Ok, fair warning- This is my biggest post ever. There are sooo many pictures! Don't feel bad if you get bored and click the "x" in the top right corner of the screen. :) Ok, your choice....
In June, Scott and I took the girls on a trip to California! It was planned farrrr in advance, and we were so looking forward to it! These pictures are kind of in a random order, but here is a quick outline of our trip: We took a road trip to Cali, and broke up the drive by staying a night in Las Vegas. Then headed straight to Anaheim. Spent a day at Disneyland. Then off to LA for a family reunion, my grandma's surprise 80th birthday bash!! Then to the beach. Then Disneyland for two more days. Then back on the road, headed home. Oopsie, car broke down- two more days in a hotel! And then
finally home sweet home. Enjoy the pictures!
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| The clan at Disneyland, the first day. |
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| Kissin' cousins! Ellie is going to give me gray hair. |
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| Tenners with Uncle Brek |
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| Outside of Haunted Mansion, I think. |
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| One of the only times we sat down all day! |
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| Making PB&J sandwiches... Tenley was way into helping! But she wouldn't taste one. Picky stinker. |
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| My sister Leah with T. |
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| Fantasmic, we watched it two nights... AWESOME! |
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| The Peter Pan scene acrobatics is one of my favorite parts! |
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| Nice camera snap, Leah! |
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| You could feel the heat from our seats, so cool! |
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| Yay, Mickey!! Watching Tenley's face during Fantasmic was worth the trip. :) "Mickey! Awesome!!" |
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| This was during the fireworks. T kept putting her fists in the air and yelling "AWESOME!!" After every firework. It was epic. |
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| T with Aunt Ashley on the Pirates of the Caribbean. |
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| Me and my siblings would have contests each ride to see who could make the funniest face for the camera. I won this one. :) I'm so proud. |
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| With my brother, chad. Tenley LOVED Uncle Chad, she wanted to ride on his shoulders allllll dayyyy. Sorry Chaddy! |
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| Eating dinner together by our hotel. |
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| We couldn't walk by the carousel without T shrieking "horsey! horsey!!" So she rode the dumb carousel multiple times. The funny thing is, she doesn't even look like she's having fun! hahha. |
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| Fireworks. The kids were sooo tired, but good sports! The first day, we were at Disneyland for 16 hours straight! |
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| More fireworks! Tenley was so smitten by them! |
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| Another carousel, at California Adventure. |
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| The new Little Mermaid ride in California Adventure is SO CUTE! |
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| Playing with the water ball, outside of Space Mountain and the new Star Tours! |
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| E, hanging out with Uncle Nolan, Vanessa's hubby! |
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| Pictures from another night of Fantasmic! Yes, it is just as awesome the second time! |
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| Waiting in line for a ride. Kinda tricky with kids since you can't bring your strollers in line. |
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| Being silly in the hotel. Tenley liked having her own queen sized bed. We would get back to the hotel each night, and she would crawl right into bed and smile. She was sooo tired each time! We slept like rocks. |
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| This is how I found her one morning. I felt so bad waking them up bright and early after going to bed so late, but you HAVE to get to the park before it opens so that you can hit all the good rides first, before all the other tourists arrive!! |
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| Getting ready to wake up baby E. |
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| Tired eyes. Nothin' like having a Krispy Kreme donut 30 seconds after waking up! Thanks Zach for the breakfast delivery! |
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| We packed a bunch of bananas for Elle bell, they're her favorite! |
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| My brother Chad and his wife Ashley. Holding T on the Pirates of the Carribean ride. She loves pirates, but she was scared the first time. |
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| On Pirates of the Carribean. |
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| Lots of naps in the stroller. |
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| Watching fireworks... |
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| With Aunt Natalie. My baby sister Natalie is so awesome with her nieces and nephew!! All of my siblings are. It made the trip sooo much easier on me and Scott! |
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| Aunt Elise, another awesome helper! |
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| Singing songs with Natalie. |
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| A Bug's Life 3D short movie, in California Adventure. It is so cute! Scott had never seen it before. T was afraid of Hopper. He is a little scarey, let's face it! |
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| With Aunt Elise on the choo choo train! This is the train that rides around the entire Disneyland park. T thought that every ride was a choo-choo though. :) |
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| Ellie stoping for a second to watch Fantasmic, in between being her spazzy self. |
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| When we'd have any downtime at hotels, Tenley would draw on the room notepads.. ya think she is a little obsessed with Mickey and Disneyland?? I laughed so hard when I saw her pictures! I guess she was having fun. :) She would lay in bed when we'd get back to our hotel for the night and chatter random words about the day, like "Pirate. Mickey. Choo choo!" It was adorable! |
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| Hangin' out with cousin Mal while waiting in line to see Rapunzel! |
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| She was pretending to pain my toenails with Natalie's makeup brush while waiting in line. |
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| On the shuttle from the hotel to Disneyland one morning! My sister Leah and her hubby Brek. |
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| Shuttle time! My sister Vanessa and her hubby Nolan. |
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| In Mickey's house... waiting in line to see Mickey. |
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| It was sooo humid and sticky, especially waiting in line to see Mickey! I pretty much had a bad hair day every day on this trip. Makes for awesome pictures! |
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| Meeting Mickey! I think she was a little confused! But cute and happy to see Mickey. |
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| Tenley loves Mickey... she would point at everything with Mickey on it, and yell "Mickey!" All. Day. Long. |
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| Waited an hour to meet Rapunzel! She was AWESOME!!!! She spent so much time with T. |
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| I don't remember why Rapunzel is laughing here, but I love this picture! |
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| Tenley is trying to copy Rapunzel's pose. Surprising, right? No, because she copies everything she does on the movie too. Haha. |
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| "Bye Rapunzel!" |
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| Meeting Princess Ariel and a bunch of other princesses, at Ariel's Grotto in California Adventure. It was a cute character lunch, with yummy food! |
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| Appetizer plate at Ariel's Grotto. |
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| Belle is my favorite. :) Tenley only really recognized Rapunzel and Belle. |
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| Tri-tip, veggies, and the best mashed potatoes EVER. |
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| Dessert plate, all edible. |
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| She says "cheeeeese!" for the camera. Nerd. |
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| Right before leaving Disneyland, after 3 days of fun. |
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| The reason for the trip to Cali - My grandma's SURPRISE 80th birthday party!!! |
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| Happy Birthday grandma, we love you!!! |
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| Vanessa hugging Mal. |
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| and Syd... |
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| and Tenners. Aunt Vanessa rocks!! |
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| We all chatted away with extended family we had not seen in YEARS. |
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| My dad re-bonding with Ellie. |
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| Grandma, opening her birthday present- a quilt my Aunt Jari made for her. Each family designed a quilt square. It turned out so cute. |
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| Partying! :) |
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| Ellie is napping, but I think everyone else is in this picture. This is just my immediate family with grandma and grandpa, not the entire extended family picture. I have a huge family! |
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| Grandma playing with the cousins! |
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| Cousin Bryn and Tenley are only a few months apart! They had fun together. |
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| Staring down a cupcake... Probably trying to decide how to conquer it without eating the actual cake part. |
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| My grandparents have a putting green in their back yard. Of course Tenley spent all afternoon out there! She loved it! I hope she likes sports when she gets a little older. |
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| My sister Camille with E. |
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| Giving out more kisses. ELLIE. This is my cousin's baby K, he and E were born on the exact same day!! |
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| Scott being dramatic about something, while I change a diaper under the shade of a little tree. |
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| Playing with Aunt Natalie! |
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| It was so hot and humid that day! But the girls LOVED being outside. Their little cheeks got so red from the heat. |
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| Brek and Scott. |
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| My baby brother Weston "wowing" the kids. |
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| Weston and Scott |
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| Cold cereal for dinner. Turd. |
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| Elliotte, taking a nap during the party. She needed it. |
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| Extended family that traveled to grandma's for the party! |
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| These are out of order, but on our road trip down we broke up the drive by staying a night in Las Vegas at the Stratosphere. |
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| Bass Pro Shop in Vegas. |
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| Aquarium inside a casino. Tenley looooves fishies. |
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| driving.... |
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| Checking into our hotel in Vegas. |
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| Lots of things for little girls to look at in the casino! They were SO GOOD all day. |
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| Watching a move in the hotel before bed. |
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| We went swimming in Vegas for like an hour, and Ellie got a tan line. Lucky girl! She has the prettiest skin. |
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| Out of order, but more Bass Pro Shop... |
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| Getting her wiggles out before getting back in the car, California bound! |
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| "I jumpinggg." |
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| On the road again! |
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| I'm making an "ewwww" face because I'm holding SOMEONE'S (no names) underwear! Hahaha we had a good laugh about this little inside joke. :) Anyway we were changing our clothes to head to the beach! |
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| Aunt Ash and cousin Mallory. |
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| Sawyer and Ellie. |
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| Camille, Me, Ashley, Elise. I have no idea what we're staring at, but this picture makes me laugh. |
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| Cool picture of Mallory, edited by Leah. Leah pretty much took all of these beach pictures. Thank you, sister!! |
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| Cousins |
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| Camille and Elle bell. |
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| Weston, burying Sydney! |
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| Tenley got so cold after a while! Elise and Natalie were fighting over her warm-me-up-cuddles. :) |
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| This picture just cracks me up! Nice pose, Scottie! |
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| My sister Leah... and personal photographer. ;) |
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| Some of the group... all my immediate family met at the beach. |
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| My dad. Chillaxin. |
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| I finally just let Ellie get right in the sand. She was in HEAVEN. She had fun with my brother Chad... |
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| She is dramatic. Do you really need to eat string cheese like that, Ellie? No. |
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| Happy baby, in the sand. |
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| She was parched, and sucked down a Capri Sun. |
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| Tenley was DETERMINED to take this board for a ride in the ocean. See pictures below... |
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| And then we took it away. :) |
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| Grandpa didn't want to get wet. You're at the BEACH, dude! ;) |
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| Ohhhhh, he gave in. :) |
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| I have no hops. It's sad. |
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| On our drive home, our car broke down. In the middle of a busy California freeway. The car engine literally died while we were trying to pass someone. Try stopping freeway traffic so you can move over two lanes to pull off the road... not fun! Two super nice men helped stop traffic and push us to the side of the freeway. It was a STRESSFUL DAY!! |
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| Playing at a McDonald's while waiting for the tow truck, finding a mechanic, and booking a hotel. |
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| She was oblivious, and didn't mind one bit! |
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| I booked this hotel online from my iPhone, for $71.00 an hour before we checked in. I was so relieved when we walked into the room, it was so clean and cute! They upgraded us to a family suite for free, which was a HUGE blessing since we actually ended up being stuck there for two days without a car. |
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| The girls polished off the snacks I had packed for the trip, we had Cup 'O Noodles for dinner, and rented a movie that night. It actually ended up being one of my favorite parts of the trip. It was quite boring being stuck in that hotel, but so fun to just spend time with my little family. We were so grateful for our safety, and for each other! |
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| She thought she was so cool because she could get into the mini fridge all by herself. |
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| Back on the road! The mechanics at the dealership took 8 hours to diagnose the problem. We were sooo nervous that it was going to be a really expensive repair. After all of that, it ended up just being some hoses that popped off, and the engine shut down so as not to overheat. We were so blessed! |
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| Beautiful Utah, welcoming us home! And the white spot looks like Mickey Mouse, calling us back to California!! Don't worry Mickey, we will be back again! |
This trip was so much fun. It was a much needed vacation after a busy Spring and hectic move to Utah. It was so wonderful to see all of my family! I miss you guys already. I love my family. Vacations are a lot of work, but in the end they are so worth it. We had such a great time and built so many memories.
