San Diego and Our Priceless Memories

We decided to surprise the kids with a trip to San Diego this weekend. It was in the low 70s and perfect weather. Ben and I decided that we were going to create some priceless memories. Oh, no.. right? Our trip started waking up at 3:30 am Saturday morning and catching the 6:00am flight. We were able to catch the flight and arrived in S.D. around 9am. We then took a shuttle to the hotel (in a bus with no shocks) and arrived only to find out we had 5 min. to catch the shuttle to Sea World. So we checked in our luggage and changed shoes and we were off to Sea World. We then were able to enjoy the rides and weather.We were able to see The Polar Express in 4-D. Where it snowed in the theatre and the temp. adjusted as you neared the North Pole. We were also able to see the holiday Shamu night show which is pretty amazing. We then made it back to the hotel around 7:45pm. We went to check in and then down to the rest. to eat. Ella fell asleep in the booth sitting straight up before dinner arrived. Camden fell asleep on my lap shortly after his dinner arrived. The food was great and we tucked ourselves in early for the night. The next morning we woke up and were able to swim at 8am. The pool was heated and felt pretty warm.... considering it was a little chilly outside. We then decided we had enough of the kids arguing and wanted to take the 1:30 flight home. At the airport as the plane was boarding we found out there were only middle seats available. So we opted to wait until the next flight 3 hours later. My kids again fell asleep on the airport floor and in my lap and I was able to read a book. We ended up at home 8pm Sunday night and tucked everyone in for bed. Although, we tried to create some priceless memories Ben and I both agreed we had enough of those "priceless" memories to last us a VERY long time.

My Gangsta Four Year Old- Happy B day!

My youngest is four today! It started off being a great day until Camden went to go to preschool and hit his eye on a friend's van. Bummer.... Here are a pictures of the celebration. I made the cake from scratch and decorated the cake myself! Camden is at a fun age and loves to pretend to imagine things and dress up as a super hero.

Ella's first meet

Here are a few pictures of Ella at her first meet. This was the first performance in front of a large audience. She did great! She got a 7.4 on bars, 6.85 on floor (the audience was right next to the floor), a 7.0 on vault, and a 5.5 on beam. Ella's gym. coach thought Ella's vault was funny... because she'd never seen her vault like that before. I'm proud of her for performing in front of a large crowd. It will be fun to see her as she gets in more meets this year. The judge on the beam must have been from Russia. (as my father in law said) Ella didn't fall off once! GO ELLA!

Last few Months

Here are a few photos from the past few months. The first one is of the kids at the fair. The second is of me and bangs. I think I like them.... they cover that big frown wrinkle in the middle of my forehead. The third picture is of Parker at the fair. They had a human heart you could touch and he was eager to inspect it. The last picture is of Mckenna who is Ella's good friend from gymnastics. On a happy note Ben started his new job today! Yeah.... we are excited for this next step in his career.

Hike to local falls

We had fun on our hike this weekend. It was 1/2 mile down..which wasn't too challenging. On the way up Camden started to complain that he was sweating. I told him that was good... he was burning calories but that didn't seem to cease the complaining. So Ben found a "magic" walking stick that seemed to help Camden finish the hike. Ella ran on the way up.... I know that's a big surprise! Ben also made a contribution to this set of pictures. See which one you think it is...

Day at Dash Pt Park

Camden spent the watching some older boys on their skim boards. He was pretty bummed we hadn't brought ours until he found this piece of wood. If you look closely you can see part of a piece of wood under his feet. Here he is balancing on his homemade surfboard

A little present for myself

I haven't been on a vacation by myself in 7 to 8 years. I started feeling how wonderful it would be just to sneak away. As it turns out (it was a sign) the flights to Hawaii were super cheap. So a few girlfriends and I went for a few days the first part of June. It was a trip of many firsts for me. I went parasailing, and swam in sharks cove, and swam to a waterfall. I also tried octopus at Todai. Barf.... I wouldn't recomend it. It was fun to see my nephew and my brother and his family. It was so great to remember who I am. Sometimes, I think we tend to lose ourselves throughout the days and years. This was great for me as Jodi said "for many reasons". So I will leave it at that...... I am trying this year to not just endure my life but really enjoy it!