Breaking tradition

For the first time since we've lived in Oregon, we broke our tradition of going to Ashland for the 4th of July. Usually it's kind of a family get-together day with my parents and as many of my siblings as can make it, but this year, only 2 would be there and we had been trying to plan a trip to Utah for a Beal reunion (Hyrum's side of the family has Beal's also). We couldn't make it to Utah at this time so we decided to go camping locally. We decided on Diamond Lake since they reputedly have the best fireworks display in Southern Oregon.

Of course since our family is half Cluff, we decided to leave at 10 am on Friday, but didn't end up leaving until the next morning. Actually it was Hyrum's fault this time. He decided to renovate the trailer to make it more family-of-six-friendly.

First, he flipped the axle so we had more clearance to get into the more remote mountain campsites. Yep, it's a monster trailer. Very white trash, yet very practical.


The trailer only slept 4, so we had to always take a play yard with us which took up tons of room. We remedied this problem by taking out the upper cabinets and building a bunk bed for Talea and Hyatt to sleep on. The cool thing is, it can slide back to half-depth so you have more head room while sitting at the table.

This was before:


Next, he made cribs out of the benches that fold down when not in use. The little girls use these.


We can even sleep 3 kids down there now, in their own spaces.


He secured a screen to the counter so we can watch movies or he can do plans while we're off in the woods.

This was before:


He put shelves in the closet so I can put the kids' clothes somewhere since we took out the cabinets for the bunk.


Finally, he put up reinforcements to be able to hang new curtain rods so our curtains would stay up. It's a work in progress, but we got all this done before our trip (hence the late start).

This was before:


Later, he built a rack for the back to hold the generator and firewood and such. Pretty ingenious guy!




So we took off on the morning of the 4th.


Caught in the act!! Kiersa is the worst blanket thief ever! Poor Paisli never gets a blanket in the car because Kiersa steals it and doesn't even use it.



The campground was full, so we camped in the lame-o overflow and got eaten alive by mosquitoes.


It's no wonder the fish wouldn't bite there. They're stuffed to the gills with mosquito larva! But...it had a great view of Mt. Thielsen.


We went to the lake during the day and listened to the band that was playing and let the kids play in the water.






Tilly tried her hand at photography again.






Here we're waiting for fireworks to start.



The fireworks that night were amazing! It started with around 6 skiers on Mt. Bailey letting off huge fireworks to get everyone's attention, then they lit themselves up with bright red lights and skied down the mountain.


After that the fireworks at the lake started. They had 3 barges in the lake with fireworks and they were at least 45 minutes, if not an hour, long. We left after 35 minutes because there had been 2 amazing finales, and we thought it was going to be over any second and wanted to beat the traffic (I had no idea this lake was such a major holiday destination), so we got the kids in the car only to see the second finale finish and more fireworks begin. By the time we made it back to our campsite, it had been over 45 minutes and the booms were still going off in the distance. Impressive!

We got a campsite the next day since a bunch of people left and we just lounged around the lake and drove around it to explore all it had to offer. Since Crater Lake was so close, we decided to go make a run over to the famous crater.




It was so blue, unlike the last time we were there with John and Maren. It was fun for the kids to play in the snow, since we saw more snow there than we saw at home in the last 5 years combined.



Here are some Crater Lake highlights.

(Tilly and I had to have matching hair that day...see her hair in the previous photo.)



I think this picture is hilarious!





This is Crater Lake from a distance. The lowest dip (in the middle of the picture) is the actual crater part.


The sign said that if you were standing at this location at the time of the eruption of Mt. Mazama (Crater Lake), you would have been incinerated (Crater Lake is way off in the background here). The ground here is pumice, hundreds of feet deep.


We didn't stay at the Crater long. We headed back to the lake to make dinner and take some pictures with the "sweet light" before sunset. Here are some of my favorites.







More often than not, you'll see Hyatt with his hands on his hips expressing his opinion about something.

Kiersa is ALWAYS chewing on her tongue...still.


And copying everything Tilly does.







Such a fun camp-out....mosquitoes and all. We just may make Diamond Lake our new July 4th destination!