an okie from spokie: August 2012

Not that I have been consistently good at keeping up with my blog I didn't think I would take a summer break like I did. So if you've been interested in what we have been doing since May, this long post is for you...here is the last couple of months in the shortest version I could put together to catch you up.

In May we finally made our pilgrimage to Ireland! It was everything and more then we could imagine and we had convinced ourselves by the end of the trip that we would like to live there some day. We started in Dublin, headed wast to Galway, next to Lahinch (a cute small beachy town), onto Killarney, last stop Cork. We met amazing people, ate our fill of fish and chip and anything potato really, hiked emerald hills, relished the daily rain and never had to spell McNamara when making a reservation. We got the chance to stay with our friend Mary and her family in Cork so we got a real local experience and were so thankful they shared Cork with us! To Tim's surprise I looked like a local, shocked people when I opened my mouth and spoke with an American accent and constantly got asked where my people were from? Not really that dramatic - but the trip put an end to our ongoing banter of who of the two of us looks more Irish...I took the cake ;)

I will share a digital version of our album when I finally get to completing it, we got some amazing landscapes. And when we one day own a little cottage on the coast you will all be invited to stay.

After Ireland we hopped to Scotland for a day and a half - resolved again to go back and stay longer! It was beautiful...last stop was Iceland. I must say, if you get the chance you should visit. It is quite picturesque and the people are salt of the earth, genuine people. We had a great time, it was an adventure start to finish. We experienced 22 hours of daylight, I can't imagine being a parent trying to get your kids to bed, it was a trip! We took a tour of the south side, stopping at the location of the volcano felt around the world a couple of years ago, played on black sand beaches, walked on a glacier and soaked in a hot spring pool literally carved into a mountain being fed directly the runoff coming off the rocks. On the last day we spent our time relaxing in the blue lagoon before our long flight home. Again, I highly recommend Iceland.

Once we made it home we kept the adventure going and drove the next morning to pick up our new pup. I will have to reserve a whole blog post just to her so I will save some details.

June seemed uneventful, back to work, back to school.
July came quickly, I turned 30....Erin came for a visit, Tim visited WA, it was hot and dry all month. The puppies kept us busy.
August rolled around and Tim got another break and headed back to WA. The puppies got even wilder, the weather cooled off.

And such has been our summer. Really I was saving you from the monotony of of lives over the last couple of months by not posting. We are thrilled that Tim is in his third year, I personally think it came fast, don't let him hear me say that though. I am ready for Fall and all the festivities that the next couple of months bring. I promise to be better at blogging, although I think I said that in one of my last posts....4 months ago.

Now, if you made it through the long rambling of my post you deserve to be rewarded, so here you are - some pics of our trip. Enjoy!!