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Southern California Day 6

 


We had planned to have a relaxing morning on Tuesday, but Matt had other ideas. So we left Papa and Ben at home and took a spin around Disneyland for a few rides. It was a chilly day with short lines and we had nice soup for lunch in Frontier Land.

 

After lunch, we collected my dad and Ben and met up with Kjersten and her little ones again for beach time! We went to Aliso State Beach and it was a really nice, super pretty beach that wasn’t too crowded. It was a bit too cold to swim, but we had a great time chatting and the kids played in the sand.

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Southern California Day 5

 


So after the half marathon, we chilled just a bit. We slept in (ish) and did not-a-lot. In the AM we went to IKEA. There still isn’t one near us and we all wanted to pick up a few things. Surprisingly, Tabby and my dad had a really great time. Tabby played “house” in their design setups and served my dad tea.

 

After IKEA, we went to Ruby’s in Huntington Beach and had a sinfully yummy diner lunch on the pier. After lunch, we went to the Crystal Cove State Park tide pools and checked out cute little hermit crabs and anemones or urchins or something. Super cool, other than the 10 minute walk back so somebody could pee.

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Southern California Day 4 or Race Recap: Disneyland Half Marathon!!!

 


Day 4 was largely devoted to the Half Marathon, though we were done by 9 and met up with my parents, sister and the kiddos shortly after that. Then we headed off to California Adventure to have lunch at Ariel’s Grotto where we had pretty good food and got to meet tons of princesses. Fun fun.

 

Despite my (our) bodies’ protests, we pressed on and checked out a good bit of California Adventure before coming back home and relaxing. I went to sleep at 7:30 after a couple of Advils and some wine.

The race is detailed below. It was one of my favorites I’ve ever run … check it out: Continue reading “Southern California Day 4 or Race Recap: Disneyland Half Marathon!!!”

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Southern California Day 3

 


Day 3 of our S Cal adventure we did … a whole lotta nothing. Our primary outing was to LA’s Little Tokyo. I always like to visit the local Japanese district and LA’s is not much bigger than Denver’s, but nice nonetheless. We went and had awesome Japanese food and checked out their dessert shops: Beard Papa, Paulette (specializing in macarons) and Cherry on Top, a serve-yourself yogurt shop. We loved Cherry on Top, especially the kiddos.

 

The rest of the day, we laid low, resting up for our big race. We had to be up SUPER EARLY so we were in bed by … 8:30 PM. Seriously.

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Southern California Day 2

 


On the second day in S Cal, we got to go to DISNEYLAND. We started out with a character breakfast at Storyteller’s Cafe (great food, fun characters none of whom I could recognize except Chip ‘n’ Dale). Then the day got even better because not only did we get to go to the Happiest Place on Earth, but we also got to meet up with my longtime blog friend, Kjersten and her darling children and wonderful friends. It was a really lovely time.

 

After we were done at Disneyland, we headed over to the Disneyland Hotel to do packet pickup for our race …

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Southern California Day 1

 


We spent most of our first day in S. Cal going to … grocery stores! No foolin’! We have a big group to feed and we got to check out the local Costco, Trader Joe’s, Fresh & Easy and of course … Target! Last but not least, we went to the Anaheim Farmers’ Market and picked up tons of beautiful local produce, including berries, peaches, plums, tomatoes, grapes and PEARS. The kids loved it and went crazy.

 

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At Elevation

 


We escaped some of the city’s heat and went to Vail for the weekend. We left, as we almost always do, on Thursday night and enjoyed three lovely days in the mountains.

 

We had a lot of fun, including: throwing rocks in the creek, celebrating my dad’s birthday, playing in the children’s fountain, making a hot mess of a cake, cooking as a family, playing games, riding bikes, going for a run, watching movies, sleeping in and, of course, taking photos.

We are all exhausted and glad to be home … and not quite ready to be back either.

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Camping!

 


My dad is outdoorsman extraordinaire and loves to spend any and all available weekends in the great outdoors. He fishes, camps, hunts, hikes, and sleeps under the stars. Being a wonderful grandfather, he’s been talking about taking Tabby (as well as Ben) camping with him for a while now. This weekend, we finally made it happen.

 

Dad left town on Friday and went to the Williams Fork River area to find a campsite and get things set up. He called with directions and Saturday morning, we dropped Ben off with my mom and drove up to meet Papa. He had a great little campsite setup near a river with everything we could want close at hand.

We spent the rest of the day hanging around the campsite, collecting firewood and then exploring and trying to find some fish (no such luck!). Luckily, Dad was prepared and had a salmon in the cooler which we cooked, with corn still in its husks over the campfire. We ate ravenously and finished it up with s’mores. Continue reading “Camping!”

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Roam if You Want to, Roam Around the World

We really love to travel. I love all types of vacations … the ones where you sit around and just relax and the action-packed ones where there’s tons of things to see and do and taste.

But that was before we had kids. Honestly, it’s a pain in the butt nowadays. Not that I don’t enjoy vacations, it’s just the getting ready and getting there. Even when I try my hardest, there’s still a ton of stuff to lug around. Car trips are marginally better stuff wise, since I don’t have to transfer it 3 or 4 times, but that’s probably trumped by the travel itself. Little kids + long hours in the car = whine.

Still, we travel quite a lot. Two or three larger (usually plane) trips a year and then plenty of little forays near home. This year we went to Nashville in April and we are going to California in September. We’ve been to Vail to ski and sun a few times as well. And there will be more of that. Travel is one of the reasons I work. It’s super important to us to be able to travel as a family for many many reasons.

But for now, we will probably stay mostly stateside. But in the distantish future, we want to take the kids abroad and let them see the world. Some places/things we want to see: Continue reading “Roam if You Want to, Roam Around the World”

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Summer in the Mountains


Sorry for my absence. We had a crazy crazy busy week last week and then immediately left for the mountains. I especially love Vail in the summer – it is so nice to get away from the heat and manic pace of the city (and our regularly scheduled life). We always have a lot of nothing planned, though of course with little kids running around, things are busy enough. We had my parents, sister and our friend Holly and her boys with us.

The big hit of the weekend, given the HOT HOT HOT temps, was the children’s fountain, where the kids went crazy running around in the spray. Ben even got in on the action and enjoyed himself hugely. We had to go twice to get our fix. We also got to ride to the top of the mountain in the gondola, mercifully free thanks to our ski passes, where we had dinner and checked out the beautiful views. We went for a couple of runs. We walked around town … to the playgrounds, to the gardens, to pet dogs. We did a bit of shopping. We made good food. We relaxed. We played games.

I always enjoy spending extra time with the kids. It is fun to get away from the typical routine of have-tos and just have fun – playing trucks with Ben, coloring with Tabby, hearing all they have to say. I’m already looking forward to our next holiday!