Spokane and Glacier National Park

On July 13th, Steve was offered an excellent internship in Spanish Fork, Utah. He will be working for Neways and he is scheduled to start on July 27. Because that was originally the day that we had planned to leave for Spokane, we packed our bags and left the next day. We enjoyed a 10-day trip to the Northwest and took one of those days to visit Glacier National Park.


Joshua travelled so well! We were very happy that it worked out so well. There was only one time that he woke up that was inconvenient--in the middle of nowhere. This is a typical rest stop for us. I would climb in the back next to him, lay him down on a pillow and we would let him eat. Steve would normally change his diapers and fill up the car. We got it down to a science.












While we were in Spokane, we had ample opportunities to rest. Not only did Josh travel well, but he has been sleeping well too. When Joshua gets mad, he doesn't usually cry that much, he holds it in until his whole body is red and then he squawks at us. It shouldn't be so cute, but it really is. He is mid-squawk in this picture.<



Here he is around 7 in the morning when he likes to be awake. He loves to sleep in daddy's arms. Its just darling!












On one of our first days there, Steve took me to Coeur d'Alene where we had desserts at Dockside. Mine was the Snickers ice cream sundae, and Steve's, in the background, was a Huckleberry Pie. Steve's was fantastic, mine was mediocre.















My two favorite people in the whole world!

After the desserts, we walked on the dock and checked out all of the nice boats. It was a gorgeous walk, but Josh did not appreciate the heat.





Although I don't have picture of it, we took all day Saturday and went boating on Lake Coeur d'Alene. It was so much fun! Becky was kind enough to watch Joshua on the shore most of the time, and I also took a turn when the boat went out. Steve got up on a slolum and enjoyed taking his neices and nephew on a tube ride. I enjoyed the tubing and even tried to knee board, but decided that I didn't want to be overly sore the next day if I pushed myself too hard. It was a very enjoyable day and we were very happy that Joshua cooperated.

That night, Josh decided to spend many hours awake. At one time, I leaned over to give Steve a kiss and Josh belched louder than anyone I have ever heard. At first, Steve and I thought something was wrong, but when we saw he was alright, we laughed so hard we must have awakened the entire house. It was awesome.

In Spokane, there is a beautiful park called Manito Park. Manito Park is enormous and has different themes to the gardens that are separated by large pine trees and short walks. This one is the Rose Gardens. It would have been magnificent a week or so ago, but it was very pretty here too.

The park wasn't entirely stroller friendly, so I got a shot of Steve carrying the stroller up the steps.

This picture is an archway leading into the Duncan Gardens.

Here is part of the Duncan Gardens. It is a very long, well organized piece of landscape with beautiful flowers, large fountains and a nice gazebo. Steve pointed out the hill on this part of the park that he used to roll down while his mom looked around at the flowers.

On another day, Steve took me to Centennial Trail--a trail that runs by the Spokane River for many miles. Part of this walk included a manmade waterfall complete with live turtles. I was so excited to see the turtles that Steve had to practically drag me away from the spot.

This is the waterfall.

Oh, this is part of the Rose Garden. Spokane is just beautiful.

I may be mortifying our son in the future. He will probably always wonder why Steve and I thought it was so funny to take a picture of him with my bra on his head. We don't know either, we just thought it was--and his face tells all.

This was our last night in Spokane. Mom and dad left for the coast to meet Shauna's family and we headed out to Glacier National Park. Originally, Glacier was not in the plan, but the more we thought about it, the less we wanted to end our wonderful vacation.

Our little family.

Glacier National Park is a very beautiful place. This was on our way up the Going-to-the-Sun Road. It was a magnificent drive and we highly recommend it to anyone who happens to be travelling through or to Montana.

We were there during early evening when the lighting was just perfect.

There were dozens of these little waterfalls.

This is called the Weeping Wall. Most parts of the wall are wet from little trickles that are coming out of the side.









Once we reached the top of the mountain, there was a visitor's center that we stopped at. Outside of the visitor's center, there was a trail that lead even further up. What a nice hike!

The scenery was breathtaking and Joshua slept through most of the trip.

This deer was maybe 10 feet of the trail just happily grazing away.

This goat came within about 5 feet of our car while we were sitting there trying to change Joshua, who decided it was the perfect time to have a bowel movement. We also saw a few ravens--possibly the largest birds I've ever seen--as well as little marmots. Very cute.

Overall, I'd say Joshua enjoyed his first road trip--we certainly did!