Vacationing Time!
Shay and I love to take trips together!
This year we decided to trek down to Southern California and join my brother and his family in San Clemente, California. We were excited to spend time with them and introduce Luke to the beach for the first time. Since I grew up in Southern California, I was super excited!
Shay and I decided that we had better split our trip from Utah to California, since this would be the first road trip we would be taking Luke on, and we weren't sure how well it would go.
So on September 7th, we drove down to St. George, Utah to spend some time with Shay's older sister Tiffany and her family. It was perfect timing since it was Sam's birthday too. Sam is Tiffany's youngest son. She and her husband were able to adopt Sam at birth 4 years ago. It is wonderful to see how adoption has blessed the lives of both sides of our families. We have many cousins who have been adopted, and we know first hand the blessings that come with adoption!
That night we were able to enjoy a wonderful barbecue dinner and birthday cake. I was also able to hear to some really hilarious high school stories (Troy, Tiffany's husband, grew up with Tiffany and Shay so they have many friends and acquaintances in common.).
9/8/15: Tuesday morning we got up, said goodbye, and headed out to Southern California.
We finally made it to San Clemente late in the afternoon! It had been six long years since we were able to visit Southern California together (...and we hope it will never be that long again)!
The sky was SO blue and the palm trees so tall (Below is a picture of the sky). I didn't realize how much I missed it until we arrived.....this place I called home for so many years! Its beauty still takes my breath away. Somehow, even in the "busyness" of it all, So. Cal. relaxes me in a way that no other place can. I guess I will always be a Southern California girl at heart.
First thing we did was unload our car and then head down to see the ocean.
Below you can see the staircase that lead up to our beach condo. It was located three flights up....which ended up being a huge bonus because it gave us a beautiful view of the beach and surrounding areas. It also had a canopy of vegetation that surrounded the staircase going up to the front door which was SO beautiful! After hitting the beach we returned to the condo for dinner, games, and family time.
9/9/15: Wednesday morning we woke up and went to the beach!
Here you can see Luke hitting the beach for the very first time. His favorite thing was digging in the sand with his shovel while playing with his awesome cousins that dote on him endlessly! Everyone loved hearing Luke say the word, "Shovel" over and over again. Since he is just starting to talk, the word sounds so cute!
Below you can see Luke with his favorite digging partner Kami. We loved watching these two play in the sand together. It was also fun to see my brother John teach his boys how to best catch a wave on a boogie board, etc. You can see him giving pointers to his son in the background of the below picture.
We also plan on teaching Luke how to ride a wave just right so that you can avoid being crushed. He has learned to build some amazing castles. We hope he learns to love the beach as much as Shay and I do!
Unfortunately when we first got to the beach Wednesday morning, we were immediately approached by a lifeguard who warned us that there were hurricanes off the coast that were causing dangerous riptides. He asked us not to boogie board and to stay close to the shore.
At first the boys were super bummed and started to express their disappointment. I didn't want the day to be a bust for them, so I taught them "Crack the Egg" (As pictured below).
In all honesty, I told them a half-truth. I made up the game on a whim. They weren't too eager to try it, so I told them that I had played it as a little girl and that they would love it. In truth, I never played "Crack the Egg" in the ocean, just on a trampoline.....so it was HALF true, right? I just needed something to suck them into trying it and salvage the day! Well, it worked and ended up being a blast. We all laughed our heads off as we would get knocked over by the powerful waves that came in. This will be a forever fun memory for me with these awesome kids! You can see Shay holding on to Like further behind us to ensure that he would be OK.
Our sister-in-law took these pictures for us while we were playing "Crack the Egg." The top picture is of us waiting for the waves to form. The middle is of Luke's cousin, Michael, warning us that it's going to be a big one. The bottom is of us getting violently "cracked."
Luckily Shay insisted on being behind us with Luke.
"Crack the Egg" will become a family tradition for sure!
Great times!
Below you can see Shay and William playing Zim-Zam. This was a favorite game of mine growing up. When I was a child, my family and I would go beach camping almost every year. We would set up Zim-Zam and play it for hours in our campsite. It was fun to see the kids (and adults) enjoy it as well!
Shay is not only a great dad, but he is a great uncle as well!
Luke crashed on the way back to the condo after his first trip to the beach!
Too much fun can really wear you out!
9/10/15: We decided to visit Mission San Juan Capistrano in the morning before heading back to the beach. It was gorgeous, but hotter than the underworld The temperature was over 100 degrees. We all were melting and wondering how the people lived there without air conditioning hundreds of years ago. All the kids were ready to hit the beach after this tour! Below you can see the gang together.
Cousins are the best!
San Juan Capistrano has beautiful grounds--We highly recommend seeing it if you are in town!
Shay took tons of pictures of San Juan Capistrano. Shay loves history and read every single word posted throughout the mission! :-)
After the mission we went to the beach and enjoyed the water! We were able to boogie board and body surf. The photo below is of Luke and his cousin William. It was so cute that I had to capture it. William had come in from boogie boarding and crashed on a beach towel. Luke went right over to his buddy and laid down right next to him. William immediately put his arm around him. This picture melted my heart. Luke has a special relationship with all of his cousins. They just love him! We are truly blessed with such an amazing family that loves us to pieces!
We decided to stay late on the beach that night. That evening we watched the sunset on the ocean. It was breathtaking! My favorite picture is below. Here you can see Shay and Luke together enjoying the last bits of sunlight.
We were able to barbecue hot dogs for dinner on the beach---heavenly! We all sat around the fire well after dark telling stories and playing games.
What a perfect day!
Life doesn't get much better than this!
9/11/15: Our plan was to go to Knott's Berry Farm, but the weather was too perfect not to go the beach one last day before heading back to Utah (It was SO hot, we would have been miserable walking around an amusement park). Plus, Luke was loving the beach and we wanted him to get all of the beach time that we could give him!
We decided to go to Corona Del Mar State Beach. This beach is a family favorite of ours! When I was 5/6 years old my family went to this beach almost every single day during the summer. We would go with our long time family friends. It is a clean, beautiful, family-friendly beach. Due to the storms off the coast of California, there was a lot of seaweed washing up on shore. My sister-in-law Nicole and her kids taught us how to break apart a certain part of the seaweed to search for starfish. We found tons of starfish on our first day at the beach. Below you can see Kami holding the biggest one that was caught during our trip. She came running up, so excited, wanting to show it to me. We took a picture of it to remember how big it was.
I love this sweet beautiful little niece of mine!
I loved watching Luke play with his cousins on the beach. Here Luke is chasing after Josh. Josh was chasing seagulls and Luke decided he wanted to chase Josh instead. You can see how beautiful the water was in this video as well.
9/12/15: Departure day. :-(
We woke up and took a stroll with my sister-in-law Nicole on the beach one last time. It was great to have the boys watch the kids while we enjoyed some girl time.
The funniest thing happened when we went to rinse the sand off our feet at the beach showers. I hit the button, the lower shower head turned on, and I stuck my feet in the water to rinse off the sand. Nicole went to do the same thing, but accidentally hit the button to the upper shower head and got slammed in the chest with water.
She screamed and we both started to laugh so hard!
After packing up the cars,
we took family pictures by the gorgeous staircase leading up to the beach condo that we rented.
Definitely a beach-bum all natural look, which is perfect to help us remember our
wonderful time in California!
We left with great memories to last a lifetime and a desire to return next year!
The drive home was eventful. Luke went through TWO outfits! Yep, once we even had to stop and fix a major diaper blowout that caused me to spend a good 20 minutes in a gas station's bathroom cleaning it up. Luckily, he did take three naps during the drive home. I spent a lot of time posting pictures on Instagram and reading a book to Shay (We often will read a book to each other when we take a road trip.).
We love family, California and vacationing.
