VACATION!!!

For our family vacation this year, we had decided to go to California. It was a long drive, but well worth the trip! Just so you know, this may be a long post. Hopefully most of it will be photos.

To begin our trip, we stopped in Northern California to spend some time with Brian's brother and his family. We had so much fun! The boys were so funny! Tali LOVED spending time with her California family.

These are the only pictures we took while we stayed with them. Unfortunately, Tali's cousin Eli was in bed so we weren't able to get a picture with him. Thanks Mitch & Libby for letting us crash with you guys for a couple of days! You guys are the best!

Sunday we were going to go to the Muir Woods, but due to a frustrating incident with toll bridges and time, we decided to check out the Oakland temple instead. It was really cool. It turned out to be a nice Sunday activity. Brian and Tali (of course) had never been there before. Here are some of my favorite pictures from Oakland.

Monday, we went to the Discovery of Science Center. To be honest, it was cool, but not as cool as I thought it would be. I think maybe it would have been better if Tali were a little older to be able to get a little more involved. Brian and I did lay on a bed of nails though. That was pretty cool.

Oh yeah! Living on the edge!

Tuesday, we went to the USS Midway Ship which was totally awesome! In my opinion, it was TONS better than Alcatraz. We had a lot of fun exploring the ship as well as seeing the airplanes there. Brian told me that as we were leaving the USS Ronald Reagan was pulling up. The next day on the news we found out that people were being deployed on that ship. I wished I would have gotten a picture of it. Oh well. Here are my favorite photos from the USS Midway.

I told Brian it would be fun to take a picture just like this one with this statue in the background, but he didn't want to. I thought it was cute.

I married "Superman."

Wouldn't I make a really hot pilot? Hahaha!

Wednesday, we spent the day at the Sea Life in Legoland as well as at Legoland. We had such a blast! Tali and I really enjoyed seeing the sharks and the rays. Brian really enjoyed seeing the "Lego lady."

I've been replaced! Curse you Legos!

Tali even had a good time!

Oh how she LOVED Spongebob.

Brian was so funny. He was like a kid in a candy store....

He even put on a fadora hat on top of his floppy hat to get the whole effect.

My husband is such a goofball. I LOVE him!

Thursday, we went to the San Diego Zoo. That was pretty fun with the exception of the school kids running and pushing into us. We didn't get to see all of the zoo, but what we did see of it once the school kids left was pretty cool.

I even bonded with a one eyed turtle I named one eyed Willey, an orangutan that reminded me of Brian's dad, and we saw a gorilla named Maka, some lemurs, panda bears, a komodo dragon and huge snakes that I was more than thrilled they were behind glass as well as a yucky spider that was from Harry Potter 4. I actually thought it was fiction.

See. Pretty gross!

When we were heading back to the parking lot, we saw a huge flock of seagulls that were fighting over a Subway sack. It was very entertaining.

On our way back from the zoo, we decided to stop in at the San Diego temple.

It was gorgeous like always. My only beef about our vacation was that it was overcast practically the entire time and sprinkling, so we didn't get to even go to the beach. Oh well. At least we got to see some really cool temples.

On our way back home, we stopped in to see the St. George temple which none of us had ever seen before. That was really cool. It was very pretty and the grounds were just beautiful!

I absolutely LOVE this picture!

My lovely family vacation!

P.S. Thanks Ma for taking care of everything for us while we were gone!