Day 4!

Mostly smiles on everyone! They were a little wary anticipating the hike!

Oh yeah, and the other two in the family!


Maybe 20 minutes into the hike. Not so happy faces on some.

Someone was coming up the trail behind us and we all had to turn and look!

Here we are. Thank goodness you can't smell the sweat or see the dirt mixing with the sweat that was covering our legs!

At the top!!!

Again, this time with Scott in the picture!

She carried that bouquet all the way up!!!

Levi feeding the chipmunks out of his hand. They were taking the food right from our fingers!

And then back to the pool to clean off!! Just kidding, we washed up before we headed to the pool!

Wait for it.....

there it is!!!!!

"Man, that was freezing!!!!"

Hanging in the kiddie pool, where the water was much warmer!!!

Today was the day I was most looking forward to: The day we were to climb Black Butte!!!!!

My children and husband have heard the story a million times. When I was around 10 years old we lived in Redmond. One Saturday our family decided to climb Black Butte. We drove to Black Butte, parked our car on the side of the road, got out and started climbing.....straight up the Butte! We climbed and we climbed, for what I remember as being approx. 6 hours. We went through the brush and trees, got cut up and scratched and finally at almost the top, we stumbled upon a "trail" with a group of people walking along, laughing and talking.

THERE WAS A TRAIL???????? WHO KNEW?????? NOT US!!!!! I remember being so overwhelmed that we had just drug ourselves up the side of this mammoth *Butte* only to come up on this trail. We went the last 15-20 minutes or so on the trail to the top. As we got ready to go back down, I remember my parents asking which way we should go down: the way we came up or the trail? I'm sure it was my pesky brothers who said we should go the same way we came up and that's exactly what we did!

The memory that stays in my head is that it took us almost as long to go down as it did to come up! About 4 hours is what I remember. When we got down, we had no idea what direction our car was since we didn't go up and down in a straight line. We finally found it and headed home.

Fast forward to present day! We found the trail to hike! That was good news but the bad news is, it was still a very grueling hike!!! Almost immediately our children started grumbling. They were tired, it was too hard, it was too hot, they wanted to go back, why did we have to do this anyway......oh yes, I had to laugh. It was everything I remember telling my parents 20 years ago! But I didn't have any sympathy for them, we were on a trail for crying out loud!!!!!

I just kept telling them how good they were doing, how strong they were, what an amazing sense of accomplishment they were going to have when they reached the top. They knew what I was talking about. As we were driving there, they could see the Butte, looming in the distance. It is huge! The hike is a 3.6 mile loop. You gain 1600 feet in elevation! That's no small potatoes in my book!!!

The sweat dripped down our heads, faces, shirts, etc. The 3 of us that carried babies on our backs felt it even more. Most of the time, Scott also had Talli on his shoulders as well as Isaiah on his back. We couldn't take much water because no one wanted to lug their water bottles up the hill. We took a couple that we could hook on the backpacks. We took no food (except a couple of pancakes to feed the chipmunks) but had lunch waiting for us in the van.

When we finally reached the top, I was so proud of my family! Hiking Black Butte is no small achievement. It's something to be proud of, especially for the little ones! Many of the websites say that the trail is too much for children and not recommended for them at all.

Coming down was almost as hard as going up! It's killer on your thighs and feet. A few of the kids ran down. Those of us with a baby on our back did no running, except for Scott occasionally. Sabrina ended up carrying Talisha down most of the way, while she slept! Izzy slept, as did Jasmine. Must have been something about that rhythmic loping down the hill that put them to sleep.

Thank goodness Sisters, Oregon has a McDonald's. We stopped and got ice cream cones for everyone! Then we headed back to the house, got cleaned up the best we could and hit the pool!

We felt the pain of the mountain for the next few days after our hike. Our muscles screamed with every step we took. But it was a good scream!

Watch out Black Butte, we may come again!