Excuses, Excuses

Yo, we been busy.

Dis be my desk.

 Dis.  Dis be my book.

 Dis be my cram book full o' joy.

 Dis hea' be my gang full o' swimma's.

 Dis be dem agin.

an' agin.

Yo.  Dis be my bro'.  He ha' some pic's taken o' him all 'cause he be a senio'.

Big Sis.  Icin' da knees 'cause she gone ran too fast on de treadmill.

 Da' followin' be some of my mottos fo' success.

 True dat.

 Dis be how my class o' fools feels.

 He ain't da on'y one wiv' dat nightmare!

 True. True.

Love,

Marta da gangsta

Spring Break and More!

For Spring Break we headed north to Seattle and Victoria, BC (CANADA!), and Portland.

Grandma Houghton bravely joined our entourage.  

Luke and Grandma getting some zzz's here, hope someone was awake!!

It was a long drive in "Babe, the Big Blue Ox" (or Box, as Levi used to say).  However, as we drove, we got to see beautiful Oregon/Washington landscapes, such as Mt. Shasta, which was stunning, especially on the way home.  As we drove, we were also able to listen to some of General Conference, thanks to modern technology!

We stopped to visit the Portland LDS Temple on the way up.

This is where Marta wants to be married.

It IS beautiful, and has her favorite periwinkle flowers as landscape.

And a fountain.

It's a Houghton thing to take pictures with every sign that bears our name!
Eliza and Grandma in back row, Mark, Marta, Tess, Luke, and Levi in foreground.

We discovered many exciting things in Seattle.
Houghton Beach Park was one of them.

Tess and Mark stretching.

We also saw the Chittendom Locks, in Ballard, WA (right outside Seattle)

Levi, Luke, Marta, Eliza, Tess, Mark, and Denise all hiding among
these nifty sculptures near the salmon ladders

A pretty fine "being together day!"

Levi vanquished the "Fremont Bridge Troll"--but only after the troll squashed a VW bug in his left hand.  

The VW bug was one of only a few Tess wasn't the first to "call" on the journey!

Tess, Levi, Eliza, Mark, Denise and Luke on the hill near Gasworks park

We got a great view of Seattle from Gasworks park, where the breeze was stiff and the kites were flying.

We toured the Boeing factory, which was HUGE, and almost too enormous to fathom.

(There were seven production bays, each 1/3 of a mile long that could hold several jumbo jets!)

We got to see the new 787 in production--really just assembly, as most parts are made elsewhere 

and shipped in on the "Dreamlifter."  This is a stock photo, as no cameras were allowed.  

Looks like a toy, right?  But it wasn't!

L->R Denise, Marta, Tess, Luke, Levi, Riley, Allie, Shannon, Bill, and Eliza

Our gracious and witty hosts in Seattle--the Lows, survived the invasion of the Houghton Hordes!  Luke, Marta, and Tess got to attend early morning seminary (on vacation) with Riley.  

Shannon and Allie joined us for the next stage of our journey.

Denise's cousin Bill kept us laughing.  

Accommodations were comfy and food was delicious.  Thank you Lows!

From Seattle, we ventured north, to Canada.

.

We took two ferries: 

1. From south Vancouver to Schwartz Bay (on Vancouver Island).

2. From Victoria to Port Angeles, WA oisonous trolls are deadly t 

Both carried ten in our party and Babe.

Those who stayed on deck enjoyed this view of the boat wake, and sightings of a pod of porpoises

Eliza wired in.

Some chose to "surf" on the ferry.

And some truly studious members of our party did their Physics homework.  

Way to go Luke!

Grandma braved the cold to enjoy the breeze and make friends on deck.

Tess and Mark also enjoyed the breeze.

Denise, Levi, and Allie checked out the maps and played "table basketball" with a quarter.

We stayed in the Strathcona hotel, but did a walk-through of the landmark Empress hotel in Victoria!

Mostly, we walked around town in Victoria, and tried Canadian Slurpees and candy and Fudgeos.  

We also enjoyed the excellent Royal BC Museum.

We made it back across the border, despite Mark's expired passport. . .and headed homeward.

On the way through Portland again, Grandma saved us from Voodoo Donuts (one specialty pictured at upper left) with a delicious breakfast at Mother's Bistro in Portland.   We also stopped briefly at the famous Portland Rose Garden, however, it was too early in the season for roses to be blooming. 

After arriving back in Soulsbyville in the wee hours of Saturday morning, we slept, did laundry, washed cars, and prepared for Easter Sunday with grocery shopping, egg dyeing, and talk and lesson preparation.

And now we're back to reality.

We will try to update some of our pre-spring break activities in the coming week.  

You really do need to see pictures of the wood we've been cutting up.  

However, the poison oak is pretty much healed up, so we won't post pictures of that!

Photography by Marta.  Dialogue by Denise.  Editing by Tess.  Some stock photos.  

Wood Chopping and Vacationing

This is Marta writing, and unfortunately I was not in attendance at the major family activities this weekend, so I'm going to tell you about the vacationing I did, and then someone else can tell you about whatever manual labor they were doing at home, while I was at the beach!!  This weekend I had the opportunity to go to a swim meet invitational in San Luis Obispo, commonly known as SLO.  For those non-Californianers, SLO is the city adjacent to Pismo Beach along the Southern coast of California.

 Anyway, my swim team took 8 girls and 8 boys down to hang out at Pismo, and see the city on Friday, and then attend the swim meet, made up entirely of relays, on Saturday.  It's a long drive, but we do it every year and it's a blast!

These are 7 other girls (and me) who came along, we had a grand time together!!

So we played, we swam, we ate, and we had deep conversations in the car.  That's what I did, now you can hear about what the REST of the Houghtons spent their time doing: