Oregon = Garden of Eden

Because their state weed is blackberries!! They grow everywhere. As in, wild, all over the place, even in the median of the highways. More than you could ever eat, and then some, any time you want. I can handle that.

We picked a ton one day and John made some killer cobbler (with some of the ones we didn't eat while we were picking.) They sent us home with a ton too, and we've made blackberry cake (layered like cobbler,) and also some awesome blackberry pancakes (whole wheat and oats with blackberries is so NICE) and we froze the rest.

And the forests there are like nothing I've ever seen. The ground is covered with ferns and clover and a hundred other plants - you really don't see the ground, and the trees have moss growing on them. So green.

We had a great picnic here and played down by the river.

Note the wild blackberries. Just out of reach. . .

The pictures on this post have all been by a fish hatchery that they took us to (Mom and Dad and Sara went with them too when they came up.)

There were a kazillion fish in the hatchery, and the coolest part was an observation pond with 5 and 6 foot sturgeon swimming around, and trout that you could feed little pellets to.

The baby trout were especially spunky and made huge splashes trying to win the food over the other fish. I loved the reactions from the boys.


And it was so crazy to see the fish all jump out of the water.

It's just pretty up there. And Adam and Kari knew all the cool places to take us to play.