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Queen of the Juggle > fishing

Vacation Part X – Oregon to Nevada

Posted on by Sherri

We made our way through McDermott, hotter than hell and then we get the amazing welcome of the sign on the door that read “bathrooms for customers only”.  WHATEVER.  not happening.  We have 5 kids and they all need to pee.  I do too.  So not in the mood for anymore.  No one stopped us or said anything.  There was also another small problem I was having on top of all the rest…I had these weird bites on my legs that were very itchy and painful.  I felt terrible overall.  I just could not shake these weird bites of whatever they were.  I was beyond miserable.  Add to that that when we got to Winnemucca, my mom’s gate was locked.  She had gone fishing.  OMG…could this get worse?  Still 106 degrees outside and oh man…it was rough.  And I still had to get our 1/2 beef.  And I was exhausted.  And I was in pain.  Perfect storm.  Chip threw the stuff we needed over the fence and we climbed the fence.  Luckily I had a key to the house.  We overnighted at moms.  Next morning, hubs loaded up all the stuff and kiddos and headed home in a jam-packed minivan.  I stayed behind to get the meat in the big ole diesel pusher Dodge.   The final leg of the McVey Vaca. This was fun, but not without its own bunch of crazy, and a lot of driving.
I’m still having trouble with my legs/feet.  Finally, I was able to pick up our beef.  Jim’s wife commented on my legs/feet when I picked up the boxes of beef.  I felt like a lepper.  It was all I could do to get that loaded and get going.  I high tailed it out of there because I too was worried about my legs/feet and wanted to (hopefully) get to an urgent care.  I had reached my max.  The itching.  The heat.  The kids.  The lack of air conditioning.  I made my way out of the Mucc, headed for Reno and over to St. Mary’s Quick Care at Walmart about 15 minutes before they closed.  Because it was so hot, Chip came and grabbed the truck and I would take the minivan home.  I walk in and they say it’s too late and I can’t be seen.  At that moment, it was so overwhelming.  The tears came.  I was so DONE.  There was no more to give.  I begged them.  Luckily they saw me.  It was flea bites.  From somewhere.  Really?  Great.  Just great.  Then I had to trek over to CVS for antibiotics.  Wow.  Amazing.
Regardless of all of that, a big, huge THANK YOU to all of those who housed, fed, partied, laughed, and put up with invasions of the McVey family. It’s quite a big undertaking to take on 7. Hopefully, we didn’t leave too much devastation as we left each place. We’re grateful to all that we were able to share special times with so many. Friends and family that we didn’t get to see, we are sorry we couldn’t make it happen. We hope to get up to WA/OR again soon. Now a week from now I must start to work hard to remove some of the vacation food and drink indulgence weight gain.  Gillian was a trooper too. Hard to be tied to a bunch of rambunctious little boys for days on end when you’re right smack in the middle of being a teenager. Chip, Gill and I had some great conversation about all of it on our last night.  Wish I had one more day to breathe, but it is what it is and we’ve had a fun time with our travels. Thank you hubs for packing, unpacking, packing and unpacking with all the kiddos in tow.

Vacation part IV…Washington

Posted on by Sherri

So we got on the road from Othello and headed over to Washington.  It was, theoretically, a 4 1/2 hour drive.  So we took off about 9 or so.

It seemed to take forever to get over into Western Washington, but boy when we did, we knew it.  Seattle was horrible to navigate through.  It wasn’t even rush hour, it was right around noon time.  Oh.my.god!  The amount of traffic we encountered was atrocious!  That slowed us down by an hour probably.

Once out of the mess of Seattle, we headed out to Dawns in Sedro-Woolley.  Before we got there, somewhere around Bellingham, we stopped at a Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch.  It was later in the afternoon and we were so hungry.  I could have eaten my arm.  So we walk in and we stand.  Restaurant has a few people eating.  I mean it’s late afternoon.  Around 2 or so.  There were a few different choices for eating in the complex we were in, so we opted for something we knew would be okay.  Buffalo Wild Wings has never been a favorite.  When we think of them, we think mediocre or less.

So we walk in and we wait.  People walk by and then we wait some more.  Finally a third person takes us to our table.  Then we wait some more.  By now I’m about ready to lose it because I just couldn’t take it anymore.  So we get an appetizer.  No plates.  No extra napkins.  Takes a while for that to arrive.  Then we wait some more.  No one says much, they just go about their business.  No sense of urgency.  Food comes out and we eat.  Not impressed, not impressed at all.  In fact it was disappointing.  I should have taken to Yelp right there, but I didn’t not worth my time.

So then we arrived at my sisters.  YAY!  Cousins finally got to meet.  It was fabulous!  The kids took to the video games right away.  Aurora showed them the dance game via connect and they tried to show her Call of Duty.  Um yeah…no.  It was funny because the boys seemed surprised that she hadn’t seen it before. Between the five of them they settled on a Spongebob game.

 

Ben went right into the kitchen with Auntie.  It was SO cute!

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We only had a few days with Dawn, so we made the most of it.  Dawn whipped up a great breakfast the next morning and we headed out to the lake cabin.  Oh.my.gosh!  We had no idea how much fun we would have!  The place is so beautiful.  Truly.

 

Of course, we had to spend a lot of time packing vehicles and all of that, so we had a bit of a slow start.  Worth every bit of effort.

 

 

 

 

All of the kiddos and adults suited up for a fabulous day on the lake.  The cabin is about 30 minutes from Dawn and Rusty’s.  Once we drove in, we saw a beautiful lake.  We got everyone into their life jackets and swim gear.  It didn’t take anyone long to be in the water and to head out to the party barge.  Dawn had a great BBQ planned along with sparklers for the kids…the boys had never done those before.

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Then we got out the s’mores equipment and the fishing poles.  Dawn and I, being the tough Alaska chicks that we are, we did all of the hooking and weighting for all 6 poles.  Yes, 6 poles.  She secretly told me that she didn’t think there was any fish in the lake, but we kept that between ourselves.  Everyone had a great time trying though!

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The next day…only one more day in Washington…we treated all of us to a 3D movie!  We all donned the glasses and saw “How To Train Your Dragon 2”.  Really, really good!  Definitely worth seeing in 3D.  The kids had so much fun!  Mostly because of the massive amount of popcorn and soda they were permitted to ingest.  Hahahahaha.

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Dawn headed back with the kiddos and Chip and I headed to the Walmart to replace the crappy tent that bit it at the beginning of the trip.  So, like smart peeps, we bought 2 smaller tents to replace the 10 man.  Then the boys have theirs, we have ours and Gillian could have her own.

That evening we snapped some family pics and did s’mores and of course enjoyed wine.  It was such a quick visit, but so happy we could make it happen.  So lucky that Dawn has a big house that we could invade for a few days.

I think all of us enjoyed this special time.  I know it won’t be another 7 years before we see each other again.  Thank you my seester.  We had a blast!

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So the next morning we packed it up.  Chip did an amazing job of getting both vehicles loaded.  Buh-bye Washington!  Hello Oregon.  Oh yeah…I was STILL itching.  Only worse.