June and July 2012

We have been busy, busy, busy this summer.  While I have been posting about our vacation every week, a lot of other stuff has been happening.  While I haven't remembered to get pictures of it all, I have taken a few to show you.

Flowers that Mark bought me!

The day after we got back from California was Father's Day.  I had planned the whole day out before we left, although I could never pin Mark down on exactly what he wanted to do so I knew I would need to be flexible on how everything actually went.  But I had meals planned out and cards and gifts bought before we left.  I have worked in the nursery at church every year for the last 5 years on Father's Day, so this year I told them I wouldn't work that day.  Mark was very grateful for that, he feels like Father's Day is always a non-event (a fact I was hoping to change this year, and did!).  We spent the day "flying by the seat of our pants" per se, doing everything spur of the moment.  We ended up spending quite a bit of time with most of Mark's family, as well as playing games, going to church, and just generally hanging out.  Mark felt like it was a great day!

Also this summer Elijah has been getting together with a friend of his every Monday, either here or at his friends house.  So that has been happening every week.  They have a great time together!  It's so nice for Elijah to have someone to play with the same age as him, very hard to find in our group of friends.  One week we even had a bouncing house set up here for them (and all the other kids of course)!  The story behind that is Mark's shop is next to a business which rents the bounce houses out, and Mark has done a bit of work for them at a steep discount so they wanted to thank him by letting the kids use one of their bounce houses.  It ended up being a very popular thing, we had a neighbor boy come over for the whole day to jump in it and play with our kids, as well as several other neighbor kids.  :-)  One of the neighbors even bought pizza for all the kids using the bouncer!

Another big thing we did this summer was watch my in-laws chickens!  My in-laws have been gone on trips twice this summer, and both times they brought the chickens over to our house for the kids to watch.  The first time around Elijah did most all of the feeding, watering, and other general care and when the chickens were picked up he got paid for all his work!  I knew that whomever did the care would get paid but I didn't tell the kids because I wanted to see who would do the work dillegently without knowing they were getting something back from it.  I was so proud of Elijah, he really did a great job!  The second time around, the kids knew that they would get paid something if they helped but it still ended up being mostly Elijah doing the work, so he got most of the pay when the chickens were picked up.

Micah with the chickens the first time around

And Elijah.  You can see all the stuff I'm sorting for my garage sale behind the boys in these pictures.

And the second time around.  We had them outside this time, which really helped with the smell!

We signed up for the library's summer reading program, but because of our trip we didn't finish it.  When I got back from California it was really hard for me to get back in the swing of things.  I just have struggled so much with how much I have to do and keep up, and we're not even back in school yet!  I'm finally getting back into the swing of things, but the first week was terrible, I was soooo exhausted!  Anyhow, all that to say that I could never seem to get back into the habit of reading out loud to the kids for the month of June.  :-( 

One weekend we went to a birthday party for some of our friends.  They have 2 girls with birthdays in June so they combined them into one party.  It was sooo nicely done, as always!  I enjoy going to parties and seeing how everything is put together.  The kids had a great time with their friends!

Birthday decorations, beautiful as always!

We have also gotten together with several other friends this summer, including cousins.  Emmaline got to spend the night at her cousins house, which she loved!  We also went to the park with friends a few times.  Whenever I'm pregnant people seem to pop out of the woodwork wanting to get together before the baby's born.  Not a bad thing, just makes for a busy time.  The kids always love to see their friends!

In July we went to our church's 4th of July picnic.  For the first time in as long as I can remember it was actually enjoyable, the kids are finally getting old enough to get some of their food themselves so I didn't spend the whole time running back and forth between the food tables and our table trying to get everyone fed and taken care of.  I even had time to eat!  The older kids have so many friends at church that as soon as we were done eating they were off to spend time with them.  And Mark is quite gregarious so he was gone as soon as we were done eating too. I sat at the table with the two little ones and played with cars and occasionally talked with people who stopped by, which is actually more my cup of tea anyway as I'm not very chatty.

We spent the actual 4th of July out at my parents house.  One of my brothers was there, as well as my uncle.  It was a great time of food and fellowship!  My parents had squirt guns and water balloons for the kids, two very popular things.  Even the adults got in on the action!

Water Balloons!!!

This last week was VBS.  I worked in the kitchen like I always do.  4 out of 5 of the kids are old enough to be actually in the program so it was just Micah that had to go in the nursery.  A couple of days we picked up cousins and brought them and the kids loved spending extra time with them!  I'm so glad that week is done, it was just like having a job for me, we had to be there by 8 a.m. everyday and didn't get home till after 1.  I'm so glad I don't have to work outside the home, I'm truly blessed!  I'm truly in awe of those women who are able to work outside the home, I couldn't do it.

So, that's a brief synopsis of some of what's been going on here this past month, in addition to all our regular stuff.  It might not seem like a lot to other people but for me it is just about all I can handle.  I have also been doing a ton of planning, sorting, paperwork, etc. but that will be for another post. :-)

Vacation 2012, part 8

Thursday morning we were up bright and early.  We ate breakfast, then packed up all our stuff and loaded up the car.  It was very sad to say goodbye to Mary and Ty because we don't know how long it will be till they can move back here.  I sure do wish they were closer.  :-(

Saying goodbye...

Before leaving San Diego we decided to visit one more museum at Balboa Park, the model railroad museum. Another one of Mark's hobbies is model trains so he had a great time looking at all the different layouts. I was still feeling a bit quesy, probably an after effect of the motion sickness pills, so I ended up sitting on a bench while he finished looking around.

Balboa Park

More of Balboa Park

And even More of Balboa Park, so beautiful!

Model railroad layout

Mark looking at the N gauge layout, his favorite

On our way out of town we stopped at one last beach, La Jolla. It was a very nice place, very busy, but one of the only beaches we could find with free parking. We enjoyed walking the beach and gathering sea shells. I LOVE the beach, so it was wonderful to get one last chance to visit it before heading inland. 

We were anxious to get home, so we started the long drive back.  We stoped at an In N' Out for dinner.  Yum!!!  Too bad we don't have any In N' Out's here!

We stopped just outside of Vegas for the night and slept in the car.  The next morning we drove straight through all the way to Mom and Dad's to pick up the kids.  We ended up spending the night at Mom and Dad's and coming home Saturday morning.  It is so nice to be home again!

Vacation 2012, part 7

I'm sure you all are getting tired of these vacation posts by now but I promise their are only a few more!  With that said...

On Wednesday, we celebrated Mary's birthday, the main reason for our trip!  Mary opened her gifts first thing in the morning and we ahd so much fun looking at the gift from my parents, a photo album of Mary's growing up years.  Then Ty made waffles for breakfast, Yum!  After that we headed out in 2 cars, Mary and I in one, and Ty and Mark in the other, as we were planning to split up after the first few stops.  We went to the bank for Mary to cash her birthday checks, then to Starbucks where she got a free coffee, and finally to a store for Ty to buy Mary her birthday present.  Ty bought Mary a new lense for her camera, sooo nice!  (I seriously had lense envy!  The picture of Jack in the previous post was taken by Mary with her new lense.)

After all our stops we split up.  Mark and Ty headed out to do some shooting at a shooting range and Mary and I headed to Little Italy for some shopping.  We went to a few stores and I was able to purchase one small gift for each of the kids.  Then it was on to the local "Dog Beach", where dogs are allowed.  We had a great time relaxing at the beach!  It wasn't very busy because the weather was overcast and cold. 

Little Italy

Mary, using her new lense on her camera

Our seats at the beach

Me and Mary relaxing

When we were done at the beach we went back to the boat and had some tea and painted our nails. Then we got dressed and did our hair in preparation for our evening plan, going to a fancy Italian restaurant in Little Italy! We got to eat at an outside table and thouroughly enjoyed our time!

The happy couples!

Me and Mark

We ended the evening back at the boat with homemade tiramisu and a movie! Good times!

Vacation 2012, part 6

After finishing up at the Midway museum we contacted Mary and Ty and got directions to their place.  We had no trouble finding it and spent some very pleasant time at the bay they live in waiting for them to get home (they were out grocery shopping).  When Mary and Ty got home we were able to go and see their boat where they live for the first time!  It is a very nice sailboat, a bit small for a family but perfect for them to live in!  We also met their dog, Jack, who we hadn't seen since he was a puppy.  Boy had he grown!

Mary and Ty's boat, The Fairwind

Jack

Boats at the Marina

Mary's bike :-)

Mary made us a wonderful meal and we spent lots of time talking and catching up on all the news.  Mary was on the night schedule at the hospital so she was a bit tired, so we watched some of a movie and then we all went to bed.

The next morning we had a wonderful leisurely breakfast and then spent the day relaxing and talking.  Mary made us tea and scones, which was wonderful!  The only downside was that I got seasick.  :-(  I know, I know. Sitting in the marina with the boat barely moving and I still had motions sickness...  Mark had to run to the store and get me some medicine, what a lifesaver!

Mary and Ty making breakfast in their "kitchen"

Mark waiting for breakfast in the living/ dining room.

The bathrooom at the Marina.  Mary and Ty don't use the bathroom on their boat so we had to walk to the Marina anytime we needed to use the bathroom or take a shower.

The shower stalls at the Marina.  They were surprisingly nice!

Vacation 2012, part 5

 Monday morning bright and early we were up and packing up our things in the hotel.  The plan was to meet my sister later on in the day, so we hoped to go to one more museum before meeting up with her, the USS Midway.  The USS Midway is a retired Naval Aircraft Carrier that has been turned into a museum.  It was pretty cool!  We spent a lot of time touring around and looking at everything, several hours actually.  My battery on my camera died when we were on the very last part of the tour so I didn't get some of the pictures I wanted, but I did get quite a few good ones.

This was a very popular tourist attraction, even on a Monday we had to wait in line for a place to park (and pay $7!), and then had to wait in line to enter.  We debated back and forth about going to this museum because the cost PER person was $18, which seemed really steep to us but in the end we decided to go and it seemed like a good deal over all.

Mark is in the process of building a model of this plane, an F4U Corsair so he enjoyed seeing one in person.  It's amazing how big it is!

Here is a picture of one of the many "ladders" going from one deck to the next.  They were called ladders because they were too steep to really be called stairs.  They were quite interesting for me to manuever with my big pregnant belly and I had more than one person tell me to watch my step since my balance was a little off :-).

Here Mark is beside another airplane similar to the F4U.  This plane has its wings folded up.  It's amazing how much space there was on this deck (directly below the flight deck), you can see there is plenty of room for a LOT of airplanes!

And here is a picture of Mark in the Executive Officers Office.  You can see how low the ceiling was, Mark only had a few inches clearance above his head.  Although I had more room above my head, being a lot shorter, I was still slightly claustrophobic, especially in the smaller areas.  I could never work on an aircraft carrier, that's for sure!

Here is the laundry room with giant washers!  These suckers were huge!

And here is Mark next to the industrial mixer in the kitchen.  You could really make a lot of food with a mixer like that!

Here are the giant soup tureens in the kitchen.  I can't even begin to imagine how much food they would've had to prepare in the kitchen, or how hot and smelly it must have been.

Here is a typical sailors locker.  Not much space to keep everything a person needs!  They had to pack everything in a certain order or it wouldn't fit!

After the close quarters under the deck it was wonderful to come out on the flight deck!  It was HUGE!

Mark had fun having his picture taken in this airplane!

We had a great time touring this museum!

Vacation 2012, part 4

San Diego Automotive Museum, and San Diego Air and Space Museum, both in Balboa Park:

After a great nights sleep at our hotel, we spent some time finding out about local tourist attractions and decided to go to some of the museums in Balboa Park.  Our first stop was the Automotive Museum.  We had a great time going through and looking at all the different cars!

The museum had this DeLorean, which I thought was so cool!  I had never seen one before, but Mark said that he had even worked on them!

After we finished up there we made a picnic lunch from food that we had brought from home (and kept cool in the cooler all this time!).  We were glad we had gotten there so early because by the time we came out the parking lot was packed and we had people waiting for our spot while we made our lunch, not realizing we weren't going anywhere yet. :-)

Then it was on to the Air and Space Museum!  This was one of the coolest museums ever!  We had so much fun looking at all the different planes and finding out the history behind them. We thought this replica of the Spirit of St. Louis was so neat, one of our favorite movies is the old version of the Spirit of St. Louis with Jimmy Stewart so it was really interesting to see the plane up close and how big it was.

Another cool thing was this capsule from the Apollo 9 mission.  It's hard to believe anyone could stay in such a confined space for any length of time!

Mark even got to see a small plane up close similar to the one that he would like to build!  (Yes, he is planning to build a full size airplane, and complete his pilot training to get his license.  Always something new and exciting for him!  :-))

After leaving the museum we drove around some and bought some dinner at Del Taco which we then took to the beach to eat.  It was sooooo pretty, but very cold.  (The next day we had to go and purchase a sweater coat for me the next day, the temperatures were only in the mid 60's to lower 70's!)