I Used to Say

Hello World!

I'm poking my head out of my cave composed of work and school and coming up to say hi! I've missed you! I'm surviving and only have 47 days left in the semester and 416 days left until I graduate. Life is busy, but there are still so many things to be thankful for. I have realized that every stage of life has pros and cons. I am trying to enjoy this stage of life because I get to do things that I may not have the chance to later on.

I'm kind of cheating today and using something that someone else wrote. I'm going to share a poem that was written by one of our patients. They gave me permission to share it with you.

I Used to Say

I used to say 'I have cancer'
Now I say, 'yes I can, sir'
I had to stop making that claim
because I know that's really lame

I used to say 'I have cancer'
But I knew God had the answer
Now I go and walk along
Because my cancer is now gone

Don't focus on dying
Stop those tears- that's the devil lying
I used to see a lot of bad things
Now all I see are angel wings

'I have cancer' is what I used to say
Now I say, 'cancer, stay out of my way'

I sometimes forget why I went into nursing when it's so stressful and draining. This is why. I get to meet incredible people and encourage them, support them, and learn from them. It's worth it.

Heading back into the hole. Got lots left to do today.
See ya!
-C-

In and Out

Hello people

I love blogging, but unfortunately, there are other things that might be taking priority for the next 77 days. My grad school course load this semester is kicking my butt. There are more papers and assignments than the past 3 semesters, but I also have to fit in 125 hours of clinical hours on top of that and working my normal hours. I started clinicals and am enjoying them so far, but the extra work is going to leave me with very few days/time off. If you're one of the many people who have prayed for me, time management and not freaking out are some ideas of how you can pray.

77 days in this semester
449 days until graduation

I made a list that was entitled Keeping Caroline Sane.  There were a bunch of things that either make me happy or help me relax. One of the items on the list was breathing. In, out, in, out, in, out. Another item on the list is watching inspirational videos- today's was the scene from Facing the Giants where the guy carries the other guy across the field on his back. A good motivational sports moment can help in any situation. I'll watch Sam Gamgee's speech from the Two Towers next week.

Sorry for probably going MIA for a while. Miss ya.

-C-

The Dark Side

This is supposed to be a blog about nursing. I try my best to tell stories and give insight and inspire because I really think that nursing is the best. That being said, today I am going to be very blatant about how things go sometimes. I am not going to defend myself because I'm not in the mood. Nursing is not always rainbows and butterflies.

Sometimes I walk out of a patient's room, lean against the wall, and let out a big ol' sigh because I just can't deal with them anymore. 

As I walk away, I frequently roll my eyes at patients and family members. I mutter and grumble as I answer the call light for the 10th time that hour. 

My sense of humor can be very dark and insensitive. I laugh at inappropriate things. 

I am no angel when it comes to cleaning up bodily fluids. I make disgusted faces and do not have a good attitude at all. 

If a call light goes off, I don't jump up to answer it. I am lazy and hope someone else will. 

Nurses are supposed to always believe what the patient says about their pain, but I don't.

I participate in gossip on the unit.  

There are days when I give the patients nothing of myself. I simply do the necessary work and then leave. 

Sometimes I really don't want to go to work.

Charting is annoying and repetitive.

Sometimes I feel very negatively about coworkers, doctors, and other members of the healthcare team. 

I complain about things that don't matter and make issues out of things that aren't a big deal. 

People really really annoy me sometimes. I get tired and cranky and hungry and my feet hurt and my back hurts and I touch gross things and I smell gross things and there are days when I don't think I really help anyone and sometimes I hide in the bathroom so I don't have to deal with people for an extra 3 minutes. 

The list could go on, but I'll stop there. I could start a new list about all the amazing things, but that would ruin my point for the day. Every job has pros and cons.

 Do I love it? Yes. Do I want to do anything else? No. But sometimes nursing really stinks (literally). Go hug a nurse today. But make sure they disinfect themselves first. 

Then and Now

Hey readers! How are you today? Sitting in the house alone this morning, I had some extra time on my hands while the Olympics played in the background. I ended up reading some of my old posts. A couple of things came to mind.
1. My blog is entitled Lettuce, Tomato, and Mayo because this blog started when I was heading off to Mayo Clinic for a summer externship and the title seemed clever at the time. I know it no longer applies, but I don't have a better backup option.
2. I am not a better writer now. Most people would assume that with experience comes improvement, but not in my case. Apparently, I've reached my peak.
3. My life has changed in many ways in the last 3 years. Early twenties are always a time of transition and growth, but it was kind of fun to see how much has changed. Here's just a couple of comparisons from then to now.

2013
-Still in school with one year left
-Blessed with amazing preceptors who taught me so much
-First time working full time in a hospital.
-Here's a quote from a post I wrote that summer "I have been given much. With that, much is expected of me. I get to be with people during the most vulnerable points in their lives. I have the opportunity to listen, encourage, pray with, pray for, empathize, cry with, and give hope to people on a daily basis. I hope that I never lose sight of the magnitude of this privilege. I hope that in 20 or 30 years that I can still cry. I hope that in 20 or 30 years, I will still recognize that I have a responsibility. The responsibility part doesn't just come from being a nurse. My responsibility to care for people comes from loving God. Nursing is just an excellent way to make it a career. "

2016
-In grad school with over a year left
-I have the privilege of starting to precept other nurses. This is a big deal to me since teaching is something I want to pursue.
-I've worked for over a year in my second job.
-3 years after the start of this blog, I think I am past the honeymoon phase of nursing. Charting is tedious, passing medications is routine, and the excitement of being an independent nurse has worn off. However, when I look at the quote from 3 years ago, nothing has changed. It's still a privilege to love, learn, and listen to my patients. There have been multiple privileges in the past couple of weeks to talk to people about God's love and pray with some others. God is continually working in my life, and I'm so glad that I have a career that gives me so many opportunities to share His love with others.

Thanks for reading!
-C-

Hushpuppy

   I entitled this post hushpuppy because in my childhood, I was told that hushpuppies got their name when cooks would throw pieces of dough to the dogs to appease them for a while. Then they'd say "hush puppy!" I have no idea if that is true, but I know it's been a while since I have blogged, and I feel like motivation is a little harder for me to find, but I'm still posting and want you to keep reading, and I wonder how many times you can use a conjunction before an English teacher will attack you.

    In order to tell this story, I have to paint you a picture of my nurses' station. My unit is generally a circle with the station located in the middle. There are two entrances on either side. In the station, there are approximately 14 computer stations with people walking in and out. During a normal shift, there are approximately 7 nurses, 3 aides, a secretary, a case manager, a social worker, and whatever doctors or other random people who go in and out. It's a crowded place.

  Anyways...enough babbling. Here's the actual story. It was towards the end of the shift, and so most of the aides and nurses were in the station. A patient came to the station and asked for one of the aides. She was at the other side of the station. Somebody pointed to her, and tried to get her attention, but it was really loud. They asked him if they could help him with whatever he needed. He proceeded to tell her that he was on a "super secret special mission". Then he started marching through the nurses' station. Let me make something clear. Walking through the station is like walking behind a cash register at a store. It's not outright forbidden, but it's not something that you normally do. In addition, he was carrying a full urinal. Instead of stopping or engaging him, all of the nurses just kind of watched as he sauntered through and placed his very full urinal at the aide's desk. He then confidently made his way back with everyone trying to figure out what had just happened. It was so odd and so unexpected, that nobody had any sort of reaction time, so we just watched. Apparently he had been told that we needed a sample, and he was under the impression that it was urgent. I'm glad that he was able to complete his super secret special mission, but he also provided us with a good laugh.

That's all I got for now. I'll be back soon.Thanks for reading.
-C-

How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying

Want to know something that I've discovered? Even though nursing is considered one of the most difficult undergraduate degree to attain (not actually proven. yet.), I believe that once you get through school, you can get away with not doing a whole lot. I don't want to scare you, but a nurse could actually do very little and still 'do their job' adequately. I don't want to downplay what a nurse has to do, but there is a sizeable difference between a good nurse and a great nurse. I'm gonna give you a good ol' fashioned comparison chart to help you visualize this. ( I just utilized my coding knowledge to make the table! First time I actually used it in real life! Yay for hobbies!)

Good Nurse	Great Nurse
Complete paperwork for patient's admission	Listen to the patient, get the story, be thorough, and address all problems
Perform an assessment that can complete required charting	Assess beyond what needs to be charted. Really look at the patient
Address needs for the shift	Look ahead and address future needs
Pass scheduled medications	Know why medications are ordered and connect them to patient's condition
Call about critical labs	Understand why labs are off and address the underlying problems
Perform nursing tasks	Explain expectations, reasoning, and procedure to patient
Answer assigned patient's call lights	Answer any call light or other needs
Get through the day doing assigned work	Contribute to the team and help others
Talk to patients	Listen to patients
See the person in the bed as an assignment	See the person in the bed as a human being who is hurting and scared and vulnerable
Do what doctors tell you	Know what you need before the doctor even shows up. Be prepared.
Rely on current knowledge	Continue learning and growing and using critical thinking skills
Discharge patient with handout	Actually educate the patient about instructions and medication schedule
Focus on current problem	See the big picture
Do your job	Find your calling

  I want to be clear that I am not claiming the title 'Great Nurse'. There are days where I feel like I am on the ball and know what's up and bring it on and you can't touch this. Other days, I am tired and lazy and don't want to go back in that patient's room. These are just observations I've made over the past 2 years. It's hard to keep up the motivation to do what's necessary to be a great nurse. Some patients are really mean and doctors sometimes yell at you and nurses have a life outside of work and healthcare is really complicated. However, if every nurse tried to be a great nurse, our healthcare system might be very different. I could keep going and adding to the list, but it's late and I'm tired and I still have things to do tonight. I'll see ya soon!

-C-

My Privilege

   Hey guys! I have two options here: 1. blog about my amazing trip to New York City or 2. go back to the normal nursey blogging. I'm tempted to tell you all about my trip and continue the travel blogging, but the truth is that I actually already wrote about my trip and just didn't publish it. We visited a lot of the city, saw amazing things, and my sister and I saw Hamilton. I could go on and on, but most of you really wouldn't be interested in the obscure moments in Hamilton. That's why I decided not to publish it. Just know that I got a steal on the hottest tickets on Broadway and will treasure that forever. So. Back to the ol' grindstone.

   I've spent the last several minutes lying on my floor, petting my dog, and having a brain fart. I don't have any sort of theme to go with here. I don't have a rant or a list or a funny story. Whoops.
Ooh! I have an idea. You know those assignments where you have to write for however many minutes without stopping no matter where your brain goes? I'm going to try that with the theme of nursing/work/life. I'm setting my alarm for 5 minutes. Ready go.

I had the privilege of admitting a patient that I had gotten to know about a month ago. He had declined significantly. His family was at the bedside, and they are just the sweetest. They are so on top of things and are easy to work with. They are the model patient and family. I don't know what happened, but he ended up leaving our unit. I asked around, but it had happened on day shift so no one knew what happened. The family came back the next day and asked to talk to me. They had a question about his care and were very concerned about it. They told me that they came to my unit so that they could talk to someone that they could trust (me). I talked to them and gave them a hug before they left. It's moments like these where I love my job so much because life is short and as a nurse, you can use every shift to make a difference. I'm typing this sentence cause that finished a thought and I don't know where I'm going next and I still have two minutes left and I'm not supposed to stop typing. I can't decide whether I like being really bored at work or really busy. I think I like being really busy but not overwhelmed. It makes time go faster and helps me feel like I'm being useful. I was really bored at work yesterday which I'll never complain about, but it made the day drag on. I think that I worry too much about getting too busy. At my last job, I would be overwhelmed and then get an admission on top of that. That hardly ever happens at my current job, but it still worries me that I won't have the resources I need. I actually don't mind getting admissions at all when I'm on top of my work and my time is up.

   Wow. As far as meaningful posts go, this would not be in the Top 10. or 20. or 50. I'm not thrilled about posting this publicly, but I have been told that the best way to keep people reading is to keep giving them stuff to read. So now you have five minutes of my scatterbrain to read. That's all. Thanks for making it this far.
-C-

All good things

So, at some point during our trip, I asked my friends if they could do anything in the world for a living, what would it be? My answer was that I would get paid to travel around the world, eat good food, stay in cool places, see amazing things, and then blog about it. However, blogging is hard. It's hard for me to realize that you really don't care very much about what I ate for lunch on my sixth day of vacation even though it mattered to me (it was the only InNOut burger place in Oregon). Putting pictures up takes time and I didn't even edit them (thanks Nikki and Rachel!). I think I'll stick with nursing for now. This is my final push for days 6, 7, and 8. They were still fantastic, but just a little slower.

Day 6
We had pancakes for breakfast and drove to the Jedidiah Smith Redwoods Park. Redwoods are big, but you knew that already. But they're really big. We were there on a Sunday morning, and I thought it was cool because some people describe being in the redwood forest as being in a natural cathedral. I totally get that because the leaves have a beautiful stained glass effect and the trunks look like huge pillars. We took a short walk and lots of pictures that I'm not even going to attempt to format because I fail.

Our view

As a note, we did a lot of driving this day. James was a trooper heading through many mountains along twisty, uphill roads. We had lunch at InNOut. I ordered their Animal Style Burger (I don't really know what that means, but it was good :) ) Our next stop was Crater Lake. I had seen pictures of Crater Lake and was really excited. Here's a picture I saw online versus what we saw in real life. 

Online view

Believe it or not, all the pictures look organized when I write this, but when I post it, all goes to chaos. I need a formatting class or something.

Basically, Crater Lake was still covered in snow and fog. The visitor's center had a hallway with windows that were completely blocked by snow which made it quite creepy. We couldn't see much at all- although I swear I saw the lake. I did. I saw ripples in the water. My friends don't believe me. We did however watch a video that showed us the lake on a nice day. Luckily, this was the only event or activity that was inhibited by weather. Oh well. I still got a stamp. 

We drove for a better part of the day, so that was pretty much it. That night we stayed at my favorite AirBnb. It was in the middle of absolutely nowhere with no cell service. We stayed in a renovated garage, but it was so great. There were mints on the pillows, sleeping masks and scented heating packs in a basket, supplies for coffee, tea, or cocoa on the stove, music was playing as we walked in, an old stove with a fire, and extremely comfy beds. We introduced Nikki to Pirates of the Caribbean and our hostess delivered hot breakfast to us in the morning. I was in heaven. I had been tired after driving all day, so staying here was a great way to end the day. 

Day 7

Day 7 was basically getting back where we came from. We tried to get another stamp in at Fort Vancouver, but it was closed on Mondays. Go figure. I was there though. We took our time getting started and drove back up to Tacoma. We arrived at our hotel early and just hung out at the pool, caught up on life, and watched Dancing with the Stars. I think it was a smart thing to have most of our adventures at the beginning of the trip because by this point, I was worn out. Could I have hiked a mountain on day 7? Yeah, but I enjoyed it a lot more on day 3. 

Question of the day: There are little buildings all around Oregon that sell coffee. Customers just pull up to them and there's no seating or anything. It's just a little building. You know what I'm talking about? What do you call those buildings? This was a big debate. Huts? Shacks? Sheds? Please comment if you have an opinion. I'm right by the way. 

Day 8

Our flight was in the evening, but we definitely didn't want a repeat of our flight to Seattle, so we decided to arrive VERY early. That morning we found the Pacific Bonsai Museum really close to our hotel, so we stopped there because why not? I'm including this picture because it looks like Nikki is wearing a bonsai on her head. 

We stopped at a park in Seattle for lunch and finished up all of the groceries that we had bought. All we ended up throwing away was a third of the jelly. Pretty good planning. We returned our rental car, I felt rage boil inside of me, but I acted like a grown up and was polite. Then we went to the airport and hung out until our flight. It doesn't sound like a lot, but it still ended up being a really good day. On the flight back, the three of us had been within shouting distance for the ENTIRE trip and within whisper distance for most of it. However, we still had a great time for four hours on the flight playing card games. These two were the absolute best to travel with. Thanks friendies :) 

Wrap up

Here's my final breakdown of the trip. 

Nikki's Days Ranked:

1. Oregon coast (day 5)

2. Space Needle Day (day 1)

3. Seattle (day 2)

4. Mt. Rainier (day 3)

5. Multonomah falls (day 4)

6. Redwoods (day 6)

7. Driving day (day 7)

8. Travel day (day 8)

Nikki's favorite activity (besides the unanimous tidepools): seeing seals

Nikki's favorite meal: La Paniere breakfast in Seattle

Nikki's scariest moment: waking up from a nap when I was swerving in traffic to avoid a car

Nikki's favorite AirBnb: Night #3 outside of Portland

Rachel's Days Ranked:

1. Oregon coast

2. Seattle

3. Multonomah Falls

4. Space Needle Day

5. Mt. Rainier ( she really didn't like hiking in the snow)

6. Redwoods

7. Driving day

8. Travel day

Rachel's favorite activity (besides tidepools): Multonomah Falls

Rachel's favorite meal: Subway on Day 3 ( I have no idea......)

Rachel's scariest moment: almost missing our flight

Rachel's favorite AirBnb: Night #3 outside of Portland

Caroline's Days Ranked:

1. Oregon Coast

2. Seattle

3. Multonomah Falls

4. Mt Rainier

5. Space Needle Day

6. Redwoods

7. Travel Day

8. Driving Day

Caroline's favorite activity (besides tidepools): Pike's Market

Caroline's favorite meal: La Paniere or InNOut

Caroline's scariest moment: Crossing my fingers before walking into every AirBnb

Caroline's favorite AirBnb: Night #6 at the remote bed and breakfast

Number of miles traveled: close to 1600 by car- many more by air

Total cost of expenses: $630 for shared costs. $730 total including personal expenses.

Pictures taken: I'm not sure how many Nikki got but it was way over 1000. Rachel took a couple hundred too.

Number of stamps for my passport: 9 +1 I should have gotten but it was closed.

Other things gained: No extra pounds!, so many lasting memories, enhanced friendships, a suntan, knowledge about travel, history, geography, nature, boldness, and adventure. 

Things lost: My belt and respect for Hertz Rentals. 

That's all I got folks. Peace out. 

The Day of Wows

    Oh my goodness guys. I won't write this whole post in one sitting because I'm sitting in the airport and only have half an hour of free internet, but I'll at least get this started. I'm heading home after spending a couple of days in New York City. The purpose of the trip was to see Hamilton- major success. Y'all should be jealous and my life is awesome. I'll have a post about it later, but for right now, I'm going to write as much as I can before my time is up.

     Day #5 started bright and early. Earlier than my companions wanted it to, but I knew we had a lot to fit in. We headed out of the hotel and ended up at a Insomnia Coffee Company for breakfast and the all-so-necessary coffee. The best way I can describe this place is hipster. Put whatever on the wall/ sit wherever/ drink hipster things that you're just getting to say the hipster names. Pro-tip: Just stick with plain old coffee. It gets the job done. But it was good. Next, we headed to the coast.
   
   I have to admit something here. It was raining really hard at this point, and I was getting pretty bummed. I had imagined a sunny day driving down the coast, and I don't love driving in the rain. Can I? yes. Do I love it? uh.... no. We went for about an hour til we reached Tillamook. We stopped at the Tillamook cheese factory. Their slogan? "Don't run with our cheddar, it's really sharp" heheheheheh. Mostly, this was an excuse to get out of the car, but it had a cute self-tour and yummy samples. We debated getting a pint of ice cream to split, but A. it was only like 9 in the morning B. anybody who knows me well knows that you shouldn't split food with me. I eat like the food might disappear any moment and mostly just inhale food. I've been working on this but still have a ways to go. Pro-tip: Don't share food with Caroline. You won't get any. 

    Back into the rain we went. Our route was highway 101 down the entire coast. I forgot to tell you earlier that for the entirety of the trip, we played a game called "My cow". I'm not sure if that's the actual name, but that's basically what it is. You see a herd of cows? You call out, "my cows!" Same goes for horses, llamas, parrots, platypuses, armadillos, whatever. Along this drive, I got a LOT of cows. That's the only reason I'm telling you this. I totally won this game. Pro-tip: If you want to win a game of 'my cow', you should drive so you see everything first. So anyway, it was still raining, and I was bummed. I was determined to have a good attitude, so I stopped in a random town and forced my poor, long-suffering companions out into the rain to stop at this little visitor's center. We walked into the room, and there was a guy sitting by the window. The first words out of his mouth were, "Come over here, you're about to see a whale." We walked over, he pointed, and sure enough- within a couple of minutes we saw our first gray whale. It didn't jump out of the water or anything like that, but we saw the spout of water and the tail. The nice man gave us a commemorative sticker for spotting our first whale. I still have it attached to my toiletries bag just in case anyone was wondering. This was not the only friendly park ranger person that day, but he asked us about our plans and where we were headed. He recommended a beach for us with some tide pools and told us when the low tide was so we could get the best experience. I swear that God was on our side that day because the timing was going to work out perfectly. We saw the whale come up another time or two and started back down the coast.

     Our goal was Low tide was at 1:45, and we had some time to spare, so we had lunch at a buffet overlooking the Pacific Ocean because why not? We arrived Yaquina Head Beach at the perfect time, and lo! It was migratory bird day, so we didn't have to pay for parking! (I got to this point when my internet ran out. Just so ya know. Starting over now.) On a normal day, stopping in the visitor's center would have been very dull. On migratory bird day, it is quite a different story. There were educational activities galore, but more importantly, there were enthused park rangers who were ecstatic that three young people had innocently just walked in. One of them literally jumped up and down. We played a migratory bird game to appease them and got a stamp commemorating the event. One ranger asked if he could put a stamp on my cheek. I politely declined. Pro-tip: It's worth it to spend 5 minutes playing a migratory bird game if it makes someone's day. Live a little. 
    Tide pools = perfection. God's amazing creation is so evident in everything, but so easy to see when the tide goes out and leaves behind tiny ecosystems to explore. There was Oregon's tallest lighthouse up on the bluff, harbor seals out on the rocks, birds on the water, and no rain. We spent a long time exploring the tide pools. You're allowed to touch everything except the starfish. There are sea urchins and starfish and tiny fish and crabs and things with tentacles and things with spikes and spongy things and oysters and clams all in crystal clear pools. It was unanimously our favorite activity of the entire trip.

I give up on formatting this thing. It does not love me. You can just see pictures in any order because they don't want to go where I want them to go. Know that I've had good intentions.

Believe it or not, that formatting looked good on my screen. Ha. What a joke. This is why rich people hire people. It's far too hard to worry about the details.



     After we dragged ourselves away, we spent the rest of the afternoon driving. The lower third of highway 101 is right along the coast. You pull around the corner and there's the ocean right there. Our reaction every time was, 'Wow.' There are huge rocks left in the ocean from erosion and the sun had come out just in time. Imagine a movie where the characters drive down the road in a convertible with the sun setting over the ocean- that was us- except we had James instead of a convertible. We stopped for dinner at a state park close to California. I don't even remember why we picked that beach, but it was perfect. There was no one there, but there was a log for us to sit on. The sun was setting, the waves were crashing, and it was perfect.

 

 Our next AirBnb was in California because neither Nikki or Rachel had made it there. It was literally a few hundred feet away from the beach. The hosts provided chairs for us to go and sit after our long day. They also provided pancake mix for breakfast the next morning.

Breakdown of day 5:
Favorite moment: Tidepools
Least favorite moment: Rainy driving
Bonding moment: Getting soaked by the Pacific Ocean
Costs: 

•       Breakfast $5
•       Lunch $15

I got really lazy with this post because the pictures would NOT go where I wanted them to and I got frustrated. Rawr. Luckily, the pictures speak louder than I do, so you can see it was gorgeous and all that. If you're going to spend a day doing anything, I would highly recommend driving down the Oregon coast. Thanks for playing.

Pacific Wonderland

  Out of all the days, this one was least like the way I had planned it which made it one of my favorites. Pro-tip: Even if you're a type-A, planner, organized person, leave some room for surprises.  It also turned out to be one of the most photogenic days. After a delicious breakfast in the sunroom at our host home, we headed off to Multonomah Falls. My parents had hiked here a year or two ago and told us that it was a 'must do' type of thing. There were a few options for the hike which consisted of: 1. See the falls (0.2 miles) 2. Hike to the bridge for a selfie (0.8 miles) 3. Hike to the top and feel good about yourself (2.5 miles) or 4. Hike around the falls and see everything else (5-6ish miles). We were looking for an actual hike, but our hips, thighs, calves, and gluteus maximuseseses were feeling like we had hiked up a mountain the day before (we had). Pro-tip: If you take this trip, maybe don't plan your two hikes on back to back days. Therefore, we decided to hike to the top of the falls and back down. Multonomah Falls is the second tallest waterfall in the United States (I think this is only counting year-round falls. You can check me on that.) The falls were absolutely gorgeous and so impressive. It's the type of thing that makes you look up and just shake your head because nothing that I could create could possibly look that good and this thing happened naturally (or with the Creator's help). The trail up to the top consisted of more switchbacks which helped loosen up our hips, thighs, calves, and gluteus maximuseses very quickly. We had arrived pretty early, so it wasn't too hot or too crowded.

I'm going to skip ahead in the story, but the next pictures are still from the falls. However, if I asked a formatting expert, they'd probably tell me to break up the pictures with some words to keep the audience engaged and avoid boredom. Pro-tip: Bloggers want to keep their audiences engaged. My original plan for the rest of the day was to take a biking tour or rent bikes and ride through the city of Portland. (There was an option for a foodie tour where they'd stop and have you sample the famous foods in the city- a bit pricey but sounded fun). Due to our experience in Portland the night before, we weren't keen on spending a ton more time in the city on bikes. On the recommendation of our hosts from the night before, we decided to drive further down the Colombia River Gorge to a town called Hood River. The Colombia River flows into the Pacific ocean and the drive through the gorge is absolutely gorgeous.

View from the top of the falls

So anyway, down the road we went. On the way there, we completed one of my family's road trip traditions. For a reason that's way to long explain right now, we have every traveler state three things that they like and three things that they dislike and compile a list. Most of them are supposed to be related to the trip or traveling. Here's our lists.

Caroline
Likes: Donuts, AirBnb, and
adventure.
Dislikes: Hertz car rentals,
traffic, and sore hips

Rachel
Likes: Mountains, blueberries,
and cozy beds
Dislikes: Staying a hotel that
night instead of AirBnb,
being tired, and hiking
in the snow

Nikki
Likes: Moutains, water, and mountains
and water together
Dislikes: Thinking of dislikes, seeing a
mountain that she can't summit, and
mountain goat heads on the wall. 

               


 Our expected drive was about 40 minutes. If you'll remember back to day #2, I had asked both Nikki and Rachel to come up with something that they wanted to do. Nikki had suggested a fish ladder, and I had basically told her that we couldn't.  Pro-tip: Try not to be too controlling when planning a trip. On our way to Hood River, we saw a sign for Bonneville Dam and fish ladder. It was one of those should we? shouldn't we? things where we decided to swerve off the exit at the last minute. Turned out to be really cool! I got a stamp! Totally wasn't expecting that, but it was a stop on the Lewis and Clark historic trail. We learned about fish ladders and how the salmon swim upstream to spawn. They (don't have any clue who 'they' are) want to get an accurate count of salmon so there is literally a human being who volunteers for 8 hours a day to count how many fish swim by a window. There was also some history there about the building of the dam. And Nikki got to see fish. A random stop turned out to be a home run. Pro-tip: Making unplanned stops are sometimes the best memories.  I also picked up a lesson from the docent at the visitor's center: "The salmon swim up the Colombia River from spending four years in the Pacific Ocean. They swim up the river and hit our concrete wall and they say, "Oh! Dam!"

   

    Hood River was really cute, but not a lot to report. We ate from food carts which is apparently a necessity in Oregon. It was good. We walked around and had delicious ice cream. It was the kind of ice-cream-after-walking-around-in-90-degree-weather-in-an-unfamiliar-city-and-you're-really-thirsty-but-your-water-is-really-warm-kind of ice cream. Which is the best kind.
 
 




   Our next stop the was the International Rose Test Garden- or the international roast garden if you're Nikki or Rachel. There are over 550 varieties of roses including many experimental types. Pro-tip: I have no pro advice here. I honestly don't know how a rose can be experimental. However, I think I would be incredibly good at coming up with new rose names: The Derrick, Rose to the Occasion,  Rose upon Rows, etc. I have never been a huge fan of roses. I didn't think they really smelled that sweet and were too pricey for my taste. However, I was a big fan of this place. They really smelled wonderful. There was also a variety of smells- some were very flowery (no, duh!) while others smelled fruitier or more like a perfume. I am a jerk and forgot to ask the others which their favorite flower was. Mine was the first purple one pictured right below. Nikki has a great camera and took a bunch of pictures. Here's just a few.

They look like they're in time-out

 We didn't stay in an AirBnb that night. I had gotten a great deal on a Courtyard Marriott, so we ended up on the west side of Portland to get us close to the coast for day #5. We had pb&j in our hotel room with a little time that evening to watch some quality HGTV and to go to the pool/ hot tub. I think that night we were night owls. In bed by 9:30!

Breakdown of Day 4:
Best moment: Unexpected stamp! Not really, probably the 'wow' moment looking at the falls
Worst moment: Right before the first lick of ice cream
Bonding moment: Hot tub talks- sounds like a soap opera
Breakdown of Costs:

• Food Cart $7.50
• Ice Cream $2.50
• Parking in Hood River and Rose Garden $5

Thanks for sticking with me! Day 5 was the unanimously picked favorite, so stay tuned!
-C-

"49"

Day #3

    For the next couple of days, there will probably be a larger amount of pictures because what we saw and experienced deserves that. All of the ones posted here are taken by Nikki and Rachel. I don't own an actual camera, and my phone camera is the quality of velveeta cheese. Also, I'm lazy and don't like taking pictures. All of the credit goes to them.

    I'd like to let you know that my Bible reading for these days were in the last few chapters of Job. If you don't know the story, Job and his not so helpful buddies were arguing about sin and God's mercy. In short, they were both wrong. God starts talking to Job in the last couple of chapters and puts him in his place. There are sentences like this, "Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you will answer me." Then God talks about His incredible power. "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?" "Have you ever given orders to the morning or shown the dawn its' place?" This goes on for quite a few chapters. Reading this right before climbing an incredible mountain gives you a little different perspective.

   So anyway, our goals for the day were to hike Mt. Rainier and start discovering Portland. We started out early. That's because we woke up early because we went to bed early because we were exhausted by 8pm. We were only 7 miles away from the entrance to the park, but that doesn't matter because the park is huge. We drove as far as we could up to Paradise where I planned to do a hike. I had read about the incredible wild flowers that gave the place its name. The elevation of Paradise was about 6100 ft, so when we got there, it was covered in snow. Whoops. No wildflowers for us- just feet and feet of snow. The road beyond the visitor's center was still blocked due to snow. The it was about 9:20 am at this point, and the visitor center didn't open til 10am. Inside that visitor center was a stamp (see previous post). I needed the stamp. So what did we do? We hiked in the snow. Pro-tip: If you want to see wildflowers, apparently July is the month to go. Paradise has one of the highest snowfalls in the country. Anywhere from 50-70ft a year. 
     We could see a sort of path-like thing (basically a bunch of footprints), so we decided we'd start there. I'd like to add that in the parking lot, there were a couple of groups who appeared to be starting a serious hike. Backpacks, hiking poles, hiking boots, fancy jackets, etc... They had guides who were explaining the hike to them, but we walked past them all and headed up the mountain in our t-shirts and sneakers. Pro-tip: We are not pros. Do not copy us if you want to climb a mountain in the snow.  Our goal wasn't to get very high- we just wanted to pass the time til I could get my stamp. We took a couple of pictures where we depicted what our attitudes were concerning the hike.

I'm thrilled. Rachel not so much.

Nikki loves mountains. A lot. 

   This was not an easy hike. It was slippery and rough and snow got in my shoes, but it was one of my favorite parts of the day. On the way down, I found a track made by something non-human that provided an excellent slide. I pushed myself forward a little, and then proceeded to slide down. Nobody would follow me.

We're actually throwing snow in the air in attempts to be artsy, but I think this is a better representation of how Rachel felt at this point.

   Finally the visitor's center opened, and I got my stamp. A very helpful park ranger recommended a different hike farther down the mountain that didn't include any snow. This hike was marvelous. And strenuous. The ranger mentioned that "there are a couple of switchbacks" but she failed to mention that nearly the entire hike was switchbacks straight up the mountain. Just think climbing stairs for 1.7 miles in the 80 degree weather. The trail we hiked was the Rampart Ridge Trail up to the Longmire viewpoint. The trail itself was gorgeous. Huge trees made me feel like I was in Narnia. 

   Along the way we picked up a friend. We forget her name, but she was hiking alone and thought she might have heard a bear. Pro-tip: Travel in groups. Then if a bear attacks you, maybe one of you will make it out alive ;)    My friends were troopers. It took a while to get to the viewpoint where we stopped and had our packed lunch. Peanut butter and jelly has never tasted so good. There is a moral to be learned here: I'm not sure exactly what it is. Something like hard work makes the simple things in life taste better? You can extract your own moral here. 

    After this we headed back down. Pro-tip: Galloping down the mountain is significantly easier than walking. We reunited with James and started making our way to Portland. It was about a 2 1/2 hour drive, so we had some bonding time in the car. Pro-tip: Don't try to engage your friends in a game that requires a lot of brain power when you've already worn them and their hips out on a strenuous hike. Oregon= state #49!!!!! 

   

    Our first stop was Powell's Bookstore- the largest bookstore in the U.S. It takes up an entire city block and is 3 stories tall. There is a rare books room, a place where you can publish your own book, and stack and stacks of books. Somehow, we didn't take any pictures of Powell's, so this one is from the internet. Here is something really neat. When I go into a bookstore, I hardly ever have an idea of what I want to read. I might pick up something I've already read or something on the best seller list. At Powell's they had a great way of engaging people. In the bookshelves, there were these little cards that might read 'staffer's pick', 'kid's pick', 'if you liked Hunger Games, try this series', 'local author', 'award winner'. These cards made me want to read a bunch of new books. Barnes and Nobles should try this. Pro-tip: If you end up here, spend plenty of time in the children's section. It's precious. 

     At this point, we had already accomplished everything on our list, and it was only around 5pm. We made an impromptu stop at Voodoo's donuts which is a place that apparently people drive hours to partake. It might be famous, and it might be delicious, but it was also not necessarily a family friendly place. Some of the donuts have profane names. Just a Pro-tip.  Pictured is some sort of caramel donut and their famous cream filled donut. They also have weird donuts called Mango Tango, The Loop (with fruit loops), Captain my Captain (with Captain crunch), Memphis Mafia, Arnold Palmer, Voodoo Bubble (with bubble gum), and the No Name donut. 

   Our first impression of Portland was that it was weird. Anything goes. A little too weird for three young women from the midwest. There was also heavy traffic, so Portland was not our very favorite. Another Pro-tip: In Oregon, you don't pump your own gas. It's actually against the law ( which I might have accidentally broken). People come out and pump your gas for you, and you don't have to tip them. Stay in your car, lean back, and relax. It was awkward at first, but I'm sure that's wonderful in the winter. 

    Our AirBnb that night was in Gresham on the east side of Portland. It was Nikki and Rachel's favorite place- mainly due to our hosts. They had a wonderful, sweet dog named Emma, and we talked to them more than any of our other hosts. They were super friendly and welcoming. 

Sleeping Beauty

Breakdown of Day #3:

Favorite moment: Reaching the lookout point and eating lunch

Least favorite moment: Rush hour traffic in Portland

Quote of the day: *After 2 hikes for many hours, driving, and Powell's bookstore* 

Caroline "It's only 5, and I don't have anything else. Sorry I didn't plan enough"

Rachel *in total disbelief* "FOR TODAY?!?!?!?!" 

Bonding moment: Hiking with snow in our shoes

Breakdown of Costs:

•  Entrance to Mt. Rainier $20
• Gas pumped by Caroline (whoops) $20
• Parking downtown Portland $5

Day 4 will be coming soon!