Union Valley Reservoir

Camping with the Clarke family.  Grandma's brothers and their families were all there, too, which meant several days of lots of cousins, second cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, great-aunts and great uncles.  The kids had so much fun this week.

The reservoir was low, but that meant lots of beach.  And there was still enough water for lots of swimming, jumping off rocks, and boating.

Grandpa's kayaks were a big hit.  Both Bug and Bean picked up on how to handle them quickly and took off across the lake.

They spent the rest of the time moving rocks around, throwing sticks for a friendly dog, burying cousins in the sand. . .

Peanut, on the other hand, did a little splashing in the water, and then decided that eating snack after snack was a better use of his time.  I don't know why this kid won't gain wait.  He's "hungy" all day long.

Speaking of snacks, Grandpa and Grandma do anything halfway.  Along with s'mores, and dutch oven peach cobbler, we had donuts one night for dessert.

Raised, deep-fried, glazed donuts.  And real French fries with dinner that night.  This is the first time I ever heard of anyone bringing along a deep fryer camping.

The kids also had a lot of fun activities planned for them.  A treasure hunt, nature scavenger hunt, art projects, and a bubble blowing contest.  Add in a lot of log jumping, campfires every night, and all the lake time and they were kept very busy.

All three of these kids loved camping (well, except for the pit toilets--no one was very happy about those.)  Being outside all day was a dream come true, and having so many kids to play with made it all especially fun.

Peanut is a camping fan!  (And he slept better than we had expected.  Not great, but better.)

And this is how we managed to camp in a rental car.  Oh, and the fact that Grandma and Grandpa brought up tents, sleeping bags, an air mattress, pads, and all the cooking stuff.  No way we could do west coast camping otherwise.

Back to My Roots

After a 12 hour driving day, with more whining in the back seat than we would have liked (but less than we expected!),  we made it to the Bay Area a couple hours after Peanut should have been asleep.  Thankfully, we all got a pretty good night's sleep and Sunday morning, we were ready for more family and friends.  First up, we went to church where I grew up going, and there were still a dozen or so families who I remembered.  My dad's aunt and uncle still live in the area, too, so we had lunch with them afterwards.

 After lunch, Daddy-o and Peanut went back to the hotel to nap, and the kids and I headed over to S's house to play.  S and I met in 4th grade and quickly became best friends.  Over 25 years and 6 kids later, the next generation is carrying on the tradition of creative play.  These kids put on a play for us, complete with costumes. 

 The 7 hour play date pretty much wiped everyone out.

 We don't get the kids to sleep in until 8 very often.  But we had to get up and going for the next round of fun.  Breakfast with one of our friends/old roommates from San Diego, who it was great to catch up with, and then we headed into the city.

 First stop--Golden Gate Bridge.  Not that you can tell.  In classic San Francisco tradition, the fog was so thick.

 Luckily it lifted before we left, so we got a better view.

The kids were pretty excited to get to meet up with these three again for another few hours of fun.

Although the bridge turned out not to be the greatest place for running and playing.  Another high school friend, J, and her husband also met us there to spend the afternoon touring around.

 View of SF from the bridge.

 The bridge during the hour the fog lifted.

 Our next stop was the other side of the bridge in the Marin Headlands.  I volunteered at the Marine Mammal Center one summer in college, taking care of stranded baby harbor seals and thought the kids would love to go see it.

 They've done a lot with the place.  There didn't used to be much in the way of a visitor's center or education area before, but now there's a big building and a viewing deck to see the animals.

 These two girls had a lot of fun together.  And I'm pretty sure I have pics of S and I that look the same, only we didn't have a 2 year age span to explain the height difference :)

 One of the hospitalized seals.  They take in the stranded babies and injured animals and then try to get them back into the wild as soon as possible.

 We came down to the beach for a little bit after the Marine Mammal Center.  It was COLD down there.  It's so funny how different summer can feel depending on where you are.  The California coast has its own seasons.

  J, me, and S on Rodeo Beach.                                      Peanut had fun running around in the sand.

Bean and Bug couldn't keep the running up where it was dry.  They both got wet, in spite of the water temps around 60 degrees.  After a little while, even they were too cold.

We finished off the evening with dinner in San Rafael with everyone at a fun Puerto Rican restaurant, Sol Food.  And we saw this beautiful sunset on the way home.

 Tuesday morning was our last few hours in the Bay Area.  Our hotel was right across the street from the miniature golf place that I grew up going to, and the kids had been begging to go play ever since they saw it, so we played a quick round of golf.

 Peanut was trying so hard in the beginning.  He wanted to play just like everyone else.  And then he got tired, and frustrated, and threw his ball into a pond.  But he still had fun climbing around on everything and running away from us.

 There are some pretty fun features, like the crocodile waiting for stray balls in one of the streams.

 Look at that concentration.  This was actually a great way to get out some energy before getting everyone into the car for the 3.5 hour drive up to the mountains for our next adventure--camping!

Short Stop in UT

I guess the lack of pictures reflects the shortness of this stop.  We made it to Uncle J's house in time for bed Thursday night, had a long day of playing with the cousins Friday--trampoline, collecting eggs from the chickens, putting on a circus (which I do have videos from, but Blogger isn't letting me put any of them on right now), riding bikes, an early morning run for me, and lots of catching up.  Then, Daddy-o and I snuck off for his MBA reunion.  Can't believe it's been 5 years!  We all got together for dinner and while Daddy-o caught up with his classmates, I got to hang out with the MBASA (Spouse Association) ladies who I did book group and playgroups with.  It was fun to see everyone again, even if it was only for a couple hours.  Saturday morning, we were off, bright and early, for another LONG travel day.  California, here we come!

Dinosaur National Monument

Next part of our journey:  Driving to Utah.  My mom was nice enough to drive the kids and I over so we could meet up with Daddy-o who was flying in for his MBA reunion.

 And since we do have a dino obsessed 6 year old, we decided to stop at the Dinosaur National Monument at the Utah/Colorado border.

It's pretty amazing to see all the bones still in the rock.  About 1500 of them in this wall.

Bug got to touch some actual bones.

 The kids also got to do their first Jr. Ranger program.  They had done a few activities in a booklet about the monument and then they helped create a dinosaur, choosing what type of teeth, claws, legs, etc. . .

 And then at the end, they were sworn in as Jr. Rangers, promising to protect and preserve the park.

 Here's several bones from a stegosaurus--you can see the flat plates from their back.

Peanut was supposed to be napping while we walked around, but of course there was way too much exciting stuff to touch and see that he couldn't be bothered with that.  This crazy little boy does not like to sleep while traveling. No nap on the flight to Denver. 9 hour drive to UT, and he didn't fall asleep until 6 p.m., and even then, it was only a 45 min. nap, and then an hour of crying until we made it to our home for the night.  Makes for some long travel days.

To Grandmother's House We Go

 We started our crazy visit-as-many-people-as-we-can-in-the-west trip with a few days with my mom, Rara, in Colorado.  It had been 2.5 years since we'd been out, and this was the first summer visit the kids remember.  They had so much fun playing on the rocks and around the pond.

 They also had a good time "swimming" in the hot tub.  At least, Bug and Bean did.  Peanut had a great time pouring water everywhere and watching the other two splash, as long as they didn't get him in the face.  The kids did get a chance to go swim in a pool so they could show Rara their swimming skills.

 Another day, we headed into Denver to go to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.  There was a great view of downtown from the balcony, and they had a telescope set up for us to look at the sun.

 The kids really liked all the dioramas.  They pretty much cover the entire earth.

We took a LOT of pictures.

 The Smoky Mountain window.

 There was also a dinosaur section. Perfect for this little palentologist.

 They had a lot of different skeletons.

 And Peanut found the "ah-bees", of course.  This kid loves his horses.

 Getting to watch one of the paleontologists at work.

 And a picture in memory of my dad.  He loved llamas, and he was the first one to take us to this museum, back when Bean was only 1.5 years.  We missed having him along this time.

The kids also spent a lot of time playing with all my old stuff--listening to the Disney books on record, building with the Legos, making puzzles.  It was a great week to start off the trip.