A Visit to Paradise
We took our annual trip to Carlsbad in October to visit my parents. This time we brought Dallas’s mom, Kathryn, with us. We had a great time!
We settled right in with baths and cheese balls.
We went to church:
After church we went to the Mormon Battalion Museum.
We were right by La Jolla beach, so we had to stop and see the sea lions.
The good thing about vacationing with Oma is we could hug her whenever we wanted:
The kids drew adorable pictures. This is Spencer’s rendition of our blue van arriving at Grandma’s house:
Madison drew a fish and her with Grandma and Grandpa:
Caroline took her time and filled up her whole page with color as she did a cute palm tree:
Brooke was drawing some adorable animals. I remarked that I couldn’t believe how well she could draw without looking at anything for reference. I mean, I think I know what a pelican looks like…until I try to draw it and then I realize I have no idea about how its neck attaches to its body or what its tail looks like. We decided to have a pelican-drawing contest. The results ranged from impressive to ridiculous. Brooke drew the two pelicans at the top with the orange beaks. Going clockwise from there we have Caroline’s, my mom’s, mine, my dad’s, and Kathryn’s was the big blue one. My dad is good at a lot of things…but drawing pelicans may not be one of them.Â
He is, however, really good at making French toast every morning. Yum!
It was a super windy day, but the kids were dying to go to the beach, so we went and had a good time despite sand flying everywhere. Brooke directed this photo shoot before we left:
When we’d had it with the wind, we went home, had dinner, and begged Grandpa to pop us some popcorn while we watched a movie. He is good at popping popcorn. He gladly obliged.
The next day was Legoland day!Â
The weather was perfect and there were no lines. It was great!
The kids made cars out of Legos for a big race.
Madison was the youngest racer in her heat, so we didn’t have high hopes, but we were all surprised and delighted to see that her Christmas tree car was the clear winner! Red ribbon for Madison!
I was dying to do the Ninjago ride. My parents have season passes to Legoland since they live five minutes away, and my mom and dad always ride this ride when they go. My mom ALWAYS beats my dad. She has some hidden ninja skills, so I was anxious to see if I could beat her. The answer – nope.
Dallas, however, also apparently has crazy ninja skills and he was able to get on the “Best of the Day” scoreboard…with my mom!
Madison was completely fearless. She loved the roller coasters best and insisted on riding with her arms up on every ride.
Our fairy tale Brooke:
Our tickets also got us into the aquarium. The kids enjoyed stamping their booklets:
The next day we went to the Fleet Science Museum. We went to two classes to learn about air pressure and static electricity:
As we were getting kicked out of the museum at the end of the day, my dad saw the lady at the concession stand throwing away buckets of popcorn. He asked if we could have one and she said yes! Turns out my dad’s also good at scoring free popcorn!
The Fleet Science Center is at Balboa Park, so we walked around the park a bit.
We ended our day at Golden Corral:
The next day we went to Point Loma tide pools. We got there at low tide, but the surf was still too high to see much. Oh well.
Then it was off to the beach once again:
We played a rousing game of Jenga.
Brooke added her own challenge by deciding to play using her feet:
We ditched the kids with pizza and a movie and the grown ups had a very nice meal at Benihana:
We also played Qwirkle after we put the kids to bed:
We found a fun park by my parents’ house and played. The kids and Kathryn collected twigs, acorns, seeds, leaves, thistles, and pinecones:
Then we decided to hit up the beach one more time:
This is Dallas blocking the sun from my eyes. If that isn’t true love, I don’t know what is.
All too soon it was time to say good-bye.
We had to give Grandma and Grandpa’s stuffed animals one last hug:
And we had to give Grandma and Grandpa one last hug:
We always love our trips to California. We were glad to bring Kathryn this time around and make some fun memories with her.
The Best Summer Ever Part III
I have to finish posting our summer pictures so I can move on to posting about our recent trip to California, so buckle up. Let’s do this!
We went to the planetarium. On our way we saw a photo-op and had to take advantage:
Our Pass of All Passes gets us into the Fun Center in Lehi. Anytime we are down that way we run in to do a little rock climbing:…or to ride the Frog Hopper:
They have a pirate ship ride that isn’t scary at all, but Brooke had fun pretending it was:
Our Pass of All Passes also got us tickets to see Big River at the Scera Shell:Our relaxed summer schedule gave me time to give all three girls a crown braid on the same day. Photos were absolutely necessary after that: Dallas and I snuck away and went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s Pioneer Concert:Speaking of dates, Dallas and I have started having “Dessert Dates” with our kids as a way to get some one-on-one time with each of them:
We went to the Dinosaur Museum at Thanksgiving Point:
We walked around Bountiful Pond and got swarmed by mosquitoes:
We went to Wardle Fields Park. This is an amazing splash pad/park. It was so fun! I keep telling Dallas I hate camping and he keeps trying to convince me that I can learn to love camping. He was sure that a new, spacious tent would have me begging to go camping more often.Â
It didn’t work. Camping is still the worst, but we did still have fun at our ward campout:
Sarah and I took the troops to the Museum of Natural Curiosity. Caroline proved to be an excellent baby tender:
Madison showed us her trick. If a French fry is too hot, she puts it in her water…
…and then it’s the perfect temperature for eating! Delicious…?We went to Orem to play with Ania. Brooke used clay to make friendship necklaces for her and Ania. One necklace had peanut butter bread and the other necklace had jelly. Here they are smashing their necklaces together to make a friendship sandwich: We spent more time at the racetrack. The highlight was the double decker car race: My grandma hosted several family parties that we went to:
The kids enjoyed the fathers and kids campout:We went to Creekside Park yet again:Dallas took the kids on a morning hike:
We visited our neighborhood splash pad many times:
We visited the police and fire trucks in our neighborhood at safety night:
More hikes:And more camping:
And we are done! Summer is over! Bring on fall!
The Best Summer Ever Part II
We went down to Provo to see Dallas’s mom. She invited us over for ice cream and a concert in the park. We used to love going to the park concerts when we lived down there, so it was fun to go to another one.
Summer recreation classes continued for Spencer and Brooke meaning Caroline and Madison were left to play at the park. One day they had the great idea to bring scooters to the park. Unfortunately we didn’t have the great idea to bring the scooters back home. By the time we realized our oversight Caroline’s scooter was nowhere to be found. We were thankfully able to recover Madison’s scooter. Little did Caroline know this would be the last time she rode her trusty scooter:Caroline had a birthday and turned 9!
Caroline saw how much fun Brooke had decorating the cake she had on her birthday that she decided to follow suit and try her hand at cake decorating:Caroline wanted to go to Chuck E. Cheese for her birthday. What the birthday girl wants, she gets!
Family selfie! So happy Dallas’s eye made it into the shot:
The kids made a lot of Lego creations:We had several camping trips. This is the stake fathers and kids campout. Spencer was a little nervous to try the zip line: He finally bravely made the jump after standing at the top for several minutes prompting everyone who was waiting in line to encourage him by chanting his name repeatedly. We went to the city kite festival. They handed out free kites that we got to decorate and fly: The kids took swimming lessons: We had fun on our ward campout: We played some more at Creekside Park: We went to Seven Peaks a million times: Spencer was thrilled to do a little role playing during church:We went to the city’s car show and saw awesome cars:
Caroline took a gymnastics class. She got a new leotard for her birthday to wear:Madison saw me take Caroline’s picture and needed to get in on the action…mismatched shoes and all:All four kids played nicely together at least once during the summer:Haley taught Brooke how to make a delicious fruit pizza:We watched fireworks on the golf course: Oma invited us to swim in her fun rec center pool and took us out to eat after:Madison has discovered Oma’s Barbie collection and loves to play with them every time we go down: We hit up the skating rink: Madison made me and Dallas laugh as she’d scooter around the track and give us a winky face, thumbs up every time she passed: The kids participated in our library’s summer reading program and got prizes:We hiked to Cecret Lake with the Fraziers: We have more summer pictures than I thought! Be on the lookout for Part III!