Hanging out with family

We've enjoyed having lots of family in town this week for the holidays. So we decided it was a good time to bless little Levi at church last Sunday.

Levi didn't start crying until the end of his blessing, so I was able to hear the whole thing. He sure looked ticked when Dave held him up afterwards.

My sister Emily and her family stayed with us for a few days, which was a lot of fun. Last Monday we went to a local beach that is one of her family's favorites but we don't think to go to very often. There's lots of rocks and shells and tidepools and rough surf, so it's more of an exploring beach than a swimming one.

Everyone ran around screaming with excitement when Spencer found a sun star, which is like a star fish but has lots more tentacles and a soft outer body rather than a hard one.

Here's what the bottom side looks like. It was squirming all around and he had to get it back to the water quickly, since it was still alive.
Afterwards we were cold and wet, so we went to my parents' house to warm up with hot soup. It was lovely.

We went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium on Wednesday. Here are 2 of my neices, Allison and Hannah. See? There are a few girls in the family.

They had a new sea horse exhibit, and I especially liked this dragon sea horse.

And this leafy dragon sea horse.

I was worried about taking all of my kids without Dave (he had to work), so I left Brennan behind with a friend. That made the biggest difference, since he is at the age of wandering off and getting lost in big crowds. I couldn't handle that. I did get the annual membership, so we'll go back with Dave and Brennan at some point.

My kids' favorite part was the hands-on section.

And as usual Spencer enjoyed impressing all the elderly volunteers with his marine knowledge.

Here's the cool part where you can go under the waves. It was a fun but exhausting day. I was just so grateful that my kids were so awesome there. Especially Levi, who slept in the stroller almost the whole time.