The Three Part Vacation

I’m typing this post at the kitchen table in a cute little cabin in the woods in Washington. The leaves outside the window are gently blowing in the breeze and a squirrel is having a hay day running & jumping through the trees.

Ahh, life is good.

It was almost a month ago that I packed up my 10 piece carry-on wardrobe for this little trip. (I may have added a few more pieces to that list while enjoying some great end of Summer sales!!;)) Now, our holiday is coming to a close and tomorrow we start the journey home. I had lofty plans of blogging along the way, and even had a list of posts I wanted to work on “on the road”. That plan flew out the window awful fast, and I decided to really relax and savor each part of this decadent get away. It’s been amazing.

I call it the Ultimate 3 Part Vacation. Here’s how it went:

Part 1: Visiting the Family

I met my sister (after a few short flights) and the 2 of us road-tripped (a 14 hour journey) to our home town in Eastern Montana.

The week flew by at break neck speed as we tried to get in as much visiting with family as possible. Although I didn’t get to see everyone I’d hoped to, I did get a chance to hug the necks of all my siblings, saw some of the nieces and nephews, and most importantly, got to kiss the top of my mom’s downy white head and tell her I love her.

It’s been 8 years since she was diagnosed with dementia, and each time I see her she has faded away a bit more. It’s heart breaking. But, my sisters and I spent hours with her sitting in her chair beside the piano at the Nursing Home and sang hymns until our voices were croaky and horse.

Mom’s singing days are over (as well as any form of communication), yet the music seems to put a twinkle in her eye. As we sang songs like “When we All Get to Heaven” and “The Love of God”, I was struck again with thankfulness that mom raised us to love Jesus…and music. (Here’s the video of the last time she sang with us.)

Part 2: The Kitchen Makeover Project

The second part of vacation had been plotted and planned for months. My sister (the one I road tripped with) wanted some help with some home projects. We decided to focus mainly on the kitchen and for 7 days we organized, cleaned, sorted, purged, painted, shopped, and decorated our way into a whole new look for her kitchen. It was SO MUCH FUN!!! (Wait til you see the after…!)

I took a ton of pictures and will blog about it all soon.

It also confirmed to me that I love helping people with their home décor/ organizing challenges. I’m thinking of starting a business along those lines, and I’m thrilled my sister volunteered to be my first “client”.

Part 3: The Oregon Trail/ Coast

At the end of week 2, my husband met me at my sister’s house and we started the next phase of vacation. We haven’t been on a summer vacation since our honeymoon, so we decided to make this one epic!

We even celebrated my birthday (it’s the last year in my 40s for me…) and anniversary (our 27^th) while on the road.

We took our time travelling on the Oregon coast (I’ll blog more about that later, too), and thoroughly enjoyed seeing new scenery, trying out our first Air BnB, and even tented for 3 nights!

Part 4: Going Home & Another Room Reveal!

Now we’re looking ahead to being home and getting into our normal routine again. I’m itching to get started on the next few projects in our house…

Before I left, I did a guest post for Kenarry Ideas for the Home about our garage makeover and how I organized my seasonal décor (You can find it here.).

While I was away road tripping and visiting my family, my husband did a really big project in the garage. I can’t wait to show you…and see it for myself! It’ll be like those big surprise makeover shows on tv (except I did get to help plan it and saw pictures along the way.)

Stay tuned…that reveal will be coming, too!

Hope you’re having a great Summer~