Going back in time a bit...again, just to preserve the pictures! ;)
Our summer was pretty laid back because of a new baby, but we still had fun!
We enjoyed a day trip to a nearby state park.
Celebrated lots of birthdays...
Ezra's 8th birthday
Linus' 3rd birthday
Moriah's actual "birth" day
and Toby's 6th birthday!
We enjoyed outings with friends.
We sold our big green van, and were sad to lose some awesome bumper stickers, including our Yellowstone ones! We were super excited to get our new van, though, and looked forward to the adventures that it would accompany us on!
We got to go camping (and swimming) with Seth's parents.
We visited Mt. St. Helens.
And finished off the summer with a trip to the Oregon Coast with my family.
I love that you guys go on so many trips to National Parks with your kids! It's a very affordable thing to do with a large family but it's also so nice to give them a chance to appreciate the beautiful world we live in! We like to do day trips around our state(AZ) to check out historical towns. We haven't done a lot of it this year because our twins were born in February. They are almost at that age where we can go out and it won't be a disaster! Owning less stuff is so nice because it makes it more possible to go out and have those kinds of adventures. By not having as much to take care of there is more time to spend making memories as a family on the weekends!
ReplyDeleteWe love to travel and camping and visiting parks is the way we can make it work! We were hoping to go to Yosemite this year but had to cancel with Covid and everything. We always do less when we have a new baby, too, though we have big plans for next year! We have really become minimal in what we bring with us on trips, too, which makes it a little more manageable! =)
ReplyDeleteWe have to be minimal with what we bring too. We don't have a lot of space in the back of our van so if we are going to go anywhere at all we have to pack really light! We have a 10 passenger van that we bought right before baby #6 was born. We wanted to get something "small" so that it was easier to park and we thought it would take us a while to grow into it. We are already at max capacity 2.5 years later! We are considering selling our van and getting a 15 passenger and removing the back bench so that we have more room for our stuff when we travel. We would still pack light but it would be easier to go camping. We went car camping as a family in September for the first time in 6 years! We had to Tetris everything in(which was a huge pain) but we got it all to fit.
ReplyDeleteHaha! We camped a lot when we had five kids and a seven passenger van! We had the packing down to a science! We have a 12 passenger van now, but it's the same size as a 15 passenger, so similar to what you are talking about. That extra trunk space is awesome!!!
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