We have had a busy month and I have been neglecting our blog. So here is some catch up....
We got buried in snow and I tried to take Joshua out, but he hated it. These pictures are pretty representative of the snow experience. Maybe next year it will be better.
Caleb wanted a break from the winter so we went to my families for his two week Christmas vacation for some sun. We had two feet of snow when we left Vermont so we were really looking forward to the warmth of California. We were scheduled to leave on Sunday December 21st so we had our own Christmas eve and Morning on Saturday the 20th. We have a tradition of making a big Christmas dinner on Christmas eve, opening one present, reading the Christmas story, and making cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning. We did all that on Friday and then Saturday morning opened all our presents and had Christmas breakfast. Joshua caught on to the present opening pretty quick.
He loved his presents especially his cars. After opening presents he spent most the day laying in this big box and drive his cars around on the bumpy card board. He was very excited about it.
Saturday afternoon we packed and got ready for our Sunday flight. It had been snowing a ton, and more snow was coming, but we were trying to be optimistic. Sunday morning we get up for Church and learned that everything but Sacrament was canceled because of bad weather. By the time we got home from church and checked on our flight it had been canceled too! We desperately tried calling Continental to get on any flights anywhere before Christmas. Everything was completely full until the 26th! So we kept trying and finally got a confirmed flight out of Manchester New Hampshire through Newark Tuesday the 23rd arriving at LAX at midnight! The next best option was to fly from Boston to Las Vegas on the 24th and then just drive from there! So we took the Manchester flight but were mad that we would end up loosing 3 days of our trip and have to pay for parking or a rental car in Manchester. Caleb checked on some flights from Burlington to Newark on Monday. There was a 7 am flight that might have stand by room so we decided to try to get on that flight or any flight to Newark. Then we could try get stand by on any flight earlier than our confirmed flight, but if we could not at least we knew we would be leaving Newark on Tuesday at the latest. So we got up early and miracoulously made it on stand by on our flight to Newark. When we got to Newark we got on the standby list. We were about twentieth! Although there were 7 direct flights out of Newark to LAX that day so we were very optimistic. We went and waited by the first flight, which was overbooked by five passengers and had stranded crew trying to get on. After them they would call standby passengers, they only let one on that flight. All day from eight in the morning we went from flight to flight trying to get on. It was nuts by the end of the day the stand by list was close to a hundred people. We were tired and frustrated from a day at the airport and dealing with a lot of rude unhelpful people. When finally we got on the fifth flight of the day at 5 pm. When they called our name to board the plane I started clapping with excitement and almost started to cry. It was one of the longest, most tiring awful days of my life, but it was worth getting out to California a day earlier.
This is how we killed the time at the airport inbetween waiting at gates for our name to be called. Joshua was actually a great sport all day and had a blast playing with his cars. But even he had started to melt down by the time we finally got on a plane. I think Heavenly Father knew we had all reached our limit and blessed us.
My parents started a tradition a couple years back of bringing a Christmas tree and dinner to Gam (my 90 year old grandma) in Thousand Oaks. It is one of my favorite things to do so they planned to do on Tuesday so we could come and help. I was so glad we made our earlier flight an were able to make it. She has this great house and property in the hills that I just loved coming to as a kid. So I was excited to have Joshua be able to play there with his cousins. They planted "trees" (old dead branches), fed the fish, and looked for coyote, bob cat tracks, lizards and snakes. We also decorated Gams Christmas tree for her. Joshua had so much fun and I loved seeing Gam and my Uncle Ron.
After Gam's we went to Chuck y Cheeses for Braddock's second birthday.
Then Christmas eve came and we did all the traditional Christmas eve things with my Parents and Elizabeth and Scott. We had dinner, acted out the nativity, made treats and ginger bread houses, and played games. It was really fun.
In my family since my brothers all started getting married and having their own kids we always have our own individual Christmas mornings, especially since most everyone has always lived within an hour of eachother. Honestly the only way Caleb is able to talk me out of not being home on Christmas morning is because he has a limited break. So to try to fly out right after Christmas from across the country would just not be reasonable or give us enough time to make the long flight worth it. So I am looking forward to when we are with in driving distance of family so we can have our own Christmas morning and then meet up with everyone else. Anyway we had a wonderful Christmas morning we each had a few presents to open, which is fine with me because to me Christmas is more about being together as a family and of course the food. Joshua helped make the cinamon rolls for breakfast. Then Elizabeth and Scott came over for a huge Christmas Breakfast.
In the afternoon we went down to Travis and Susan's and met up with the whole family for Christmas dinner and present exchange.
Joshua loves spending times with his cousins and wrestling with them.
Here are the three little babies, who love playing together. They are really starting to interact with eachother and are quickly becoming best buds. Joshua is the youngest of the 3 by 6 months, but tries hard to keep up.
And the babies with their daddies and then with their mommies.
Here is Gam and some of her great grandchildren.
A couple days after Christmas we took a beautiful hike along the Santa Barbara coastal range. It was awsome to hike up and get a panaramic view of the ocean, and burn off some of the calories from Christmas.
One day we went down to the Santa Barbara zoo. Joshua loved seeing all the animals especially the monkeys.
Although the thrill of the day was getting to ride the choo choo train around the zoo. He was very still the whole time and kept pointing saying choo choo.
On New Years day we had a picnic on the beach. It happened to be the only foggy day of the trip but was still really fun. We played football on the sand, dug for sand crabs, and took a long walk along the water. Nothing feels better than your bare feet in the sand. Grandma was teaching Joshua how to find sand crabs and burry his feet.
So that is about it. We have had a wonderful Christmas and trip. Caleb went home yesterday, Joshua and I both cried. We go home in two weeks to see daddy. He is going to be very busy while we are gone, but we will really miss having him here with us.
