Special Guests

No, I'm not talking about more opossums...thank goodness. We had some guests for the last two days, the Macks! We were very excited to have them with us for a couple of days as they took a road trip to Kansas to see Jamie's parents. They got here on Sunday evening and left Tuesday morning. After being in the car for two days straight the kids were antsy, so we put out the sprinkler and kiddie pool to give them something to do right when they got here.

The next day was spent at a park in Rockwall. There are some water features (actually made for kids to play in) so we took a picnic lunch and the kids got to run through the water. Randy found the disc golf course a played a few holes. He found out very quickly that disc golf in texas, in July, in the middle of the day is not a very pleasant experience. That evening Jason joined us for some yummy Texas BBQ at County Line BBQ, we all left with very full bellies.

Jamie and I had a lot of time to talk and reconnect. It is such a great feeling knowing that all the time between visits, phone calls and emails is wiped away when we get together.

Randy, Jamie, Audrey, Isaac and Violet, thank you for coming to see our piece of Texas. It was our pleasure to have you here, we hope you will come back soon!!!

P.S. Jamie took both of these pictures, I cannot take credit for them, but I am glad she let me use them!!!

She did it again

As many of you remember we have a opossum killer that lives in our backyard! She is keeping true to her reputation, there is one less opossum in the world this morning!

It was about 3am and I heard a familiar noise from the backyard. It was a half growl from Maggie along with that lovely shakign sound that comes while she has something in her mouth. I listend for about 1 minute and heard nothing, then the barking started. Now it wasn't like the last time, this was more of a half bark, a little high pitched, but not as panicky as the last time. So, that woke up Kevin and we both headed to the back door to see what it was. Sure enough, Maggie was satding over something barking. We got the hose to spray her so she would stop and turned the flood lights on in the yard. Kevin's first comment was "It's something small." I looked and said "That's a opossum!" It looked dead, we had pulled Maggie away and she was getting a drink. Kevin asked if we should bring Maggie inside, I said no because what is she had guts on her...gross! Then I suggested he scoop up the opossum and throw it away. He said "What if it's not dead, that's what they do you know." I think I said something like "Maggie wouldn't leave it alone if it was still alive." Shortly after that out of the corner of my eye I saw something moving, sure enough, that stupid thing was only pretending it was dead. Maggie was in the garage at this point, so she wasn't getting after it again. It may have been moving, but it was moving VERY slowly. You see, Maggie had injured it enough that it was dragging the back half of it's body, it was nasty! Kevin said by morning it would be dead, and I said what if it tries to go behind the shed or hide and we can't find it. That's when I left the scene, I just couldn't watch what was about to happen. Kevin got his shovel...yup, you guessed it, hit it over the head and killed it! YUCK!

He then scooped it up, put it in a garbage bag and into the trash. It took a total of 30 minutes, nothing like the 1 1/2 hour ordeal last time.

Maggie got a treat for, once again, protecting her family! Good dog!

What a trip!

Well, I've drawn in out as long as possible. Two weeks ago today we returned to Texas, so I guess it's time to wrap it up. We got to celebrate Joshua's 6th birthday on the last night of our stay in California. We don't get to spend birthdays with our family, so this was definitely a treat. There was more swimming and more food, homemade chocolate ice cream made the birthday cake taste so much better. Again, I didn't get many pictures, but here are a few.

This birthday celebration came complete with a pinata. This was Ethan's attempt to break it, couldn't quite get it. It was fun to spin the teenagers at the party around and then see them try to knock the heck out of it, only for it to be moved right before they swung! It never gets old!

This picture is a replica of one taken in 2004 on our last long trip to California. I have hard copies of the previous picture, but I could not find it on my computer. I wish everyone could see how much Mark and Jakob have changed in 3 years!

This is a picture of Ethan and Kevin in my dad's toy! He has a replica of a Mercedes-Benz, if I told you what year it was I would be lying, so I won't try. The best part was the horn that is on the panel right in front of the passenger. There are about 10 different choices of songs to play while youa re driving down the road, Ethan had his fun pushing those buttons!

WOW, what a trip. We can't thank our families enough for letting us come and go like a hurricane. We had a blast. My parents were perfect hosts (as always), Charlotte runs her home like a 5 star bed and breakfast whenever we are there. Rod and Julie rearranged their schedule to spend more time with us, we felt so blessed because of that extra time with those girls that we miss so much. Our nieces and nephews put up with me talking about "when they were little" they are still very cute kids, but man, when they were little...! Ross and Connie made us a wonderful dinner that gave us time to sit and relax right in the middle of our crazy vacation. Grandpa and Grandma taught us a new game and spent an evening with us that we will not soon forget, we will have so many things to laugh about for a long time. We also were SO happy that the Swanson's came with us. We always talk about our lives in California, and all the great people we know and the fun things we used to do, now they got to experience a little of it for themselves.

For 10 days we were able to have our WHOLE family in the same place, what a blessing!!!

Hume Lake

The final stop on our trip to see California was to the Steinert cabin at Hume Lake. As with all of our other stops, our trip wouldn't have been complete without it. As a child I spent many weeks there enjoying the mountains, and couldn't imagine my friends missing out on that experience. So, after the NFC breakfast we headed to the mountains. We stopped at the fruit stand on our way up, I just couldn't quit eating fruit, I miss it so much! We took a SLOW trip up the mountain so no one would get sick, it worked! When we were at Disneyland it was great to see Ethan's reactions to everything, well at Hume it was fun to Aaron's reactions. I know the mountains are beautiful, I do miss them, there is nothing that speaks to God's creation quite like the mountains, but to witness someone's first experience was great. Aaron is very animated (hm, much like someone else I know) so every chance we had he was asking "Can we stop and take a picture?" and was very excited to talk about how beautiful everything was. As always, the Sierra Nevadas did not disappoint.

The best part about staying at the cabin is that you really don't do much. We thought it would be a nice ending to our trip, and we were right. We sat around, read books, Kevin and Aaron went fishing, we played Mexican Train, we went on hikes (really just walks, but when you have a hiking stick it's a hike!)and we enjoyed ice cream from the Snack Shop...twice! We ate burgers at the Snack Shop one night for dinner, and the next night we ate fish and chicken on the deck at the cabin. Aaron and Kevin went fishing one morning and all I know is that when they got back they were extremely tired (the mountains didn't prove to be very cool because it was over 100 in the valley) and they had caught one fish. Yikes! Ethan witnessed Kevin cleaning the fish they had caught, we weren't sure how that would go over. It was just fine, while he was eating the fish we asked if he knew where the fish came from and his response was something like "Kevin caught it and then he cut it open." At one point he even acted like the piece of fish on his plate was alive and swimming, not sure what that was all about. Eating outside is one of my favorite things to do there, and we always take a group picture! The cabin was just as we had expected. It always brings floods of memories from when I was a child, I'm glad I have new memories that include our friends.

One more day of swimming at Max and Charlotte's!

Ahhhh! It's just gorgeous!

For those of you who know me best you didn't have to guess where the most beautiful place in America is according to me! I LOVE SF!!! I just can't get enough of it. From as early as I can remember I wanted to live there, and from 1999-2001 I was able to do that. It still holds some of my favorite memories. Anyway, enough about me. We only got to spend one day in SF, and really not even the whole day. By this time in our trip we had been running around crazy, but I just couldn't bring my friends to CA without showing them this beautiful city. So on July 3 we headed to SF. WE didn't try to leave early in the morning, we just took our time. Our plan was to spend the morning in SF and then head across the bay to Oakland to see an A's game that evening. We walked around Pier 39, ate lunch, and then headed to Ghirardelli Square for some ice cream. It was SO good! We felt a bit rushed and didn't really get to see as much of San Francisco as we woudl have liked, but it was still beautiful. It was a gorgeous day. I had warned the Swanson's that SF was usually cold and foggy, but much to our surprise it was sunny and warm the day we went. It was amazing. I lived there for two years and saw very few days like that, we were blessed. After our huge ice cream sundaes we drove across the Golden Gate Bridge. What a sight!

Then we went to the A's game. We got to see the A's beat the Blue Jays!!! After the game, since it was July 3, we got to see a fireworks show. This meant we were allowed to go onto the field and watch fireworks from the very grass that the A's play on. The fireworks were amazing, we were so glad we stayed to watch them! Yup, we had this Texan wearing A's gear and doing the wave...and he LOVED it! Go A's!

Our final stop on our trip is up next!

Fres-YES!

On July 2nd we headed to Fresno from Pismo. We tookour time driving and stopped a few places along the way. One of those was for an In-n-Out burger...yummy! Priscilla had eaten one before and Aaron went light because it was pretty close to dinner time when we stopped. I think he still wishes we would have gone back so he could get a double meat, double cheese...next time Aaron! Ethan ate a whole cheeseburger by himself, I think he liked them too.

We were treated to more tri-tip cooked by Rod that night. Connie prepared dinner while we swam and played in the water. Julie made peach cobbler (yum) and Ross made homemade vanilla ice cream (yum). We got plenty to eat and had a great time hanging out with our family.

July 3rd we actually spent the day in San Francisco and went to an A's game, but came back to Fresno for the NFC July 4th breakfast. Tomorrow you will see pictures of SF.

The breakfast was a great time to see many people we haven't seen in at least a year, some longer. We met Charlotte Wiens for the first time, I saw my old (not in years, but the person I have known the longest) friend Jill, caught up with the Mack clan and just talked to a lot of people who we dearly miss. What a treat! We also found out that the Macks are taking a road trip at the end of July and they are going to stop by our house and hang out for a day. We are looking forward to that!

Coming up...The most beautiful place in the USA!

6/30-7/2 Pismo Beach

A trip to California wouldn't be complete without a few days at Pismo Beach. We headed to Pismo on Saturday morning and stayed until Monday. We had told the Swansons that Pismo was notorious for cool temperatures and freezing cold water. We were accurate about our prediction of the freezing water, but we were pleasantly surprised by the weather. It was sunny both days we were there, and you might even say it was warm!

We spent a lot of time sitting on the beach, we walked around town and of course, we ate at Splash Cafe! My grandparents were there for the weekend as well and they introduced us to the domino game Mexican Train, we are hooked! Rod, Julie, Alyssa and Lindsey joined us for the weekend as well, it was great to get to spend some extra time with them. I guess I didn't take very many pictures while we were there, because I feel like we did so much but I don't have mnay pictures to share. One of our favorite things that we did while we were there was actually on our way out fo town. We stopped by Avila Valley Barn. For those of you who live in California and have never been there, you need to go. They have animals that they will let you feed, you can pick your own ollalieberries and raspberries (if you don't know what an ollalieberry is, you MUST go find out!), and they have a huge market to purchase locally grown produce and freshly baked goods. We could have spent hours looking at the food and hundreds buying it, but we only stayed an hour, but came away with plenty of snacks for the rest of our trip. Of course, I have no pictures! Sorry!

Enjoy the few pictures that I have!

Next stop, Fresno...or maybe we should say Fres-YES!

Our stay in Bakersfield

After we spent a wonderful day at Disneyland we headed to Max and Charlotte's house in Bakersfield. Kevin and Aaron played golf with my dad and our nephew Mark on Friday at 11am. They played teams, my dad and Mark vs. Aaron adn Kevin. It was totally set up, you can ask Kevin who won. My friend Kristi (from high school) brought the newest member of her family over so I could meet her! We just hung out, talked and relaxed during the morning. At about 3:30pm people started arriving. My whole side of the family was coming over to swim, play Wii, eat grilled tri-tip and Marie Callendar's pies!!! We had a blast. All our nieces and nephews are growing up SO fast, it was so neat to be able to spend some time with them.

Coming up next, Pismo Beach!

Our whirlwind trip to CA!

We left Texas on June 27 for California with the Swansons for a 10 day tour of our favorite California things. We are now back home, a little tired, but with many stories and new memories!

We flew into Burbank, partly because of the price and partly because our first destination was Disneyland. We got there in the early evening, ate dinner and then headed to our hotel. We woke up early Thursday and got to Disneyland by 8:30am ready for a LONG day! We found it funny that everywhere we went we heard people complaining of the heat and fanning themselves and spraying themselves with water. It was 88 degrees!!! I know, 88 is hot for southern California, but we brought native Texans with us, 88 degrees was the perfect temperature for a day at Disneyland. If it would have been cooler we may have needed our sweatshirts before the sun went down!

We got there and just started walking from ride to ride. The crowd wasn't bad since it was a Thursday. I think Kevin and Aaron waited 45 minutes for Space Mountain and that was the longest we waited. We were a little sad because we didn't get to ride the new Nemo ride, the wait was 2 1/2 hours and we just didn't was to spend that much time in line. Next time! We did manage to ride Dumbo, Pirates and Peter Pan, some of the most important rides in the park. Ethan's biggest accomplishment for the day was riding The Matterhorn. I was very impressed. He wasn't too sure when the ride started, but by the time it was over with he was begging to go again.

For Christmas in 2005 my parents bought my sisters and their families passes so they could go to Disneyland a couple times the next year. Since we do not live there they said they would pay for a trip whenever we made it out to California. So, instead of a few trips to Disneyland we got one day with our friends, Merry Christmas to us! It was so fun seeing Ethan's reaction to everything. I don't know if he had more fun doing everything or if we all had more fun watching him. Thank you Mom and Dad!

Here are some pictures from our day at Disneyland. While looking through the pictures I noticed that Kevin wasn't in any of them, apparenlty he took all the pictures that day. He is in pictures from the rest of our trip.

Tomorrow I will post pictures from our stay in Bakersfield.