Guys Weekend - 2007

The Impetus:
One day I was complaining to Missi about how she was always seeming to go off with her girlfriends on these really fun "girl's weekends," and how I never got to do anything like that. She responded by telling me something to the effect of "The reason you never have guy's weekends is because you don't plan them! Just put them on the calendar and make it happen!" Taking her advice to heart, I started talking to a few of my closest friends about have a weekend just for the guys. One of the things I learned through this process is to start planning WAY in advance so everyone can clear their schedules.

The Objective:
Backpack into the Green Lakes Complex in the Three Sisters Wilderness area, camp for a few nights, and climb South Sister, at 10,358', the third-highest mountain in Oregon.

The Participants:
Your Truly
Jeff Evans - friend from MSCC and member of Banning's Boyz (also works with Missi's dad)
Sean Heyworth - friend from MSCC, helped tear down a wall at our house in Eugene
Jesse Foglio - childhood friend from fifth grade (also married to one of Missi's best friends)
Craig Cartmill - old friend and member of Banning's Boyz
Brian Salwasser - my new brother-in-law
Peder Quello - old friend (played soccer together in fourth grade!) and member of Banning's Boyz

The next several blog posts will include photos and recap of this past weekend. It was, without exaggeration, one of the best weekends I've had in my life. I'm already planning our next trip!

The Fray concert

On Thursday evening, July 26, we went to The Fray concert at McMenamin's Edgefield. We were given the tickets as a gift by one of the world's greatest guys, who also attended with his girlfriend. Our good friends Craig and Mauria also came along, so we could've gone to a 4th-grade piano recital and we still would've enjoyed ourselves as we had some great friends with us. As I've written previously, Missi and I love going to concerts together, and this was a pretty good show. The downside was that we got to the venue a bit late, so the only seats we could find were way in the back. The band sounded good and interacted well with the crowd. Overall, it was a great way to spend a summer evening.

"I love it when a plan comes together"

Isn't that what Hannibal used to say on The A-Team? Well, hopefully a plan that I've been working on for a long time will all come together this weekend. Tonight we are going up to Portland to catch The Fray in concert at McMenamin's Edgefield, and tomorrow I leave for Central Oregon to go backpacking with a group of guys. We'll be in the Three Sisters Wilderness Area, and the plan is to climb South Sister (at over 10,300', Oregon's third-highest peak) on Saturday and hike out Sunday. I'll post pictures next week.

Hiking Spencer's Butte with Drew and Zeke

On Tuesday morning I hiked up Spencer's Butte here in Eugene with Drew and Zeke. In part it was just to get out and do something fun with Drew and in part it was to get sorta ready for this weekend's backpack. It's a pretty easy hike, and we woke up about 6:30AM and were done by 8:30. We also happened to find a ginormous slug crossing the trail, which we of course had to take pictures of. It was probably a good 6" long.





Not many things better than a boy and his dog

Zeke gives Drew a kiss

I tried to put my size-12 foot next to the slug for some perspective. It was huge!

Pictures from Jay's Birthday Party

On Saturday night we raced back from Portland to make it to our friend Jay's thirtieth birthday party. Our friend's John and Robyn did a great job hosting everyone and it was a really fun night.

The ladies

One of these things isn't quite like the others

Take One: Something was obviously really funny here or I am in a bunch of pain.

Take Two: Missi's shows us her "Blue Steel"

Take Three: Thank goodness for digital cameras and large memory cards...

Our little princess...

She's got it ALL going on: the little crown, the necklace, the bracelet, earrings, and the blue Cinderella dress! She was dancing to the soundtrack from Beauty and the Beast.

Pictures from The River

Every year many of Missi's family visits a place on the McKenzie River called The Wayfarer. It's a quaint, old-fashioned "resort," where the activities are things like horseshoes, croquet, volleyball, etc...It was a fun coupla days away from Eugene and the kids had a great time exploring and playing. Here are a few pictures.


The kids LOVED going out on this Huck Finn-style raft that they had at the place in a little man-made pond. We had to push ourselves along with a pole as we looked for bullfrogs.





Drew lost a tooth while we were were at The River, but he was relieved to discover that the tooth fairy could even find him while he was sleeping in a tent at a place up the McKenzie River!

Every night one family from among the big group who visits The River is responsible for making dinner for everyone else. This year the Hillier's put on a Hawaiian luau and it was a HUGE success.

Three generations of Oregon Law students

Zeke figured out that he enjoyed swimming

Here's a fun game...

Here's a little challenge I just thought of: What (or how many) words can you type using only your left hand (A-S-D-F) and maintaining proper typing technique? For example, here's a few: sad, was, tazed

Perhaps this is the type of thought that runs through my brain only after I've been on the phone for like four hours talking to people about the federal citations they have received.

If you think of some more words (and I know there are more!) leave them in the Comments!

Big News

I bought a scooter this weekend. How sweet is that?

Action photos coming soon...

There are lots of things I could write about today, like how our dog Zeke got out and so I was riding my bike around our neighborhood for a long time trying to find him, but instead I'll just post a screenshot from Yahoo for today. Check out temperature! I know the rest of the country is under a heat wave, but 101 is really hot for Eugene!
Thank goodness for AC!

Blog Finally Updated!

A long-overdue update to the blog is finally complete. I tried to go in reverse-chronological order, so the most recent stuff should appear right below this post. Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Fourth of July Recap

For Fourth of July we were at our friend John and Robyn’s house, which is just around the corner from our house. Earlier in the day I organized a flag football game, which was fun but was slightly a let-down since we only had enough players for 4-on-4. I also got pegged in the eye that didn’t feel too good (it’s a long story but it probably would’ve killed a weaker man).

John and Robyn had about 40 people over for a big BBQ and the pool was absolutely packed with kids. They had tons of good food and the kid’s loved getting their faces painted. We also watched a replay of the Nathan’s hot-dog-eating contest (on a side note – what drives these people to stuff their faces with nasty hotdogs for 12 minutes?), which almost took away my appetite for the whole night.

The fireworks display we put on probably rivaled those put on by several small municipalities – we were shooting off 4-5 mortars per “set.” It was a really fun night.

Night Out in Portland - 6/30/07

We have been trying to get together with our friend’s Dave and Caleen for about the past year since they got married, but both of our busy schedules has made it EXTREMELY difficult to find a night to make it happen. Well, we finally got it on the books and it was well-worth the wait. We met over at their house in Forest Heights and we were joined by our other great friends Jesse and Nicole and Lindsay. Jesse and I have been friends since fourth grade and Missi and Lindsay are also childhood friends. We hung out for awhile at their house catching up and then went to the Dublin Pub to catch a show by The Jacob Merlin Band. It was a fun night with great friends. The type of night that makes us miss being in Portland more often…

Day at the Farm - 6/30/07

I took Samantha and Missi's sisters Ella and Elizabeth out to my grandparent's farm. The girls had a great time picking raspberries, getting eggs from the chicken house, swinging on the swingset, and taking a tractor ride. It was just confirmation that The Farm is one of the best places for a kid.