California Adventures: Monterey, Sunset, Aunt Pam's, Home Again

Saturday morning we drove down to Monterey. We explored the bay and visited the souvenir shops. Mieren found the maple fudge she was looking for, and I bought a sweatshirt because I was cold. When we stopped for a picture, Jane did not want to cooperate. The forced pictures are so much fun! Paul and Seth decided to act like Jane so they 'cried' too!

While we were looking at the shops, we got separated from Les.  Jane, Seth and I stayed at the van to see if he would return and the others went looking for him. It was great that we all had cellphones to communicate with, because we didn't have to worry about the search party getting lost!   

This is us in the van waiting for the search party to return.

Les had gone to the market by the parking lot and bought a case of fresh strawberries.  Those strawberries were delicious!  Jane loved them!

Les and Jane

We drove to a rocky shore and played on the rocks.  This was Easter weekend, so the sandy areas were really packed.  It was a lot of fun to explore the rocks and watch the waves.

Me (and Batman!)

Seth

Me and Seth

Paul and Mieren

Mieren was mesmerized by the water.  I think that she could have stayed in that spot for hours! 

Jane would stand in the sand, wiggle her feet (and consequently her little bum) back and forth to dig her feet into the sand.  It was so fun to watch!  She was kind of afraid of the big rocks and the waves, so we stayed back in this little area and looked at the rocks.  We started to collect rocks and shell fragments that were different colors. Just around our feet we found red, pink, purple, white, black, brown, orange and blue.  It was amazing to me that there was such a variety of colors when closely inspected. 

Mark

After driving around Carmel Beach and not finding one parking spot, yet alone the two that we needed, we drove up to Moss Landing Beach and played in the water.  Mark wasn't feeling much like playing in the water at all this trip.  He played in the sand, made some sand castles with Jane and Mieren, but for the most part didn't get wet (except for the time that he fell down in the water just minutes before we were leaving!)

The cold weather didn't bother Paul, Seth and Mieren- they were in their swimsuits.
The rest of us were covered up a bit more.

Seth had a blast throwing the ball into the waves and retrieving it.

 

 

Jane, Me (wearing shorts!) Paul, Mieren, Mark 

Les and Janet in their beach attire

That evening after dinner a few of us went over to Sunset Beach to watch the sunset. I have a list of things that I want to do before I turn 40, and watching the sunset at the beach was one of them. How fitting is it to check that item off of the list at Sunset beach?! It was a beautiful, peaceful sunset. We had a great time playing on the shore.  Jane entertained herself by chasing the waves- she had a blast!  I went for a jog along the beach. I wasn't gone for very long, but when I was at the farthest point away, I realized that I was completely alone and it felt kind of good to have a small break.

Sunset at the beach

Mark and Paul found a dead jellyfish and HAD to pose with it!

Mark came and watched the sunset with me.

The next morning we changed plans and decided not to go to San Francisco and spend one more night in Watsonville.  It was a great decision because it gave us more time to visit and gave us a relaxing day.  We went to Santa Cruz where we watched some surfers, explored a small section of the beach and Les nearly broke his elbow when he jumped over a fence to get closer to the edge.

 

Mark, Mieren, Seth

My handsome Paul

Seth, Mark, Les, Mieren, Janet

Seth, Jane, Me, Mieren, Mark, Paul

We arrived at Aunt Pam and Uncle Steve's house (Daniel's aunt and uncle- Janet's brother and sister-in-law) just in time for a lovely Easter lunch.  I was excited to meet Pam in person because I only know her from Facebook. It was a short visit and next time we are in town I'd love to spend more time with them.  Pam's sisters (most of them anyhow) were there with their families so we had a nice size group there to visit with. It was great to meet them. We had a nice, relaxing afternoon.

 

ALL of the unmarried people were required to participate in the egg hunt.  Mark and Paul were not thrilled with this rule, so I told them that they didn't have to participate, but only those who do participate get a ride back to Grandpa and Grandma's house.  Suddenly they were willing participants!   

 

See how excited Paul was!?

That's the spirit, Mark!

Jane and Pam's sister looking for an egg.

Jane won the egg hunt by finding the most eggs.  She might have had some help with finding eggs. I think that everyone in the backyard helped her find a few eggs! 

Jane learning how to eat a Peeps marshmallow by watching Paul

She stuffed the whole thing in!

The winner's prize- a chocolate bunny!

A little note about that candy necklace that Jane is wearing.  She got it the day before and ate most of it.  The next day I saw it on the table and almost threw it away, but decided to set it aside.  She remembered the necklace when we got into the van to go to Pam's house.  Luckily, I knew where it was and she was delighted to wear it.  She didn't finish eating it until that night.  It does make a cute little accessory!

Me and Pam

Pam, Steve, Janet, Les

Steve, Janet, Sherron, Les

 

Mieren, Pam, Paul, Mark

After a delightful visit, we headed back to Watsonville.  We went to the beach one last time in the evening, but I decided to leave my camera behind and just enjoy the time with the kids.  I really love the beach! 

 

Monday we went out to lunch with Les, and headed back to Loomis.  We found the illusive I-5 and got there in three hours.  Bright and early on Tuesday morning we loaded everyone up and headed back to Utah. 

We were caravanning with the Butterfields for about 2 hours into the 9 hour drive, but they got a flat tire and had to call for help because they didn't have a spare.  Since I couldn't really help and Jane was getting anxious to get going, we abandoned them out in the middle of nowhere in Nevada and headed home.  (They got their tires fixed and were a couple of hours behind us)

 

We experienced crazy weather on the drive home.  We drove through a rain storm, a snow storm (visibility of 15-20 feet), a dust storm, we were attacked by tumbleweeds, and finished off in a high wind storm.  Thankfully we were safe and everything went well.  Our windshield took a beating and our fingers were sore from some "white knuckle driving", but other than that we were safe! 

A sign that they had a good time!

 Daniel had an entire week home alone.  By the end of the week he was ready for us to be home. He had several days to recuperate from his crazy work schedule (he worked 5 weeks of 60-70 hours a week leading up to this trip). I think that the R&R was needed, but a bit long to be alone.  On the other hand, I was really ready for some time alone.  I genuinely enjoyed this trip with the kids and I really hope to do it again, but when I arrived home, I was ready for a bit of R&R myself.

 

The last ten minutes of the drive we were all a little slap happy.  Call it cabin fever, exhaustion or whatever, but we were all super silly. 

 

When we came into the house, I was greeted by this:

 

I took this picture after we had dinner, but the table was set and there was beef stew in the crockpot.  That was divine to come home to! 

After we unloaded the van and got things put away a bit, we were ready for dinner.  Daniel said that he was going to call the kids up for dinner, but I told him to wait- I'd rather eat dinner without them.  Daniel and I enjoyed a lovely dinner as we caught each other up on the events of the week.  Then we called the kids up for dinner and we sat and talked with them while they ate. 

All in all it was a successful trip.  I am anxious to go again when Jane is a little bit older and isn't quite as much work to keep up with.  It was wonderful to visit with Janet and Les.  Now that I know that the kids travel well- I'm sure we'll make it out again (in a year or so).

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.