I have a bunch of pictures so I'll get right down to business. We went to California last month. We were planning on going to visit Jacob's grandparents right before school started again since early this spring, but sadly his grandfather passed away the weekend before we were going to leave. So we ended up leaving a few days early to make it down there in time for the funeral. It was a wonderful service, and it was good to spend time with family. I'll explain a little more as we go. So, without further ado, here are some pictures:
Jacob was happy to be out of the car and in our hotel room. (if you look in the mirror in the bottom left, you can kind of tell he was dancing...)
These were some beautiful flowers we kept in our room for the funeral the next morning.
After the funeral, most of the cousins went to the park down the street.
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We didn't see any mountain lions, but there was a miniature zoo in the park that we did go explore.
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Jacob and Adrian were cute.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTuIUOXG6HWEFlDK5pwelQbLfhH9yYTnPJeZc8iYTuZ2S9T2kxdfOWWKG_ymFqJmKgRGXzF91sZMJ9mAzeBHAQxu1gcaZH6c9tPZIkbpNwtjLZBXZQ2aoSdpKCpqevh7lR9vXI6iecsKg/s400/DSC_0630.JPG)
Jacob, Brian, and Adam played frisbee and then...
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Everyone played duck-duck-goose!
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Adrian's shoes were not cooperating when it was time to leave, so Jacob helped.
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This was at Herschel's burial. We almost didn't get to go to the grave site because it was considered a 'construction zone', but they eventually arranged things so we could go. Jacob also had the opportunity to dedicate the grave, which was really great.
Here is a common contrast in our lives:
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My frozen yogurt
vs.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-5bwWpKQSEbX6HLAwwpgK5TzeOybkbnTe6rOfViBG2ly0ETTUJjQvLcwrpQY2YHdXQ0EFqJ2FfSODuqJ-mTCoTe1bK5aD47nwCqCNASOtYyrsrhyLrhfsfhWIQ-I10HZYqrP174bqpes/s400/DSC_0683.JPG)
Jacob's frozen yogurt.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEik_V8AnRb4QqKvkET8mmSTj8tRk6y4XHLgL43qELz0wApd2SBZKne2PmU0kw0yLp_6lopf9ZmEn1MQzcUDvJVEl9nvetaels4NOOvAM81yvzxfrgNDS2GSu34K-utuktqrBwBtNRygFyA/s400/DSC_0685.JPG)
Hooray! I love Penzeys. I also love my husband for taking me clear out there and not complaining no matter how long we spent there :)
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My monkey in an awesome tree just outside Penzeys.
We went to the beach with Brian and Katie![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHROSO7_SUWER0mSIbUxPWkTPR_egPAEEGpDZP5hQCrApI1xWAYHiZJXumSex2Sx1qAVxFYO8NQBMv64G-yIr3V1PkKTd5ruB07-2gQJCpoi4u_HuXND33Krdiq9Hskaag6ezvU_0E72I/s400/DSC_0659.JPG)
Who were very cute.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEZv8XbctWA5pw2Ssr3Ak460iSmNWwMoIKDCm9Hc3edzOubR-8_R57wXZz1Xw7UtNwk351caUKoDfVGyOkEoCGmQMESBDgx9RpWn1JGhqRlDImeMBAsJ_2AcGLH9UfFFsfOagNFJ3ZbsU/s400/DSC_0639.JPG)
We found this flower on the way to the beach from our car that we had to park 3 miles away. I couldn't believe it wasn't plastic.
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Jacob built a sand castle.
...and threw Finding Nemo fruit snacks at the seagulls.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjphEi_sanoWQbuYZupgejp1kgVCaE2IkikmhjOcYk0UXj5hD5tNz3PydTzRU7KUrG4WNo1pEzdXXR4zdUe3FRZZL9Pc4MFC0hr51HR-jz0echWwjtp3dB-wSaM1jncysU4bndC3bGWgkg/s400/DSC_0669.JPG)
...and took pictures of me.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLLMZhzWnHY-Ig6oHyofUd6Xy0bDblBmJMjrvdO7g-Xcs3kiI9nxW_UtbigCms_UXUSzPCGyfLHGg0LB-4TBHsQap5Y3Mhh1hOyzkaJwZqUdv3NuIUwp3Zf73wXhHCRXBtsijXz17efBc/s400/DSC_0675.JPG)
Brian taught us how to catch sand crabs which was awesome. If you look closely, they're the little white bug-like things in Jacob's hand.
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Jacob picked me this flower, and since it was too huge to put in my hair, we ended up using it as an "air freshener" in the car.
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Hollywood Walk of Fame.
It couldn't keep our interest for too terribly long, but it was cool.
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I mostly took this picture for Ethan.
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I mostly took this picture because... um, what the heck?
If you can't read it, I highly recommend enlarging it so you can.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy7bU9r61r2EfXPMrsa_7edNxYq6FLNziyuQTudnH2ex40B2PuG0j3wd8hXdPZRL-juHanQa7L8ICzT0J5H8cfEZEpwU4FnafkDdslwDLDypP8jG1KejoCJeDpuYcwy00d44IP-0xRqZk/s400/DSC_0725.JPG)
We went to the farmers market and The Grove outdoor shopping center across the street. Both were right up my alley.
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This was right outside a toy store at the farmers market.
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We went to the Santa Monica Pier and ate at Bubba Gumps. De-licous. Jacob even stopped eating his sandwich halfway through dinner (which means I had just started eating...) to save some of his food till I caught up, because it was the "best chicken sandwich" he'd ever eaten :)
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While we waited for it to be dinner time, we had a guy on the pier draw our caricature which was funny. We played skee-ball at the arcade, watched a swimsuit model get a bunch of shots taken in the freezing water (funnier than you'd expect), dodged seagulls, and had a great time.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbnQz_dyHr32LZ6PdHl1GjxuOcSr6x5A_HJPliDVIX-9MJrAZGIxtoeHzGn9LqxjgtQbnG8DN3SFwTaPV-Ydoa-0vmzefEXxtdpwZSNNBlCAucAV6oBlyIZjUxufCRyWIrpNLnfUrcd_A/s400/DSC_0737.JPG)
A big seagull swooped down and snatched the churro right out of this lady's hand about a minute after we took this picture. She was pretty freaked out, and it was hilarious :)
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Jacob had the camera on the day we went to the zoo. This is me in line.
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This is me being happy because I have a huge bag of kettle corn :)
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Pretty.
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The giraffes were hungry.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidDyuYQXLL02JtJPWpeB2FbtdZzkA_-P7If2RUKd9ZEnHUsJIn9KIQxLW4qf9c-bMpS-0z58bded34C7ww0m46iznPdS0TPGC3jmcA0IMfXMdKUZD8AP9d9tcXowBbchker10S-TmuZCk/s400/DSC_0831.JPG)
...and a little desperate.
This one was the baby, and was very cute.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih0ex4fpl9yQY3irviqU_CVBjsAgRvk1gxuHZssdDEHXeSgEtzuFrG_JlzFx6kFB5Fvm4S9SX2S-oOLfd99uYQMxwNKbMIInsA5g9jqyesq73wwI0KBBYtsKeiEmdAM5bVv5MSqJQ4tsw/s400/DSC_0804.JPG)
The gorillas were cool too. Jacob took some good pictures, no? yes.
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I've always loved flamingos. Just not in my lawn.
Our last day in California, we didn't feel like doing much.![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijPmziSI3tS8uuKHQmRlfNqu6wLtDePgsmvNU5GhilQ7sZwICg1rA4LiFhqaS8i-CzwCJ53afpVysfvoHVntloajwJYVKxJU3ei7hRtmBrRk_wg9vhxCjGBv3bDJ5S67Blht-4qGBVaaQ/s400/DSC_0627.JPG)
We went to the park down the street again and jacob hiked around a bit while I read in the shade for a while. It was very nice.
Then we hung out at Jacob's grandma's for the rest of the day.
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These lizards were all over the place!
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Tangelos waiting to ripen.
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There are no words to describe how happy this tree made me.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidR0c8qR-4Gl3nrcBBufaxACth3s1__G_SzpZsl7UqUyNMWdmgMQlKjI9hSmNceLxZX-dyyNIW4Kn3qVXbhFja7xVtf8gIXDg0I5LdjolLgKCUqNq6Y_-O4CHoRacUzu-vDEzudYwGEFE/s400/DSC_0960.JPG)
Her backyard. We swam a couple of times, which was fun. We laughed a lot. I think swimming makes us giggly.
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Jacob picked some of the harder to reach Tangelos.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnNUpm-LIxf3Wpwpn2xx9lN_rOhBIWLJz5qFF8Tf78OqS51oV1WcfHNjIdXc9cjRp1Rx8_cy2izjBjMmSQfM2tgs1MhOy27CYcSlvtf2A1a4hms_PM1Hvnse0D0FUbezo_vKtHhnS1KK4/s400/DSC_0968.JPG)
Walking back from the tree along the wall.
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Mission accomplished.
On our way back to Utah, we stopped in Vegas for a couple of days. We decided to do this because Green Day (Jacob's favorite) was playing there. Actually, they were playing in Salt Lake the day we left, and in California while we were there, but it would have been a long drive and we'd have gotten back at like, 3 in the morning, so we decided Vegas was our best bet. Besides, neither of us had actually stayed there before. So, turns out I'm not the biggest fan ever of Las Vegas... at least the Strip part. Maybe it was sensory overload, and maybe I was just really homesick, but I couldn't really see the appeal... Don't get me wrong, there's some really cool stuff there. For example, we did go visit the Coca-Cola store and M&M World, both of which were fascinating. We had some cheap all you can eat pizza which was delicious, and spent a good hour and a half driving down 6 blocks of the strip admiring the lights (and the traffic). I can say that the Green Day concert was the most awesome concert I've ever been to though. We both enjoyed it immensly :) We had a great time in Vegas, even though we cut it a little shorter than planned, and we didn't get to visit with family there like we wanted. Another nice part was that driving home from Vegas seemed like nothing compared to driving straight from Utah to California :)
Hope your summer was as awesome as ours was!
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Saturday, September 12, 2009
at
at
2:10 PM