California Adventures: Loomis, Watsonville, Wet Suits

Last fall, I was talking with my friend about how I wanted to go to California to visit Daniel's parents, but since he didn't want to do the drive (and we can't justify the cost of flying out there for all 6 of us) I wasn't sure how I'd get out there because I was uneasy about driving out there as the only driver (My fear was that if I were to get a migraine that I wouldn't have anyone to take over the driving - 12 hours)

Jerrilyn said that her parents live only 3 hours away from Daniel's parents, so we made plans to caravan out there during spring break. 

 

Spring break finally came and we went! 

The night before was a long night.  We were all packed and ready to go, but sleep was eluding us.  Jane woke up at 1 and didn't go back to sleep (thankfully she fell asleep in the van, but only after several hours into the trip!) our smoke detector decided to remind us that it was there at 2, 2:30 and 3  (the first two times, the one upstairs just beeped for a few seconds 30 minutes apart and the third time all of the alarms went off in loud mode for about 10 seconds). Seriously?  There was no fire no smoke and it wasn't a low battery chirp.  Oh well.  We were all in good spirits to begin the trip at any rate!

I invited my niece, Mieren, to come with us.  She is 17 years old and inviting her to come was the best decision we made about this trip!  She was a pure delight to have with us and I really think that the boys were better behaved because of her presence! 

We loaded up the van with activities to keep everyone busy and traveled 9 hours to Loomis.  I packed some movies that Jane has never watched, but that I knew she would love, to keep her entertained.  It was such a delight to listen to her watch Cinderella.  She gasped out loud when Cinderella's dress was torn, she yelled at the cat to go away, and she sighed when Cinderella and Prince Charming kissed!  It was one of the cutest things to witness!

We made it to Loomis ahead of Jerrilyn's family because they didn't leave until a few hours after we had planned.  We got in the pool at the Johnson's house and got quite a few wiggles out. 

Jerrilyn's brother is living at the house with his family, so Jane was able to play with the toys from the girl's room.  She loved it all! 

Once the Butterfield's got there, the kids played some games and ran around the large yard.

The next morning we went for a walk up to the reservoir by the house.

After lunch we headed began the second leg of our trip. Loomis to Watsonville should take about 3 hours, but we missed the interstate we were planning on taking (seriously, Mieren and I never saw the exit and we didn't realize that we had passed it until way too late) and turned it into a 5 hour trip.  I had a moment of panic, called Daniel to help us figure out what route to take.  Meanwhile, Les (Daniel's Dad) had left to meet us at a city 40 minutes away from their house, but we weren't anywhere close to that city.  We finally got on the right route and met up with Les for dinner, then drove to Watsonville.  He took us on the scenic route home which was breathtaking!  We drove through a twisty mountain road and we were completely covered by trees.  Mieren and I sounded like we were watching fire works with all of our "Oooh's" and "Aaaugh's"! 

It was this section of our trip that I was truly grateful to have Mieren with me.  She was driving, so I was able to focus on getting the route.  I don't handle stress well- I really like to have a plan, I like to know where I am going and I really didn't like the idea of being in San Francisco during rush hour. Mieren was perfectly Zen.  She helped me to be calm and to look at this as an adventure, not a burden. 

We settled in to our spaces and played games while waiting for Janet to get home from work.

 

The next morning we drove to Santa Cruz to rent some wet suits and boogie boards.  The last two days of traveling no one asked me the dreaded "are we there yet" question, but on the 30 minute drive to the beach, Jane was so excited that she asked me 3 times! 

A few things that I did to help the kids know how far along we were on the trip- I used push pins to pin circles on the ceiling of the van above the driver/shotgun seats.  The circles were labeled in increments of 50.  For every 50 miles that we drove, the driver would shout out "50"! and we'd move our marker to the next circle.  I also printed out a map with our route highlighted and had one in every seat.  Of course, since our trip to Watsonville was not according to the highlighted route, we didn't worry about doing the circles.   The kids were really good about not complaining.  They traveled beautifully, and even though I knew that they were bored and impatient to get out, they didn't get upset or cause any problems. 

It took three of us to get Seth into his wet suit.  The kid was a good sport about it, and it was worth all of the effort- he took to the water like a natural.  He looked pretty good out there! 

This little girl loved the beach!  She spent the entire time chasing and running away from the waves.  Jane was so much fun to watch!  I knew that she would be extra work to bring with us, and we toyed with the idea of keeping her home, but I'm glad that she came! 

Mark decided that he didn't want to get in the water.  He didn't really play in the water the entire trip, but he still had a good time.  Since we had rented a wet suit for him, I decided to try my luck at wearing his.  It was a snug fit, but I got into mine more easily than Seth got into his!

Mieren had fun with the boogie boards.

Paul looked really good out in the water in that wet suit. He looked a lot older than 12 to me.

Les even got his wet suit on and tried out the boogie boards!

Strike a pose!

Paul wore his wetsuit for a while, then changed out of it to finish playing on the beach. 

We all thought that Seth looked like a penguin when he carried the board like this! 

 I decided to give the boogie board a try.  I actually had fun- didn't enjoy the salt water in my mouth though! Since I get motion sick really easily, I was worried about how I would react.  Even just standing in the waves while some water was moving back towards the ocean and some was moving towards the shore would make me feel queasy, but I was able to have some fun without getting sick! 

We had some downtime after our morning adventure.  Les keeps his monitor on a slide show of all of his pictures, so we had a lot of fun sitting around his computer and looking at the kids when they were little!

Jane was a champ considering that she didn't have regular naps during the trip.  She only napped in the car.

While the older kids were resting, Seth, Jane, Janet, Les and I went to another beach. We saw this dock covered in sea lions.  Cool and gross. 

The wind was coming off of the ocean, so it was really quite cold out side, but we still played in the water for a bit!

We walked to the local park to fly Grandpa's remote controlled helicopters and then headed back.

Seth enjoying his luxury ride courtesy of Paul!

Jane wanted a picture of her on my back, so this is the best one I could get.  She was just soaking in everything about this adventure!

With one half of our trip done, we were tired, but excited for the other adventures we had planned. 

Next up: Monterey, Sunset, Easter Sunday.

 

 

 

Seth Abraham Taylor

 

 

On November 15, 2004, we welcomed another little boy into the family.  When we were thinking of names this time around we realized that we had a bit of a pattern going on, with one syllable and four letters.  We didn't realized until after we picked the name Seth that the boy's names are in alphabetical order according to birth order.  I often joke that if we had named Paul first and Mark second, that we would have PMS instead of MPS! 

We decided on Seth's name because we liked it and since the third son of Adam and Eve (that we know about ) was named Seth, and this was our third son, it fit.  The middle name of Abraham stands for Abraham Lincoln.  I read a lot of books while I was pregnant and I became fascinated with the history of Abraham Lincoln.  I read as many books as the library had available to me about him.  What stood out to me about Abraham Lincoln was his attitude of fairness, his work ethic and his integrity.  I hoped that my son would have these characteristics, so it felt natural to use the name Abraham.  So far Seth isn't taking after the physical attributes of Abraham Lincoln though- we don't typically use the word 'tall' when talking about Seth! (There is hope for him that he will be tall, but it is likely that he has the 'Kresser' genes from me!)
 


The first two months of Seth's life were hard for us.  He was up and crying every 3 hours around the clock.  Around 4 weeks old, he developed a rash on his head and body that concerned me, so I took him into the doctor and we discovered that he was allergic to milk.  I was breastfeeding exclusively, so I tried to eliminate milk from my diet, but it proved to be too difficult for me at the time, so we switched him to formula.  Even on the formula he was up and crying every 3 hours.  He was in pain.  The doctor switched him to another formula that was a hypoallergenic formula (free of the dairy and soy that were giving him problems- expensive stuff, but so worth it!). The first feeding of that formula finally let his body relax and he started to sleep through the night. His body finally outgrew the sensitivity to the proteins and he doesn't have any problems with foods now.


Seth is the kind of person who everyone wants to be friends with. He is loyal, creative, a problem solver and thoughtful.  All of his teachers have adored him- you just have to, though, he is such a cute kid!  I love to look through the pictures of him because they are all so cute!  I really have a hard time picking out my favorites. He was just such a happy little kid.  He had the chubbiest checks, the most adorable smile and the cutest little walk I have ever seen.

When Seth was 10 months old, we moved to Georgia for one year. He melted everyone's heart in the neighborhood. Several of the kids would come over just to touch his hair (they were African-American and their baby's hair wasn't nearly as soft and fluffy as Seth's!)  I was playing the piano at church, and I had several ladies practically fight over who got to hold him while I played! I wasn't alone in thinking that he was adorable!  He was always happy to go to anyone.

Sadly, we don't have many pictures of him from about 10 months to 14 months because our computer crashed and we lost all of the pictures that I hadn't backed up.  We lost the pictures of his first birthday and some fun Christmas pictures. Thankfully I had his pictures taken professionally for his birthday, so I had a physical copy of that milestone!

Seth used a pacifier until he was 18 months old.  He didn't suck on it though- he would suck on his finger and use the smooth part of the plastic to rub on his lips!  I wanted to get rid of the pacifier, but wasn't sure how to do it.  Mark came home from school one day with a little red silicon bracelet that said "Drug Free" on it.  Seth adopted it and used that in place of the pacifier!  He also had a little plastic caterpillar that he carried around for a long time, too.  He used that bracelet until he was about 5 years old.  He stopped using it a while after he stopped sucking his finger. 


Here he is with his red bracelet and his blue caterpillar.  He had them with him all of the time!

He got his first haircut when he was about 18 months old. When we were in Georgia, the back of his head was covered in beautiful little curls.  When we moved back to Utah (we were in Georgia for under a year) his hair didn't curl as much without the humidity, so he looked like he had a mullet.  When we went swimming, his hair went part way down his back in one big piece, so it looked like he had a rats tail- way past time for a hair cut!  He was a champ for his haircut.

He has some gorgeous eyelashes!  I love how dark they are and that they frame his brilliant blue eyes so perfectly.  He is such a good looking kid!

Even though he is only nine years old right now, he exhibits several personality traits that he has had his entire life.  The main one is his determination.  Some people might read it as stubborn, but stubborn connotes a negative vibe and what he displays isn't negative- in fact it may prove to be a very positive thing for him as he gets older.  Once Seth has made up his mind that he isn't going to do something for whatever reason (fear, doesn't feel good about it, just doesn't want to, etc.) there isn't anything we can do to change his mind. 

When we went indoor skydiving a few years ago, Seth was set to participate.  Once he got there, he didn't want to do it- it was too high for him and he wanted out.  We did our best to convince him to just try it- we even bribed him- to no avail.  He was happy to sit it out with me and Jane and just watch.  He has had friends try to convince him to do things (and sometimes they aren't even bad things) and he won't budge. So far this hasn't hurt him, and I realize that it might hold him back from trying new things sometimes, but he is still adventurous enough that I'm not worried about him standing his ground for what he believes in.

He is a trouper when things are hard.  Last year we went on a hike that was a lot harder than we anticipated.  He was very tired and ready to be done, but we still had a long ways to go to get back. We took a little break, found him a walking stick and he stuck with me and my friend while he worked through the exhaustion.  He was a delight to  have with us and even though he was tired, he didn't complain past the first time that he told me he was ready to be done. 

Seth is growing up.  He is at the difficult age where he isn't a little kid anymore, but isn't quite a teenager yet either.  Stuck in that area of wanting the comforts of being treated like a little kid but wanting the freedoms of a teenager.  He doesn't want to be tucked in at night with a song or a story anymore- it's been a long time since we did that. But he still wants some attention, so we rub his legs most nights and I think that he enjoys listening in on us telling stories and singing songs with Jane in the bedroom next to his! 

Seth is a wonderful big brother to Jane.  I have told him many times that he needs to be great friends with her because when Mark and Paul move out of the house, it will just be the two of them left here together.  I want her to have someone to look up to and to love her.  Their relationship is sweet and he is very tender with her.

If I had to use two words to describe Seth, they would be gentle and genuine.  He has a gentle soul and his demeanor is gentle.  He enjoys being rough and silly at times, but that isn't how he is normally.  He does things from the heart and naturally tries to be good and kind, that is why I picked the word genuine.  His behavior is honest and I appreciate that.  I really love being with Seth. I'm excited to see how he grows and changes over the next few years.  Before I know it he will be taller than me!  It is an honor to be Seth's mom- I am one lucky momma!