The Rest of the Story

So I mentioned that we were in California but now we're back and that might have made you think the trip was uneventful. I assure you, it was not!

I updated our first day in San Clemente, but failed to tell you about everything after that. Things like playing at the beach that I thought was just a hair to cool to be perfect, but my kids thought was fantastic.

Wyatt would've stayed there for days, right at the edge of the water.

This is Natalie, being girly and afraid of the seaweed Jeff wants her to touch.

The next day was SeaWorld with the whole crew. We got there a little while after they opened and stayed until close. It was really fun, especially when Aimee and I got the bright idea to ride the shipwreck reef ride with the boys. It's a rafting ride and we were soaked through. Thank goodness we had all our clothes in the car  - one quick trip to the parking lot, some clever covering up while changing clothes in broad daylight and poof! We were as good as new. Well, except for my hair, anyway. It was a half-curly wreck but oh well - we had fun!

Joel, Wyatt & Kyle hanging out watching the seals.

Kyle, really proud of his purchased fish. Note Wyatt's hand - he
wanted in on the feeding action.

Waiting with Aunt Aimee and Daddy to see
the sea lion show (which was extra entertaining due to a
rogue sea lion who was behaving like a two-year old human).

One tired girl on our way to see Shamu's evening show.

And because that wasn't enough stimulation for our kids, we took only one day at Joel & Aimee's to regroup before heading to Disneyland. Our plan was to get there at a decent time and stay only as long as everyone was having fun. We didn't get in line for the first ride until 10:30 and were a little slow getting into a groove, but the kids were amazingly patient (most of the time). We rode almost everything we could (no Space Mountain, Splash Mountain or Big Thunder Railroad due to Natalie's height and we just overlooked the Jungle Cruise) and had a great time.

If you ask Natalie about it, she'll tell you, "I scream Goofy!" because she let loose a blood-curdling scream when he approached her stroller. Like the good-natured Goofy he is, he just jumped back, gave me and Wyatt high fives and went on about his merry day. She might also tell you about her new hot pink Mickey Crocs, which we acquired after she threw a shoe somewhere in Tomorrowland. A one-shoed child at Disney isn't ideal! We backtracked (twice) to look for it then went to the front of the park to check with lost and found and it wasn't anywhere to be seen. Thankfully Disney is prepared for anything and the Crocs were available in a store on Main Street. She loves them but please imagine our delight when we returned to Tomorrowland thirty minutes later to ride Autopia and found her "lost" shoe laying on a wall by all the stroller parking. Oh well!

waiting for Dumbo, the first ride of the day

proof we were all there together - getting on the Small World ride.

Me and my passenger on Autopia.

TEACUPS! Jeff (the pilot) wasn't thrilled about all the spinning
but the kids and I loved it :)

See? They really did love it.

the carousel with our post-dinner energy

my superstars after riding the Matterhorn together!

Astroblaster, the last ride of the day. It was
a perfect ending to a beautiful day as we were high enough to
see all the lights of the park from above.

this was taken approximately three minutes after the car started moving.

And in case that weren't enough, we capped off our last day at Joel and Aimee's with pool time and a spin around the lake on their boat. Wyatt and Natalie had never been on a ski boat before and I'm positive that Jeff is determined it won't be their last excursion. Jeff had a great water-skiing run to show them what that's all about and they were pretty impressed with their cool dad. They also just liked the fact that Aunt Aimee gave them some Cheetos for the ride.

Wyatt holding on during the high speed portion of our ride.

Natalie hanging out with her favorite man in the whole world.