Micah and I took the kids down to San Diego’s harbor to check out some huge world-renowned sand castle contest. Minus the UNBEARABLE heat, it was pretty amazing to see the artists at work. My kids attention span lasted about 6 minutes, but when we found a place they got to bui;d their own castles, they thought it was pretty cool. SOme of the instructors taught them some tricks of the trade, and they got to enter their castles into a contest.
I wouldn’t say it was the Saturday of my dreams, but Micah and I thought it was decently fun.
This morning was a real doosie. I told the kids to go in a brush their teeth, and the same whines I get every day took place. “MOM! The toothbrushes aren’t there!” (Between Navy and Dash, those things walk off regularly!) I told them to look until they find a toothbrush, and get brushing.
A few minutes later, Scout and Navy came running in and were going nuts over something that had just happened.
Scout said, “Mom, I finally found a toothbrush. But then I had to go potty. And in the middle of me going potty, I realized that the toothbrush was still in my hand, and I went potty all over it!” He had mixed emotions of surprise and laughter, and was pantomiming the whole thing to me.
In the meantime, Navy came out, and was cracking up over what had happened. And she basically retold the whole story with one extra detail.
She exclaimed, “MOM!!!! And it was YOUR toothbrush!”
Great.
But it doesn’t end there.
I told the kids to get right in there and get it for me.
But before they went anywhere, we all saw Dash come around the corner like a good boy…..brushing his teeth.
I ran and flicked it out of his mouth, as the other two were rolling on the ground in hysterics.
Nasty.
A real doosie.
While Tristen watched the kids, she took them out for a photo shoot. I was SO stoked when I came home because I love pictures, and she knows what she is doing more than I do. But mostly, I was grateful that she loves my kids and had a fun afternoon with them.
Here is a little sample of what I got:
Thank you to the woman behind the magic….
Bella.
Out of the blue one day, Tristen told Micah that she would watch our kids if he wanted to take me somewhere for my birthday. I think it took him less than 30 seconds to be on the internet searching for deals. But when I saw Jamaica on the possible to do list, I stopped him and told him I wanted to do something beyond lay out by the pool with a book. I wanted a little action. So within a few minutes, we were booking a fishing trip to East Cape — a little fishing town above Cabo that my Uncle Ray told us about.
We stayed at the Hotel Palmas De Cortez.
I’ll admit that when I saw pictures on the internet, I thought it was a resort. But in person, it was not quite what I thought it was cracked up to be. But nonetheless, it was really clean, had amazing AC, and had some really good fishing — enough pluses to make this girl happy!
(Speaking of girl, did I mention I was one of two girls at the whole place.)
And Micah was questioned over and over about how he talked his pregnant wife into a fishing trip for her birthday over anything else.
When he responded with it being my idea, every man there was blown away.
Remember — I thought I was going to a resort with good fishing!
On our first day, Micah scored the first bite and reeled in a 100lb. Marlin.
Not to be outdone — I reeled in the second fish all by myself!
Here is the beautiful 120lb. Marlin I scored!
I have had “catching a marlin” on my bucket list for years, so I was beyond stoked when I got to check that off my list!
Unfortunately for Micah, that was the biggest catch of the trip, and I remained the leader of the “biggest catch” the whole time!
(In his defense, he had a 250lb. Marlin on his line, but it got away the next day.)
Here is Micah’s 40lb. Durado.
(That is Mahi Mahi to us Americans.)
And Micah’s second 100lb. Marlin.
We caught and released the others, but let out captain and deckhand cut this guy up for their own taking.
Needless to say, they were pretty excited about that.
After fishing all day, we would head down to the pier and fish off the dock with some buddies we made. Micah probably thought this was the highlight of the trip. He was trying to lure in an elusive rooster fish for days. He never got it, but caught a lot of stuff in the meantime.
Like this puffer fish.
Apparently, this is the biggest puffer fish some locals had ever seen on the line.
And you should have seen his teeth.
Frighteningly sharp and big.
-
It was a happy birthday. We hit a bit of rainy weather, and didn’t land any Ahi Tuna (Yellowfin), but ended up having a blast! If I didn’t have a full bucket list with lots of other adventures, I might head back for a few days of fishing. And who knows — maybe we will at some point. But until then, East Cape brought about some pretty legit memories.
Navy and Scout were having fun in the pool. Part of that fun was doing a coin drop. That’s fine. But my rule is that they get every single coin out of the pool before they get out. That is easier said than done when there are about 150 pennies in the pool. Scout spent a bunch of time getting a bunch out, and I told him he could be finished and that lazy Navy would have to get the second half out.
And then our standoff began.
After whining and complaining, screaming and crying, and doing nothing on her end, I told her that she wouldn’t come in the house until every penny was out of the pool.
10 minutes.
30 minutes.
60 minutes.
2 hours.
And then she laid by the pool and fell fast asleep.
I reapplied sunscreen and let her sleep.
It looked like it was going to be a long day.
A really long day.
And then look what sweet little legs came to her rescue.
When she woke up to see that her brother was there to help, she dunked right in and got to work.
Scout is as sweet as they come when he sees someone in a bad spot.
And apparently, all my stubborn little girl needed (after three hours) was a little sidekick action.
Why she didn’t work alongside that sidekick in the first place, nobody will ever know.
Unfortunately, my younger self might have “known”.
Our final stop on our month-long road trip was our stop at Seth’s house. Of course my kids loved every second of nonstop play with cousins. They go ALL DAY LONG when they are at Seth’s house. The energy level is off the charts, but they have incredible sleeps there. Which allows them to go again the next day all over again!
The only hard part about Seth’s house is that Dash thinks he is one of the big kids and tries to keep up.
He was so sad when I made Christian bring him back down from up the hill on his scooter.
Something about him being 1/4 mile away on a scooter at the ripe old age of 21 months had me a little worried.
But we just found him a good dress-up and he was happy again.
These two little girls spent their days collecting.
(You know — Navy’s ultimate past time.)
Too bad, bugs were at the peak of their season, and were collected day after day.
Worse than that - - too bad Scout thought it would be so funny to show off his roly poly eating skills.
But that was nothing compared to the night we found this HUGE beetle flopping around.
All of the kids were running from it, and/or kicking it towards the other kids who screamed with real terror.
After the night of fooling with it, it laid dead on the ground.
And then Seth got bargaining.
Whomever would eat it would get $100 from Nonnie.
Knowing that NOBODY would eat it, she was happy to oblige.
But then Grant grabbed it, and was ready to bite off the head when Seth stopped it and told him he wasn’t allowed to do it.
The fact that he might have is insane!
INSANE!
But then my smart little cookie (Scout) started mouthing off that he was going to eat it.
I told him it WAS allowed with me for $100!
(I don’t think he would have ever done it.)
Then my mom, knowing he eats roly polies, stopped him and said she would give him $20 if he didn’t eat it.
DONE!
And now my boy sits $20 richer.
Nice work Scout!
Our final stop on our road trip was Aspen Grove for a little Family Camp action. We met up with Ashley and Nathan’s families and the kids had a really good time. There was constant action between the pool, the numerous parks, the mini golf, the racquetball, the ice cream shop, the huge grass area, and of course — the constant activities they provided. Our favorites were Family Game night that was full of competitions, Pioneer Night that was full of pioneer games and activities, and the night all of the kids performed for us.
Here is the crew of cousins (minus Samuel who was who knows where!).
Clearly, we are a little boy heavy.
We can’t forget Ka — the greatest traveler in the world.
Her only flaw is the amount of time it takes her to get ready.
I easily had my three kids and myself ready before she got her makeup on.
(But maybe the proof is in the pudding.)
This is the other world-class traveler.
The cutest boy on earth never did anything but go along happily.
Game night had my little competitor in Heaven.
This one loved the water game that had her sopping within seconds.
But about a million pumps on the swing dried her up pretty quickly.
And then it was off to create her own rocket that the counselors would launch.
It was really cool, and the kids must have made three rockets each, and were entertained for at least an hour.
Pioneer night let Scout try to break a balloon with a whip.
I tried and was amazed at how hard it was.
But Scout eventually got his balloon to break!
This was Dash’s spot during the pioneer games.
But he eventually broke off to make his way to compete with his siblings in the duck races.
This is Scout after “pirate day” with his group.
Here is Navy on a favorite feature — the extra long slide through the quaking aspens.
Here is the boy that hung with me most of the time because he wasn’t into his group.
Too bad they wouldn’t have allowed him to go with Scout’s group because he would have loved it!
Nonnie got the kids in on a good game of badminton.
Our final night was when we watched all of the kids perform. Navy and Scout did a cute job. Afterward, they had a slide show that featured pictures of everyone throughout the week.
And then there was the family dance party.
It was really well done, and a great way to end Family Camp.
We spent a day in Midway with Brit and the kids, and had a blast.
Of course.
Midway is already heaven, but Midway in the summer is almost unbeatable.
Scout, Navy, Dash, RoRo, Grey, Charlie and Tommy spent a few hours running through the sprinklers and having running races down the grass.
They ran through them this way, that way, jumping, holding hands, backwards, etc.
Even this little weasel was making his rounds.
We took out a bunch of cut up watermelon, and Dashy went to town.
Clearly!
These kids get together and have so much fun.
But as much fun as they were having, I think I had more fun watching them live their childhood carefree and happily.
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