Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 7

12-26-08 Rain, snow, or wind, it wasn't going to matter. We were going to the beach! It turned out to be a sunny day, but still a bit cool. I love the sound of the waves, so this was a relaxing morning even though we beach hopped.

These law abiding citizens are covering up the sign that said "Keep Out".

The previous pictures were taken at Gaviota Beach. We enjoyed the long dock that jutted into the water. It gave a great view of the coastline. There were many fishermen and women hoping for a bite.

Grandpa finally got into the family look for pictures. The kids knew they would wear him down.

Now we are at Refugio State Beach. This beach was sandy so the kids took to the very cold water. Marissa and Whitni made it to their waists, but they were freezing the rest of the day.

Sand wars are above.

This was where I wanted to make a sand castle with Rock. That didn't happen so the kids and Dale made their own version of a snow man, a sand man.

Yes it does have arms, eyes and a nose, all courtesy of the waves.

I know we took pictures of where we ate lunch in Santa Barbara. It was a dock that had many shops and restaurants on it. We ate at one - outside - that had birds everywhere. They were outside and inside the restaurant.

After our lunch we drove through Santa Barbara looking for their police department. My children have finally got on the Psych train. Dale and I have enjoyed it for a couple of years now. They would watch episode after episode in their condo, so it just seemed natural for them to go to where it takes place. The outside is apparently what is in the series but the children were disappointed the inside didn't look the same.

Dinner was late, only reservation we could get at the Hitching Post. Most of the things we have done have come from suggestions from Greg Neff, who went to school in Solvang. Both he and Sue recommended the Hitching Post for its great steaks.

Yes, the meal was delicious but the fun part was the waitress. She is kneeling between Dale and I. She truly enjoyed our family and Dale's brand of humor. She took no guff off of him and that was fun to see them sparring.

All have left now on this Saturday morning. Mom, Dad and Nick left at 6 am. The rest of the children left about 9:30 this morning. They will be driving to DeAndra's folks and spend the night. They get to see Rock one more time. Dale and I are waiting around Los Angeles and Anaheim until our plane leaves for Mexico at 1am. Our Christmas vacation in Solvang is at an end. I hope you enjoyed this daily update of our trip.

Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 6

December 25, 2008 Merry Christmas!

It doesn't matter where you are Santa will still find you. We had a fun morning.

Every year Dale gets the kids some kind of leatherman. They should have quite the collection by now. Marissa got really excited in her attempt to get out the sharp tools. Sometimes we must be more observant.

Marissa got a new Pictionary game. This is the first picture. We were sure this was going to be a long night. Got any guesses what Disney character this is showing? We all were stumped.

Twenty-three years ago Santa brought a brand new baby boy to our house. Actually Dr. James brought him to the world in the hospital. Enjoy all the pictures I tried to take of him, the boy cannot just smile in a picture!

We played some birthday games, courtesy of Santa. Mom is figuring out how she will get us to guess what is displayed on the game. And yes, Sherry, Mom is not always in her bathrobe.

Marissa got a little competitive throughout the night, or was it Dale. Either way they didn't always agree on whose point it should be.

Nick wanted a racecar cake. I couldn't find the checkered flags or the little girls waving them like he wanted. This had to be good enough.

Happy Birthday Nicholas!

Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 5

December 24, 2008 We started the day out with breakfast at a restaurant boasting to have the world's best ableskivers. Every vacation we go on I try to bring my ableskiver pan and we enjoy the mini pancakes. This year we did it easy and let someone else do the cooking.Dad loved the beams above our heads with sayings in Danish. He translated quite a few, reminding us it was in Danish and it has been awhile since he spoke a lot of Norwegian. I know it doesn't look great in the pictures, but my favorite part was this sausage that came with the ableskivers. It had a homemade honey mustard with it. It was wonderful and I want to go back tomorrow for more!

Whitni was in charge of our evening program. For her personal progress requirement she needed to present a family home evening. I don't know if it was the stress of being in charge or the room immediately raised a few degrees, but after just starting to talk Whitni paused and started taking off her pants. Yes, she did have shorts on underneath. She talked about faith, Mom and Dad did their gift on Christmas Eve along with a very beautiful story about Christ's birth, Dale read Luke 2 and the traditional new Christmas story was told by all the children.
Marissa was in charge of game and chose the water game. Name a category, then think of something in that category. When someone says your chosen thing they get the water. When mom said the right thing Whitni panicked. Mom got it on her robe, but she handled it with grace. After no one could name mom's Christmas song (It Came Upon a Midnight Clear) she just gave the cup to dad and told him it was his turn.

After the game the children created some interesting cookies for Santa. One of those is baby Jesus. I'm not sure which one either.Turns out it didn't matter because nothing quite looked the same after baking.

It was a great day. We have had a wonderful time being together and enjoying the season. It's become quite relaxing which we all enjoy. Merry Christmas to all!

Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 4

12-23-08 Because of weather and having DeAndra's brother it was decided the little one with his parents and uncle would leave earlier than usual with a rental van . Their Christmas, therefore, was a little rushed. It was fun watching a very sleep deprived Rock pulling it together to please the adults that watched to see his reactions. He performed well.

Dale and I took the grandson to Santa Maria for a farewell. It was great having them for the time we did. I appreciate them letting this grandma monopolize their little boy. I just never seem to tire of being around him. I wonder if that will hold true when he is a teenager?

They did call throughout the day updating us on their progress. Dale and I got back to Solvang and enjoyed a little shopping. We did a little stocking stuffer shopping. I would tell him what I wanted and he would buy what he wanted. It worked for all.

The evening was a relaxing one with Navajo Tacos, watching Elf, and watching mom and dad with their daily gift.

Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 3

December 22, 2008 This morning again started with sweet sounds of Rock. For an hour Aaron and I tried to get him happy. I took him into my bedroom and turned on the light. That was the switch for him. I guess in the dark (trying to be nice to KC asleep on the couch) he thought he had to go back to sleep. Once in the lighted bedroom this sweet angel couldn't have been more cute. Of course Grandma shared all his unwrapped Christmas presents with him.

One of my favorite things when I visit my mom and dad are the breakfasts my dad creates. I talked him into fixing breakfast for 12 people, a few more than the two he 's used to cooking for. He put on quite the feast with potatoes, eggs, bacon and toast. It was a good way to start our big hike to Nojoqui Falls.

We anxiously walked the 10 minutes they say it would take. I kind of wondered on the way up how much water would be falling in December. The stream heading from the falls barely had any water. When we got to the falls it looked like this:

We took the opportunity to get a group picture before heading down, which was a lot shorter.

Dale, Mom, Dad and I went to Santa Maria to get some final Christmas shopping finished. We weren't quite sure where the stores we wanted to go to were so I would put it into the GPS and it would say 55 miles away. We found the Walmart, but the GPS still said it was 50 miles to the south. Dale was trying to find a charger for my camera. I left mine at home but wanted something so I could take pictures in Mexico.

Walmart sent us to Best Buy down the street. Dale got into the car after striking out there and said they sent him to a camera shop down the road. Once we got there Dale was set to go into the store and couldn't find my camera.

We searched the pickup, purses, and pockets. No luck. No use going into the store, so we headed for the Costco we saw, the GPS people said Costco was 147 miles away. We bought another camera, Dale felt bad because he couldn't remember where he put the camera. ( I was secretly glad it was finally his fault and not mine)

Dad was sure we would find it so we decided to head to Best Buy just in case. As I got into the pickup on my seat was the camera. I had been sitting on it. So yes, once again, it is my fault.

Our evening went a little different than planned, but we are always certainly flexible. DeAndra's brother was supposed to fly home today from his mission. Because of all the flight problems his plane was not going to fly until after Christmas. Her dad called Aaron and they went to Los Angeles to pick him up. We got the honor of watching Rock for the evening. He was a great entertainer. Rock enjoyed the nightly reading of Sherry's book with the gift that goes with it while eating grandma's slipper.

Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 2

From yesterday- We tried on hats - semi Rob style. The girls were sports, Rock not so much.

12/21/08 I woke to a crying Rock. It's a good reminder to me that I have a cute boy here. DeAndra said that she was in the bathroom with him and the light went out. Rock didn't like that. With all the blinking clocks in the condo we deduced that the power went out. When dad came out of the bathroom and asked if there was any hot water we found it had disappeared. I immediately thought of a vacation Sherry had had. They blamed all the mishaps on her husband, Larry. Maybe we should start looking for him here. All got fixed. All are happy - at least I think they are. Dad brought out his mistletoe hat from Sherry. He explained the story behind it and mentioned it came with HOPE. Dad said that it probably was hope because with mistletoe people hope for a kiss. Mom complied with a smooch.
Church was our priority this morning. The only bench left was right in front. Haven't sat there in a long while. DeAndra has been teaching Rock how to wave. He was very excited that a lady up front waved to him. He excitedly waved back at her. He was amazed she kept waving at least the length of a hymn. Rock and I went in the foyer when it appeared he wanted to go back to sleep. As I sat I heard a young man singing a solo. I stood up with Rock and we stood where we could see and listened to this beautiful song. Rock layed his cheek on mine and sleep soon overcame him. I don't think life gets much better.

Rock has a tooth on top with a big sharp point. It has seemed at times to pain him. I don't like to see the big guy cry so I did the only thing a grandma could do. I grabbed something frozen. It was a chocolate covered mint oreo. Grandma did good!

Christmas Vacation 2008, Page 1

The long awaited trip has come! My hope is to daily log our journey. Since this is my journal if I do it daily we'll have a great scrapbook of the trip. Your choice is to continue reading or turn the channel. Dale, Whitni, Lindsea, KC and I struck out Friday morning EARLY at 5 to get me to Wenatchee to fly out. I had told Dale that I wanted to stay partway down in a hotel. Driving all night is too exhausting. He then got me a plane ticket to get me out of the way so he could drive all night. So I flew all day while they drove it. I got to the hotel, watched some TV, ordered some room service and enjoyed my night. At midnight I got to pick up the little guy. Dale says this is why he got me the plane ticket, so I could have more time with Rock. Right, he ordered it right after me asking not to drive all night. It was fun having the little guy with us. He entertained for a couple of hours and then we crashed.

Dale and the kids rolled up around 4 in the morning. By nine o'clock Dale, KC, and Aaron left to drive 6 or more hours to Las Vegas to watch BYU. I think they're nuts, but boys are interesting creatures. They met up with Nick who was just dropped off in the middle of Vegas by his grandparents. (BYU lost, Nick was way bummed, they decided to spend the night to sleep. Us women folk are happy to have a little breathing time before depressed, frustrated boys come) Yesterday was girl time. We found the condo, but couldn't check in so we took Rock to the park. He didn't have as much fun as we did - 6 hours sleep will do that to a young one. Whitni wanted a picture of her with a palm tree. This was the result.
Then we walked the streets of Solvang. It is a Dutch version of our Bavarian town of Leavenworth. There are a lot of the same shops, but we only visited a small portion. We picked Marissa up at the small Santa Maria airport, took a breath as we listened to all her tales of her trip. When we returned to Solvang we also had the addition of my mom and dad. We're almost all here. The rooms are good, we enjoyed the visiting, and love watching a little guy destroying, crawling, smiling, flirting and walking tentative steps. Till next time....

Next in line .... basketball

Whitni has unleashed the inner animal inside. She has become mad dog england. Unfortunately the officials are trying to keep her in line by blowing the whistle in her face. This has resulted in two games having to sing the goodbye song a little earlier than she may have wished.

She has determined to try and control this wildness that overcomes her so she can actually stay in a game and play and not have to sit on the sidelines yelling or actually screaming helpful hints to the lucky players with no fouls out there. Tonight she succeeded and ended the game with only three fouls and 6 points. She hustled and kept her cool. The wildness has been tamed.

Fun Times

During Whitni's senior year people have heard me say, "This is the last time I'll need to go to Oroville for a volleyball game," many other things to that same effect. One thing I'll miss, though, are the visits with the team. A lot of them I've had in school and it's fun to see them relax in our home during team dinners.

I spent a wonderfully relaxing weekend with two good friends. We laughed, sewed, laughed visited, laughed and ate. I was taught some new tricks in sewing, it was almost like getting twice as much done in the same time as one. It is fun to go somewhere other than home and quilt all weekend. I got a lot done, and had a great time while doing it.