Thanksgiving trip - California

We left Sunday morning, November 11th for our 2 week California/Utah trip over Thanksgiving break.  The drive to San Clemente was a little over 6 hours and the kids did great!  We stayed at the Mortensen family condo, which is right on the beach, with John's brother Joe, his wife Lisa, and 3 of their kids. 

Monday I went for a run (I love running on the beach trail there), then took the kids down to the pier and walked around for awhile.  Brooklyn is really into the Little Mermaid right now and would look out into the water and ask "Ariel is??" 

twins! - people have already asked me if they are twins...umm no, look again.  But one day I'm sure you won't be able to tell there is difference in age.

on the condo balcony - it is so pretty here, I love it.

Pictures on the pier...

it was surprisingly chilly for us hot blooded Arizona folk!

This isn't the best picture, but it shows the condo - the white building to the side of Brooklyn with the red roof.

We also went to the park which is right by the condo.  It was so nice all week to not be rushed to go or do anything, and to have John with us wherever we went.

swings right on the beach

That night we did hotdogs and s'mores on the beach.  John's sister Shari and her family joined us and it was so fun to see them again and spend time together.  The beach was dark (this was right after daylight savings) and hard to see what we were doing at times, but we still had fun.

I love these 2 pictures.  This is Brooklyn's cousin Drew (Shari's son).  He was the cutest with Brooklyn and kept asking her if she wanted a hug...which you can tell by the pictures she was more than happy to give him one.  I think you can definitely tell they are cousins.

cute Sadie

This was the only day I took pictures.  But we also went to the Spectrum with everyone and rode the faris wheel, Shari watched the kids so John and I could see the new 007 Skyfall (which we both loved), got surfin' donuts (more than once), played at the beach, and had ourselves a great time :)

zoo trip with friends

To start off John's 2-week break from school, and before we left on our trip, we went to the zoo with friends.  We have a zoo pass and I'm so excited to start going more often.

We met Nate and Kayla at the zoo Saturday morning when it opened.  They have the cutest little girl named Lexi, who is 5 months younger than Brooklyn.  Kayla and I do a lot together during the week with a few other moms.  It was fun to have husbands/daddys along this time to join us!

The weather was great (finally!) and we took our time walking all around the zoo.  We pretty much saw it all - elephants, giraffes, lions, zebras, rhinos, monkeys, ...you get the idea. 

Brooklyn was terrified of these statues of animals (she thought they were real).  You can see the fear in her face and she had a death grip on John. 

cute little Lexi

We went to the petting zoo and let the girls see and touch the goats.  Brooklyn wasn't so sure about them and kept her distance at first, but eventually warmed up.  Lexi LOVED them and was crackin' us up - she not only was petting them, but laying on them and giving them hugs too. 

Nate and Jake

We also rode the carousel and Brooklyn wasn't afraid of it this time.  She knew right what to do and picked a rhino to ride on.

And at the end of the day Jake had a HUGE blowout - he has them daily - but this one was massive and was everywhere.  We stripped him down and cleaned him up and he was a good sport about wearing just a jacket the rest of the day because I forgot a change of clothes.

Halloween

Our kids were sick the week of Halloween.  I don't know if we picked something up in Utah or something on the airplane flying home, but it was a low-key week.  Brooklyn had it the worst...a cold/cough/runny nose and definitely wasn't her normal, active self.  But we still made the most of it and did a few Halloween-ish things.

Monday night, our good friends invited us over for a Halloween party (dinner, dessert, cookie frosting).  The kids were Pebbles and Bam Bam and John and I dressed up as Fred and Wilma (thank you Shari for the costumes).  I must so say myself...we looked pretty awesome.  BUT, I didn't take ONE picture!  I can't believe I completely forgot to.  I'm tempted to have us all dress up again just so I can at least get one picture.

Tuesday night we carved pumpkins.  Brooklyn thought it was pretty neat but didn't last too long because she wasn't feeling well. 

sick little girl

My pumpkin turned out special (I was trying to be quick)...ha ha.  Even Brooklyn would point to it and say "special" :)

John did a zorro pumpkin.  And poor Jake...wasn't feeling that great either and drooling all over the place.

He was done by this point.

On Halloween (Wednesday) Brooklyn woke up feeling the most sick she was all week...fever, cough, runny nose, and would cry and say, "body..owie!"  I made a bed for her on the couch and she laid around and watched The Little Mermaid and Nemo most of the day.  (I don't like having sick kids, but I did get a LOT done that day). 

 

We still had our traditional Halloween dinner of chili and cinnamon rolls - it was delicious.  We decided not to take the kids out trick-or-treating.  With them not feeling well and not knowing the difference whether we went or not, plus no candy for John and I to be tempted to eat.

For the most part, we've started to feel better (although Jake has gotten a little worse).  Brooklyn learned how to climb up on the changing table and I find her there all the time now picking out different bows she wants to wear.

We took the kids to the park the night after Halloween to get out and have some fun.  Brooklyn loves the park, especially swinging and going down the slide, which she does all by herself now.

I love these kiddos!