Taking a break, getting a break....

I write to you from my parents' laptop, sitting in their motorcoach at a resort in Newport, OR. The fog is thick today, but I don't care....a cup of coffee in hand, I'm blogging here before writing in my journal a bit. Tessa, Grammy and Grandpa are at the pool, where I have already spent many happy hours this trip. (News flash: Tessa swam the length of the pool! She's turning into a fish.)

And I have an update....
Ryan has received a good job offer! I won't share all of the details just yet because the offer is verbal and we're waiting to see the whole offer in writing, but we feel very positive and optimistic about it. Stay tuned for more details, but it looks like Ryan would start on the 25th. Hurrah! If it works out (and we do think it will), Ryan will meet Tessa and I in Portland on Sunday, spend some time visiting with his folks, and then spend a couple of days at Cannon Beach, which is one of our family's favorite places (Orcas Island, Cannon Beach, and West Seattle are our top three, I think) so we can play as a family before he begins the next adventure.

Tessa and I are having a great time with my family; my parents have been spoiling us by taking us to resturants, getting Tessa ice cream cones, going on a whale watching cruise (yes, we saw whales - love it!), and of course hours of beach time and pool time. I flew a kite yesterday (Tessa was uninterested, so I realized it was what *I* wanted to do, and we brought the kite we purchased two years ago in Cannon Beach), I've gone for runs on the beach, we've watched seal pups on the beach and sea lions on the docks, we've gone to the aquarium, we've climbed the Yaquina Point Lighthouse, and we've seen more shore birds than I can count. Tessa was feeling a bit homesick yesterday, missing Daddy but also her friend Anna, but just in time another girl her age came to the pool and the two of them played for a couple of hours yesterday. The other girl is from North Dakota, and she and Tessa have vowed to be penpals....so cute.

More from me another time, but now I feel a need to write in my journal. Ahhh, the good life! I hope that you are well, and that you, too, have relaxation in your near future.