The next day of our vacation was Sunday. We woke up and found all the kids playing in the house’s toy room:
Dallas was against visiting Disneyland on Sunday, so we joined my parents for sacrament meeting in the local Disneyland ward:
After that, my parents met up with my siblings at Disneyland. It was the only day my brother Abe could go, so off they went to spend time with him and his family.
While we didn’t go to Disneyland with everyone else, we still wore our matching Mickey shirts:
A friend told me about the Mormon Battalion Historic Site in San Diego. Dallas and I thought that would be a fun thing to do. We drove down to San Diego to see what it was all about.
We had a quick cracker snack before going inside:
The quick cracker snack ended up being not-so-quick and we just missed the start of a tour so we killed time driving ox carts:
And sitting in rocking chairs:
The tour started and it was so fun. This visitors’ center did an impressive job incorporating media into the presentation and the kids loved it. We sat on logs and played musical instruments with the Mormon Battalion volunteers:
We located one of my ancestors who was in the Battalion:
I hesitate to show the next few pictures because my siblings will see how much fun we had and will all wish they had foregone Disneyland in exchange for this excitement.
We panned for gold:
Brooke found her two pieces:
Spencer thought the water spout was more fun:
Meanwhile, Caroline stayed at her station patiently finding all the nuggets of gold she could:
Spencer and Brooke made bricks:
Finally Caroline finished panning and was ready to show off her nice pile of gold:
The Mormon Battalion Historic Site, aka The Happiest Place on Earth. Look at those smiles:
We were close to La Jolla beach so we stopped to look at the sea lions. Here are the kids experiencing the beach for the first time:
We finally spotted the sea lions (after realizing they were the lumps on the rocks):
Then we headed back to Belle’s Castle. We put the kids to bed, hung out with the adults, and planned our next day of fun:
We just got back from Disneyland! We had the best time…and now I’m having the worst time wanting to get back to real life. Yesterday I actually forgot I needed to cook dinner. Completely forgot. I also spent an inordinate amount of time trying to convince myself that clean underwear is totally overrated and that I could put off doing laundry for another day. In an effort to further procrastinate my reentry into reality, I will ignore the items that still need unpacking and putting away and will instead look through all the pictures we took and relive each day. Here we go!
The kids are all settled in their spots ready for our drive:
We made it to Grandma Golden’s house in Las Vegas that afternoon. The girls got right to work discovering all of Grandma’s fun toys:
We love Grandma Golden!
After spending the night at Grandma’s, we decided to take the kids to the Strip to see the lions at MGM and the water show at the Bellagio.
Did you know the lions are no longer at MGM? We didn’t. Grrr.
Also, did you know the fountain show doesn’t run in the morning? We didn’t. Grrr.
The one saving grace was the M&M store:
We got to see the free 3-D M&M movie there:
After our little Vegas detour, we headed straight to Anaheim. We have been planning this trip for MONTHS. My brother said he was going and invited my sister. She invited me. Then we decided to call it a family reunion to pressure my other two brothers and my parents to join us there. It worked! My parents even had the great idea of renting a house instead of a hotel so we could have a full kitchen and put the kids to bed at night and the adults would have a place to congregate and talk and play. It was a beautiful thing. Here’s the house – Belle’s Castle:
The house was perfect. I think that picture is a little deceptive because it makes the house look kind of ordinary and not nearly as big and luxurious as it felt once you were inside it.
The girls got to sleep in the Peter Pan room:
We got right to work trying out the pool and hot tub:
Then we put the kids to bed and relaxed a bit before our adventures the following day…
A few weeks ago we had our ward campout. I have this idea in my head that I don’t like camping. I think it started when I was little and my parents said they hated camping, so even though I hadn’t gone much, I just assumed I hated it too.
Dallas loves camping. He tries to talk me into going camping with him more, but our compromise has been that I’ll camp with him once a year, for ONE night, on a designated campsite, during the yearly ward campout.
As I read the fliers for this year’s campout, I caught myself accidentally thinking, “Wow. This sounds…fun.” We were promised flushing toilets! Showers! Games! A slip and slide! Skits! Dinner, dessert, s’mores, and breakfast all provided! I told Dallas I might actually enjoy myself this time.
We got to the campsite and it was wonderful. There was a huge field where kids could run and we could set up tents:
There was a little exercise area that the kids loved to play on:
There was the promised slip and slide which Brooke loved:
Spencer wasn’t a huge fan of his solo ride:
So we convinced him to try again with Brooke. He still didn’t love it:
Caroline also did it but seeing as she made me walk her three fourths of the way down the slide before putting her in the tube, her ride wasn’t long enough to snap a picture. Apparently it was still scary enough for her to never want to do it again, though.
Brooke’s favorite part of the campout was this silly rope swing:
Just when I was starting to think I may like camping after all, bedtime came. No sooner had we gotten the kids settled in their spots than Dallas said, “See ya! I’m off to take pictures. Be back sometime!” And he left.
He left me in a tent with three raging lunatics who were all still wide awake, of course. Notice our sleeping arrangements, because this will come into play in a minute. Caroline was on one side, then Brooke, Spencer, me, and (eventually) Dallas.
Within ten minutes sweet Caroline had nodded off and was happily dreaming. Brooke and Spencer were still running around the tent, hitting the sides of the tent, screaming, yelling, laughing, turning flashlights on and off, etc. When that got old, they started bugging each other. Why didn’t I put Caroline in between those two? I’ll never know.
This campout marked the first time in his life Spencer has slept without being confined to a crib or a pack and play. For some reason I thought he would settle down quickly, but…no. Finally, by some miracle, Brooke fell asleep. It was about that time that I realized I hadn’t given Spencer his pacifier. No wonder he was still awake! I took the paci out of our bag with a flourish, plugged the kid up, and knew that within seconds he’d be sleeping.
Ha ha.
He was still having way too much fun romping around the tent. I just decided to lay down and try to sleep anyway. Spencer was by my feet, and I must have dozed for a second because the next thing I thought was, “Huh. Spencer sounds really far away.” I bolted upright and realized he had escaped the tent. Rascal.
Luckily he was just outside the door giggling like a maniac.
Finally, finally, finally, Spencer calmed down and went to sleep.
Just as I was again dozing off, Dallas returned from his midnight photowalk. I reminded myself to get really mad at him the next day for abandoning me with the hooligans while he had a peaceful evening.
At about 2:30, Brooke woke up. I heard her sit up and groggily say, “Mom? I can’t seem to find Caroline.”
Again I bolted upright and thought, “What in the world? Caroline escaped?!” I felt all around her spot and sure enough she was missing. Then I realized she was curled up at the bottom of the tent where all our feet were. Crisis averted.
Brooke went back to sleep. I didn’t.
By about 3:30 I needed to go to the bathroom but it was so far away.
By 4:00 I decided to make the trek to the bathroom.
By 4:30 Spencer had migrated to my head and was hogging all my pillow.
By 5:00 Caroline had crept up into all of my foot space. I was curled up in a little ball unable to move for fear of waking her (or Spence).
By 5:30 I knew my childhood notions of hating camping were true. Camping is the worst. I hate it.
At some point everyone woke up.
We went for a morning hike:
Moral of the story: I like being in the mountains with my family. I like eating in the mountains if someone other than me is in charge of planning and preparing the meals. I like hiking in the mountains.
But I hate sleeping in the mountains. Dallas and I pay good money on our mortgage to keep a roof over our heads. Doesn’t it seem wasteful to choose to give up that sleeping arrangement…for a tent?!
One of our favorite days of the year happened a few days ago – Dallas’s work Lagoon day!
All of the employees and their families got to wear matching shirts for the occasion. Please pay special attention to the awesome design on the shirts. The employees could submit a design and the winner got some cash and the pleasure of seeing his/her artistry on hundreds of people all day.
It just so happens that Dallas A. Golden was the T-shirt design winner. Out of the hundreds of employees, his design won!
(Okay, okay. So maybe out of those hundreds of employees only two people turned in designs. But still! It’s a great design, and I just may start wearing it all the time!)
You’ll have to excuse me. Apparently for this post I’m living by the mantra “you must post every picture you took that day to the blog or else”. The kids love seeing the pictures of themselves and reliving all the fun rides so this post is for them!
Caroline surprised us all by throwing her hands up in the air on a couple of the rides:
The ferris wheel. Brooke gets very nervous on this ride:
I guess my last post should have been called “Third of July” because that’s when we watched the fireworks. On the actual Fourth of July we went up to my sister’s house and had lots of fun!
The kids lounged in the “hot tub”:
Spencer commandeered all vehicles and made them his own:
We ate a delicious Dutch oven dinner that Jeff and Sarah made for us:
The kids played with water balloons:
The kids were so entertained the adults were able to sit around and chat:
There was much trampoline jumping:
Then we gathered for the slightly dangerous, always a little terrifying home fireworks show:
Just as we finished with our fireworks Sarah’s neighbors started theirs so the kids shifted seats and sat through round two:
Thanks to Sarah and Jeff for planning such a fun evening for us all!
