San Diego

We took another trip. This time we went to San Diego. Our trip began with a night in Vegas. We drove the strip so the kids could see all the lights and how neat Vegas looks. We went to church the next day and visited the Las Vegas Temple.
The next day we drove to San Diego. It was so nice. The sun was shining and it was a very comfortable temperature. We got there on Sunday.

On Monday we went to Sea World.

Daniel was big enough to go on the Journey to Atlantis ride. He was excited to go on this ride. After going on it once, Bryan asked if he wanted to go again and Daniel said no. He wanted nothing to do with it after that. He thought it was fun but too scary.

We watched Shamu and friends.

Took a ride on Elmo's flying fish and two other rides (I don't remember the names. They were the only rides all of us could go on.)

Played on the huge playground.

And just had a ton of fun.

We bought each of the kids a souvenir. Daniel picked a stuffed Shamu. It's funny, he can't remember the name Shamu. He will begin talking about it and then stop and ask us what the name is. Megan is usually the one that reminds him the name.

That night we went to La Jolla beach and felt the water on our feet and watched the sun set.After the beach we went to the San Diego temple. We were able to see how pretty it is a night up close. Of course the temple grounds were closed as so we did not take a picture.

Tuesday we took a Harbor Freight Excursion. This was an hour ride around the northern bay area.

It was neat to see sea life in the ocean. Not just at Sea World. We saw lots of sea lions. We also saw them training a dolphin.

We also saw lots of other neat things.

After the harbor tour, we went and toured the aircraft carrier "Midway".

In the brig.

We spent the remainder of the day at the beach. I believe the majority of this activity is on the video camera.

It was a great get away. We all had a lot of fun.

Moab

This past weekend we took a trip to Moab. We really only had one day to do whatever we wanted. So we decided to spend the day in the Canyonlands. Here's a quick summary of our trip.

This was our first trip camping with our camper.

We went to dead horse point.

We hiked up whale rock.

The kids found something on the way up......

A lizard!

Me, Daniel, & Megan at the top of Whale Rock.

We hiked along the rim of Grand View Point Overlook.

We ended the day with some off roading along Shafer Trail. This trail took you below all the sites we had just previously visited. You can see the trail we went along in this next picture.

Our trail began with some switch backs.

The rest of our adventure on this trail is on the video camera. Hopefully we'll get some of the videos up in a bit.

Big Cookie!!

The primary presidency in our ward held out a carrot (well, a cookie) for the kids to read the Book of Mormon with their families in the year 2009. We worked our way methodically through the book about one chapter a night just telling the stories in words the kids can understand. We finished just two weeks ago. When the primary said big cookie, they weren't kidding!!

And if you think that was a cheap way to go through the Book of Mormon, I have two challenges for you. First, you try getting your 3 and 5 year-old to sit through a verbatim reading of the book. Second, ask Daniel the next time you see him who Nephi's favorite Old Testament prophet is or as Megan how Abinidi died. It was a lot of fun.

September Monthly Challenge

My Grandma Likes to Say

A few days ago, Megan and I took a trip to the library. When we go to the library, I give a basket to the kids and tell them how many books they can take off the shelves. They don't usually look much at the book while there, they just fill their baskets. Megan pulled a book off the shelf titled "My Grandma Likes to Say" by Denise Brennan-Nelson. I have to say this is a very cute book. It uses the cute sayings people say. For example, the following is a page from this book.

"'Everything's coming up roses,'
my grandma likes to say.
I'm not sure what she means
but I like it anyway.

They started in the garden,
but now they're everywhere!
They're in my bath and in my bed
and in my underwear!'

This book has some really cute pictures to go along with the text. It even goes through and gives you a little information about where the saying came from or what it actually means. Some other sayings it uses are: Hit the Hay, Like a Bull in a china Shop, I'm no Spring Chicken, When Pigs Fly, and a few others.

I think I enjoyed this book way more than the kids. But I have to say that this is probably the first kids book we've checked out that I really liked. What a fun read!

My New Ride!!!

I've been driving a 2001 Honda Accord.


Last night, we traded it in for this.....

A 2004 Ford Explorer Sport Trac. It's pretty sweet. I was attached to the Accord and had a hard time turning it in especially when there was nothing wrong with it. It was in great condition. However, this is a fun vehicle!

We wanted to have something that had towing capabilities. After camping two weekends in a row, dealing with extremely cold weather and rainy weather, we thought we might like to purchase a camper of some kind. But we first needed something that could tow. So we now have something that can tow.

Funny story about the kids: When we went to sign the papers last night, we brought the kids with us. This was the first they had heard of us buying a new car. Daniel thought I was joking at first when he saw it. As we were driving home in the new car, Daniel and Megan both said they liked this car. They didn't like the Accord. When I asked them why they didn't like the Accord, they told me, "Because I don't like silver. Black is better." But then tonight as we were coming home from our Sunday excursion, Megan, out of the blue, says, "I don't like this car. I like the other one better." I asked her what she didn't like about it. Her response, "It's just dumb." That gave us a good laugh.

Megan

It's a new month with a new monthly challenge.