Sam… you left this life 17 years ago today. You are still so much part of our lives.  I woke up thinking about what great hugs you gave,   Today Mom and I are taking a hike in the Oregon Mountains you rode when you were at High Cascade. Lots of your friends will be doing things they love to do as they remember what a fun and loving person you are.

Mom and I took a hike up to Dry Creek to place a samstone up there for you 

I crawled up behind the waterfall to get a samstone there.. sam loved nature like this 

 

We stopped at Monmouth falls on the way back. We have a great picture of Sam and his friends here when Sam was at High Cascade snowboard camp. it was nice to visit again and leave a samstone

Then we had a great sushi dinner.. just the kind sam loved

We love you so much  Sam !

nite sam, nite all

-me

Today was a work day.. so worked by phoen and email most of the day. Near the end of the day Gabe’s new dishwasher arrived.. We’d managed to keep his old one workign for 4 years.. but it was time to move on. THis is a Bosch very much like the one we own. Lowewes dropped it off.. And Gabe and I spent a few hours installign it.. It went in pretty easily.. Its nice to do stuff liek this by ourselves. We always learn so much

 

Tonight I spent  time thinking about this evening  17 yers ago when we got the call about Sams accident.   Its still so hard for me to go to that moment.. even though I remember just where I was standing.. 

Tomorrow we will remember Sam with a hike  to a beautiful p ace as we always have done

Still so unbelievable.

We love you Sam

 

Nite all, nite sam

-me

We woke late , ceaned the house and headed back towards portland. On the way we stopped to visit ‘oregon’s largest tree’.. NOt sure how they identified this one tree.. but it was a beautiful boardwalk hike back into the costal forest

 

We stoppped at the tilamock cheese factory on the way home.. nice.. but just note Cabot 🙂 

 

 

We got home and hung out the rest of the day at Gabes.. super nice

nite all, nite sam

-me

We had a great day at the coast. it was cool and wet.. but not rainy.. we woke up slowly then headed up the coast for a hike

 

We chose a moderately steep trail that would give us a good view of the coast. The trail was beautiful with views both up and down.. like these beautiful banana slugs ! 

 

We came down and walked along a new beach looking for rocks for Gabe to carve.. Lots of cool finds there.. including seaweed bull whips and  finding that Ben starred  as Donkey in a professional production of Shrek

 

We found a great source of carving rocks.. Gabe is able to transform these chunks into beitully polished works of art.. We spent a long while finding just the roght ones. He can see whcih ones will polish well and which ones have cracks that will cause them to break when cut

 

On the way home we stopped at the #1 local tourist attraction: the pronot pup !> A place that specializes in delicious and huge cordogs. THey are all in here. . in addition to the normal corndog offering, the menu includes vegan  corn dogs, pickle corn dog s, pancake corndogs. THey even have a coin operated corndog ride !

Then back to the house for more food (and microsoping.. gabe had picked up samples at the beach).. then charades and a game called PIT !

FIannlly we walked down to alocal  bar with Karaoke .. Not my favorite scene buit Mel, Gabe  and Ben just crushed it !!

 

Great day !  More tomorrow

nite all, nite sam

-me