Hoopfest 2009

You have got to love how every year Spokane shuts down almost their entire downtown area, and puts up over 6000+ basketball nets/courts for the world’s largest 3-on-3 basketball tournament. I absolutely LOVE basketball (love to play it, and love to watch it), so I totally enjoy Hoopfest every year. The only problem with Hoopfest is that everyone thinks that they are the best basketball player, and should have gone to a NCAA basketball tournament or to the NBA, so let’s just say…that there is some nice rat ball. But put all that aside and you can find some fun games to watch and great people watching. My brother Eric played this year with some friends, so we went down and watch several of his games. The picture above is his team - PJ, Eric, Phil and Russ. They had a good time and really play well together.

Here are some additional pictures from the weekend.

Eric getting ready to drive the ball

Eric playing defence.

(Jenny, Maveric, and I on the sidelines)

Maveric and Mom watching Eric play.

It is always fun spending time with Jenny, Eric and Maverick. We wish they lived closer so that we could see them more often.

Camping at Farragut State Park

This last weekend we went camping with our great friends - Kim and Ben - and had such a fun time. The weather was a little colder and more wet than we would have liked, but we still had a great time together. Here are a few pictures of our quick little camp trip.

Joel and I on a bike ride.

The boys (Joel and Ben) trying to throw rocks at different targets across the swimming area.

Here we are sitting around the camp fire.

We will have to try it again later in the summer, when the weather is warmer!

This is what we have been reading...

That is right...we are finally expecting an addition to our family.

Our little buddle is due on December 20, 2009.

It is totally crazy and does not feel real to us at times (except for the sickness and exhaustion), but we are so excited and cannot wait to be parents.

Great Urban Race 2009 - Portland

We had such a great time doing this race last year with Jenny and Eric, that we decided to sign up for the Portland 2009 race. Last year Maveric was too little to do the race with us, but this year he was able to come along for the ride (and he actually did really well - and may have even enjoyed it). We were a little worried about the weather, since it rained all night and morning before the race began, but it turned out great for the 3 hours we were searching for clues around the city.


Maveric and Eric ready to start looking for clues.

At the beginning of the race, they give you a clue sheet that you have to decipher, and then find all the places that the clues lead you to. Most of the clues you have to take pictures at, but the pictures have to be specific and show all the details that they are requesting or you get a time penalty at the end of the race. These are some of the places that are clue sheet led us to and had us do.

We had to find this random statue by only seeing a picture of it. (Thank goodness for finding a visitors center to help us with the exact location)



We had to find a booth in the huge Portland Saturday Market and take a picture wearing these beautiful plunger hats!



We also had to find a local pizza joint by only knowing the places slogan. Once there we had to take a picture of one teammate feeding pizza to the other (at least Joel got a free piece of pizza).


These antique water fountains are all over town, but we had to find this specific one in front of this old hotel built in 1913. This was probably one of our hardest clues, because you had to figure out a riddle to find where you were going.

You are not allowed to use any private/personal transportation (own vehicle, taxi, etc), you can only use their bus and trolley system. We road the metro from time-to-time, praying that we were going in the right direction.

So...we did not finish as well as we did last year, however, the rose garden parade was taking place the same time as the race start, and we could not get to the location of the race due to all the roads being blocked off. We had to park so far away - cut through the parade - and by the time we actually started the race it had been going on for 40 minutes. When we ended, we did not get any time penalties either, and many other teams did because the clues were much harder this year, so hopefully our time will improve. They will email us our actual placement in a few days. We had such a great time! Here is a group photo of us at the finish.

Can't wait for next year!!