The "How 'Bout Them Beavers!" Special Edition

Okay, you "Beaver Believers" out there, despite my previous caustic remarks about the respective Duck and Beaver win/loss records....I felt compelled to do the right thing and comment on the stupendous victory over those evil Trojans on Thursday evening! Any day that a team from California can come up and be soundly trounced by an Oregon team is a great day!

It just proves that the Oregon State Beavers when they dig down deep and try really hard can actually walk the walk instead of just talk the talk!

So, I just wanted you all to know that we root for the Beavers, absolutely! In spite of what true "Beaver Believers" believe...(say that three times fast!)...we derive great enjoyment from watching Oregon State Beaver victories, unless of course they are playing THE University of Oregon Fighting Ducks! We wonder however if our Beaver supporting compatriots would be so magnanimous as to publically make such audacious statements about the Ducks....hmmmm....well I'll just have to resort to quoting one of my favorite "philosophical" commercials........the world may never know!

The Rod Is Runnin' !!

So most of you know that Shawn has spent the last few years getting his dad's 1931 Model A back up and running in her former glory and with some improvements! The rumble seat and new upholstery are finally complete and today we took her out for a little spin to our new Sonic drive-in! It was pretty fun! The girls don't seem to mind the wind in the rumble seat! I guess it adds to the enjoyment! Can't beat that old-fashioned "air conditioning"!

The Back To School aka How 'Bout Them Ducks (!) Edition 2008

So, here we are again! The First Day of School - well, a few days ago anyway! We have officially survived our first week! Ashley is a junior in high school and Alyssa is off to middle school in 6th grade! Good Grief - how can it be?! Me, I'm still in Kindergarten! But that's just fine with me! You learn everything you need to know there! How to share, how to get along with others, how to follow, or not follow, the rules! And you get to have fun and do cool projects! What more could you ask for?!

So in celebration of surviving our first week of school we treated ourselves to our yearly Oregon Duck football game! And for you "Beaver Believers" out there, and you know who you are, hmmm...well I suppose the respective win/loss records so far this season tell the story!

All in all, it was wonderful day at Autzen Stadium (where it never rains!) and we had a great time enjoying the Duck victory! GO DUCKS!!

Where oh where has the summer fun gone?!

Good Grief! My last entry was the beginning of June and now it is the 1st of September!! As you have probably noticed (or maybe not!) there has been a lack of activity on my blog lately! Not because there hasn't been much going on - are you kidding?! We just haven't been home! That's par for the course during summer in the Crawford house!

So, where do I start! In addition to all the trips we took, we enjoyed partaking in our new obsession, uh, I mean, our new hobby, and did quite a bit of geocaching this summer.

We started off our summer with our annual Oregon coast trip with my folks. This year we decided to rent a beach house in Oceanside near Tillamook instead of camping at Beverly Beach. It was great fun! Introduced my folks to geocaching and of course had to visit the Tillamook Cheese Factory!

We ended June with Alyssa's dance recital. She participated in Tap this year. Their perfomance was a karate-themed piece to of all things - Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song"! Way Cool!

Before we knew it, it was July, and Shawn and I traveled to Lake Tahoe for a weekend getaway to celebrate our 19th wedding anniversary. We decided to relive our adolescence just a bit and got tickets to see Cheap Trick, Heart, and Journey in concert. It was fantabulous! I was a little nervous about hearing Journey, one of my most favorite groups, without the vocal stylings of ol' Steve Perry, but I have to say their new guy, Arnel Pineda, does a stupendous job!

Shawn and I decided to try a little geocaching on our own as well. If you're ever in the Lake Tahoe area, we recommend "The Full Monty" geocache! The view is quite...hmmm...remarkable!

So, let's see, after that we traveled to La Grande with Shawn's folks to visit with the Erickson clan for our annual summer get-together. Decided to try a little mountain biking this year! Boy, do I feel old and out of shape! This wasn't just a little casual trail riding, oh, no - the Erickson's don't mess around - this was the real deal! We first shuttled the bikes by truck up the ridge near Mt. Emily. I'm thinking okay, this is pretty easy - then came the part where we actually got on the bikes! We then rode the bikes uphill a little more before making our way back downhill to the house! Let's just say, I walked kinda funny for a couple days afterwards and I don't think my hands have forgiven me yet for gripping the brakes during the entire downhill trek! But don't get me wrong - we had a blast and the scenery was gorgeous!

Oh, and yes, we did some geocaching too!

After La Grande, we headed home for a few days of laundry and then were off again to the coast to visit Shawn's grandma in Coquille and his aunt, who came out for her summer visit from Nebraska. And you guessed it....more geocaching!!

Then back home again for a few more days of laundry before we headed south to San Diego for our last trip of the summer. Enjoyed the sunset at Mission Beach and then took the girls to Seaworld and the USS Midway aircraft carrier the following day. Didn't think the girls and I would enjoy the Midway as much as we did. We ended up staying for most of the day - it was pretty darn cool! Then we were off that evening to see Shamu and the other sights at Seaworld.

Then we were off for a drive north on Hwy 1/101 to enjoy the California coast on our way back to Oregon. We stopped for a couple of hours at Huntington Beach so the girls could swim in the ocean, where you can actually swim without first numbing your body to the water temperature or have to resort to wearing a wetsuit (for those of you who are not sturdy Oregon coast natives!)

One of our other sights along the way was the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. Had heard about it many times, but had never visited before.

Then it was off to San Francisco! We had plans to visit Alcatraz, but soon discovered, as we found was the main theme of our trip, that you just can't travel spontaneously anymore! At least not to popular areas! Unfortunately, we mistakenly thought we could just drive as long as we wanted and would be able to find a place to stay for the night without making reservations ahead of time - boy were we wrong! After trying this for a couple of nights, we had to resort to finding a wireless hotspot and making hotel reservations online. Which brings me back to Alcatraz...found all the information about the ferry trip online and saw that you could buy tickets ahead of time, but we thought, what the heck - we don't mind standing in line to buy tickets - we're on vacation, man! We're not in a big hurry! There's lots of departure times on the ferry! So, we got there in the morning, parked the car, walked to the ferry dock, got in line, and.....they were SOLD OUT! Not just for that day, but for five days out! You've got to be kidding - I wish I were! So, dejected, we got back in the car and crossed the Golden Gate in the fog! It fit our mood! Oh, well, we decided that we would just make a special trip back in October! And we learned our lesson - so much for spontaneity! But that suits my Shawn boy just fine anyway! He's the planner - I'm just the navigator! And speaking of navigators - our GPS "Lori" was a wonderful addition to our trip - she told us where to go all the time - we didn't always agree, but it was good to have her along!

So, after getting on track with reservations, we headed north through the Redwoods. Breathtaking as always! Even found the "drive-through" tree! Amazing that it is still a living tree! Oh and yeah did I mention we did some geocaching?!

Ended our trip with a visit to the Oregon Caves before heading back to Central Oregon. It was the girls' first visit. Shawn and I hadn't been in about 20+ years. It was a scorching hot day, so it felt good to wander around in the caves. And the trip wouldn't be complete without some more geocaching!

So, that's about it! Tomorrow is the first day of school (and work, for me!) Can't believe it has gone so fast! Oh, well, it will be Christmas break before we know it!

Our new electronic friend...

Yes, after much research and pondering, we recently acquired a TomTom portable GPS unit. Since Shawn and I are getting older and are finding that we can't remember stuff more and lose things more frequently than we used to that we better get this new gadget before we lose ourselves! Since I have always been the "navigator" when we travel we were surprised and amused to find that our new GPS has a navigational voice named, yes, you guessed it, "Lori"! Ha Ha Ha! Very fitting! Kind of even sounds like me, but to Shawn's thankfulness, GPS Lori tells him where to go without any attitude. That's okay, I have enough attitude for both of us!

Anyway...not only does GPS Lori help us when we travel, but we have found that she can also help us with a new hobby we have heard about but never tried until this weekend! We decided to try "geocaching" this past weekend with our longtime pals, the McDowell family.

For those of you who don't know, geocaching is kind of like a treasure hunt using a GPS unit. All sorts of folks go out and hide these little treasure "caches" all over and then enter the latitude and longitude coordinates and other information about their "cache" on a very cool website called http://www.geocaching.com/ for other people to go out and find. We have found that cache etiquette allows you to add to the treasure (as space allows) and even take a little momento from the cache if you choose.

Our first excursion led us to an old cemetery near Tumalo where we had to look for clues on headstones to get the final coordinates to lead us to the hiding spot of the cache hidden in the cemetery. Very clever! It took us a little bit to get the hang of how the GPS works, but what great fun!! We are hooked!

Today we decided to try it again on our own after the McDowells took off for home and were able to locate another cache near the Deschutes River just outside of Tumalo.

We think it will be a great summertime hobby and help us and GPS Lori get to know each other better! Happy Hunting!

Happy 11th Birthday, Alyssa Rae!

Can you believe it?!? We sure can't! How can it be that our very own Miss Alyssa has turned 11 already!?! She's our baby! But a baby no longer - she is turning into quite a young lady and will be off to middle school come fall! She is quite excited at the prospect. It has been a challenge for her to wait and watch her big sis gain her independence and get to do all sorts of new things while little sis watches from the sidelines. She is so ready to spread her wings...sigh...as mom and dad watch from the sidelines as now our two "goosers" become more and more grown up before our eyes! Ah....snap yourself out of it, Mom!

Like everything she does, Miss Alyssa likes to party dramatically as well, and this year was no exception. So, her dad and I were most brave and allowed her to invite a few of her most special friends for a sleepover to help her celebrate being a decade plus one! Six pre-adolescent girls in one house! Whew! But, being the smart mom that I am, I acquiesced when Alyssa suggested the girls go to open gym at one of our local gymnastics locations for a couple of hours. Yep, let's just say that by the time we got home at 9:00 and they hopped into the hot tub for a little soak and some ghost stories, all was quiet by no later than 12:30 a.m. Thankfully, no bad dreams or bouts of homesickness!

So here's to a new year of memories with the youngest member of the Crawford clan...our "Sissa Rae"!

The Crawja 4000

Watch out Baja 1000 racers, it's the Crawja 4000! We may be small, but we're spunky! One of the Crawford family's favorite activities is taking our little "be-bop" 90cc ATV's and Shawn's "antique" 1980 Yahama Enduro 175 (no laughing please!) out to one of our local OHV trail areas and tearing around the sagebrush and kicking up the dust! And I would just like to say, it's not the size of the machine, but the amount of fun you can have with it!!

We recently went out and had our first ride of the season. We're hoping to get a little more riding in this year than last year which amounted to no more than two trips! Pitiful!! Too busy doing basketball stuff and pageant-y stuff, I guess. But I think we have successfully reprioritized ourselves, thankfully!

So, let's introduce our racers....!

Here comes "Atomic" Alyssa......!

Next is "Ass-kickin" Ashley.....!

And here is the mutha' of all riders...."Leadfoot" Lori!

And last in the lineup, but definitely not least ~ "Speed Racer" Shawn!

The "Masters" Birthday!

Augusta, GA - the birthplace of The Masters golf tournament, but most importantly, Christopher Shawn Crawford, who was born the day after the The Masters tournament concluded 42 years ago! His mom remembers there was quite a traffic jam trying to get to the hospital! Yes, they were definitely lining the streets in Augusta heralding the pending birth of our Shawn! LOL!! No traffic jams this past weekend (at least not in ol' Bend, OR) - Shawn got to spend his birthday weekend doing some of the things he likes best - eating BBQ steak and birthday cake with lots of frosting and watching The Masters on television in HD! Not a lot of fanfare for our Shawn-boy! He prefers it that way! I am trying to convince him that we should get our name on the waiting list and start saving now so we could get tickets to see The Masters tournament in person in honor of his 50th birthday! I think that would be so cool! But he says that he prefers to watch it from the comfort of his own home and watching it in HD is just like being there without dealing with all the crowds. We'll see......

Ahhh.....Spring Break!

So, it was off to the Oregon coast for Spring Break. The girls and I decided to brave the snow on Santiam Pass....Snow?!?! Isn't it supposed to be "Spring Break" not "Snow Break"?!

It was probably the worst snow driving conditions I have ever encountered since we moved over the mountain almost 11 years ago! (Photos courtesy of Ashley, by the way! Are you kidding? I had both white-knuckled hands on the wheel the whole way, thank you very much!). We headed over midweek so we would have time to go to the beach. Thankfully, the weather cooperated there and we had one good day to enjoy the beach and do a little kite flying at Bastendorff! As a former coastie, I am very thankful that we got that one good day - I was fully expecting it to rain the whole time we were there! Shawn and his folks headed over on Friday and we spent the rest of the weekend visiting Shawn's grandma in Coquille for her 89th birthday, and his aunt, Kathleen, who was out visiting from Nebraska. I also got to visit with one of my long time friends, Leah, who I have known since we were just 7th graders! My how time flies! (sorry Leah, I just had to do it! It was just too funny!) We still get to giggling, no matter how old we get! We entertained the girls with tales from our youth! Well, I think I have figured out how to add a video to my blog, so here is a slideshow I created from some of the pictures I took while we were at the coast. Enjoy!

Teen Driver Alert!

Yep, it's true! Watch out everyone - Our own Ashley Rose Crawford passed her driver's test today and is now a bona-fide Oregon driver! She took her test this morning and had a few minor errors: apparently she bumped the curb when parallel parking, signalled too early, didn't turn into the closest lane, didn't check her blind spots enough, and stopped too far forward at a stop sign and crosswalk. Wait a minute, that's stuff I do every day!! But despite all that, the instructor decided that she was a safe enough driver! She's spent a lot of time driving with us over the past year (my accumulation of grey hair and arthritis from gripping the door handle prove it!), but we know she's a responsible girl! It's one of those milestones that we are excited for but also dread! We worry more about those other crazies out there than we do her! So watch out everyone, she may be on the road in a city near you soon!

Skiing!!

Yes, the Crawdorks are at it again! Thanks to Ashley's new digital camera we were able to catch them riding the ski lift at Hoodoo over President's Day Weekend. It was a glorious day, but a little breezy at the summit! Those Crawford girls are improving in their skiing skills - they have surpassed their poor Mama which doesn't take much - she's much more of a ski bunny than anything else!






"Am I doing this right?"

Hmmm..do I detect a little attitude to the left....maybe it's the sunglasses....they tend to bring out the Paris in her... Watch out...we're hunting wabbits - hehehehehe!

Orthodontia...it's a wonderful thing!!

Go Big Green!

So, since we are a big basketball lovin' family - Shawn, with the help of Mr. Milliron, secured us tickets for some pretty sweet seats at the women's basketball Civil War battle this past weekend in Eugene!

That controversial duck was up to his usual tricks!

And the best part - was that our lady Ducks were able to secure a win against those evil Beavers - I think there's something Freudian in that comment, but I will let it pass...

And I couldn't help but add a couple photos of the Dork Family, uh, I mean Duck Family!

Happy Sweet 16 Ashley Rose!

Well, it's hard to believe that Shawn and I have been parents for 16 years! Our Miss Ashley Rose has survived our parenting techniques thus far and made it to her 16th birthday! Watch out world, she will hopefully be getting her license on March 17th - St. Patrick's Day! She'll be wearin' the green for good luck!





In honor of her "mature" status, she requested that we take her to a fancy restaurant for her birthday. She selected Staccato, a very upscale Italian restaurant in town, owned by her basketball coach, JJ Anderson. It was very yummy! Then as if we weren't stuffed enough, it was back home for cake!

Somewhere between 40 and death...!

Ah, birthdays! They make me feel so nostalgic, especially my own! 41 years! I definitely don' t feel 41, which I suppose works well in my favor! I remember my mom being 41 which doesn't seem like it has been almost 20 years ago! And shame on me, I made her a grandmother at 45! At 45, I will have an almost 20 year old hopefully still continuing her college studies and an almost 15 year old high school freshman! Grandmotherliness can wait until my 5th decade, if I get my way! Don't get me wrong, I don't dread getting older, in fact, I have enjoyed every age I have been. Some more than others I suppose. I don't think I would do my teenage years again, unless I could go back with the knowledge that I have now! Like in the movie "Peggy Sue Got Married". I think that would be great fun! But I guess I will just impart my acquired knowledge to my daughters instead so they will hopefully benefit from all I have learned thus far! Here's to another year!

It's Been Wild...!

Well, today is the last day of Christmas vacation for the girls and I. It's back to the real world!


But, we had a lot of fun! I thought I would start off with the wild weather we got that destroyed our Christmas present from a few years ago! We got some big winds a few weeks ago and came home to find our trampoline must have decided it wanted to be a frisbee while we were at school!





So, Shawn dismantled it while we figure out if we can get a part to repair it.

Christmas morning was fun as always!





Santa visited and brought fun gifts....

Papa Bob and Gramma Ronda, made the trek over the mountain from Lyons to celebrate with us as well as Papa Clinton and Gramma Linda, but they only had to travel across town!

Abby the Diva Dog got her Christmas wish too....

And my mom's new baby, Dolly, (aka Swiffer) celebrated her first Christmas with us!

And last, but not least, Shawn would like to say....

GO DUCKS!!!!