Dave's family visits

Dave's family came to visit and meet Chloe last week. Because of his dad's failing health and dialysis 3x/week for the last few years of his life, it had been five years since his mom's last visit to California.

She didn't want to fly alone, so Dave's sister Christine came with her two kids - Noah (16) and Celestial (14). It was their first time visiting California.

One downer was that we were sick for the first few days of their visit. There have been so many mean viruses going around! Dallin had a stomach virus, and Dave, Brennan and Levi had fevers and such that lasted for days. My mom, Kristen and Nathan and several of their kids were sick too - some of them for weeks. We were SO glad our company didn't get sick - whew!

We set up our badminton net and Foosball table, which gave people something to do while we were hanging around the house.

I love this picture of Levi on the zip line!

I pretty much stayed home with sick kids and Chloe while they managed to get around a little bit. Thursday they went to Farmer's Market in San Luis Obispo, where they ate ribs, watched a play snippet and stuck gum on the wall of Bubblegum Alley.

Friday (after taking snickerdoodles to Tyler's class for his birthday) we signed Spencer and Tyler out of school a couple hours early, and they all went to Morro Bay. They shopped, watched big waves, ate crab and fish, and bought lots of salt water taffy.

At the Salt Water Taffy place we like to go to, the owner let Tyler have a lollipop with a cricket in it.

Tyler: Oh cool! How much does this cost?

Owner: $2.

Tyler: Oh, darn!

Owner: How much money do you have?

Tyler: None.

Owner (laughing): Okay, you can have it.

Noah chose this hat and sweatshirt for his birthday.

On Saturday we went to In-N-Out for lunch. We were hoping to go to a beach again, but it rained. That was the other bummer about the trip. The first couple of days were sunny and warm, but then it was rainy, cold and windy.

On Sunday we watched our church's semiannual General Conference on T.V., and Dave's mom went to mass at the San Miguel Mission. Then we had my family over for dinner and cake. Tyler and Noah share the same birthday, so we celebrated them together.

On Monday they went up to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I stayed home with Levi and Chloe.

I probably should have put my regular lens on my camera before I gave it to them, because my new one is a little finicky if you're not used to it. Group shots are particularly hard because the focal length is so small and it's hard to get them all in focus at the same time. I just thought it would have been perfect for low light pictures of fish.

I think Celestial really enjoyed it.

Tuesday was their last day here, and we all went to the beach. First we went to see the elephant seals. The adults had gone back to Alaska, leaving just the babies and teens. It wasn't as exciting as the last time we went, when we saw mating and fighting. And it was freezing cold and windy!

I don't have any pictures of Celestial at the beach. It was too cold and windy for her, and she spent most of the time in the car.

At least it was warmer and less windy at Hearst Beach, which is why we usually like to go there.

This was Chloe's first trip to the beach. Poor thing pooped through all her clothes and had to be wrapped in blankets because I forgot to pack a change of clothes for her. I have since bought a diaper bag so I can be more prepared for outings.

Dave and Noah went kayaking, but the waves were bigger than normal and flipped them over a few times on their way out.

Noah is such a cool guy. I'm glad we all got to know him better.

Christine was going to go boogie boarding, but she put her feet in the water and decided it was way too cold for her, even with a wet suit on.

The boys spent the entire time building a dam and sand castle.

And eating, of course.

Brennan loved having Spencer pull him around on the boogie board. Kids don't seem to notice the coldness of water. Plus they tell me it isn't nearly as cold in the creek, which is why they spent all their time there. I'm glad I was finally able to get out of the house a little bit while they were here.

Ice skating and Christmas lights

Another winter thing we wanted to do in Utah was ice skating. We went to a great indoor rink in Bountiful. I didn't do it myself, because I have a hard enough time with balance on solid ground, but I enjoyed taking pictures of everyone having fun out there.

All the Abbotts and Smalleys went too, except Daniel, who was home sick with Strep throat.

I was amazed at how quickly my boys picked it up. It was their first time, and before I knew it they were racing around, playing tag.

So apparently it's a lot like rollerblading, and Spencer even wrote a compare/contrast essay about them this week for school. The muscles and balance are the same, but he liked ice skating better. He even skated like a hockey player. Too bad we don't have an ice rink anywhere near us.

But Brennan had to hold on the whole time. We need to get him on roller blades.

Brennan and Caleb were done before everyone else, so they hung out with me and Levi and ate popcorn and climbed on the bleachers the rest of the time. These two seem a lot alike to me. Too bad they live so far away from each other. They're both small, allergic to nuts, born around Thanksgiving, very blond, and super wiggly and wobbly on ice skates.

I don't know what Marrisse was saying in this picture, but I sure love Emily's reaction!

Spencer recently taught Dave how to rollerblade backwards, and apparently that's the same on ice skates too.


You can't see Maggie's face, but what a cute pose!

At least Sabrina was feeling better. And I'm so glad no one else got sick.


Can you believe how tall Hannah is getting?


Dallin wasn't even sure if he wanted to go, but he LOVED it.

After the skating session ended we hung around and watched the beginning of a peewee hockey game. It looked just like our roller hockey games, but the puck just glided so much smoother across the ice. Now Spencer's ready to move to Utah so he can play ice hockey.

That night we went to temple square to see the Christmas lights. Apparently they had just turned them on the night before, and it was quite crowded. In fact it took us forever to find a parking spot. But it's something I've always wanted to do, and it was all very beautiful. And cold. However, Emily said she's been there when it was even more crowded and cold.

I love multicultural nativity sets. There were a bunch of them.



Such a gorgeous reflecting pool. There were little balls of light floating in the water and a white nativity in the center. So, so pretty.

I'm amazed I managed to get this picture of the Christus without crowds of people in front of it, since there were SO many people in the visitor center. This concludes our trip to Utah. We had such a fun time. Thank-you to my family for hosting and playing with us!