July in America! Part 1

 In July the kids and I headed to Port Townsend, WA for a NEW fiddle camp! We were going to try out the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes since all our regular camps were happening while school was in session for us. After our LONG day of travel (seriously, can you GO any farther than SA to Seattle?!?) we drove up to the American Girl store, met up with some friends, and Sasha adopted a new girl that she had been saving up for. Josefina!

we settled into a really quaint B&B overlooking Puget sound.

The next morning we headed to a cool marine aquarium and park because we only had a 2 hour drive and we didn't have to check in at camp until 5pm. The polar bear was full-on playing for about 30 minutes... he was amazing to watch!

 And the wolves were in crazy-fight mode!

 On the drive to camp Sasha passed out in the car. We didn't want to wake her up so Teddy and I snuck into Coldstone Creamery, a place I had told the kids all about. We both got small's and they were HUGE!!! Teddy had tried to talk me into a large but he has no experience with American portion sizes. Well that ice-cream kicked our butts. Neither on of us was able to finish and for Teddy that's saying something! When we left he said "Note to self: when at Cold-Stone, ask for a SMALL!"

We got to camp and got checked in. Our dorm was awesome and we had a great view overlooking Puget Sound and the mountains!

 The camp was held at a historic military base, Ft. Worden. It was beautiful and the perfect setting for a fiddle camp.

 Camp was a BLAST!!! VIDEO HERE. In the morning you could take 2 different potluck sessions but then in the afternoon you had to commit to a band lab and stick with that all week. I was in band lab with an amazing group called the Foghorn Stringband. The kids also had a morning session and then they were in kid band. Teddy made this awesome friend named John and they went everywhere together. He kept talking about his big sister Olivia. We finally met her on like the 3rd day.

She looked so familiar and finally I was like "I know you!!"

 In 2009 Sasha went to fiddle camp for the first time. Guess who one of her buddies was? And that was waaay down in California!

AND Nic was also at this camp, so here's my time-warp picture of the 3 of them:

We had a blast all week. We played with friends, attended concerts, played in concerts, and just generally celebrated music.

 Kids and one of their awesome teachers.

 And these 3 monkeys ran like loons from one end of camp to the other!

 After camp we had a late flight to Bend so we had time to visit the Seattle flight museum. It was pretty cool!

 And we had lunch at an old favorite!

 Our flight to Bend was amazing. I miss that part of the world so much! We flew over Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helens, and Mt. Hood.

 And then we were in Bend! It has, if anything gotten even better in our absence and it just feels like home. I so miss it. Everything there is JERF/Paleo and the temp is perfect and the river and mountains are beautiful and I WILL get back there someday! Sasha ran out to the horse barn with Auntie Cris and basically stayed out there for the whole trip!

 In heaven!

 We dragged her out with us finally to canoe the Deschutes with us. Laurakay hooked us up with a cool paddle that took us most of the afternoon!

 Teddy even braved that COOOOLD water!

 And switched boats!

 While Sasha did horses Ted and I did a 9 mile loop on Phil's train. I have always dreamed about riding this trail with one of my kiddos so this was a dream come true. He crashed several times as you can see by his shirt, but got right back on his bike and kept riding. I was so proud of him!

 We celebrated our ride with some shave-ice:

 They told us it was the best shave-ice in the world. I was like "hmmm how can shave ice be better or worse than any other shave ice?" Boy I was wrong. That stuff was magic. Even Nimanim and Auntie thought so!

 All too soon though we had to get back on a plane. We are missing the days when our summer holidays lined up with summer in the USA. A summer trip to America is just too hard to fit into a mid-year break!