Sun, Surf and Sand

We're back from a week long vacation in Southern California. The weather was amazing and we had a great time. It was a great break from the COLD winter at home.

Trip Highlights:

• visiting cousins in Las Vegas on the way

• a day at LegoLand

• birthday lunch at In-n-Out yum yum

• mastering the art of boogey boarding, (ahem, some of us don't swim in the ocean, so this doesn't really apply, but others did a great job!)

• walking 40 steps from our condo to the beach

• watching the surfers from the kitchen window. What do surfers do, other than surf? Every day there were TONS of them out in the water. Last I check bobbing around in the water holding onto a board in the hopes of the next big one, doesn't pay very well. Or at all.

• sleeping with open windows and the sound of the waves

• visiting the tide pools in La Jolla, seeing star fish, tons of hermit crabs, a baby octopus, and various other unidentified squishy things

• thanksgiving dinner made by yours truly

• playing games with the kids

• pulling Houdini off the bunkbed ladder over and over and over and over.....

• Houdini falling face first into the water/sand one minute after we got to the beach, coming up screaming with a mouth full of sand!

• negotiating just how many shells we can reasonably take home

• pounds of sand needing to be washed off everyone and everything, everyday.

• taking a family picture on the beach with the help of a tripod/camera timer. Ok, there are MILES of empty beach. Why is it that right when we set up for the picture, all the other people on the beach decide to park right behind us!?!?!?!?

• forgetting that we were only there for a week, and buying enough food for a month