The last day we had together as a family was Sunday morning for breakfast. We met with my cousin Jason & his wife Rosa, Matt, Cherise, and my parents at Denny’s. Todd and I had to be on the road that day to make it to Sacramento for the night. We stayed with my cousin Sarah again and I finally got a picture of her lovely remodeled kitchen. I am always sad to leave my family, but hope to see them soon.
… Redwood Forest coming up
I am not quite done with my vacation posts, but I wanted to share what our weather is doing up here. First off, our place does not have it bad (yet!) compared to other parts of the county. Most of the major roads are closed due to flooding. I drove by (at a higher level) several vehicles with the water line up to their hoods and a front door of a house only a couple inches away from water entering it. Pretty crazy!
We could flood since we are close to a river, but I hoping that does not happen. At 2:30 when I took these pictures, our deepest spot was about 8 inches, it’s been raining non-stop since. I heard about 15 years ago people were rowing around town, we should have taken that inflatable boat my parents offered us :)
Below is a stitched together picture of our new backyard pond! *Click to view larger.
Meet Lucy, Matt & Cherise’s new adopted Boxer pup! She is such a love bug. She has to be in your face, in your lap, or wherever she can get close enough to be pet, hugged or held (even though she is pretty big). Lucy has very expressive eyes and sometimes she almost looks human which makes her extremely cute!
The day after Christmas we wanted to go to Disneyland but it didn’t work out. Instead, the four of us drove to L.A. to see the Griffith Observatory. It had been closed for 6 years due to remodeling so it was neat to finally be able to visit it. From the observatory grounds you can see the Hollywood sign, downtown L.A. and the ocean. It was pretty cool, but packed with people.
For lunch we ate at a popular hot dog stand called Pinks. They are known for their specialty hot dogs. Celebrities are also known to go there but we did not see any this time. The average wait for one of these fancy dogs is about 45 min to an hour. It’s worth it for the experience but it’s pretty greasy. For dinner we ate at a Mediterranean place called Zankou Chicken in Pasadena. It was really good too!
… next up is Lucy, the newest addition to the family
The next couple of days before Christmas we had fun catching up with Mom & Dad and playing Wii games. One of the nights we drove around looking at lights and watched in amazement as three houses joined together for a musical light show. Christmas Eve we attended a beautiful candlelit service at my parents church that ended at midnight. On Christmas day we finally got to see my brother and his wife. We ate turkey dinner, opened presents, played Wii and other games before Todd & I headed to Matt & Cherise’s house to stay the night.
… more to come
Well, we are finally home after an almost two week vacation. We drove from Washington to California in our little, and I mean little, red Aveo rental car. The weather was not typical for California, it was a little cool and it rained until Christmas. It still was warmer than the snowy 16-20 degrees we left up here. Despite the weather conditions, it was a great trip and I miss everyone already.
Since I was warned no one may want to read a really long post I am breaking up the trip into a few posts, hope you don’t mind :)
On the Friday before Christmas we headed down to Shelton, WA to spend the evening with Todd’s family. We exchanged Christmas presents and chatted for a few hours. The next morning we headed to Sacramento. We planned to get there in 12 hours, but because of some ice & stopping to buy chains (which we never needed) we got there in 14 hours, not too bad, but we were tired. There we visited with my cousins Sarah & Nate and Sarah’s husband Andrew. We got to stay in their beautiful home that they recently remodeled. (I took more pictures on the trip back).
On Sunday we drove to San Francisco to see the sites. Todd had never been there so it was a treat for him to see the Golden Gate Bridge. It eventually started raining so we didn’t stay outside very long. We then drove down Lombard Street which is famous for its steep, tight turns. After spending the afternoon there we decided to head to my parents about 7 hours south of the city.
… to be continued
