Berlin Family Vacay Volume 1

Charlie's little sister, Shannon recently got married in California Wine Country and Charlie was a groomsman, Summer was the flower girl and Steve the ring bearer. We decided to drive down and make it a little vacation. So, Charlie took 2 weeks off and we drove from Granite Falls took the ferry to Hobuck Beach on the Washington Peninsula, then from there to Nehalem Oregon, to the Redwood forest in Weott, California and to our final destination in Healdsburg, California.
While I was in the throws of the trip, I had a little time and service (shocker) to briefly scroll through Instagram and there on my feed was this:

You know you're a mom when you go to Target alone and it feels like a vacation,

and a family vacation feels like work.

Thank you Instagram!

Its not just me!

 

Day one of the trip started out as I had expected. The night before I was scrambling to get everything perfect; packing everyone's bags, making 12 snack bags for the 12 days we would be away, baking bread and cookies and breakfast cookies and tortillas and muffins, trying to find sheets and pillows and all the other bullshit a family of 4 needs for 12 days in a suburban.

Charlie and I had decided we wanted to catch an early ferry so we wouldn't have to wait in line.

HA.

HA.

HA.

By the time we were pulling out of the driveway it was close to 11.

It started raining just as we were pulling down the hill.

Charlie looked at me said, 'We need the tarp. I'm gonna go back and get it.'

Fine!

The kids and I sat in the driveway for 20 minutes.

'What were you doing in there? We've been sitting in here forever!'

'I grabbed a bunch of stuff I thought we might need. Also, I put blue painters tape over all the heater dials and wrote 'NO' on them so Gma wouldn't turn them on. Do you think that's too much?'

At this I laughed so hard that I cried and couldn't get it together for a solid 10 minutes.

Needless to say, my Gma did not turn the heaters on.

 

Finally, The Berlin Family Adventure can begin!

Oh wait, we need to stop at Target and get rope and a flashlight.

Oh wait we got stuck in the ferry line for an hour and a half.

Actually, getting stuck in the ferry line was kind of a blessing.

We got out and everyone went potty and I

literally ran the kids up and down the sidewalk for a solid 40 minutes, everyone was a little more subdued in the truck for the next 3 hours.

After roughly 5 hours we finally made it over to Hobuck. We found a nice spot right in the middle of all the action and pulled out our millions of pounds of gear.
I love Hobuck Beach, its a campground right on the beach with an excellent surf spot. There are awesome camper vans, wetsuits hanging everywhere and dogs and kids running all around. Its one of my favorite spots in the world.
We went down to the beach and Steve was on a mission for sand dollars, whole sand dollars if he could find one. So, he was off doing big kid things

by himself. Summers favorite thing in the entire world is sand, as soon as we were on the beach she parked it and would not be moved. Charlie laid down next to Summer and I wandered for a bit.
The smell of the ocean is incredibly therapeutic for me. A few deep, salty breaths and I'm calm and happy. Exactly what I needed after a long day in the car. I tracked down Steve and tried to get him to put back some of his finds, which happened to fill up a large bucket. He might be a hoarder when it comes to rocks and dead sea life.
No dice for me.
The whole bucket came back with us.
We went back up and made dinner and Charlie started a fire, in our designated area, of course.

We sat around the fire eating and watched a guy on a bike go around to each person with a fire, which was everyone in the packed park. He eventually made his way over to us and politely told us there was a burn ban and that we should just let our fire burn down and not to stoke it.
He rode off into the sunset and we didn't see him again.
We did, however, see everyone in the park add more wood to their fires so we followed suit. We didn't want to be the only good guys in a pack of rebels!
Charlie went to lay down with Summer for bedtime and Steve and I read our books, Wild and Minions: A Novelization (this always makes me laugh) by the waning sun light, cozied up to the fire.
Just when we were really getting settled in our respective books a pack of children ranging in age from 4 to around 8 came up to us to stare, awkwardly close.
Finally, I looked up.
"Hey lady, you know theres a burn ban, right?" Sassy older head of the  pack asks me.
"Yep." I am the queen of sass kid, whats up! Don't make me give you nightmares!
"Well then, you should really put it out, right!'
"Hmm." I replied with a death glare.
They screamed and ran away in terror.
Steve looked at me and we both giggled.
We made sure our fire burned brightest all night long.
Sometime around me just trailing off to sleep our friends, who just so happened to be camping there too that weekend, pulled up in their RV next to us.
The boys were still up so everyone packed it in around the fire and chatted for a while. I eventually went out and snatched up Steve who was falling asleep in the chair and made him go to bed, which he did not appreciate.

Damn Mom and her rules!
The next day Charlie decided to go and explore with Nick. They found a little hike out to an overlook to the ocean. It was beautiful and terrifying.
Steve went up the boys and I just kept pace with Summer. Letting her take in everything at her own pace is wonderful. She gets to look at every single thing she wants, it slows you down and makes you appreciate what you're actually out there for.
We had caught up to them eventually and Summer absolutely refused to be carried at any part of the trail.

Then she fell.
What a shock.
She screamed bloody murder and I scooped her up and sat her down, trying to casually get her to relax. Everyone who walked by, and it was a busy trail, had something to say.
Just mind your business people!
After I offered her a lets go back or keep going option, we were off to finish up.
We caught up to the boys again and I was firstly, taken aback by how breathtakingly beautiful the view was then quickly had visions of Steve falling off the cliff to his demise.
Cant have a fun family vacay when one of you leaps off a cliff to their death.
"Steve, get back!"
"Ugh! Why? Dad and Nick are over here!"

"Don't care, come here!"
"Ugh!"
Death stare.
We continued on while I vice gripped Summer and made sure Steve was only on the designated trail.
"Cant I catch up to Daddy?"
"Nope, you have to stay with me. I like when you're alive."
Another death stare.
We turned around and once we got passed the sheer cliff faces and 1000 foot drop offs I let Steve go on ahead of us.
Then I couldn't see him anymore.
For kind of a long time.
Cue snatcher and broken limb, hanging off a cliff where no one can get to him thoughts.

"STEVE! STEVE!"
Summer caught on pretty quick and soon the forest was alive with our frantic screaming.
After a few minutes we caught up to a giggling Steve.
"Im fine, jeeze!"
Then Charlie comes huffing and puffing out of nowhere yelling "Whats happening ! I ran, I heard you yelling!"
We made it back without major incident all our limbs intact and 5 people and a dog accounted for.
Thank God.
The rest of the day was filled with sand and salt water, my two very favorite things.
Summer, Lola, her son Thomas and I were posted up on our blankets chatting about mom stuff while Thomas taste tested sand and Summer snuck a sand snack in too.
Steve wandered off so far that I had to go and track him down to chase the images of him either getting snatched or being drug off by an errant wave, out of my mind. Charlie and Nick surfed for a better part of the day and Jake flew his kite, which Steve quickly became obsessed with.
We napped and had dinner and I slept like a baby, sandwiched in between Summer and Charlie. Steve, lucky for him, had his own tent.
Sometime during the night a new camper came in and set up shop next to us.
Before Charlie came to bed it started to pour and I heard someone come over and say "Hey, can I borrow a towel for a dollar?'
My super nice husband gave him one from our stack and I didn't think anything of it.
The next morning we ate breakfast and started packing up.
The guy that needed a towel was lingering on the edge of our site trying to talk to Steve while he played with an airplane in the field next to us.

We packed at warp speed and asked our friends to stay until we left because our new neighbor was giving off a seriously creeper vibe.
I watched him steal a fork off the table from the people next to him and tried to jam Summer into her seat as he loudly asked us how much the rest of our milk would cost. As we pulled out of our spot with all our gear haphazardly thrown in the back we watched him crawl half-way into his tent and laugh hysterically.

I'm glad we left what with my imagination and all.

 

 

On to Nehalem, Oregon.

Cheers