Hello from sunny California! I hope the week's been treating everyone well. It was quite an adventure here, but we all made it through and we're all doing well. On Monday we ended up doing our plans from Sunday, so in the morning we headed to see the temple! Here's our eternal family!
One of the mornings Grayson was called out to see the "sneeleys" and he's been REALLY into them since. I don't think we have snails in Colorado, or at least I've never seen them. I believe we'll have them in Texas, so that's potentially good news. Anyway, Grayson loved to go outside and watch them crawl along. Winry loved the snails (and most bugs) too!
(Story from the future. I think there's no way I'll remember to write this in this weeks blog post on Sunday, so I'll drop it quick because I'm remembering. Yesterday Monica was taking the kids to the park, and I happened to step outside and Winry was crying. I checked to see what was wrong and she was sad because there've been a lot of worms out with all the rain, and a few got in the garage and dried out and died! She was so sad about it! So we pointed out some that were still wiggling and she picked them all up and took them back to the lawn.)
There were even a bunch out at the temple. There were also some leaves that had fallen on the ground, and Grayson was trying to hold as many of those as possible. He used them to poke the snails, which I guess was okay. Doesn't seem like any of them got hurt.
We got a group picture together with the Cammacks while we were there too.
And we even found a lady bug to hold.
After the temple we went to see the sea lions and the tide pools in La Jolla. There were a whole bunch of sea lions on the beach, so I picked Grayson up so he could see them over the wall.
There's also a walkway that juts out into the water a little bit, and we went out there too. It's been pretty beaten up by the ocean, and the stroller basically didn't roll at all from how much the cement has been ripped up. Anyway, we were able to get close to some sea lions that were napping on the rocks.
And over on a nearby shore there were some sea lions and one or two of them had babies with them!
After watching them for a while we walked down to the tide pools. I remember seeing crabs and sea urchins, and maybe a few little fish. I spent most of the time trying to stop Grayson from accidentally stepping straight into a puddle of water. He'd be great and step over 2 or 3 in a row, and then his next step would be heading straight into one and I was always glad I was keeping hold of his hand.
Monica showed the kids you could poke the urchins and they'd shrink in, so that was everyone's favorite game.
And while we were there we got a text from our realtor asking if we could discuss offers on our house! The trip was a success! Over the weekend we had over 30 showings, and we got 6 offers. To be speedy I picked Grayson up and carried him to the car so we could chat about options. I will say that I was still feeling pretty sick this day, and I was just about wiped out from carrying him, but we made it, and I'm really glad Monica took a picture of us!
After our chat in the car and picking an offer, we headed to lunch. Then we went down to Seaport Village to see some shops that are down there. We wandered a bit, and all the kids picked a souvenir. Winry got a dolphin necklace, Brooke picked a key chain with some shells and stuff on it, and Grayson... well, Grayson stole a keychain. We didn't know he was sitting on one. Heck, I don't think HE knew he was sitting on one, until we were almost back to the car. We were also in a bit of a hurry at this point because I needed to get to the airport to fly back home, so we didn't have time to run back and return it. Oops!
My flight home was fine, and everyone else returned back and had dinner. For the remaining CA pictures, I wasn't there, so Monica may have to fill in some details when she reads through this. On Tuesday they went to the Point Loma lighthouse.
It looks like there was a fun little path by the ocean leading up to it, and all the kids looked happy in the pictures. Winry's being silly in this one (note from Monica-she actually was mad about something), but she was happy in other ones, so I think everyone had a good time.
And then they went to little Italy for lunch. I don't remember the name of the restaurant at the moment, but the food was amazing. Best food of the trip!
They had a giant chair there, and all the kids fit on together!
And then it was time for some ice cream from Salt and Straw. It's supposed to be real fancy. Monica said they have an olive oil ice cream. If you can have olive oil flavored ice cream and stay open, you must be good! I do believe final review was that she'd still rather have Butterfields though. Hopefully we can find good ice cream in Texas.
Tuesday afternoon I took Jelly to the vet. We just wanted to get her in before we moved to Texas, because last time we took her was in the summer, so I knew the time was coming up, and I didn't want to have to worry about finding a vet right when we got there. She didn't love it, but she was good for them.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, it was beach day again. I think this one was pretty unplanned, because no one was in swimsuits! (we actually weren't in swimsuits because we thought it would be too cold) I don't know if they found or dug this big hole, but Grayson was delighted by it, and the kids played in the water a little, though they tried not to get their clothes wet. This was at Oceanside which is the beach I (Monica) went to growing up!
Grayson worked on organizing his room that day. I don't know if there's a story to this that Monica can add, but I just thought it was really cute.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday night I went golfing with my friends, and it RAINED on us! I knew there was a chance of rain, and I think this was my first time golfing in the rain. My review? 10 out of 10, I would definitely do it again! I thought it was a lot of fun, though I was dumb and left my rain jacket in my car because it wasn't raining when I got there.
On Wednesday morning Monica took Brooke back to the doctor to look at her ears because they were still hurting, and because they were leaking, which isn't a good sign. One of her ear drums had ruptured. They couldn't see it because there was too much "debris" in her ear, but they said she definitely couldn't fly until it was healed. So a call to the rental car company later and the plan was to drive home. The good news is that we had a hybrid mini van, so if there was a car to do it in, we had it. So Thursday morning Monica got everyone ready and started the drive home. She decided to route her path through Arizona, and stopped by her friend Nicole's house!
They spent the night there, and if this picture is any indication they slept great.
The next morning Grayson checked out their garden. He was keeping an eye on the tomatoes waiting for them to turn red! They also gave us some stuff from their garden. I don't remember what all Monica came back with, but I know there was one lima bean ready to pick that we got!
The kids had fun playing there in the morning. Brooke jumped on their trampoline.
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And Winry swam in the pool! Brooke wanted to swim too, but her ear can't get wet right now, so she dipped her feet in and jumped on the tramp.
And then they got a start on the drive. I don't know where this picture was taken, but it's a very deserty picture. For day two the plan was to head from AZ to New Mexico.
And Nicole came along to help out! What a champion! So they all drove to New Mexico together, and then Saturday they finally made it home! Nicole booked a flight on Saturday afternoon, and took the car back to the airport for us. Thank you SO MUCH Nicole! You were a life saver!
And now that everyone was back? I was reunited with my buddy to play in the backyard! Also, Grayson kills me. He'll essentially eat ANYTHING from the garden, but often won't try his dinner. I'm not sure why he loves stuff in our garden so much, and I shouldn't complain about that, but he'll pick and eat tomatoes from our garden, and not eat them from the store...
I learned something funny this past week. While everyone was away the first day or two I was still getting better from being sick, but once I was better I couldn't fall asleep until like 11:30 or midnight, and I'd wake up without an alarm by 6 each day. I thought I was going crazy. Then everyone got back on Saturday, and I was tired by 9:30 per usual! Never knew how much it took out of me to chase the kids around all day! Haha!
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