Trip to Oregon (in one picture)

 

We had planned on leaving the morning of the 26th of December to drive to Oregon to visit Jon's mom.   It was really important to us to get there because it was her first Christmas without my father-in-law.  

 

We had quite a bit of snow on Christmas Eve and then a 2 day storm was expected on the 26th and 27th.   Jon had to work overnight the night of Christmas, so we had everything packed and we were planning on leaving as soon as he got home.

 

But, it was really, really snowy.  I was nervous about driving most of the way while he tried to sleep.  Then, our van wouldn't start (Jon had vacumned it out on Christmas night and left the lights on).   Then, his brother David called.  David was heading back to Utah from Oregon and said that chains were required on semis in Ontario.   Those were enough reasons for me to not go on the 26th. 

 

That gave Jon the chance to sleep, me the chance to take all the Christmas stuff down and the kids the chance to play with their new things.  We left the van all packed with the plan to leave on the 27th.

 

The weather wasn't great on the 27th either, but at least I had an awake husband.  We had to take most of Utah pretty slow, but we pushed through. (We had told the kids that the trip would take us longer than normal, but that we wanted to use as much daylight as we could).

 

Then, we got right past Burley, ID and it got really foggy!   We came upon stopped cars and thankfully we were able to stop and everyone behind us was able to stop.   Just a little farther down the highway, the other side was totally blocked off by a huge pileup, involving several semis & cars.   Everyone seemed to be okay - just unable to continue down that side of the highway - so we kept going.  (I later read that both sides of the highway ended up being closed, so we were so grateful we made it through).

 

After Jerome (where we stopped for lunch), the roads were much clearer.  We ran into some fog and slower roads again in Ontario, but we got to Union right as it was getting dark.  We were so grateful for our safe travels!!

 

 Anyway, we had a wonderful 2 days in Oregon.  The kids played the Wii, we played games, I sewed (2 quilts in 2 days!), Jon took the kids sledding and we ate at a yummy pizza place and then at the Cove Drive In - our favorite!

 

It is always fun to be with Diane & Rebecca (& Tom who was there)!

 

I was terrible about taking pictures and only got this one at the Cove Drive In!