"The plane, the plane.."

Anyone else remember that line from Fantasy Island? Or is that just my family that watched the cheesy show?

Just before Christmas, in the wee hours of the morning, my youngest son and I arrived at the airport for a grand adventure. Thankfully, my oldest dropped us off and spared anyone else that privilege.


The line for breakfast at the bagel shop was long:


I loved his sleepy smile while we waited:


We flew into Ontario....California, that is. Mark took us to work with him, at the airfield where he's been consulting with Boeing. The plane was beautiful (never thought I'd say that about a plane!) and top secret, so I can't show you the pictures I took. Except maybe this one which only shows Peter:


It was Mark's last week working on this project and Peter had always wanted to see where dad works. One day I noticed a sweetly hand addressed envelop to "dad", scratched out with "Mark" written over top. Later, Mark shared it with me. It was the most precious letter he had written his dad to tell him all about how much he loves him and how he wishes someday he could visit his work. So air miles and a shared hotel room with dad, and we were off!

We toured the plane with the nicest man who told Peter everything he could hope to know. Between you and me, I think Peter was having way too much fun using the buttons on the pilot's seat to move it up and down to hear much of what he said! It was a fun trip, even if traveling right before Christmas is a crazy way mess up pre-Christmas prep!

Paradise Day Two

October 23rd, our 18th anniversary, was fantastic! We snorkeled in the morning (which was a huge deal for me, I'm fearful of the water) and went to the Polynesian Cultural Center.

It was beautiful, enlightening, and gave me a new appreciation for the variety of fascinating cultures we share this earth with. Dinner was delicious! Here we are, relaxed and living in the moment:





After dinner we enjoyed the breathtaking show called, "Ha, the breath of life!", which highlights several of the Polynesian Cultures:




The fire dancers made my heart stand still:




On the way back to our suite, we shopped for dinner and rented Redbox movies to watch.

Disneyland = Fun

Disneyland IS fun! Not a new discovery to most of you, but I was thrilled that everyone had a great time. My favorites: Aladdin play, Soarin' California, and Pirates! Or was it Toy Story Video Game Ride, California Screamin' and Space Mountain? Can't decide! Here is the last day there!

I found this crazy family there:


And hopped on a trolley with them:


Then this driver crashed into me:


I met some adventurous boys on Tom Sawyer's Island (or is that a pirate Island?):


Saw Mickey with a cute boy:


Met Mickey (most exciting part of my day!):


Went on a fabulously scary coaster:


All in all, it was a perfect trip to a happy place:

Funcation part 2

Christmas Eve is the perfect day to visit Disneyland, the lines are super short and there aren't crowds to push through!

We camped a few blocks from the park, which turned out to be mostly a parking lot...luckily we didn't spend too much time there!

Daytime was filled with adventures in Disneyland and California Adventure, evenings we came back to eat, and nights were for the adventurous ones who wanted to go late to the park while some of us stayed back to watch movies in the tent trailer.

We kept our Christmas traditions, as much as possible, and reveled in the newness of being away from home during the holidays.

Our Christmas tree (as promised earlier):


Sleepy, but happy, Christmas morning kids:



Opening stockings:

Fantastic Famiy "Funcation"

Vacation plus fun = Funcation!

We had an amazing journey as a family over the last few weeks. It was more than just an average trip for us. We've been planning parts of it for over 7 years.

When the older kids were young they would beg to go to Disneyland (don't all kids?). Mark and I were determined to make it special. For me, I didn't want to go until all the kids were old enough to remember it. Plus we're way too cheap to make it a regular thing ;-) Thus when Peter was born we told the kids we would go when he was old enough to remember, or at least kindergarten age.

Last fall Peter entered first grade and we gave the kids a choice, Disneyland in fall '08 OR Washington DC in fall '08 and Disneyland the following year. Wise ones they are, they chose DC then and Disneyland later.

We planned our trip to include driving down so we could enjoy the sights along the way; namely the redwood forest. And after Disneyland, the best part of the trip...a humanitarian advendture in Mexico! (I know what you might be thinking, that we're crazy for thinking that would be a vacation! But as you'll soon see it was the best part of our trip!)

Day one the kids and I hit the road and made it to Medford, OR. Spencer dutifully set up the borrowed tent trailer (wait to see the outcome of that too!) and we snuggled in to watch Sand Lot. Mark joined us that night, flying in from Alaska.

Day two we drove to the coast highway, stopping in southern Oregon to get the world's best buffalo, elk and beef jerky...plus a "Christmas" tree. Everyone was excited to see the Ocean in Klamath, CA, even Peter who is hiding from the camera for some odd reason:


Love the rugged trees that hold on with such strength:


Then we ventured to "Trees of Mystery" where Mark had fond memories from his family trip years ago, here they all are on Paul Bunyon's foot:


Amazing:


Pausing to soak in the beauty:

Driving towards our next stop Peter kept saying, "I want to see the BIG trees". Hmmm, guess trees of mystery wasn't BIG enough. We went to the Ladybird Johnson Grove, which I hear was stunning. However, I have no pictures to prove it as I was sitting back by the bathrooms with a kid that REALLY had to go! Alas, I did not experience the fantastically BIG trees. Luckily I am content with the ones I did see.

We spent that night in Eureka, CA. Not at all like the TV show, but still not a total loss since we got to see the Carson Mansion.

Day three was just a really long drive through beautiful wine country and long stretches of I-5 to Anaheim.

More summer fun...

Yes, it's no longer Summer and I am behind. So...what's new? Back to school craziness with husband gone, 4 kids in school, one getting ready to enter running start, doing the PTA thing, a house that is way behind on projects...
I'm lucky to be getting any blog entries done!
So enjoy the last glimpse at summer, all taken at temple square in Utah, one of my favorite days there.

Summer memories

August was the best month of summer for me! It also went the fastest...is there a connection there? The more you enjoy something the faster it goes? Hmmm.

It was my favorite because we were all together as a family for the longest period of time! We traveled, we hung out, we had adventures...

Some highlights:

Road trip to Oregon/Utah/Montana...gotta love the car ride, van piled high with stuff, hours of road before us.


In Oregon we found a cool park with OLD Fashioned playground equipment. Love the merry go round!




In Utah we revisited favorite places at BYU with our nieces in tow. The ice cream at the creamery is still as fabulous as I remember it!


Our niece Bethany made us authentic Hawaiin shaved ice at the place she works. They were perfect and I loved the colorful tongues!

Day 11

Favorite people pictures from camping at Fort Worden:

Peter trying to get a serious face, to look like a tough military guy:


Peter with his serious face:


All the kids at the museum: (the extra one is our "adopted" daughter Eunice! We're so glad she came)



Me with my two youngest:


Knoshing on Peeps after the Easter "egg" hunt in the fort:

Day 10

Favorite pictures from Fort Worden:

A little lull in blogging...

Life is always interesting, never boring, sometimes a little hurried. Life is also an everchanging "experience", as Sis. Beck would say (those of you who heard her wonderful talk this past Saturday know what I mean by "experience".)

My life is good and I'm seeking to partake of the best things life has to offer. Like quality time with my kids, by which I mean the kind of time where I listen, teach, lead and love - not boss around, yell or dismiss. Or quality time with my husband, of which I am blessed to get several days every month full of time to do that.

This past 2 weeks has been full to the brim with that kind of time, and time to adjust to going back on campus to take a class (not just online), time to accomadate projects being done around the house and the mess and chaos that goes with that. Time to be spiritually fed during Stake Conference.

Honestly though, I haven't taken enough quality time for myself, even though I am doing new things that are for my growth. Like time to exercise, waking up early enough to give myself time to get ready before I leave the house. Time to breath and connect with how I need to balance out my wonderful life.

This week I am going to take that time and breath and find a good balance. Will you do the same for you? Find your balance and take inventory of the great things in your life.... make a little list maybe...

(And I still have 3 days of our DC trip to finsih blogging. It ended up being a good way to preserve those memories and I'd like to finish, you can just skip over those ones if you'd like....I'll never know ;-) ).

Back to the trip - Day 6

Day 6 of our trip found us headed off to the wild! We rode the metro to the National Zoo. It's amazing that everything like this is FREE in DC! It was a beautiful zoo, well staffed and clean, and again FREE! It was sunny, but cold. One of the coldest days so far on the trip. We took our time and didn't worry about seeing everything, but we did see a lot. I had never seen a live panda bear before. I didn't have my longer zoom lens, so I didn't get any great pictures of the animals, but still enjoyed looking at them.

Peter getting started on the day:


I found a bunch of monkeys there:


I loved the butterfly house. Apparantly I have a few children who are creeped out by butterflies! I don't get it, however I am not going to force them to enjoy butterflies so my mother in law and I took our time looking while the scardy cats quickly escaped:


They have some beautiful tigers and a lion there also! My favorite.

Then we got back on the metro and went to the National Archives:




Exciting place to be, espcially for National Treasure fans like our kids. We watched the intro movie that tells about the thousands of things you can see there. Honestly, we just wanted to see the Declaration of Independance, The Bill of Rights and some other historically amazing documents. We waited in line for awhile. They are SUPER strict about flash photography in this part of the archives, so I didn't even attempt pictures. The lighting is very dim and guards stand on either side of the cases. It was another one of those indescribable moments for me. Standing there reading those original documents brought home the reality to me of the blessings of living in this country formed by men who were lead by the Spirit at a time in the world's history when things were ripe for the gospel to be brought back to the earth. Sadly the ink is so faded it's almost impossible to read the signatures.

Then we went to the visitors center for the white house, not at all close to the white house, but still pretty cool. We got there about 15 minutes before it closed. Another example of our lack of timing, which we found comical every time. We walked to the back (or is it actually the front?) of the white house:




Then we walked around for kids to shop at the tourist kiosks. It really was cold, but a beautiful fall day:


We headed back to the metro, all tired out, and went back for a warm dinner at the hotel. It was a good day!