Vacation to Utah and California

Haaaaa! What a wonderful vacation we just had. Each day was packed with awesomeness from morning till evening. I wasn't asking for so much but seriously couldn't have gotten more out of this week and a half. Of course I had to take hundreds of pictures (381 to be exact) so bear with me as I try to filter out the highlights.

We left on Wednesday early EARLY morning of June 6th. I should add that the night before we left we were having dinner with friends in Smiley Court (another Family Housing complex) and William fell backward from a picnic table and opened his head on the concrete (I'll spare the gory pictures but there will be some scab pictures later). If he hadn't been so carefree about the blood gushing from his head, we may have delayed our leave, but he was so chill about it! I had to keep reminding myself to chill and not show how freaked out I was because he obviously had no idea his brains were sticking out of his head! Anyway he was fine, so we left Colorado and arrived in Salt Lake City around 1pm the same day. 

My brother Francois has been living in Salt Lake with his family for the last 4 years while getting his PhD in Operations Management (I think) at the University of Utah. They let us stay with them for a few days and enjoy the pool and their company before making the long haul to California. It was so nice to hang out with them and see Josh and William interact with their cousins. Since they live close to my older brother Christophe they often have cousin sleepovers so my nephew Pierre was there too, but Alysee (Francois' oldest) was in Costa Rica for a school trip.

Josh was a little scared of the pool at first but ended up going and having fun. William only put his feet in. The cousins obviously had a blast!

Josh, William and Mailys got along very well. They were so happy to have so much space to run around and do gymnastic tricks while Francois and Russell enjoyed geeking out : )

Nothing beats family time.

And on Friday early afternoon, we were back on the road, bracing ourselves for a 12 hour drive. It really wasn't that bad (says the girl who drove 3hrs and slept the rest of it), but we went through a lot of snacks, movies on the iPods and can thank our good kids. We arrived at Jeff's beach house in the middle of the night and quickly went to bed. Jeff is a very good friend of Russell's family and we think of him as a Dad. One might describe him as extremely fun (and it's true) but he is way more than that. He is one of the most Christlike people I know. He is sincere, loving and accepting and he is extremely generous. And we can totally attribute the awesomeness of our stay in California to his generosity letting us stay at his house and treating us like family.

Of course we didn't miss a minute and as soon as we could we headed for the beach. Jeff's daughter Rachael and her family were at the beach house too, as well as Gramma and Uncle Cody. It was so nice to see them all after such a long time (the last time we'd seen Rachael was about 2 1/2 years ago). Lexi (Rachael and Derek's daughter) is the cutest 4 year-old ever. She wasn't phased at all by Joshua's initial coldness and managed to wrap him around her finger in no time! 

Russell, Cody and Jeff boogie boarding:

3rd generation of friends:

Smashball with Derek:

Cuddles and naps on the beach:

Our future frisbee pro:

The camp:

An impromptu frisbee session across the street. How I wish I had a recording of Jeff's "ooops! HaHaHa" every time the frisbee hit the house/a car/a tree.

A tennis introduction class for the kids:

Capturing and observing sand crabs. Daddy taught the boys to make sure the crabs went back home to the sand when they were done:

Jeff's treat: a pair of Rainbow flip flops for each of us. They're made in San Clemente and are super comfortable and unbreakable. Josh wears his every day.

Another of Jeff's treats: My very first pedicure! I'm glad Lexi was there to show me how it's done!

and of course we hung out at the house and had some nice discussions

On Monday everyone left (Cody and Gramma had gone a day before), but we stayed an extra day and enjoyed another afternoon at the beach (baby beach this time) and another dinner of "Pedro's" delicious burritos.

Wednesday we decided to visit Los Angeles and the temples nearby. The first temple on the way was Newport Beach. It's a fairly recent temple (2005) with a nice modern design and unusual seashell color located just around the corner from the University of California, Irvine. Russell and I both agreed that we'd love to live there.

Next was the Los Angeles temple. This one is quite old, but the gardens were beautiful and we loved the visitors' center.

Just as we were leaving the Visitor Center, William slammed into the front glass door (so clean that it was hard to see) running full speed and almost knocked himself out! It was just a culmination of all the "accidents" he'd had that week so I decided to document them with pictures. Poor kid!

After the temple, we visited the walk of fame (nothing special if you ask me) and Hollywood hill. It was too hot to climb all the way but we still got a pretty nice view of the city.

We then headed for Bakersfield where Russell's aunt and some of his cousins live. Aunt Carol was so nice to let us stay at her place. The house was so nicely decorated and maintained, I'm sure aunt Carol could earn her living being a professional decorator. We visited Russell's cousins Becca and Emily the next day and got to hang out and play with more cousins! The kids were in awe at how many awesome cousins they had.

Reading stories with Aunt Carol and eating pizza at Becca's:

Chilling in the pool at Emily's:

We were very happy to spend some time with cousins we rarely see but with whom we feel we have much in common. We joked about how Russell is more and more like Uncle John and Cody like his Dad. We hope we'll have more chances to hang out in the future.

We left on Friday early morning for Salt Lake and arrived there around 6pm. There was an outdoor movie night near Francois' so we all decided to go. I don't think anyone really got the movie (Napoleon Dynamite) but the night will definitely be remembered as the night Mailys threw up on her Mom!

The next morning we took Alysee (now back from Costa Rica), Romain and Laurine to the LDS temple in Salt Lake with us and visited the grounds and the conference center while the cousins were doing baptisms. It was really nice to be there as a family and show Joshua the place where church leaders speak at conference. There's a special feeling around this place that even the kids could sense.

and later that day Christophe and his family joined us for a picnic (originally planned for the park, but due to Mailys's sickness, we did it in the backyard of the condo). More cousin time for our happy kids. No wonder they keep asking to go back.

We finished the day at a festival near Francois' where Josh got to go down a zip line for the first time and played in a bouncy caterpillar obstacle course and a trampoline while the rest of the group played mini golf. Romain climbed all the way to the top of a climbing wall and Russell impressed everyone (including himself) with his fast ball at the pitching station. Could we have fit anymore in this 1 1/2 week? I think not!

Special thanks to Lexi for introducing us to the summer 2012 #1 hit "The gummy bear song":