.:Meet the Ritchies:.

Oh my sweltering heat batman!  I hope you all survived the heat wave this weekend, if you aren’t in our beautiful neck of the woods, chances are you were experiencing warm temperatures yourself.  We had 90+ degree days, which hasn’t happened for awhile, so we chose our activities carefully.  On Saturday we went over to our friend Josh’s house for a pool party in celebration of his nephew Alex’s birthday.  The best part was that his pool was completely in the shade, so we didn’t even have to worry about drenching our girls in sunscreen.  After that we took a drive out to Newberg, which is quite a drive considering I don’t remember the last time we were out there.  My friend Jessica Bobillot, whom I graduated with from the Art Insitute had done the costumes for a Shakespeare play and it was being performed outside at the Allison Hotel & Spa.  Willamette Shakespeare put on A Midsummer Night’s Dream for the 2nd weekend of a three weekend run.  It was so much fun!  Not only was it a beautiful venue, but the weather was perfect also.  We took a picnic dinner and delighted in the live band Roughly Hewn that played before and throughout the performance.  And it was totally free!

Shakespeare in the park

And today, even though we knew it was going to be a scorcher, found us at the Clark County Fair in Vancouver.  We toured the animal barns, which always brings back very fond memories for myself regarding the 8 years I spent in 4-H when I was growing up.  I never showed any large animals, but I did have rabbits!

We saw some goats…

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(I’ve been feeling a lot like this guy lately, always with my head in the feedbag…)

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And the llamas.. or are they alpacas?  There was a sign explaining the difference but I didn’t read it. I guess I wanted to keep it a mystery…

I think she was giving me the eye, so I couldn't help but take her picture...I wish I had lashes like that...

This guy was hilarious… is this a llama or a poodle?

or maybe an Ostrich?

We walked through the buildings that had the 4-H kids exhibits including photography, food, clothing and table settings.  I can remember standing up in front of the judges and baking muffins, like I was practicing to have my own cooking show.  I remember being really nervous even though you don’t have to explain what you are doing, you just have to do it.  I also put together table settings and won blue ribbons for doing so.  I should dig up those old photos..

After we had some lunch and walked around the commercial buildings, we made our way over to the grandstands for the Monster Trucks.  Hey, it was free (with fair admission of course) so why not, right?  The place filled up quickly and the girls put in their earplugs.  Then it got seriously noisy!  My ears are still ringing.  We didn’t stay for the whole thing, about a half hour was all we could handle.  The smaller trucks were more fun, especially the ones that either broke something or almost crashed.

Then the girls were ready to ride a few carnival rides before we headed back to our air-conditioned home.  They had a tough time agreeing on which ones they’d go on, since neither of them wanted to ride alone and we didn’t buy enough tickets for Mark to ride any.  And oh darn, I wasn’t allowed to ride any on account of being pregnant.  As you can tell, I was really disappointed (ppsshhhh).  They finally decided on a ride called Haywire, which when I was a kid it was called the Scrambler.  Mark and I were making bets on who would lose their lunch first, which probably sounds pretty mean but it’s only because we both remembered having similar episodes as kids ourselves.  When I was in the 6th grade, my friends and I rode the Tea Cups and they made it spin like crazy and I was laying under a tree in the shade for the remainder of the day, sick as a dog.  But luckily, they had fun and nobody complained about feeling ill.

Before..looking very confident...

And during...laughing like banshees...my face hurt from laughing at them while I was taking these pictures...

And then it was time for the Tilt-A-Whirl…

Still smiling...

So from Shakespeare one night to the Monster Trucks and carnival rides the next, we had a great weekend.  Too bad the work week starts up again tomorrow, as my friend Kira said, the weekends just go by way too fast…

xoxo

Mark:  Babe, you make the best cut lines.

Be still my heart, such romantic words to be heard while rinsing off my paintbrush, as Mark diligently slices along the cut line that I drew for him with a blue colored pencil (why is it impossible to keep track of pens and pencils in this house? Does everyone have this problem, or is it just us?). 

We laid down laminate flooring in the laundry room on Saturday.  It turned out amazing! 

Mark:  You make cutting wood so easy!

Oh my gosh, now I’m blushing… *grins*

We make an impressive team, my husband and I.  In all ways that you would ask for in a marriage.  Another home improvement project tackled and successfully so!  Here are some pictures to prove it…

Floor was concrete so we laid down the same laminate flooring we put in the sewing room adjacent...

Major improvement!

The girls and I met our friend Julie and her adorable boy Evan at Fred Meyer on Saturday morning for “Fuschia Saturday”.  Even though I am not a skilled gardener, I have the desire to learn and figure it out so that our yard can be full of beautiful colors and scents!  It was a very blustery morning, but fortunately the sun was only behind a thin layer of clouds and their was no precipitation in the air!  We waited in line for about an hour to have our plants potted for free, and the kids were being incredibly patient!  The free cookies, doughnuts and juice were a significant aid in that, I’m sure!

I love Evan's winky smile!

And of course, there are always way more pictures to share than i have words to describe them so I’ll leave with you some visual enjoyment.  Hope everyone had a lovely weekend!  Check back tomorrow for a new segment on our blog where I will be sharing a story written by Claire once a week!

xoxo