Leavenworth Oktoberfest Marathon

We got back late last night from Leavenworth, WA from the marathon. Sore today but glad to be done!

We left mid day Friday and got into Leavenworth by 7pm to pick up race packets. Had a pre-race dinner in Leavenworth and crashed early at our hotel.

We left hotel by 5:20 Saturday a.m. to get to catch a 6am shuttle at the Fish Hatchery to get to the marathon start.

The shuttle took runners 11 miles up a forest road into the mountains. I didn't have a camera on me but the first 11 miles were absolutely gorgeous - through the mountains along a beautiful river into the town of Leavenworth where the second half started...

Mile 17 after our first pit stop to see our support crew - Evelyn, Ashley, Darby, Fiona and Carmen. SO happy to see them! 

Beautiful fall day and scenery for the run....

Mile 26 and still smiling!

DONE! 

Cheering squad

So happy Evelyn made it! As usual she had all sorts of treats for the marathon end.

Including a bier for the car ride afterwards. YUM. 

Gorgeous fall day!

We didn't get any pictures of the town of Leavenworth, but its adorable and was PACKED  with visitors for their Oktoberfest. The crowds were a bit frustrating, but we got our pizza and beer after the run and felt much better. We headed back to Portland Saturday afternoon as neither of us had much energy to explore the town and partake in festivities (and we wanted Sunday to get things done around the house), but we would love to go back to Leavenworth again (without the 26.2 mile run ;)

More catch up

The weekend before our anniversary we went to Pendleton, OR for the Pendleton Round up, one of the ten biggest rodeos in the country. Its 111 years old this year and in a really small town about 4 hours east of Portland. The whole thing was a pretty cool piece of history.

We drove out early Saturday, went to the rodeo and camped that night:

Fun cars and carriages driving to the Round up.

The arena. Kinda reminded me of the old Lambeau Field!

The cowboys are insane. "Let er Buck" is the rodeo catch phrase.

Check out those chaps!

Lots of cowboy hats. This is the event where a cowboy jumps off his horse while at full speed and tackles and ropes a calf. So crazy.

In the stands.

Ashley cooked up pulled pork in the dutch oven for dinner at the campsite.

Last weekend (our anniversary weekend) and this weekend have been spent working on the yard. The stone wall is coming along.

Sean, Ashley's friend, has been chipping away (pun intended) on the wall all summer. Here's him and his nifty old truck.

Working on the wall and digging fence post holes.

And last weekend we ate our one year old cake on the china with silver from Fritz and Susanne, and used our cutter from Heather, Matt and girls. We added another knot to the ribbons from our ceremony :)

Yesterday we poured concrete footings for the new fence, cut the posts and today hope to get the posts bolted in. We then went to Claudia's, the sports bar down the street to watch the Badger game with neighbors from Nebraska.

I'm off on a training run now and hopefully won't be too wiped to help with the fence afterwards (I have a feeling I won't be off the hook :)

All of you are probably heading off to Greg and Jenny's shower now. Have tons of fun and wish I could be there. Say hi to everyone for me and Go Packers!

Its hard to believe...

...it has been a year since everyone made the trek to the Point Reyes National Seashore. Ashley and I were just eating a piece of one year old frozen cake (it was actually from the Wisconsin reception, and it actually was still SO GOOD) and going through pictures, and I decided to post a few:

While I LOVED the wedding day and have such awesome memories from it, the rehearsal picnic was also one of my most favorite days ever:

There are SO many awesome photos from this, its too hard to pick a few good ones....

I still can't believe what awesome weather we had for the actual wedding day. Again, way too many photos to choose from, and Blogger takes so so so long to upload them (especially because most are pretty big files). Thanks again to everyone - such a wonderful weekend....

Summer since our WI trip and Hood to Coast....

Here are a few random pictures of what we've been up to since the Wisconsin trip and my Hood to Coast weekend. I have been really busy with work and these last weeks have flown by - its hard to remember what random things we've been up to, so its actually kind of nice to keep track by organizing my thoughts (and photos) for a post....

Ashley with Doug's old chainsaw. We cut down a big dogwood in the front yard... (and when I say "we" I mean Ashley :)

We went for a hike Labor Day weekend in the Gifford Pinchot Nat'l Forest in Washington. You can really see the haze from forest fires just above the treeline in the way back of this photo...

On the way to the top. A gorgeous day...

A neat arch the trail goes through on the way...

Ashley finished fixing up and sold his 1968 Cutlass! It went to a good home (and the proceeds will go towards the long list of house projects...)

We listed two Japanese maples from our front yard for sale on craigslist. A couple from nearby bought them and came and dug them out. They are now in their front yard not too far from us!

We had a weeknight dinner at our house to catch up with some friends - here are all the girls, including Carmen (I'm sure the boys were playing pool in the basement...)

This weekend we are headed to Pendleton, a town in central Oregon for the Pendleton Round up - one of the biggest rodeos in the country. I'm sure we'll have photos from that to post as well. Can't wait to see what everyone else has been up to! XO

Wisconsin Trip - part two

We headed down to Pewaukee for week two of our trip and got to spend lots of good time with Mom and Charlie - golfing, museuming, hanging out at Jack's garden. Lots of fun pictures! And more to come... This trip may end up being a three-post trip!

Mom and Susanne at Museum

Mom and a Chihuly

Lunch at the museum

Love this photo!

Mom, me and Susanne at museum

Ashley and Fritz at Bill's

Me and Grandma at Bill's

Action shots of the three golfers

Charlie, Mom, Fritz and Susanne in Pewaukee right before Fritz and Susanne's train left for Chicago

Waiting for their train! We were sad to see them go but they had a fun train ride ahead of them (even if it did eventually reach CA VERY late...)

Mom and Emily goofing around in the kitchen

A summer game of backyard whiffle ball at Mom's

Leo - such a good sport :)

Ashley gets to play with more of Matt's toys : ) His first time driving a Harley!

So much fun! And there are so many other good photos. I'll post more soon... I'm so happy we got to spend so much good time with everyone. THANK YOU again to everyone for hosting us all for so long!