It is high time you all got to know my wonderful roommate Wendy a little better! The best way to get to know someone is to get to know their family. I got to spend a week with Wendy and her family in Southern Oregon for the Finlayson Family Reunion.
The entire family was there
(minus Christina, who is on a mission... although a cousin stood in with her picture!)
Christina, Matt, Wendy, Reed, Grandma West, Sherrie, Mark, and
Adam with his kids and wife, Kailee Jo, Stephanie & Taydom
All the Finlaysons are super funny and kind, just like Wendy.
Let's give a close-up of the stars of the show...
Kailee Jo, not quite 2 and full of spunk.
Favorite word?
"Squawk!"Ok, it's not a word, but it's her favorite choice of communicative sounds.
Taydom, with Aunt Wendy.
About four months old and the sweetest, happiest, quietest, rolley-polleyiest baby EVER!
Ok, with that brief introduction of people, here's the vacation stats. Wendy and I flew into Eugene on Thursday, June 25th and headed down to her parents house in a tiny town called Sutherlin. By the next morning, the entire family was ready to drive down to the coast and meet up with extended family in Bandon.
(I like these maps, but I can't figure out how to post an image that shows exactly what I want it to... Click the minus button a couple of times to see more of the state.)
Anyway, some of the family had rented a beach house that became the central location for the family reunion. (By the way, the reunion was her dad's side of the family... his brother and sister and then a few cousins and then all of their children, grandchildren, etc. And me.) The beach house had limited space, so the single cousins (aka me, Wendy & her brothers Mark & Matt and their cousin Lori) got "banished" to a campground... it was actually pretty fun for us to have our own little space. Plus there were some fun cousins at the same campground as us just across the way. So, one of the first items of business was to set up camp.
Me and all the stuff got shoved into the back of Mark's Expedition...
and the three of us set up a pretty good campsite!
Yep, those are blow up mattresses and cots. Mark had a bunch of comfortable camping gear.
I was lucky enough to get my own tent and cot, away from the snoring boys.
Sorry Wendy & Lori! ;)
On the way back to the beach house (it was about 10 miles), we picked up one of these:
A Hitch Hiker!
I've never done that before! Mark lives in Lake Tahoe and apparently they do stuff like that all the time... especially when it's just small town teenage kids (like this one) just trying to make it into "town" for one of the few and far between social events going on. It was an experience!
We also stopped off for a beautiful Oregon Coast sunset!
This last picture is of a rock called "Face Rock" (I think it's the big one in the back on the right) and a bunch of little rocks straight ahead to it's left. Apparently, according to our little small town girl hitch hiker, legend has it that some indian girl was walking on the beach with her basket of kittens. She put them down and went for a swim and drowned and so did her little basket of kittens that swam in after her trying to save her... a load of crap, if you ask me. Although I found some verification
here on the internet and, as we all know, everything you find on the internet is TRUTH! At least me and Mark and Wendy got some good laughs out of that story all weekend! :)
The next morning (Saturday) we headed down to the beach for some low-tide, windy cold, Oregon Coast Finlayson Family Fun! Here, Kailee Jo and her mom Stephanie demonstrate how windy it was...
with Kailee Jo's dad, Adam, practically being carried away via parachute in the background...
(And Matt just watches it all go down...)
We also played some beach family reunion type games (like I would know... I've never had a beach family reunion. But we should!) like Tug-o-war:
A little beach golf... no retrieving balls necessary, according to Mark!
Notice my fierce swing, Mark avoiding that fierce swing... and the ball. Still on the tee.
I never claimed to be a golfer!
Wendy had fun playing with the little kid toys.
Silly girl. I
begged her not to put that ridiculous hat on! ;)
And there was plenty of sea-life to look at and play with in the low tides.
Allow me to explain... (press play!)
So, like I said, there were tons of sea anenomes...
... and crabs...
and starfish!
I've never seen so many in one place in my life!
Isn't it cool to see their suction thingys?
Even though it was cold, it was still relatively beautiful weather for the Oregon Coast,
we got some pretty shots of people on the beach.
The O.G. Finlaysons: Reed, Joy and Alan
And the New-School Finlaysons: Wendy, Mark, Adam & Matt
And the FFA (Future Finlayson's of America): Taydom and Kailee Jo
Here's a wannabe Finlayson: Spendy Finlayson!
For some reason I love to test out how cold water is.
This was cold, like I expected. I don't know why I do these things...
Anyway, after some rip-roaring fun with the fam on the beach,
us big kids decided to tear it up in downtown Bandon!!
Matt found a turtle to sit on.
Wendy and I shopped for beads.
Mark and cousin Chandler just practiced their tough look.
The highlight of the afternoon was Mark treating us all to an Umpqua icecream cone.
It's pretty much the BEST ice cream I've ever had in my life. I'm not much of an ice cream person... I can turn down ice cream any time. But umpqua? I don't think I can refuse it. In fact, I didn't later on in the trip (you'll see...)
You Oregonians know what I'm talking about!
Well, that pretty much ends the Beach Reunion. On Sunday, the 28th we packed up and left and the Finlayson's (minus Mark... he went back to Tahoe) headed back to Sutherlin. The rest of our vacation was spent just chilling with the family and an occasional day activity here and there.
For example...
Hiking to Grotto Falls
This was an easy hike and a Finlayson Family Favorite in the good ol' days.
I enjoyed all of the rich, lush greenery. Made me miss my mission!
I <3 the Great Northwest!
on the trail...
next to the falls (which end up being smaller than remembered)...
Adam and Matt
Grandpa and Taydom
Sherrie & Reed
The Finlayson Family
Entertaing Kailee Jo so she wouldn't want to run off on her own and slip on the super slick rocks... We were playing a little horsey game. And, it worked.
After the hike we had a really yummy picnic too!
(Don't mind the green pictures... Wendy likes to play with the color swap on her camera and sometimes it gets left on, so "normal" pictures end up having a little more "character"!)
Ok, other things we did?
Fired up the old go kart!
Reed and his brother Alan made this when they were kids and Wendy and I took it for a spin!
Just have a little look-see on this video!
Another activity?
Day trip to Portland.We had to take Matt up to the airport anyway,
so we made a day out of the 3 hour trip up to Portland.
After dropping off Matt, we went to the Portland Oregon Temple...
Then we met up with Wendy's BFF from childhood, Kylie and went to the
Rose Garden in Portland.
Wendy and Kylie... she's really cool! We had fun with her all afternoon.
We stopped to smell the roses...
... and, ofcourse, play with the color swap feature on the camera!
We also went out to dinner with another one of Wendy's HS buddies, Jeff and his wife.
Kylie also took us to the Nike outlet, where I got a smoking deal on TWO pairs of Nikes for $80!!
Wendy bought one of the same pairs as me, along with this shirt and lounge parts at Maurice's.
(Maurices was technically another day trip we took "into town" in Roseburg, OR. Sutherlin is so small that you have to drive about 15 minutes to a slightly bigger small town to get things done. Oh, I love the small town life!)
She just
so wants to be like me. ;)
And, of course, we chilled with Kylie at her fixer-upper house for a bit.
I took some pictures of the decor on the walls of Kylie's bathroom:
I really dig the pussy willows and I'm thinking about doing it somewhere on my
bedroom walls.
Black or white?
Which wall?
What do you think?
Ok, and the FINAL activity...
(Did anyone make it this far besides Wendy or my mom??)
A "daddy-daughter-adopted daughter for a week" date out to lunch. 
And what did we finish with?
Umpqua Ice Cream!
And with that, I'll end.
Thank you Finlayson's for hosting me!
July 24, 2003
(2001 Toyota Camry, totaled on Valentine's Day 2004)
(2001 VW Jetta, almos 100,000 miles and the road-tripping machine!)
Taylor Jr. High School, 2003 - 2007
Mesa High School, 2007 - present
Northern Arizona University, Class of 2006, Masters in Math Education
I want to barf all over this guy, Rob, and it was only 2 weeks so he doesn't count!
A super dark black guy named Fabilo. The only picture I ever had of him, he was standing in the shade and you truly could not see him.
Corbett Brown. 3 months at the tail end of 2004. A very serious relationship that broke my heart. In retrospect, I glad I'm not his wife!
Jonathan Simon, a two month rebound from Corbett at the beginning of 2005. Nice guy, but we were in no way right for each other.
Greg Smith, the absolute love of my Arizona life. We spent Jan 2008 - June 2009 together .
Kimberely Bernhoft (now Smith) & Carrie Cannon (soon to be Hammons)
Darby Schnepf (now Simon... yes, as in Jonathan) and Jill Slentz (now Dever) and
Morgan Dahl (now Larsen)
Wendy Finlayson and Sarah Neerings
and made oodles and oodles of friends and memories!
Havasupai, Summer 2006
Stake Activities, 2006 - 2008
BYU vs. UCLA football game, Fall 2007
BYU vs. UofA football game, Fall 2006
People's Choice Awards, University 7th ward 2006 - 2008
Snowflake Trip, Summer 2007
U7 Homecoming, October 2006
Various Birthday/House Parties
Dollar Dares Guatemala Fundraising Party, Winter 2007
Camping, Summer 2006
California Road Trips
