Summer Trip to Nebraska

The kids and I flew to Nebraska last week to visit my parents. They were supposed to have puppies but it never ended up happening, however Grace is still free to fly for a couple more weeks so I decided to keep the trip planned. Caiden is a rockstar on the airplanes...you stick a movie on the iPad and he doesn't say a peep. Grace is still all over the place -standing on my lap, sitting on my lap, standing on the floor, standing on the armrest, sitting on the tray table, pushing the flight attendant button...she NEVER stops. We even got her some headphone but she lasted for about 4 minutes with them on her ears.

She loves to share the smell of her shoes with other people (because they are the brand that smell like cherries). She was making friends with this lady then just whipped off her shoe and shoved it in her face. Everyone was laughing so hard until I explained they really do smell sweet.

I think this was the ONLY time they were actually carrying their own backpacks

Grace even got her own seat on the very first flight. The remainder of the three flights she did not and was not happy about it.

My parents had some leftover fireworks and Caiden was having a blast. He loved lighting off the rockets that flew in the air and the parachutes that we had to run and grab. I equally was having fun...haven't been able to light fireworks off in years since we can't do it in Cali.

My Dad built the ultimate tree swing. Everyone, adults included, have so much fun. It can go really high since the ropes are so long. Grace was most obsessed with the swing. One step outside and she was begging someone to push her. She would also ask for the "puppies" all the time. They are pretty big and crazy so she just kind of giggles and prances around them.

We went to the zoo with Mickey and her twin 2-year olds on Tuesday. And it rained!

The kids had the most fun when we got stuck in the rain sitting under a small covered area and they could run back and forth to those chains on the other side. They did this nonstop for probably 20 minutes.

On Wednesday we went and visited Sally and Toni Ann at work. They took a break while we were there for a swim in the pool (since it was about 100 degrees out).

On Thursday Mickey and I flew to Chicago for a girls weekend. My parents watched the kids and it was a much needed time off for me. We stayed downtown and went shopping, ate at fabulous restaurants, went dancing and did a few touristy things. 

While we were gone my Mom sent me some pictures and videos. They took Caiden fishing where he caught a lot of little crappie.  The garden is also coming into full bloom so they were picking tomatoes and sweet corn the entire time.

On Sunday we all flew home. I was not as nearly prepared with activities and snacks as I was on the way out so it got a bit out of hand a few times. But we all made it home and Caiden even got to sit in the cockpit!

Grace napped for all of 30 minutes then cried for an hour before I pulled out my make-up bag and she proceeded to eat my lip glosses for another hour.

4th of July weekend!

We started the weekend off with a visit to the pool on Saturday. We are trying to get Caiden used to the water with his water wings off because he starts an intense 2-week, every single day, swim program in a couple weeks and when I say, "intense", it is nothing but. Apparently it's pretty brutal but this guy has like a 99% success rate with thousands of reviews.

So we put the water wings on Grace and did some work with Caiden in the pool. He loved hanging on to the noodle, though. So not sure if we really made any progress.

Sunday we went to our usual beach spot in Del Mar at 25th St. It's our ultimate favorite beach because, 1) It's so close to our house, 2) There's always parking if you get there in the morning, 3) It's not filled with tourists, and 4) It's a wide beach with all different types of sand.

On Monday we met our friends at the beach in Solana Beach where they are renting a house for a few weeks. It was a long walk up and down a set of stairs with all our stuff but so fun because we had such a good group of people there. Sara, Dustin and Theo even came for a bit so we decided to skip our usual 1pm departure to guarantee naps and stayed until 3:30. Everyone was having so much fun that I didn't even want to leave then.