
and the portland temple! so awesome. just what we needed!
sams mission president lives in washington. we were lucky enough to spend a few days with them. WOW. they are truly VALIANT servants of the Lord. their lives are dedicated to Him and to missionary work. they truly are examples to live up to!
they took us to long beach- the longest beach in the world for a day. we ate lots, talked lots, and learned a ton!

like i said we are now in seattle with decker and abigail. we are enjoying being here and the sun (was) shining but it is seattle right?

my guess is that by the next time i update this we will be home! i hope life is treating you all very well!

we are blessed and very lucky.

all my love,

x0x0

ill make this quick.

short and sweet. its the best right?

we are now in oregon. i LOVE oregon. i want to live here. move with me please?

while visiting a lovely beach someone left this note on our car accompanied by this sand dollar. it read: welcome to the coast. here is a sand dollar i found today. -a local

its amazing how something so small can make someone feel so happy. sam and i couldnt get over what a nice gesture this was!

this lady must have been listening to the spirit today. we needed a little bit of uplifting.

now we're smiling!

x0x0

a sight to see.

good sight isn’t something that I was blessed with in my life. In second grade I got my first pair of glasses- and since then my eyesight has only gone down hill. currently my eyesight is a negative 7 in both eyes. for those of you lucky enough to have 20/20 vision, negative 7 is REALLY bad. basically without help from either glasses or contacts I am blind. Growing up I always wanted contacts, but it was a rule in our family that we couldn’t get them until we were in 7th grade. my mom wanted us to be “mature” enough to take care of them and take them in and out on our own. I don’t think I ever became mature enough for that… since that time I have gotten in the habit of sleeping in my contacts. it is a really bad habit, but luckily last year I ended up getting some contacts that were actually made for sleeping in. although you can sleep in them, you are advised to take them out every other day or so still. well the night that we got back into long beach from pocatello we decided to go celebrate sams sister jenny’s birthday in mexico. we had a few people (our parents) worried about our decision to go to mexico because of the shootings and violence that have been taking place… but because jenny and nicholas have been to where we were going quite a few times and knew exactly what we needed to do to get there, we decided to do it. everything went great and we were safe as could be! we never felt threatened and everything turned out fine. anyway. the reason why I bring up eyesight is because the night that we got to mexico I lost one of my last pairs of contacts. oh boy. glasses aren’t the same when you are used to the convenience of contacts. my peripheral vision was definitely not the same and neither was the quality of my vision. I don’t think I realized how dependant I am on my contacts until I lost the only pair I had. Boo.
a few days later though- when we got back to our car I found one more contact! Halleluiah! I was so happy to have my quality of life back! I am so glad that somebody VERY inspired decided to invent contacts. they have made my life so much better!

since we have been back we have definitely seen a few sights worthwhile. since mexico (we were only a bit across the boarder in a place called rosarita.) we have pretty much been on the 1 the whole way. what a beautiful place to drive.
If you haven’t driven it, it’s hard to explain. so here are some pictures of the sights we have seen. Lovely wouldn’t you agree?




unfortunately every time i post, i forget which pictures show up first... well of course they are backwards but there are too many pictures so sorry to say we will have to drive in reverse! :)





oakland temple. its lovely. sams grandpa was in the temple presidency here so it was really special to visit. we watched the joseph smith video for the first time in about 2 years. it is such a great movie. i truly respect and love joseph smith so much. i cant wait to one day meet him!

we went to san fransisco. such a cool city. it was my first time ever visiting so sam took me to all sorts of fun places. the fishermans wharf was a must see.

of course we had to walk across the golden gate bridge! this was one of my favorite parts of the day!

driving down lombard street! great right?

while we were in san fran we also went to the natural history museum. it was a nice place. i dont think ive ever really been to an aquarium so it was pretty cool to go to a huge one!dont worry this was just another part of the adventure! :)

this was in santa cruz on the pier. kind of a fun place but more for teenagers!

i freakin love light houses. i would live in one if i could. this one is called pigeons point. it is now turned into a hostel which is pretty cool. we didnt end up staying there but it was fun to visit.

just some cute kid.

this was in carmel. this is such a cute little town with lots of art galleries and awesome doors! seriously i love them. all of the doors to every business in the town are split in half so that the bottom can be closed and the top can be open. we will have doors like this for our home someday! i wish i would have taken pictures.

cali coast 2010

sam picked me my FAVORITE flower of all time! woops not like it was a national forest :)

the carmel mission. there are 17 along the coast and in surrounding areas.

i love telephone booths so i made sam take some pictures of me! im awesome i know!

this is where we parked one night. we woke up to a beautiful view dont you think!?

julia pfiefer burns park or something to that effect. it was beautiful and a nice walk.

i know hearst castle is supposed to be one of the main attractions of the coast, but we couldnt fork out $50 to see it so we settled on the visitors center instead.

just a pretty sight. :)

we were able to see a huge elephant seal colony. arent they cuties?

morro bay. it was chilly! kind of everywhere past san luis obisbo was cold!

this was one of my favorite places! only a population of 18 people. but its so quaint and lovely. it reminds me in a way of nauvoo. but ALOT smaller. there was a cool glass blowing studio and gallery here which was really fun to watch.

sampson on a beach in san luis obisbo. san luis was also one of my favorite places.

this is at gowesty. gowesty is a place that revamps and blings out old westfalias and then sells them for a heck of a lot of money. sam and i really want one. :) seriously they would be the best for road tripping! so if anyone knows of one for sale we arent kidding we REALLY want one!

my brother in law nicholas went to cal poly for architecture school. he built this house for a contest in washington dc called the solar decathlon. it was cool to see something that he worked so hard on and did so well with while we toured around cal poly.

ohh la la!

the store we found these at was so weird. everything in it was stuff like this. i wont lie i loved it.

have you ever heard of the madonna inn? dont worry i hadnt either. :) supposedly its really popular and everything is PINK! its crazy! and really gody!

san luis has a famous gum wall. actually its a full gum alley! its pretty sick but of course we had to add our mark to it!

we also went to a place called venice beach. it is WACKO! so many crazies in our world! i like culture, but lets be honest im glad to live in little conservative idaho.

this is back in san luis, like i said my brother in law went to cal poly. they have a canyon that they use for architecture and engineering students to build different structures. we camped there for a few nights! its a really beautiful canyon with lots of fun stuff to explore!

another house/bridge/structure.

im not really sure what this one was but isnt it so pretty and green?

i got hops!

frank lloyd wright (a very famous architect) had a son named the same thing just with jr at the end! :) he built this really cool church by the ocean. its a must see if you drive up the coast.

in a shopping market in mexico

just an interesting little tourist attraction?

our view from our campground in mexico.

i know this is an extremely long post but trust me ive cut out a lot of pictures from what i originally planned on posting! :)

we decided to come to sacramento for the weekend so that we could watch conference. wasnt it wonderful?

it always is, but i especially enjoyed the talks this time.

i know we all get different things out of each talk but for me the theme seemed to talk about mothers, families, youth and children alot. it made me so excited to someday be a mom and (hopefully) raise them in righteousness!

im so so thankful for my mom and dad for raising me so faithfully and helping me through everything.

another thing that stood out to me was the topic of enduring trials. they will come. they always do, but its good to be reminded that the attitude you have will affect what you learn from them.

Especially on this Easter day i am so thankful for my Savior. what a blessing to know that HE LIVES. the music through conference reassured me again and again that this is true. I am so thankful for all that he does for me on a daily basis. I know He is helping me through each struggle i have.

i hope your weekend was an uplifting one and that your week continues to be!

x0x0