Our Vacation!!

We had a great vacation!! We have been planning this for a couple of years. Brady's whole family met in California and we played together for a whole week! It was a blast!! His brother Bryan and his family came all the way from South Carolina and his sister Brynne and her husband came from Texas. The rest of us drove from Utah to get there. We split the drive up by staying in Las Vegas for a night, and then finished driving the rest the next day. The drive was not bad. You would think with 5 kids that it would be a nightmare, but it wasn't. Even Jaxon was good, he did not cry one time. I was so happy and impressed with him!

The night in Vegas was uneventful, I realized that I really don't love Vegas. We went to the Coke store, and they now charge for the taste of coke that used to be free and we went to the M&M store. After looking around, we decided that paying $12.99 a pound for M&M's was not going to happen so we stopped at a gas station and bought some coke and M&M's so the kids felt like they completed the adventure to those two places. Then as we were driving Dylan, my 4 year old son told his dad that he saw a naked lady (he didn't, but she was mostly naked, it was an ad on the side of a truck.) and after we saw a couple of drug deals go down, we decided to go back to the hotel and be done with Vegas. Brady and I have done fun things in Vegas, but really if you don't drink and you don't gamble, there is not a lot left to do. So we were ready to leave the next morning!

After arriving at the Resort in Anaheim, we just chilled Monday afternoon. The kids went to the pool with the dads, while Brandy and I went shopping. We just relaxed and got ready for a busy week!! We started bright and early Tuesday by being at Disneyland when it open. When we walked in the first characters we saw were Mickey and Minnie. Megan especially was excited about that!! We played long and hard. We ended up eating lunch in the park, and then leaving for a few minutes at dinnertime to eat the lunch that we had packed. We just had a parking lot picnic! We rode a ton of rides and saw a lot of characters. Lauryn went on every ride that I did. She had so much fun. She along with her cousins decided that they were going to face their fears. They made us laugh!! Katelyn was a little more nervous to ride some of the big fast rides, but she had fun with what she did do. We watched the firework show which was awesome. We could also see the fireworks from our balcony at the resort, but it was better when we could hear the music with them!!

Wednesday, we went to California Adventure. We played ALL day again. Soarin over California is one of my favorite rides, and my three kids that were tall enough to go on it loved it too!! We also rode California Screamin, for those of you who don't know, it is a big fast roller coaster. Lauryn went with me and she LOVED it!! We made reservations ahead of time for our whole group of twenty and ate lunch at Ariel's Grotto. It was expensive, but so much fun!! The kids got to see most of the princesses while eating their lunch, which was really good!! Dylan was not so fond of the princesses, but I think he was mostly hungry. When he is hungry, nothing is good! Once he ate, he was happy again! We played some more, and rode the Tower of Terror!! Again, Lauryn loved it! It was a lot of fun to go on the big rides with her! We went to the Crush show from Finding Nemo, I sat in the back so that I could feed Jaxon and Bryan and Brandy sat on the floor with the kids. Crush was talking to the audience and picked Katelyn out of the audience to talk to. She was cute!! She got a little stage freight and couldn't think a question to ask him so Aunt Brandy told her to ask if he had ever been to Utah. He said, "I don't know, how is the surfing in Utah?" It was cute and Kate was happy to be picked out. We stayed for the Disney's Electrical Parade, which is always fun!! We had a great time!!

Thursday, just our little family left and drove to San Diego. I love San Diego!! We went to SeaWorld, and we all loved it!! The kids especially loved the Shamu show. We spent the whole day there which made that hour and a half drive back really long!! I noticed after we got back that I didn't take pictures at SeaWorld, everything I have is video. Sad, but what do you do? Next time I will have to remember to do both! I love driving on the freeway in San Diego and as you come around the corner the temple just appears. That was so fun for us to see! I have only seen it during the day before, it was fun to see it all lit up! We decided that it looks like a castle!! Beautiful!!

Friday we had family pictures with all 20 of us in the morning. While waiting for the pictures to be ready to view, we ate at a Sushi Buffet...it was so good!! They had really good food. They also had other food besides sushi, so everyone, including the kids were happy. After lunch we headed to Huntington Beach. It was so fun and relaxing!! I love the beach!! While there, we met up with my cousin Jennifer that lives in Huntington Beach. It was fun to visit with her even if just for a short while! Friday night, grandma and grandpa kept the kids so that we could have a little time for just the adults. It ended up just being Brady and I and Bryan and Brandy. We went to Downtown Disney and walked around and ate some more and had a relaxing time without worrying about the kids.

Saturday, our family and Bryan's family went to Universal Studios. It was fun. I had not been there, so I did not know what to expect. I had a good time, but decided that it will be more fun when the kids are older. We enjoyed the rides, but out of my kids, Lauryn is the only one that could or would go on most of them. We loved the Mummy ride and the Jurassic Park ride. We did the Back Lot Tour first thing and that was a lot of fun! The kids saw Dora for a minute, but she wasn't stopping for pictures, but they did get their pictures with Shrek and Donkey. That was fun for them! Universal has a big water area for the kids to play. That was the highlight for them. As they were playing in the water and having a great time, Megan wandered off. So we had a good 10 minutes of complete panic until we were reunited. When we got to her, I was crying hysterically. I told her that she scarred mommy. She hugged me and said, "I sorry I scarred you mommy...I love you!!" That is a moment where you don't know weather to laugh, hug her, or cry. So I did all three. At that point we were pretty much done with Universal, we hit one more show and then we packed up and left.

Sunday we spent one more day at Disneyland and California Adventure. First we headed to California Adventure. We rode our favorite rides again and hit a couple that we hadn't the first couple of days. Dylan went on the Tower of Terror. He was not too sure of it, but after he was safely back on the ground, he loved it. He was airborne in his seat most of the ride. Brady and I were on either side of him and he was hanging on to both of us. It was cute!! We caught the High School Musical show while at California Adventure and they picked Lauryn and Savannah to get up and dance with them. They were in heaven!! Lauryn loved it. Later in the show, they picked Savannah again to dance some more. We saw the Playhouse Disney Show, that included Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, My Friends Tiger and Pooh, Little Einsteins and Handy Manny. Megan and Dylan LOVED that!! They love to watch all those shows on the Disney channel so to see them on stage was great for them!! Later we just happened upon a show that we had not planned on. It was an animation show. Katelyn and Peyton got picked out of the audience. They were so cute!! Kate was a little timid, but did a great job. Peyton was so good!! He was a complete ham!! People stopped him and his parents after and told him how cute he was and that he did a great job. Both kids got the poster from the show. It was fun for them and they were happy to get a free souvenir! Late afternoon, we headed back over to Disneyland. We hit several rides there also and got some more signatures. That night we stuck around for the Street Party, which was a lot of fun!! The kids all got pulled up to dance with the people. They all had a blast. Megan was so funny to watch!! She is not the most coordinated dancer, but loves it!! They were all so cute!! Brandy and I decided that we have some really cute kids!! We also stayed for Fantasmic, which was pretty cool, but there were so many people in such a small space that it was hard to see. Our last day was a long hot fun day!! We were exhausted by the time we finished!!

Monday, we got up and Harrison, my brother in law made waffles for everyone. We ate and said our goodbyes to everyone and packed up and left. We drove to St. George where we stopped for the night. By the time that we got there, I was really happy to be stopping! I was so tired, and with nothing to look at while driving, it makes you even more tired!! Brady and I traded off every hour and a half because we were both so tired. But thankfully, we made it safe and sound. We met up with Grandma and Grandpa and Brady's sister Bambi and her family for dinner. Then it was back to the hotel to crash, and that is what I did. I remember Brady trying to talk to me, but I was not coherent enough to respond.

Tuesday, we got up and ate breakfast and headed home, but not before hitting the outlet mall in St. George. They have a Sketcher store there now, so I got new shoes for the kids for school. The drive from St. George is not too bad, but we were all ready to be done driving at that point. The last hour of our drive, all the kids started to get restless, but they were still good. For driving that much, they did really good!!

We had a great time!!! Every day was packed full of stuff to do!! We were going all day every day. We had a couple of little break downs, but nothing too major! All of the kids were really good. My kids had such a fun time visiting with everyone. They had fun with grandma and grandpa, their aunts and uncles, and especially the cousins!! We all really miss them...South Carolina is a long way away from Utah! We can't wait to do this again, but mostly we can't wait to see the family again!! We love you all and had so much fun with you!!

Below I have a slide show of some of the pictures, warning...there are a lot!!

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